Vegas Getaway

Last Friday I finished my last week of classes. In the next week I was facing due dates for 2 exams, 3 assignments, and one presentation. So what does my lovely wife suggest? Let's go to Vegas! Lindsey had planned a surprise overnight visit to Vegas last Friday to celebrate my birthday.
One of the great things about living in this area is that there are numerous places to visit within 5 hours of here (Vegas being one of them). We headed out around 10am surviving the Friday traffic on the way out of the city. We stopped in Baker at the famous Mad Greek's restaurant for a Gyro. They claim it is the best in North America, but its got nothing on Sammy Souvlakis. In Vegas, Lindsey reserved a room at Treasure Island right on The Strip. It was a small, but a really nice room with a pillow top bed. We had a nice view of the pool where they do the Pirate Show each night.
Next in her bag of tricks, Lindsey made a dinner reservation at a very high end sushi restaurant in Treasure Island. Then came the surprise, I made the reservation, but you will have to pay for dinner because I spent all my money on the hotel and our later plans (actually it was really money stolen from our house budget). The dinner was excellent. We decided to go with the house special where the chef chooses a series of plates based on our tastes. We ate on a patio overlooking that pirate show pool. The table had a very zen-like style completing the mood. Overall, a great experience!
After dinner, Lindsey treated me to a Vegas show. Obviously thinking about me, she got us tickets to Monty Python's Spam-a-lot. While the show quasi-follows the plot of The Holy Grail, it does change it up to make some fun of Broadway and Vegas. The best new addition was making Lancelot a closet homosexual and having him come out in a big disco number. Arthur was well played by Sienfield's J.Peterman. The show is a quick and entertaining 1:40 minutes.
After the show, we headed out to do a little gambling at my favourite hole on the strip, Casino Royale. Casino Royale features the awesome 100x odds on their craps tables. People who pay attention to odds when gambling will know this is about as fair as casinos get. I still lost $75 in 2 hours with a pretty unlucky table. Oh well, you know what they say "unlucky at gambling, lucky at love".
By this point, I was exhausted and Lindsey's feet were killing her (note to future Vegas visitors - were comfortable footwear). We went back to our room and listened to the explosions of the pirate show. The next day we headed back - tired - so I could finish up my projects and start studying.
Thanks to Lindsey for the special trip and her parents for the present of a little gambling money.

UPDATE: June 18, 2007 - I figured I would give a bit more analysis of Spam-a-lot from the perspective of a Monty Python nerd. Now, as a preface, I am not the type of person who can quote endless quotes from the Python movies, but I have watched Life of Brian and The Holy Grail multiple times. After seeing the show, a couple thoughts come to mind.

First, they seem to forget what puts particular sketches to over the top hilarity. For example, they use the "Knights of the Round Table" sketch which is awesome and the dance number is great, but they forget the line that makes the scene "fall off your chair funny" - "let's not go to camelot, it is a silly place". Bloody hillarious. A second example, is that they bring into the Grail "Always look on the bright side of life" - the legendary ending of Life of Brian. While it is funny to see it when Arthur has lost his knights in a forest, but it really forgets that its comedic sharpness was achieved by singing "Always look on the bright side of life" when Brian is being crucified.

Lastly, while they include a number of the best sketches, the play does not include some of my favorite sketches such as the "burining witches" and the "Virgin Castle" sketches. It also includes only a half-assed version of "The Knights who say 'Ni'".