Visitreno

[stan_allen]

Looks as though the drought has ended, and there are now plenty of trip reports, so mine isn't really necessary, but I'll pile on, anyway.

As most of you know, my trips tend to be for work, which means there aren't nearly as many late-night shenanigans as I'd like, but I take what I can get.

The rental car this time was a Camry, and came with a nice perquisite, in the form of a satellite radio, which was rather fun, though I wouldn't want to be struggling to tune disparate channels across a three-digit band while pushing 75 mph on mountain roads. Still, several channels of classic rock provide good background, and I wound up neglecting the half-dozen CDs I'd packed.

Took off at 11:30 on a very nice day, and enjoyed lovely conditions all the way up. I was a little concerned about smoke from the various immolations around California, but encountered no road closures. Still, there was a section of the upper reaches of the mountains where the smell of burning was very apparent, suggesting that the fire I'd seen on the map earlier in the week that was closest to I-80 had still not been tamed.

That portion of the drive was relatively brief, though, and I was soon enough approaching our favorite city. Took the Virgina Street exit, turned right on Sierra, and slid into the Silver Legacy parking garage. Despite the various debates on this hotel, I still like their accessibility the best - from the parking garage, it's a brief walk to the elevators, and from there, a very brief walk to check-in, and from there, another very brief walk to the room elevators. If I stay at the Atlantis, I'm generally required to use the outermost spaces of their parking lot, go into the building, walk all the way to the front of the hotel for check-in, then walk all the way back to the doors near the same parking area for the elevators, and that's if I want the upper floors - if I'm willing to take the lower floors, I can take the elevators nearer to the check-in, but what fun is that? I want a view!

So after ensuring they wouldn't put me in the side of the building that faces the sunset - got that last time, not much fun - I was comfortably ensconced on the 34th floor, with a view of the "Reno Regency Apartments", once known as the - the- dang, I've already forgotten what it was called - remember the wost dump in Reno, with the sign bearing a '30's-style gangster? Well, the character's all drained out of it now, which is probably a good thing, but wow, now I can't even remember its name. Well, it's early, yet.

In these situations, I usually wait until after dinner to attempt any gambling, but as it was still merely late afternoon, I thought I might check and see if the Cal-Neva had any three-dollar Blackjack tables, and so I was off. On the way over, I saw a fellow passing out coupons in front of Fitzgerald's, and took one. It seemed to be saying that the five-dollars-with-club-signup was back, and so was the free-dollar (one per day) for existing club members, along with the daily free spin on the prize machine. Woo-hoo! Could the old deal really be back? I questioned the coupon guy, who said it indeed was. I continued on to Cal-Neva, but made plans to return and claim my dollar. I was pretty close to omitting that club card from my wallet on this visit, and was glad I hadn't!

Cal-Neva looked busy, and after circumnavigating the table areas in both buildings, I was on my way out, but suddenly, there it was - a lone table, with single deck Blackjack. They only allow doubling on ten or eleven at these tables, but that was good enough for me. I put up my meager twenty-one dollars, and off we rode. I noticed that they've retired the "Silver" coins they used to use for the one-dollar chips - I hope I still have one stashed somewhere for a souvenir!

Played a while, and had some pretty good action - three blackjacks, three doubles, two of them winners, one a loser - and a pair of 8s, which I promptly split, but then lost to a dealer 19.

After half an hour or so, the dealer was about to be changed, and I was exactly where I'd started, with my twenty-one bucks (I tend to give back the half-dollars as tips, even with my super-cheapskate status) - and so, I decided to quit. Hey, I got my action, and even a little drama - but I hadn't had dinner yet, after all.

Started back towards The 'Leg, but stopped in at the Fitz to realize the return of the sacred Lucky Forest.

I got in line for the free spin, and noticed that the line for the sign-ups/free dollars was getting long, and suprise, surprise - there was just ONE employee at the 'Forest', who had to jump between the two lines - and the other line just kept getting longer. Where the heck was that super-nice, 98-year old woman who used to work this counter?? Curse you, new management! Well, after finally winning a "Three dollars off" coupon for the restaurants, I didn't have the patience to join the queue for the free dollar - that's right, I, the ultimate cheapskate, passed on free gambling money!

Went back to the room for further rest, and to enjoy the local syndicated episodes of The Simpsons, which for some reason, are always better (re: older) than what I get in my area. I was rewarded: they showed the one where Homer gets a gig teaching a class at the community college on how to build a successful marriage. Lots of good stuff I'd forgotten about.

