Sleepless in Las Vegas

It's too bad I'm not into the one-armed bandit, betting on red or black, or any other means of spilling all my money into the hands of the casino's. Instead, I'm spending 12.5 hours in the Las Vegas Airport. And it's not even that great an airport. Others airports have nice restaurants to hang out in or lots of shopping. But, for a Vegas airport, this one is rather boring.

And monotonous. Yes, it has slot machines down every corridor. And that constant chiming and beeping has given me a headache. Off to Hudson's News I went to buy some Tylenol. $4.30 for 6 pills - so much for not spilling my money.

Anyway, here's why you should never fly American Airlines between Tampa and Las Vegas...

You would think that having a hub in Dallas would give you plenty of optional flights. Thinking I had a full day of work in Vegas today, the only flight available after 5pm (or even 2:10pm for that matter) was 11:00pm. But my day ended up early... really early. I called Orbitz for Business, who said that there were flights with available seats - but I should go to the airport and get on the standby list to avoid the change fee ($150 + the difference in airfare = total of about $450). I even called American Airlines but they said my ticket was booked through US Airways and that I should call them. Of course they sent me back to American because American currently held the ticket. (Is it any wonder the airline industry is in such turmoil)?

Upon arrival at the airport, I was informed that the two other flights both had their standby lists closed - having over 30 standby passengers. I really had no desire to head back to a casino and lose my life savings so I thought I'd stay here get some work done.

I worked on my work work, and researched airline fees and policies (to make sure this doesn't happen again), figured out how to do this blog thing, and still lost $$$ in the airport. The food is pricey and not all that great. There's no real restaurant to speak of (Chili's ToGo doesn't count). And it was NOT fun having to have both lunch and dinner here. Actually, the Wolfgang Puck Express had a pretty darned good veggie pizza.

Dinner was at "Burke in the Box". Apparently "Burke" is some celebrity chef and I was told that the food was great. So, I headed there at 6pm and ordered a chicken panini. It was delivered... along with a To Go box and a big hint to leave - seems they closed at 6:15pm. What?! No matter, the wireless connection was terrible and they didn't even have unsweetened tea. I ate the fries and hours later I ate the insides of the sandwich. Even the panini bread was kind of hard. And I paid $18 for that!! More spillage...