Westward Ho!

I'm off to the West again this weekend for about 10 days.

First stop: Las Vegas

Business. A technology conference. Ho-hum. BUT, it's 3 days & nights at the Mandalay Bay Hotel & Casino, all company paid....so while I pay my dues during the day and sit in on meetings where people get excited about things like server virtualization and cloud computing (yawn), I'll have my evenings and nights to do the Vegas thing. Not a bad deal at all. I'm not a big gambler, but I do play a bit of poker for fun, and no better place to do it than Vegas. And if I get a chance, I'm going to sneak away in the afternoon and hit the Mandalay Beach. I feel the need to lie there in a bikini (no matter what I look like) and have some guy name Pedro bring me a colorful overpriced drink. *ahhhh*

And then: San Diego

In an earlier post I wailed on Los Angeles and barely mentioned San Diego, which is quite refreshing vs. LaLa land. It deserves a decent nod. I actually find San Diego to be a friendly and charming city where one can actually relax. In fact, if it weren't for the plethora of homeless people downtown (seems to be a California standard), it would be extremely pleasant. But I must say, so far, the San Diego homeless I've bumped into have been fairly pleasant. It's such a lovely city, even the homeless can't help but be in a good mood....unlike the homeless crowd in San Francisco, who I found to be generally unpleasant and scary.

Catch you from the West Coast, dudes.