Anyway, after this rest, I utilized the restaurant - used to be the coffeehouse, now it's called "Cafe Sedona", or some such nonsense - and ordered steak and eggs on a whim. While not super-fast, this gambit paid off - when the platter arrived, it was overloaded with eggs; the chef must have put in a half-dozen of them - and I could scarcely finish it all, but did it justice.

Sated, I took my customary post-dinner perambulation through the area, and blew a couple of bucks on a "Double Dragon" machine which I've come to like - though I'm not even really sure why, as it's not particularly loose - and "Lucky Larry's Lobster Mania", whose theme song I enjoyed greatly in my youth, which has now become the punctuation of a losing penny machine - a rather sad slide, now that I think about it, and I really should stop playing it, just to preserve the original, and more pleasant, memories.

A rather amusing sight was that e-bay, the on-line auction giant, has licensed its brand to gaming, and there was thus a bank of "e-bay!" slot machines on the NorthWest side of the 'Leg - I laughed out loud at the absurdity of this sight, although I guess there's really nothing absurd about it. Capitalism is capitalism, after all.

So the twenty-one dollars I started out with at the Cal-Neva faced a slow but steady drain, and since the next morning required an early start, there wasn't much more to be done in the casino.

The good news about the work portion of these trips is that the work itself is close enough to Nu Yalk Pizza for me to use it for lunch, and their product is as top-notch as ever. If you're stuck outside New York, you couldn't do much better than this place for authentic New-York style pizza. It's pretty much exactly as I remember it, with the thin crust, sharp but not overwhelming tomato sauce, and the glorious orange grease oozing out of everywhere. As Rachael Ray most surely would NOT say, "Yum-o!"

So that's the meager payoff of the work portion of the trip, but once that's clear, it's back to fun and games. Sometimes, I'll drive a different route back to the downtown, just for the fun of seeing different parts of the metropolis that is Reno, and this time, I did the return approach on the next street down from Virginia that crosses the Truckee - don't recall the street name, but when it passed over the river, I could see the riverwalk, and the park there was having some sort of summer-do - ah, yes, it must have been the Friday "Art Walk", and there was a bandstand of some sort, which looked as though it was getting ready to host a concert of some kind - just the thing one could indulge in if one were blessed with free, unstructured time - but there were refreshments awaiting me in my room, and greed sped my return.

So after the requisite quiet time, I headed downstairs, and decided to hit the restaurant. By this time, things were getting busy - it was Friday, after all, and the work I go to Reno for usually takes place on Thursdays, but this time, it had to be switched, meaning I would see a weekend evening for a change, and there was definitely a difference. The "Cafe" was crowded, and people were lined up, though I got seated quickly by being willing to accept a table with a crappy location, which doesn't matter much to me. Tried a French Dip sandwich, which was reasonable enough, then took another walk around.

Went out on Virginia Street to stock up on more supplies, and observed the weekend throngs, which were predictably ginned up for rowdy aspirations, though thankfully inhibited somewhat by their equally-inebriated female companions. The bum situation on Virgina remains unchanged, and it would be really nice to be able to stop on the bridge, and just look at the trains without being hit up for spare change. Then there's those little groups of people who are not exactly bums, but not quite productive members of society, either - they resemble punk rockers, except that their presence in this particular place and proximity to casinos tends to undermine their manufactured disdain for conventional society. They may or may not be homeless, but they seem to like appearing as though they are, either way.

I didn't even bother returning to the Fitz, as weariness was already kicking in - this is the curse of the work trip, as the second night is always compromised by the limited sleep of the first - so I contented myself with passing a few more lone dollars through the dopey slot machines. The human entertainment consisted of watching some inebriated guy at a slot machine being questioned by security, fumbling around for his I.D. or club card or whatnot, and having some inscrutable exchange regarding what he was doing there, or what had happened before, or something. Nothing too outrageous, and eventually the show fizzled out.

After imbibing whatever free drinks I could muster with my meager buy-ins, I used my remaining "Free Drink" coupon - one of the other perks for business stays - and retired to the room. What's up with those weird bottle-cans, anyway? All the appearance of a bottle, but with the functionality of a can!

I used the remaining free time in the room to finally finish Ayn Rand's "Atlas Shrugged", which is a sprawling behemoth of an epic of a tome (over a thousand heavy pages), and decidedly non-Reno related, but I was glad to finish it. Heavy stuff; it will induce you to mindlessly pump money into a slot machine, after its seemingly endless pontiifcations on the nature of man and the spirit of the individual.

Next day, it was time to return - fought the urge to stop in at Boomtown or Terrible's and have one more (certainly losing) slot session, then enjoyed a lovely drive through the mountains, until approaching the Sacramento area, where the temperature shot up inexplicably. At least air conditioning and Satellite radio were present!

