Escape from Douchebaggery, Part 34: Backstage Bar and Billiards Opens

The Fremont East block in Downtown Las Vegas continues to add idiosyncratic watering holes, eateries, and businesses. In addition to the promising spots opening in the near future as well as the recently birthed and totally awesome Commonwealth, the 'hood now boasts a rock bar meets pool hall meets sports bar hybrid, The Backstage Bar and Billiards (or The Triple B as locals have already taken to calling it).

Owners of the bar include DJs who spun for House of Pain and Limp Bizkit, and while a connection to Fred Durst's vile 90's rap rock atrocity is enough to make anyone wary, they've pulled off something pretty cool here and filled in a niche that the neighborhood sorely needed.

If you're looking to catch some games or shoot some pool, now Downtown has a high quality option for partaking in such dude-friendly activities that's far enough away from The Strip that you'll most likely be able to avoid the frattier elements who will probably stick to the big sports bars in New York New York and The Palazzo. The Triple B also does a great job setting itself apart from the more corporate mega-sports bars because of its rock 'n' roll attitude.

The place has an admirably and intentionally scuzzy partied out rock star vibe to it, helped along greatly by the fact that the bar, the tables, and the stools you sit on are made from re-purposed Anvil Cases, those durable boxes that bands use to haul their gear around the country. The place is decorated with blacklight concert posters that lend the place a very 70's vibe, as well as bookcases stacked with vinyl behind the DJ booth. DJ's are often on hand to spin hard-rock hits for an energetic crowd on the dance floor, and even though one of those DJ's was in the worst band ever in history, he was actually spinning some good stuff when I was there.

Prices aren't too bad, and the beer list is decent, with a few tasty Craft and Imported options available on tap. Their mixed drinks seemed to be a little cheaper than the ones they pour at Commonwealth and The Downtown Cocktail Room, but this is not a fancy-pants craft-Cocktail place so that makes sense (the extra few bucks at those places is worth it for the crazy concoctions that the mixologists put into them).

The other thing that excites me about The Triple B is the live music venue attached to the place set to open sometime next year, The Fremont Country Club. A decadent rock club that promises to offer great acts playing in a space that co-owner Carlos "Big Daddy" Adley described as decked out with "30-foot tall diamond tucked silver lame' walls with chariot wagons in the sky, bejewled merry-go-round ponies on the bar, and horseshow VIP booths elevated six feet in the air." Sounds appropriately over the top (especially for a place co-owned by a dude with the nickname "Big Daddy), but the reason it most excites me is that it's a medium sized venue in Downtown, which means that some good but not MGM Grand or even Cosmopolitan pool level bands can be booked to play there. Vegas could use more cool venues for up and coming yet worthy bands that are not yet (and may never become) superstars to play, and The Fremont Country Club sounds like a great option for that. With bejeweled merry-go round ponies.

Until the place opens, I'm content to shoot some pool and drink some hard beer while watching a football game as good rock songs play at The Triple B. For anyone allergic to sports, there's always Insert Coins down the street (and hang out for a bit, cause I'll probably meet you there when I'm done at The Triple B).
 
But for everyone else, The Triple B and the still in the works Fremont Country Club are bringing a much needed dose of rock 'n' roll attitude to Fremont East. The place is cool enough that I'm almost willing to overlook the fact that one of the co-owners committed nearly unforgivable crimes against music and good taste as a member of Limp Bizkit.

Almost.

Never Enough Chlorine: Strip Club Pool To Open In Early 2013

If the Mayans weren't right about the world ending later this month, perhaps they should have been: Sapphire, the world's largest Strip Club, is dipping their toes into the ever-expanding Las Vegas "daylife" scene, as the Sapphire Pool and Day Club is set to open in March, with a preview day scheduled for this week.

I mean, I'm not a moralist whose against strip clubs. I've been to my share of strip clubs. I enjoy strip clubs. In fact I have a problem where I'm spending all my money at strip clubs. Please help me. This blog is a cry for help. (None of this is true, other than the "I've been to my share of strip clubs. Don't send help). But an outdoor pool area combined with a strip club? Is this something anyone is clamoring for?

Personally, on the rare occasion when I go into a strip club (I promise, rare is the actual operative word here, I know some of you might be worrying that I'll need to set up a PayPal account to fund my sad addiction to paying for lap dances from girls with daddy issues who smell of coconut body oil), the fact that the place is dark is a good thing. I'm not saying that I'm ashamed of going or anything like that, but do I really need to pay for a lap-dance in the bright sun?

