Tuesday July 10th

The day actually started out pretty early. I woke up around 8:00, and we took our leisurely time getting ready. Around 9:30 we walked out the door and took a cab over to Mandalay Bay. This morning we were going to be trying out Verandah at the Four Seasons.

Overhead shot going down to Verandah.

And there you go.

Menu page one.

2nd half of page one.

Page two.

Over priced coffee.

Coffee cup.

OJ and tomato juice.

Her omlette.

My selection.

With berries.

Outdoor seating.

Towards my left.

Behind me.

These birds were everywhere.

For my breakfast of champions I decided to try out the Continental Breakfast. It came with some fresh fruit, a granola parfait, and some assorted pastries. Ang went with the Jumpstart, aka a cholesterol free omelette with a side of fresh berries.

The food was good, and it was a nice way to start out the day. It wasn't scorching outside at this early hour, so we took our time finishing our coffee and enjoying the scenery around us. The service was excellent and no complaints to speak of. I want to say before tip breakfast was around the $60 mark. We paid in short order and soon made our way through the casino and towards Luxor.

We made a stop at the candy store "Lick" just past the Art of Shaving. We picked up a few candy selections for our monsters at home and continued into Luxor. The plan was to check out the Titanic exhibit once again. Of course by the ticket counter, they had an area setup to basically try to snag you into a time share presentation. We mentioned we wanted to see the Titanic exhibit, and of course they said they could offer up something better. I think the thing came out to tickets for each of us to two different shows, a $50 resort credit all for $26 total. All we had to do was be shuttled to some off site property (in their air conditioned van!) and listen to their spiel about how we could "own a piece of Vegas."

It wasn't a bad deal if you had an extra three hours to kill on your vacation. They had nearly half of the MGM/Mirage corporation shows up for selection. But, we really didn't want to kill half our day, so we opted to pay the $33 each for our passes into the Titanic exhibit.

The kids will love 'em.

No thanks...

Is it just me, or do the nipple tassles remind anyone else of disease?

Howdy!

As we're entering the exhibit, we're reminded that no pictures, no food, gum, or drinks are allowed, yada yada yada. Well, I didn't think this would really be a Omaha-Rounders trip report if I didn't have SOMETHING to show for the Titanic exhibit. It was much like I remember it from years before, but they did re-arrange some things and actually added a few new displays.

The most interesting was "The Big Piece" and I've included a link about it here.

Yeah, I can't read it either.

The original champagne is still in that bottle.

These types of quotes were all over the exhibit.

A mock up of the deck.

With the stars in the background.

First class candy dish.

I died.

For those that don't know, when you walk in, you're handed a boarding pass with the bio of a passenger on the Titanic. In the end, you look up on a wall and find "your" name and see if you survived or perished on the ship. I didn't make it, but seems my wife did.

It's neat to see how lavish the Titanic was for its time. Only first class passengers had running water in their cabins. The price of a first class ticket was $4,500 then, or the equivalent to just over $100,000 today. But, hey...for that price, food was included. But I guess you had to pay extra to use the squash court. Kinda like Vegas, eh?

Towards the end of the exhibit, I inadvertently had the flash on my camera go off when taking a picture of the candy dish above. I thought I had the flash setting disabled still but apparently in my haste, neglected to check. "Oh shit" ran through my mind, but since no one was near, I figured I'd be in the clear. I wander up to a display showing about fifty dishes lined up in sand and then noticed someone walking behind me. I turned the camera off and folded it in my hand while nonchalantly pretending I wasn't breaking any rules. An employee in a vest came to me and said "you need to turn that off." To which I replied innocently "Oh sorry, it is. See?" That seemed to do the trick, but damn...where did that dude come from? I think he was hiding in some corner, or repelled down from the ceiling ninja style. Whoops.

In short order, I was done with the exhibit, but the wife was still taking her time reading every single display and processing it word for word. This was my opportunity to grab a quick drink (okay, two drinks) downstairs at the Luxor bar nearest to the check-in desk. $17 later, I had a vodka shot and a captain and diet.

I wander over towards a pai gow table and buy in for my first gambling session this trip. There were to locals on my left and a kid in his early 20's on my right. The kid on the right was Travis (from Texas), and he proceeded to tell me how he lost $600 at the same table the day before waiting to get checked into his room. As we're playing, I'm slowly losing, but the waitress is at least coming around at a decent pace. Travis orders us a round of shots (southern comfort mixed with something else - lime?) in addition to my normal captain and diet. The waitress comes by and tells us she can't serve us two drinks at once, so in short order we kick back the shots and gladly take our regular drinks. I believe this occurred for about three more times.

