I went ahead and reserved a room in Vegas anyway. And in addition to the idea that reserving a room I can’t really afford was something I didn’t think I ought to do, I reserved it at the Las Vegas Hilton, where I told myself the last time I was there I would not return to until I was at least semi-fluent in Klingon. I looked at prices at other places, at cheap-ass places and at places on the strip (one weeknight night at the Bellagio in the steeping heat of summer is more than I paid for two nights at the Hilton on a weekend that no Vegas hotels seem to have good rates for), and some places had reasonable deals… mostly for nights other than the ones I need to be there for the wedding on. I even found an upgraded room at the New York New York Casino (for the wrong nights) at only $5/night more than the generic ‘Station’ hotels are charging during the week. But, for $10 more a night than the station I chose the Star Trek package at the Hilton & get two free admissions to the Star Trek Experience (street value: $50) two free meals in Quark’s bar (which would cost almost as much at the Experience admissions), and 10% off in the Star Trek-themed store (though unless my art takes off, I won’t be spending money there). Plus some free drinks in the casino I would have got anyway… but between the package stuff and the reasonable price (that includes a second person in my room, if anyone wants to come – they charge the same for one person as for two) plus the fact I probably would have ended up eating at Quarks anyway, if not paying for the Experience again … I think it was the best deal I saw. Oh, and not to fear – the people I’m going with are also Star Trek fans, and were planning on going the the Experience anyway.
Blah blah blah…
So as long as I managed to get the second (more detailed) book of the Ferengi Rules of Acquisition for 50 cents at a recent book sale and have recently lent both my Klingon language books and my Klingon language learning software to my father/brother, I may just try to memorize all the Rules of Acquisition instead of trying to figure out Klingon language structure in the next couple of weeks. Or maybe I’ll memorize the Klingon rules of Acquisition and memorize a few important phrases in the Ferengi language. Strike that, reverse it.
I feel like I’m not being clear here. Oh well. When I was documenting all my financial whosi-ma-whatsis the other day I discovered that one of my credit cards upped my limit without telling me, literally days before I looked, by an additional $500. I know, I know, I shouldn’t be putting more on credit with no real income source in sight, but… Well, I was looking at rooms and rates last night and this morning and … I just about decided on the Hilton before I went to work in the store this morning, so this afternoon when I came back up to my room everything was set up to reserve the room but my name, address, credit card… and today in the store I had a lot more believable interest from people in my art… from people who seemed to know what they liked and …. frankly that clearly had the money to be buying art… so I felt a lot better after today than after yesterday, when I got more quizzical, confused looks at the art than interested or appreciative looks… and I booked it.
Okay, I’ll stop rambling about this now. I don’t want to be (or to seem to be) justifying it to myself, or to you… I just wanted to say what I’m doing. But I just remembered I left some laundry in the dryer downstairs I better go get it.