Sapphire is actually a pretty impressive operation, as far as "Gentlemen's Clubs" go. I went for a bachelor party, and between the odd conversations I got with the dancers about politics and the fact that I one of them said I look like one her Rabbi (I'm assuming it's because she has a super broody/sexy/mysterious Rabbi, and not because I look like a middle aged religious leader... I hope), I was actually impressed, in both good and bad ways, by the sheer scale of their operation. And I can understand Sapphire's desire to get involved in the extremely profitable pool-party/ dayclub trend that's overtaken Vegas like a virus transmitted through ill-advised drunken hookups, but I question the type of clientele the place will attract.

Dudes go to the pool parties to meet ladies, pure and simple. They gather around a body of water and compete with other males by showing off their abs as they attempt to impress the females. It's kind of like a nature documentary, with big name DJs shipped in from Europe to provide the soundtrack instead of Morgan Freeman's voice over narration. But that leads me to the question... will women who are not paid to be there show up at a stripper pool?

Sapphire already has a history with the pool party scene... they partnered with The Rio a few years ago to open a Sapphire themed pool area at the resort which featured topless dancers from the club, but the place was closed down in 2009 when it failed to pass an "integrity check" by local police. Basically the place had become a cess-pool of prostitution and drug deals, which is not super surprising considering everything. The so-called "integrity-checks" were voluntarily conducted by Rio management, which probably felt jumpy about diving into the venture with a strip club, so The Sapphire-run pool will probably not face such problems (and by this they will probably not run "integrity-checks," though I'm sure the other issues that integrity checkers were checking for will certainly persist).

The whole idea just has a creepster vibe in my opinion, but then again, the owners of Sapphire Pool and Day Club might be totally okay with attracting creepsters to their establishment. And it's possible I'm completely wrong and the place will become the hottest and sexiest pool area in  the city.

Either way, I'll let everyone else enjoy their douche-tastic pool party scene and take my chances at The Golden Nuggets pool on Fremont Street in Downtown. They've got a waterslide that goes through a shark tank, after all.

The Continued Evolution of Downtown Las Vegas

Apologies for the slightly supremely pretentious title, but sometimes excitement for cool new things is a valid excuse for pretentiousness.Or so I tell myself.

I've spent many, many reams of digital ink typing up my praises to Downtown Las Vegas as the neighborhood continues to grow from an empty lot filled mugging-zone where one would not dare spend time after dark away from the single large street of cheesy low stakes gambling parlors into the vibrant and interesting area filled with unique and cool local businesses its quickly becoming. Places like The Downtown Cocktail Room and The Griffin and events like First Fridays have thrived and encouraged the openings of distinct watering holes like Insert Coins, The Lady Silva,  Bar+Bistro, Artifice, Commonwealth, and resurrected classic Atomic Liquors, as well as hipster brunch spot Eat, quirky museums that illuminate the history of the Mob and Atomic Testing in Las Vegas, the soon to open (and surprisingly cool sounding) Shipping Container Park, coffee/vinyl/zine merchants The Beat Coffeehouse, world class cultural showcase The Smith Center... you get the idea. Basically, I'm trying to say that Downtown is pretty cool.

Clearly, Zappos CEO Tony Hsieh and Downtown Cocktail Room proprietor Michael Cornthwaite's masterplan to convert Downtown Las Vegas into a world-class neighborhood that will attract creative and artistic young people and innovative start-ups (as well as tourists looking for a more off-beat experience than The Strip can offer) to the area is already paying off, and will continue to do so. (Let's just pray that they're not trying to gather all of those people into one Downtown neighborhood in a relatively small city so that they can use their brains to power their brain-powered giant robots. I know this fear is far fetched, but we can't rule it out as a possibility, especially since Hsieh's massive investment of his own money is so generous that some sort of unseen ulterior motive may as yet be revealed.)

Downtown's evolution continues to roll on (to mix metaphors), as list of new businesses and projects are set to debut on or near Fremont Street in the next year or so. Below is a list of just a few #DTV coming attractions I'm most excited about.

The Velveteen Rabbit
Local sisters Pam and Christina Dylag are set to open their dream bar in Downtown as soon as construction finishes, and these crushable alt-chicks have a vision. Named after their favorite children's story, set to serve craft brews and cocktails, and promising to feature an imaginative and whimsical design inspired by its imaginative name (and teased on the bar's Facebook page), the place will most likely become an essential hipster mecca, frequented by Vegan-riding bicycle riders and haunted by food trucks just outside its doors, once it opens officially in 2013.


