Only two more days till vacation. One long work day and one short work day! We hope to see some snow in the mountains, however, looking at the extended forecast, it looks to be mild and snow is unlikely. Hopefully we’ll see something in the higher elevations, or at the ski resorts, thanks to the magic of snow making machines.

We stay in Orlando several times a year. We take the kids for a weekend at Disney or Sea World and we go I prefer to stay the night. The nice thing about going there is the number of Orlando hotels - and the variety of hotels. They have everything from the no frills Super 8’s to high end stuff like the Gaylord Palms. We always stay some where that has a pool, an in room fridge and hot tub. The moderate resorts at Disney are usually our first choice, but some super deals can be had if you stay off site.

Wife and I booked a hotel room for our trip to NC next week. Last time, we drove at night, and straight through, but this time, we decided to stop for the night. It will be an easier trip with the kids, and wife didn’t want to drive at night, so we search for travelocity deals online and found a nice hotel room at a good price. Colleen is training me to always check for online coupons and promotion codes before I buy anything online, and she’s right, we usually save money. I can’t wait to get on the road next week to start this trip.

Let me tell you what a fun city Chicago is. I absolutely loved it. Me and my buddy went out Saturday night on Rush Street and Division Street, hitting some Irish pubs and stuff. We hit 3 or 4 different places, and not a single one was a sausage fest. It was so nice to be in a place where the ratio was an equal mix of guys and chicks. Not that it matters, because I’m happily married, however, I’d rather look at chicks than dudes.

Chicago is a pretty laid back city, and everyone was pretty friendly. All of the places we went knew how to pour a good pint of Guiness. We eventually crawled back to our hotel room around 4am and barely made it to the Bucs/Bears game on time at noon on Sunday. The Bucs played better than I thought they would, but unfortunately they lost.

Well, I’m back from my Chicago weekend and we had a blast. First, it was my first time to visit Chicago and what a beautiful city. We flew into Chicago-Midway and rented a car to go to our hotel. We stayed at the Congress Plaza Hotel on Michigan Avenue. The hotel was directly across from Grant Park and just a block down from the Art Institute. I would recommend staying at this hotel for anyone visiting Chicago. The hotel was walking distance to Soldier Field and the Magnificent Mile. Plus, it was only $7 cab ride to the pubs on Rush Street or Division Street. Also, the Navy Pier was a $7 cab ride away. We had great weather for the weekend, nice and cool, temp in the 40’s, no rain, although I would have loved for it to snow on Saturday when we were out walking the Magnificent Mile. More to follow on the nightlife….

We got in late last night, because our plane was delayed 2 hours leaving Tampa due to the weather in the city the plane was coming from. We’re up and out early this morning, getting breakfast and checking out some of the Chicago shopping. We’re going to hit something cultural today too, I think an art museum.

Only a few more hours until I leave for Chicago. I’ll only be there for two nights, but I can’t wait to see the City with Big Shoulders. My friend Don that I’m going there with is from Chicago. At the Lightning game last week, he asked what I wanted to do there. Now, I have two travel rules I try to follow when I go to a big city. One, experience some Art/Culture, that way I can justify the trip to the wife. Second, go to a least one dive bar. Nothing like finding the underbelly of a city to find out what it is really like. Also, included in that is try to hit a nudie bar, sic, gentleman’s club. Plus, we are going to the Bucs/Bears game on Sunday. I’m torn, I love my Bucs, but their season is over. The Bears are the starting defense on my Fantasy football team, and I’m one game away from the Championship game. Talk about a catch-22….

I’m headed to Chicago tomorrow with my friend Don for the Bucs game. In order to prevent getting beat by Bears fans, I’ll be leaving my Bucs jersey at home. I’m looking forward to seeing the city and maybe hitting a museum while we’re there. Colleen tells me I have to go to the Billy Goat Tavern while I am in Chicago. They are the place that inspired the Saturday Night Live skit in the 70’s that always said “Cheezborger! Cheezborger! No fries, cheeps! No Pepsi, Coke!”?

We had a great time hitting the bars and the casinos. The beer started flowing before we left Thursday morning. A typical Vegas day was to go to bed at 8 am, wake up around noon, walk down to the pool and lounge. Order a couple of buckets of beer at the pool to shake off the night before. Go back to the room and shower and then start hitting it hard again around 2 pm. We got to enjoy some of the seedy side of Vegas - from the dives, to the hooker chatting us up at the hotel bar, the strip clubs and Jamie hooking up with the stripper. He’s single, he’s allowed. To the 60 year old swinger trying to pick me up at the Frontier, and believe me, that grandma was not some hotty like the old chick in Grumpy Old Men. What can you say, Vegas is great. It’s a great place for the guys to go to decompress and have good clean fun. However, this is my third year in a row going there, so I think next year we might head back to Fantasy Fest in Key West. It will have been 4 years since I’ve been to Fantasy Fest, so I think it’s time to go back. Good clean fun!

My buddy Jamie called me about going to Vegas the first weekend in November, so we started researching fares and hotels. Our friend Ed wound up booking our trip on Expedia and we stayed at the Internationally Renowned Imperial Palace. We actually stayed there two years ago, so we were familiar with the hotel and location. The hotel is not one of the eye popping resorts like Bellagio, Caesars Palace, or the Mirage. However, it is a great location - center strip with a monorail stop - and usually one of the cheapest hotels on the strip. Just our kind of place! Standards go down the drain when I roll with these guys. Side note to the married guys, the cheaper you make the trip sound, the easier it is to sell to the wife.

We had a good crew - there were five of us sharing the room. Three of the guys are guys that I went to high school with, so we’ve known each other for quite some time. We had a great time doing Vegas on the cheap! We hit dive bars and casinos on the strip and off. Places like Slots-O-Fun on the Strip and Ellis Island Casino and Brewery located at the Super 8 motel on Koval Lane. They still have the $4.95 steak dinner and it was good! You might ask yourself why go the dive route? Well, free booze doesn’t flow like it used to in Vegas, unless you are at a less than glamorous place. So, if you want to play roulette for $15 minimum and $8 for a Miller Lite, go to Bellagio. If you want to get loaded, and my buddies are professionals at that, go play the nickel video poker or $1 roulette at one of the above mentioned places.