Viva Las Vegas!

There are a couple of places in the world I want to have visited when I’m old and hitting on nurses in the old people home. One of those places used to be New York City because I wanted to see the Twin Towers. That dream kind of collapsed in 2001 so now I’m focusing on other places, one of those being Las Vegas.

And who wouldn’t want to visit Sin City, the world’s playground, good old Vegas? In my opinion everyone should have been there at least once in their life. In Las Vegas there is something for everyone. You name it, they have it and that’s the great thing about Vegas.

Besides the obvious stuff (gambling, hot chicks, strippers, sex, shows) I also like Las Vegas because of it’s architecture. Ever since I was a little boy I’ve always been busy building stuff. First with Duplo (the toddler, big brick version of Lego), then with Lego and when I got my first computer one of the first modern games I got for it was The Sims. In fact, sometimes I ask myself why I never considered studying to be an architect. But I think that a desk job like that and having to deal with tons of math never really made architecture an attractive study for me.

I enjoy looking at other people’s work though, which is why I love Vegas. Las Vegas is one of the fastest changing cities in the world with new hotels being built and opened every couple of years. Not a day goes by in Vegas where you can’t see at least one crane hovering over a building site. And with the opening of The Mirrage, built by Steven Wynn, in 1989, a new trend was set to design and built the biggest and most luxurious hotel on the Las Vegas strip. This trend has since then spawned some of the most incredible and original buildings such as The Luxor, a hotel built in the shape of a pyramid and has a completely Egyptian theme. For New York New York they recreated a part of the New York skyline. For hotel Paris they recreated the Eiffel Tower and inside The Venetian, you guessed it, they remade the actual Venetian canals.

Because of the constant change a lot of old hotels who can no longer keep up with the ‘bigger is better’ trend are subject for removal. They are often bought by a big developer who has plans for a new building on the site of the old one. The hotel is imploded and construction on the new mega resort begins as soon as possible. Of course an old building making way for a new building isn’t that weird. But only in Las Vegas the implosion is an actual attraction and an actual party. Because if the old hotel has to go, it will go out in style.

In my search for Las Vegas info I came across the blog of someone who has a similar love for Las Vegas architecture. Mark Adams owns the website/blog Vegas Today and Tommorow on which he constantly provides his audience with updates about current construction projects in Vegas. I especially find the construction of the Echelon very interesting to follow.

What happens in Vegas, stays in Vegas

Now for the really awesome part. Upcoming October me and my girlfriend will be visiting Las Vegas for the first (and hopefully not last) time! I’m already very excited about it all, even though the journey there will involve me sitting on an airplane for 11 hours straight, being in my dream town Las Vegas makes up for just about anything.

We will be staying at the previously mentioned Luxor. Although not the most classy place you can find yourself, it is one of the cheaper hotels directly on the strip (and the airport, I forgot about that when I booked it, haha).

Of course I will be making lots and lots of pictures there and hopefully walk away with some decent winnings from the casinos. One can always dream! Expect to see a lot of my adventures on this blog when I get back.

Finally I have a question for any Vegas natives or regulars who happen to read this. What are, in your opinion, places me and the girlfriend MUST under any circumstances visit? The Secret Garden, Bellagio fountains and Grand Canyon are already on my list but I’m sure there’s lots and lots and lots more to be seen in Vegas.

Robin

Exams – Part 2

Don’t you just hate how you’re always on time at school/work every single day, but when something extra important requires you to be there at a certain time, something always fucks it up?

I have been using the car to go to school. Not because it’s so far away or because there is no public transport available (heck I have three bus stops near my house, none of which have a bus that goes past my school), but simply because it’s faster. I live maybe ten minutes away from the train station. From station to station it’s a little under three minutes, yet it’s still faster for me to take the car in the middle of rush hour. Funny how time works sometimes, huh?

Now, I have been driving the same damn route for the entire year. I know the choke points in my route. There is a junction with retarded traffic lights and a railway crossing which I have to wait in front of if I leave the house a few minutes late (given the train is actually running on time). When I’m past the railway crossing it’s usually smooth sailing to school.

But wouldn’t you know it. Out of every day and every place a terrible accident can happen in this city, this idiot driver choose this morning and that particular junction to park his car into someone else’s with 70mph. The entire thing was locked down, traffic jams were forming in every direction and you didn’t realize what was going on until you were stuck in the middle of it with no way out.

Since I had exams I was supposed to be there strictly on time, otherwise I wouldn’t be allowed to make the exam. And for a moment I thought the gods were with me because I managed to drive onto the school parking lot at 8:55AM, 5 minutes before starting time. At least on my watch. By the time I got to class it was 9:02AM and I was late for my exam. Access denied.

Luckily I can still do the exam, though I won’t have a second chance to do it in case I fuck up. So I better not fuck up.

I hate strict times. I hate how you can leave your house well in advance and still manage to be fucked over because of circumstances you have no control over. I hate god for hating me for hating him. But then again I probably had it coming.

Robin

Quieting Down Your XBox 360

Everyone who owns a 360 will no doubt know how much noise the thing makes when the fans start turning at full RPM and the DVD just spins and spins and spins around. In some cases it can get so bad that you will hear the 360 over the game you’re playing which is obviously not the idea.

I had this problem myself. Especialy because my console is inside a cabinet it got hot very fast so I would hear the fans goig in less then 10 minutes of gaming. Wanting to silence the damn thing I decided to look for solutions on the internet and quickly found a guide to hacking your 360’s fan. Hacking might not be the right term though, it’s more like replacing.

Anyway after ordering the fan online I got to work on my Xbox using the above guide as reference. I didn’t have the unlock tool they had handy here so I had to use a screwdriver to pry things open here and there. It wasn’t as easy as the guide made it out to be (though the unlock tool might have made things a lot easier, I dunno). To open up certain areas of the Xbox I had to use some force which resulted in some minor damage to the back of the case. It’s not really a problem since you don’t see it anyway, but it’s still anoying that you have to damage your console just to open it up.

But once it was open replacing the fan was easy. Take the old one out, put the new shiny one in and put the entire box back together. To my own surprise the thing actualy still worked when I turned it on again. The quality of the fan was a bit disappointing, as I had hoped it would be even quieter then it is. But it’s absolutely an improvement over the noisy fan that comes standard with the Xbox 360.

You can order the fan, toolkit and unlock kit at this store. And while you’re there also have a quick look at all the fancy cases and mods they have there. I’m considering replacing the case sometime. White is about the worst color for any console.

Robin

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