The Life is Beautiful Festival
No, it's not a weekend devoted to the Oscar-winning Robert Benigni concentration camp set tragi-comedy, but rather a music food and wine festival that promises to bring "arena sized acts" to Downtown in an event that's being organized by a powerful coalition, including the people behind San Francisco's popular answer to Coachella, Outside Lands, the marketing group behind First Fridays, and the guy who served as The Cosmopolitan's music director. Despite the terrible name and even though they have promised "arena-sized" artists, Life is Beautiful has the lot of potential to bring back a full-on music festival that's a little less corporate-driven than iHeart Radio to Las Vegas and features acts a little more interesting and outside-the-box than Lady Gaga or Usher (and which will hopefully be organized in a way that will lead to less diva-like onstage tantrums from mega-selling pop-stars who petulantly insist they're not Justin Bieber).

Bolt Barbers
The irreverent and dude-friendly barbershop, which gained some notoriety by promoting their bad reviews with a "people hate us on Yelp" flag that became so popular that they turned it into book form. Now the cutting-edge hair-cutters are moving to the Shipping Container Park in Las Vegas, in a converted train caboose. Obviously, this place could not be cooler, so get on the crazy train and score yourself a great new cut before you hit the bars on your next Vegas adventure.

Escape from Douchebaggery, Part 33: Commonwealth

The reinvention of Downtown Las Vegas continues clicking along with the just opened Commonwealth, a Cocktail lover's dream and the first of many interesting spots opening on and around Fremont Street in upcoming months. So new that the place hasn't even had its official grand opening yet (they're still in the middle of adjusting things to get it all right during their soft-opening), Commonwealth instantly became one of my favorite bars in Las Vegas after my first visit (or basically once I walked in the doors during my first visit).

Commonwealth's pre-prohibition era atmosphere brings a trend that's gained some steam in other cities to Las Vegas, as it shares a similar vibe with popular Downtown LA establishments where people often dress to the nines in flapper girl dresses and vintage suits like The Edison, Villain's Tavern, and The Varnish. But Commonwealth isn't just chasing a trend... the place has a special magic and quirky voice of its own, and its just the kind of spot that proves Downtown is really coming into its own.

The place looks modest from the outside, but like The Tardis, it's bigger on the inside. The massive, 6,000 square foot building features a large main-bar area, a rooftop patio with great views of the city, and a hidden speakeasy in the back that can fit 28 patrons at a time and will feature a special cocktail menu. The place is flat out gorgeous, with design touches that are singular and quirky including dark wood floors, exposed brick walls, beautiful chandeliers hanging from exposed beams, plush and colorful mismatched chairs, unique wall murals and paintings by local artists, vintage Newspapers and black and white photos stuck to the walls, animal-print rugs, and an antique player-piano shoved into a corner. A statue of a dog dressed up in old English duds proudly greets customers at the main bar while a gorgeous albino peacock hangs behind the bar-tenders. Grab a seat at the communal bar in the middle of the main room, or snuggle up with that special someone in the leather booths, which are built into alcoves that afford you a little privacy.

The drink menu is excellent, with interesting signature cocktails created by excellent mixologists that pay homage to the roaring 20's. I enjoyed the extremely elaborate Horny Tailgater, a Whiskey Sour made with Wild Turkey and delicious smoky Barbecue bitters, topped off with PBR in glass rimmed with salt that mixes Peach and Mesquite flavors. As if that wasn't enough, the whole thing features a garnish of Beef Jerky floating atop this truly epic drink. Considering all that goes into the Cocktail, the price was totally reasonable compared to the fancy-pants mixology establishments in LA (and around the same price-point as excellent signature drinks they serve at The Downtown Cocktail Room).

They also feature an excellent selection of rotating craft brews, the names of which are scrawled on chalkboards behind the bar. I ordered pints of Stone Arrogant Bastard and Old Rasputin out of taps creatively topped by vintage boxing gloves and tennis rackets. I was wary of the Wells Bannana Bread Ale because I don't usually go in for flavored beers, but the bartender sold me on it and he was right... it was excellent and gave me a warm feeling, probably a Pavlovian response that triggered memories of my mother's home-cooked Banana Bread.