The wife makes her emergence and meets me downstairs. She kinda wants to find a quiet place to sit for a bit and maybe grab something small to eat. We decide to meet back up at the same table in about an hour. Time flies when you're having fun, and she meets me at the scheduled time and was nice enough to bring me a girly fru fru daiquiri. I scoop up my remaining chips, and bid the table goodbye. One more quick cab ride back to Cosmopolitan and we're back in our still hot room.

Just some random shots along the way.

BMG bus.

Not sure why I took another.

MGM.

Construction near the entry.

Coke. Duh.

I press the "Beck and Call" button on the in room phone, and again ask if there's anyway we can have an additional fan brought up into our room. The bedroom is just warm enough to be uncomfortable, but the living room area is fine. Again, we're told that Cosmo doesn't have any fans for their rooms. 3.9 billion dollars, and they couldn't afford a few $25 fans? I know that would have put them over budget....but instead they went ahead with building a tower with a "design flaw" in it's ventilation system. That's more sensible. I enquire about checking out early, but I'm told since I booked under a package offered by Cosmo, I wouldn't be eligible for any sort of refund. Now I'm starting to get agitated. I call Bellagio and find out they're booked the last night we're in town, so they wouldn't be a feasible option. So I get a quote from Aria and Vdara just so I can consider my options.

Got some night fountain shots before leaving the room.

Pretty cool.

Zoomed in.

More zoom.

Out of focus.

Last one.

We ready ourselves the best we can, and make our way downstairs. I talk to a check-in clerk and presented our case. At first the solution was to increase our resort credit from $50 to $100. I thanked them for that offer, but just told them I really just want the bedroom a few degrees cooler. We explain how we've moved rooms already and had multiple visits from an engineer. I mentioned that I can get free rooms at MGM/Mirage level properties, but wanted to pay the money to stay at Cosmo for my anniversary. The clerk and her supervisor seemed genuinely concerned, and told us that they'd call me back to see what they could do. Okay, fine.

Now we make our way up to Holstein's for some laid back grub. We were seated quickly enough and scan over the menu. By this point, I'm just a little agitated, but trying to not let it damper the rest of my night. After reading through the menu, I opted to order the Longhorn burger, while the boss went for a burger that escapes me at the moment. We agree on trying a round of deep fried pickles, although I was thiiiis close to ordering the truffle lobster mac n' cheese. That still sounds good.

Burgers - 1.

Burgers - 2.

Still want to try that one.

My mint shake.

Pickles!

Ang's Oreo shake.

Her burger, which I forgot.

My Longhorn.

And cut open.

The pickles were awesome as we were hoping for. It was nice to try them fried as spears instead of slices. The shakes were good, but felt a little light on the booze. I wasn't looking to get trashed from one, but it would have been nice to at least taste that in indeed was an "adult" drink. Mine was mint with miniature malt balls throughout. Hers was your standard Oreo shake.

My burger was inhaled in record time, and hit the spot. It was good, and something different. Her burger was also good, and it had some goat cheese and bacon in it. She couldn't finish hers, and I had a hard time eating any of my fries. The fries were "eh, they're fries" but it would have been nice to at least have the option to dress them up with something as simple as ketchup. I guess our waitress was too busy with the three other tables in the section we were in. Overall the meal was alright, but the service at Holstein's could have been better.

About halfway through the meal I did get a call from the clerk downstairs. She gave me the answer I didn't want to hear, which consisted of "we had an engineer stop by your room, and the problem is now fixed." Yeah, we'll see about that.

We go to the room, and don't notice much in the way of change. I think the bedroom was a whopping one degree cooler, but it certainly didn't want to drop below the 71 mark and we couldn't feel any additional air blowing out of the small vent near the ceiling. By this point, I'm just feeling defeated, and we call it another early evening.

Oh, and another note Cosmopolitan: Don't have two pages dedicated in your in room directory advertising the great and wonderful service you offer pertaining to a "Pillow Butler." Sounds great in theory, but when we called down to the front desk we were told "oh, sorry...we don't offer that anymore." So, I can book a boxing lesson from someone at the property, but I can't get a neck pillow? (or a fan) Unless that service isn't offered anymore either. Instead of getting the advertised body pillow from their out of date directory, the Boss used a couch cushion from from the living room.