No other events to report; another Reno trip, while a predictable money-loser, completed.

[remano]

Thanks for the report.

The e-Bay slots should be a big hit. After all, their customers pay more for an item than anybody else in the whole world was willing to offer, then say that they "won" the auction.

The casino you're recalling was the Speakeasy.

[CaSwede]

Thanks for taking the time to report. Reno and a business trip sounds great. You are getting paid for having fun. Did you ever think about calling in sick just after you checked in with the boss?

[RenoLady]

thanks for the trip report Stan, I love the frugal reporting. My style too! Damn slot machines though, eh? I noticed the staying even until the slots took over. did you like the EBay slot? similar to Monopoly it looks. (sounding like Yoda)

I love the drive up the hill. I tell R that as soon as we hit the Raley's sign, (signaling the beginning of the foothills), that our weekend/vacation starts. The landscape changes with the color of the soil going from brown to orange, the trees from palm to pine and the sky from kinda cloudy/foggy/smoggy to crystal clear. Well, that's my view anyway, R may be white-knuckling a corner at 70 mph, only to come upon semi's side-by-side as one 40 mph truck attempts to pass a 35 mph truck.

[stan_allen]

Swede, don't think it doesn't occur to me every single time I'm up there! Alas, the work I'm there to deliver is a presentation, which is the kind you really can't weasel your way out of - unless you don't want to be invited back!

But you are right; the company is providing for me a good time, even if it's not quite as good as the scenarios in my imagination - I'll try to remember that next time?

RenoLady, I'm glad there's another cheapskate here to commiserate with! It's so true that the video slots are nothing more than a bleed, as another recent trip report so eloquently stated - of all the "Bonus Rounds" I received, for example, none was more than a few bucks, and certainly nowhere near the profitable zone!

Where's the Raley's? I don't quite recall seeing that - for me, the cutoff is that town beyond Auburn, where there's a McDonalds, and it's pretty much the last of the Sacramento-style civilization before entering the super-rural zone, and the accompanying climb - but I just can't recall seeing a Raley's!

And thank goodness for the newer lanes, eh? Now if they could just finish the areas near the summit! And what's up with the non-asphalt finishing? I'm already seeing ruts from trucks in pavement they laid from the *recent* work - how nearsighted is that??!

[RenoLady]

The Raley's sign is right after Rocklin. It's literally a tall sign for the store beneath it. Years ago you could see it from quite a distance, and I would signal that once we reached it, we were on vacation, no talking about anything of importance. Now, the trees have grown up to meet it and I purposefully have to look for it now to signal the start of silliness.

I can't believe the condition of the roads on the return trip. The bumps, lack of painted lines and the NOISE from the tires if you're having to ride the right lane. Not like it's going to keep me from going, besides it's more on the way home.....

[BC Dave]

Stan,
I read, with delight, nearly all of your trip report. Reno Ramada was the casino hotel you looked out on and back on. Love the Lucky Forest. I even won $50 once at a $1 VP machine downstairs with that buck. And here's one for the fond memories of cheapskates (like me)...Does anyone remember when you could get $3 form Harold's Club and $2 from the Fitz? All you had to do was show out of state I.D. Back then that would buy breakfast at any buffet in town. Woo hoo!

But I digress. The non delightful part, Stan, for me anyway, was the book review. I have been a big fan of Ayn Rand's work for more than 20 years. Atlas Shrugged was her magnum opus.

I'll not attempt an essay here or be too didactic. Just a couple of quick thoughts. To me, one of her keenest observations was that America had discovered and prospered under the right political system "Capitalism", but never had the discovered the required moral code " Rational Selfishness" it's logical foundation. (Self sacrifice and selflessness are still thought to be moral ideals.)

Ayn Rand may stress the Human Spirit more that any other writer I know of. This can be a pretty distressing world without some good examples of the Human Spirit like Lance Armstrong, the Wright brothers, Thomas Edison or even the fictional heros of Ayn Rand's novels like John Galt and Howard Roark.

Ayn Rand's ideas were even at the base of my posts during our historical VisitReno smoking debate!

Ah well, time to move on to some more silly posts.

[stan_allen]

Thanks, Dave, I'm glad to have a little input on that book, even though it doesn't exactly tie in directly to Reno!

I liked it a lot, and have been a bit bummed since finishing it to see that a lot of the commentary on the book - at least what's freely available on the web - is pretty shallow, and many seem to have missed the point altogether.

It's certainly clear that Ayn Rand was way ahead of her time; watching the presidential primaries, debates, and all the accompanying activity, I'm seeing parallels everywhere!

We now return you to your regular channel of decadent bacchanalia...