Entries Tagged as 'ross'

Fish, Friends & Family

December 2nd, 2009 · 4 Comments

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Beijing Noodle No. 9, Caesar’s Palace, Las Vegas

On Friday we only slept a few hours, which was not good, since we’d been out at the crazy dance party the night before. We got up and met everyone down at the buffet to eat breakfast. Dallas then went back to bed, but I got talked into walking around a few casinos. After an hour or two I couldn’t take it, and neither could Ross, so we went back to the hotel to rest. I walked into our hotel room and I thought Dallas said “Ross is on the way,” which I thought was weird since I’d just walked over with Ross, but he actually said “Guy Voss is on the way.” So much for that nap!

Guy is a good friend of Dallas’s from back in college. He and his wife Amber live in the Las Vegas area with their two kids, Liam and Ella. We saw Guy and Amber at Killian and Liz’s wedding last year, but we hadn’t seen Liam since he was 2 months old, and now he’s 5 years old! Compare a photo of Dallas and Liam in 2004 to the photo of Dallas and Liam last week:

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Dallas & Liam, Planet Hollywood, Las Vegas

Ella was a little shy, but as adorable as ever. I was glad we could see everyone, even if it was brief. Oh, and I was all smoky and felt like death warmed over, but Amber said that on the way home Liam said “Daddy’s friends are really fun,” so maybe it wasn’t so bad. Or maybe he was just on a sugar rush because we accidentally let him drink a whole soda!

I feel exhausted just typing this out, but next up we got ready and went to dinner at the Rio. That’s where Dallas’s parents and Caroline and Jordan were staying. The Carnival World Buffet there is the longest buffet I have ever seen. Crazy. They had everything.

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Jordan, George, Kathy, Dallas, Caroline :: Rio, Las Vegas

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Jordan, George, Kathy, Dallas, Caroline, Rachelle :: Rio, Las Vegas

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Ross, Rachelle, Dallas, Matt, Molly :: Rio, Las Vegas

Since sleeping is what you do when you leave Las Vegas, we then went over to the New York New York Hotel & Casino to see Zumanity. This is the Cirque show that you have to be 18 to see. Enough said.

After the show we hung out at New York New York. I tried really hard to rally by drinking more, drinking coffee, getting cold air in my face, etc. When we finally went back to our hotel, I had to go to bed early. I say early, but it was at least midnight, probably past. In Vegas, that is early. Anyway, I had a great time, but I think I’m still recovering. And trying to get used to not drinking beer at breakfast.

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Thanksgiving in Las Vegas

November 30th, 2009 · 2 Comments

Previous year’s family trips to Las Vegas have been relatively mild by Vegas standards, but this year 5 of our friends from the Boston area – Molly, Matt, Sarah, Adam and Ross – joined us for the trip and it felt like some kind of crazy bachelor party. We were out every single night until 3 or 4 in the morning and didn’t really sleep in at all. We had a great time, but I think by the last night we were all just done. Exhausted!

The first night Dallas and I arrived first around 9 p.m. We set our bags in our room, then turned around and went to the casino immediately. Molly, Matt, and Ross arrived a few hours later and joined us.

On the first day Molly, Matt, Dallas and Ross drove out to Mesquite and went golfing. I stayed in town, slept in late, and explored The Strip a bit. I’ve always stayed downtown when I’ve been in Las Vegas, so The Strip and its casinos and resorts was a bit foreign to me.

Ross had a ton of points from all the traveling he does for work that were about to expire so he set us up in some great rooms at the Planet Hollywood Resort. This was the view from our room. You can see the Bellagio fountain show, Caesar’s Palace, and the Paris resort.

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View from our room at Planet Hollywood, Las Vegas

One of the first things I saw while wandering around our casino: a sign advertising strip karaoke. Not sure how that works.

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Planet Hollywood, Las Vegas

Connected to the resort was a huge shopping mall called the Miracle Mile Shops. I spent several hours walking around there.

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Planet Hollywood Miracle Mile Shops, Las Vegas

After a while I stopped for lunch at La Salsa, a Mexican chain restaurant that I used to visit when I lived in Southern California. Of course, in Las Vegas, it was all done up garishly, but I still liked the food I ordered.

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La Salsa, Las Vegas

A lot of the ceilings in the shopping center are painted like blue skies, which is neat, but after a while I felt like I should see some real blue skies so I went outside. It was so gorgeous. Sunny and I had a tshirt on, no jacket, and was just fine. The resort to the south of ours was the Paris. They’ve got the fake Eiffel Tower out there and the Paris balloon, but what I was drawn to was a gorgeous fountain.

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Fountain Outside the Paris, Las Vegas

I decided to walk to Caesar’s Palace. It was only a little bit farther down the street and across the street. Inside were a bunch of really beautiful statues and fountains. I walked through the shopping area there a bit and then headed back to Planet Hollywood for a rest before everyone came back.

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Caesar’s Palace, Las Vegas

We decided to spend the night at the MGM Grand. At first we thought maybe we’d go to craftsteak, Tom Colicchio’s steakhouse, for dinner. After looking at the menu though, we decided on something a little less spendy, since we’d be spending money on gambling later on. Ross had been to a great Italian place right down the hall called Fiamma so we went there. I had the best gnocchi of my life.. lobster, truffles, mushrooms. So delicious.

Adam and Sarah flew in that night and met up with us at the MGM casino. We were probably there til 2 or 3 in the morning, when there was a super bizarro Fat Burger run. We walked in and they started blaring Biggie Smalls so loud. Everyone in line started dancing and singing. Even the fry cook was raising the roof. Molly was dancing like crazy. For the whole time we were there they only played Biggie and Tupac. So awesome/strange. Also strange? This high chair full of ketchup.

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Fat Burger, Las Vegas

Also at Fat Burger, some guy who said he was from the south side of Chicago gave me his CD. He said his friend was from WI and I said I was too. When he asked where I told him and he shouted out to 920, our area code up there.

The whole end of that night was super bizarro. There is video that exists somewhere and I must find it!

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A Visit to the Mass Gen ER Before Heading Home

September 4th, 2008 · 2 Comments

The day after Rob and Colleen’s wedding we all got some free hotel breakfast and then started parting ways. We dropped Billy at the Portland airport where he was catching a flight to LA for business. The rest of us drove to Boston. Killian and Liz then rented their own car and continued on to see a friend in Connecticut and Liz’s brother in Brooklyn. Ging was working in Boston for a few days and took the T to meet some friends.

Dallas and I planned on having dinner with Ross, Matt and Molly and then catching our flight from Boston to Chicago. One little thing. When we got to Ross’s house in Beacon Hill he didn’t feel well. His shoulder hurt… like really bad. Turns out he’d dislocated it. He’d done it a few times in the past and is to the point where it comes out easy, I guess. We all walked him down to the emergency room at Mass General and sat there as long as we could with him. I’ll spare Ross the embarrassment of posting the photo I have of him in a wheelchair.

While waiting we looked at photo albums from Matt and Molly’s wedding, which we attended in Connecticut in June. Finally we had to leave to catch our flight. We stopped at Anna’s Taqueria, Dallas’ favorite, to grab food to eat at the airport and then went home.

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