The Speakeasy isn't open to the public quite yet (though it will be very soon), but the rooftop patio is certainly worth visiting. The bar on the roof actually offers their own cocktail menu, with the tasty East of Fremont's (a potent mix of Gin, Cucumber soda, and interesting spices that give the drink a nice kick) and features plush couches for kicking back with drinks and enjoying views of The Fremont area and the city's skyline. The rooftop is where live bands will perform in the future, don't be afraid to climb the staircase, with its black  New Orleans-style railings, to access the chilled out area.

The creators of Commonwealth hit it out of the park with their quirky design flourishes and seriously great pre-prohibition style mixology program as they've brought yet another exciting and unique local business to a neighborhood that is quickly becoming the coolest and most colorful corner of Las Vegas.

Drais The Roof: Bills To Be Replaced By Nightclub-Centric Resort

It seems that low-rent casinos are going the way of the dodo bird, at least as far as The Strip goes.

After the closing of O'Shea's a mere six months ago and the continued metamorphosis of Imperial Palace into The Quad, Caesars Entertainment has just confirmed plans to shutter their other mid-Strip Casino-equivalent of a dive bar, Bill's Gamblin' Hall. The home of $3 buckets of beer and obscenely low stakes gaming tables, Bill's will close in February 2013 in order to undergo a $185 million face-lift that will turn it into a hip nightlife mecca. After the place is shut down for about a year, Bill's will be reborn as a beautiful butterfly with as yet undisclosed new name that will sport such new features as a upgraded hotel rooms, a glass balcony hanging over The Strip, and three new stories designed to house a 59,000 square foot nightclub and pool deck managed by the good people who run Drai's After Hours. While Caesars has been mum about the new name of the renovated property, a popular rumor amongst Vegas-watchers is that the entire property will be actually re-branded as a Drai's Resort, which would a greater emphasis on the nightlife aspect than any other resort in town (which is saying a lot, considering the trend in Sin City over the last decade).

This makes a certain amount of sense, I suppose. Drai's is such a popular and well-loved brand that they opened a second location on the top of The W Hotel in Hollywood (something I've never understood since Drai's Las Vegas made its name as an "After Hours" spot to head to after all of the other clubs start to empty out, an irrelevant feature in a city where its illegal to serve alcohol after 2:00 AM. I'd begin a rant against this stupidly outdated law if it wasn't so severely off-topic, but seriously... what are we, living in the middle ages?). Nightclubs continue to bring in tons of revenue for Las Vegas resorts, even as the recession has driven down their gambling profits. It's a good, smart play for Caesars. So why does the shuttering of an admittedly pretty grungy casino give me a case of the so-sads?

It's certainly possible that I'm only feeling melancholy because today is one of the 10 or so un-sunny days we get in Los Angeles every year and I've been listening to Radiohead and The Smiths on Spotify all day, but the imminent demise of Bill's has got me feeling a little blue.

The place is the last of a dying breed of truly cheap spots on The Strip. While Downtown, despite the many hip additions opening there seemingly every month, still has plenty of Bill's-like spots that feature really cheap booze and even cheaper table limits, The Strip is starting to run dry similar spots. I'm not saying that Bill's is the only type of Casino that should be on The Strip... but I am saying that it is a type of casino that should be represented somewhere along Las Vegas Boulevard. While nightclubs filled with attractive people trying to look disaffected enough to get past the most discerning doormen are certainly part of a balanced Las Vegas vacation experience, so too should slumming it at a place like Bill's to enjoy hot-tub sized buckets of beer and a roulette table where it takes you an hour and a half to lose $15.

Don't get me wrong... there's nothing "nice" about Bill's. The carpets were ugly, the place smelled like stale beer and cigarettes, the rooms were adequate at best, and it was often more crowded with scum and villainy than the Mos Eisley Cantina. The staff is mostly old-timers who took their time pouring decidedly non-fancy yet stiff (and cheap! so cheap!) cocktails. But that was the charm of the place; it had character. It's one of the spots that felt like it was actually connected to old Las Vegas (even though the name Bill's Gamblin' Hall was something of a reinvention itself, as the casino was once known as The Barbary Coast).

