Las Vegas Strip at Night

croci

When I posted these photos, back in March 2009, I did so without any text explaining where these crocuses were at. And I don't remember anymore either. My guess is that it's probably O'Bryant Square, but I could be wrong.

Also, according to pretty much every site on the interwebs -- including Wikipedia's crocus article -- either "croci" or "crocuses" is acceptable as the plural form of crocus. So now you know.

various lions

First off, here are a few more Vegas photos, this time from the MGM Grand Las Vegas. The MGM Grand is, supposedly, the world's second-largest hotel, second only to some sort of mega-resort in Malaysia. And the lion out in front is the largest bronze sculpture in the western hemisphere, or at least that's what the plaque next to it said. These are just two of the many curious facts one can pick up around Las Vegas to impress one's friends back home in good ole Mudville and make them all say "gee whiz". Who says Vegas isn't educational?

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Inside the MGM Grand there's an exhibit featuring real live lions, right there in the casino. I thought I'd read somewhere that they're descended from one of the old MGM movie logo lions, but I haven't bothered to go check. I did take a couple of photos, though, and here they are:

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And a few cat photos, since it's just not the interwebs without cat photos. Not technically lion photos, but he's quite certain he's king of the jungle, and who am I to argue?

spring flowers, march '09 edition

The Bellagio Fountain

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A few strictly tourist-grade photos of the amazing fountain in front of the Bellagio. I hope I don't have to explain that this is in Las Vegas and not Portland, right? I don't know where we'd put something like this. It's big and loud and splashy and gaudy and shameless, which is to say it just wouldn't fly in Portland. Which is a damn shame. And if by some weird accident we ended up with a Bellagio-style fountain here, they'd only run it in the summer months, and it'd be broken most of the time it was supposed to be running. And we'd be constantly wringing our hands about how to make it more sustainable. Sheesh. Sustainable, sushmainable.



These are actually all the photos I took of the fountain, despite standing there watching it for quite a while. At some point I went, oh, wait, I should take a few photos for the Gentle Reader(s) back home (or wherever it is you people are located). And here they are. As I said, they're strictly tourist-grade, at best. It probably didn't help matters that I was about halfway through a large Eiffel tower full of strawberry daiquiri. Which I was holding as I walked down the street, perfectly legally. Very civilized place, that Las Vegas.

Luxor, Night & Day

komodo, las vegas

It may seem weird that my first batch of Vegas photos are of the Komodo dragon at the Mandalay Bay's Shark Reef Aquarium. The main reason for this is that I only had these three photos of the beastie, so this was an easy little post to put together. It was, er, a bite-sized chunk.

And with that, I've used up my lame joke allotment for today. So there'll be no lame and unoriginal wisecracks here about meeting Mr. Komodo up close when you're caught counting cards at blackjack or whatever. Besides, everybody knows they use the piranha tank for that. (Yes, they do have a piranha tank too. And sharks, obviously.)