The texture of the place will soon be replaced by something new and slick, designed to appeal to the young hip taste-makers who won't have nostalgia for the charmingly ugly place it replaced. But I have to wonder... are we not near a saturation point in terms of nightclubs in Las Vegas? Yes, it's been the most reliable money maker for resort owners in the last decade, but the emphasis on nightlife is starting to make everything on The Strip feel a little too homogenous. I know, I know... it's The Strip. It's the main tourist drag in Las Vegas, but do we really need an entire resort (if rumors of The Drai's re-branding are to be believed) built wholey around the nightclub experience?

Drai's is one of my favorite clubs in Las Vegas (in the fact that it's one of the few nightclubs at which I don't feel a crippling sense of letdown once I'm finally admitted in after waiting in an infuriatingly long line), and I'm sure the management of the club will knock it out of the park when the remodeled Bill's opens its doors in 2014. It just makes me a little sad that another unique, if kinda scummy, part of the Las Vegas landscape will be replaced by something slick and trendy. The good news is that you (and I) still have have a few moths to head out to Bill's to tip back one last bucket of cheap Beer and gamble away some cash with their dirt-caked chips in Gamblin' Hall's honor.

Goin' Off The Rails On A Crazy Train: Los Angeles To Las Vegas Rail Line To Open In 2013?

Sometimes, dreams do come true.

There have been rumors of a train running from Los Angeles to Las Vegas for years now, and it seems like those rumors are finally coming true. While early concepts involved a sleek, futuristic high-speed Bullet Train that would smoothly whisk passengers on Mag-Lev tracks to Sin City in about two hours using anime-style technology (a rumor that became so popular that a local band named themselves after the concept), we unfortunately don't live in Japan (a country that exists in the future and present at the same time), so it sounds like we'll have to settle for a conventional train instead.

The Los Angeles Times reports that Las Vegas Railway Expresss Inc. has inked a deal with Union Pacific Railways to use tracks that were previously only used for freight to take excited passengers from Fullerton to Downtown Las Vegas on Thursday and Friday nights, with return trips on Sundays and Mondays.

The creators of The X-Train are making up for lack of sci-fi technology (and for the fact that you'll be forced to go to Fullerton, of all places) with what they promise will be a luxurious "party train" experience. Tickets will go for a relatively steep but not outrageous $99, which will reportedly include a meal and one free cocktail.  The X-Train will be up and running, if everything stays on track (pun fully intended) by late 2013.

The trip will takes less than five hours, and the fact that the train will have a bar running throughout the duration will certainly make the experience fly by faster than the usual drive on the 15, which is often gridlocked with bumper to bumper traffic (a situation that will only get worse as the number of cars that drive on the interstate is expected to more than double in less than a decade).

Amenities will include meals prepared fresh in an onboard kitchen, flat screen TVs at passenger tables, sports lounges for watching games, concierge desks for booking Cirque Du Soleil tickets and dinner reservations, and some sort of live performances (which will most likely just mean DJs spinning in some sort of moving lounge room, but might mean live bands performing in cramped quarters, like in that horrible Buick ad featuring the even more horrible band Neon Trees "rocking out" on a bus). Unsurprisingly, the train will also feature private cars that can be rented for bachelor/ bacehlorette parties, corporate meetings, or Eyes Wide Shut style rich person mask orgies.

I like the idea of hopping aboard a Las Vegas-bound train from LA (though it would be even better if the train actually departed from LA and not Fullerton) and not worrying about driving on what can be a stressful drive on a packed two-lane interstate (especially since I'm usually the one who ends up driving when I head to Vegas with friends... though sometimes people have to drive my car back on the Sunday morning after Saturday night antics, ya feel me bra?), though the potential for douche-tastic antics runs incredibly high.

There's no denying the fact that a thing called "The X-Train" that whisks people to Sin City and promises to be a party on rails will definitely attract an element of Ed Hardy bros with frosted tips (as a side-note... how are there people still wearing Ed Hardy? All evidence on OKCupid points to the fact that ladies would never sleep with a dude who wears that stuff, but I guess there are still enough girls out there for whom T-Shirts with bedazzled Japanese Tigers printed onto them isn't a deal-breaker), but maybe, just maybe, the creators of The X Train will take a hint from the fact that their train's destination is in the increasingly quirky Downtown neighborhood and include some more offbeat offerings that appeal to folks looking for something a little more outside the box(car).

Just think about it... the creators of this crazy train have the opportunity to bring Wes Anderson's obsessively art-directed train cars from The Darjeeling Limited to life (with a more Las Vegan than Indian twist, of course). Hire cool artists to paint and decorate the train, stock the bar with interesting Craft Brews and fresh Cocktail muddlings, hire some actually unpredictable live entertainment acts (which means bands better than the friggin' Neon Trees and DJs that spin something more interesting than Dubstep or Top 40), and bring experts onboard to chat with passengers about interesting (and sellable!) topics, like Wine and Food. If the train is seriously serving fresh meals made by in their kitchen, why not hire cool Chefs that can put together something that is locally sourced as they start to prepare it and becomes less so as the journey continues? All I'm saying is offer a little something extra for people who are not interested in the typical Las Vegas experience.

All of these ideas are probably fantasies, I know. The X-Train will probably be dominated by lowest common denominator programming, cheap mass-market booze options, and disappointing food which will please the less discerning percentage of the population who end up riding the train. And I'll swallow it without (too much) complaint (even as I try to plug my nose from the overwhelming stench of Axe Body Spray), because drinking on a train sure beats sitting in traffic for hours on a Friday night. Bring on The X-Train, in whatever form it ultimately takes!

Turkey Day in Vegas

Thanksgiving is supposed to a family holiday. But it's also supposed to be a celebration of when our nation stole the land we live on from the natives who lived peacefully and in harmony with the place we now call home. Also, it's a day when Al Roker points at floats of outdated cartoon characters (why is Underdog still included in the Macy's Day Parade every year? Do kids even know who Underdog is?).

Anyway, Thanksgiving is one of those holidays for which you might need a holiday. Your family might get mad at you, but why not avoid the usual questions about when you're getting your life together from your parental units and skip the stressful part altogether with a trip to Las Vegas instead of home? While this idea seems irresponsible, you know that it also seems more than a little bit appealing. And while many places across the country are closed up for Turkey-Day, most of Las Vegas is open for business. So what, if you were to take the audacious plunge and forgo family-time for Sin City, are the best things to do in Las Vegas over Thanksgiving?

I'm thankful that you asked, because it gives me the not so rare opportunity to pontificate on my opinions about how to spend a successful Sin City Turkey-Day.

FOOD
Even if you skip tradition and head to Las Vegas, you'll probably want to enjoy a Turkey dinner somewhere. It just feels downright un-American to not consume the tryptophan-filled bird somewhere, and luckily you'll have many options around town at which to enjoy a good ol' American-style Thanksgiving dinner.

If you want to go all fancy-pants with your dinner, Le Cirque at Bellagio is offering a five course (and very expensive) prix fix meal with stuffed Turkey and the like. The food will most definitely be perfect (and better than your mother makes it... sorry Ma', but it's true) and the service will be impeccable, but if you're looking for a more downscale experience, then New York New York's Irish Pub Nine Fine Irishmen is serving Guinness-Glazed Turkey, which sounds pretty awesome (and much cheaper than a five-course prix fix meal at an internationally acclaimed resto).

DESSERT
You won't miss your mom's Apple Pie when you can visit some of Sin City's decadent sweet-centric businesses. Choose from dessert haven Sugar Factory at The Paris, Planet Hollywood, MGM Grand, or Mirage, as well as Chocolate-centric places like Jean Philippe Patisserie (with locations in The Bellagio and Aria), or Max Brenner at The Forum Shoppes in Caesars Palace. Some of the most sweetly decadent desserts are available at the whimsical Serendipity 3 at Caesars Palace, which features mega-sized Chocolate Blackout Cake, Apple Cobbler A La Mode, Deep Fried Orea Sundae, or their world famous Frrrozen Hot Chocolate. If you're feeling extra fancy and want to show off all of the money you have as a bonafide 1%er, the restaurant also serve a $1,000 "Grand Opulence" Sundae, which is topped by 23 Karat Goldleaf and Gold Flakes and is in the Guinness World Record Books as the most expensive Sundae on the planet.

FOOTBALL
Yes, Thanksgiving is a great day to check out and watch a bunch of football games. Luckily, this is Las Vegas we're talking about and you can find plenty of spots to post up for hours and watch all of the games at once. Sports bars galore, such as Lagasse's Stadium at The Venetian (I'm no longer boycotting Sheldon Adelson's resort now that his $100 million in donations aimed at defeating the President TANKED BIG TIME) or the Brit-tinged Crown and Anchor will have all the games playing on flatscreen TVs. Or you can get MORE emotionally involved in the outcome of an event you have no control over by putting some money on the games at any of the bazillion sports books located in every single casino... where they'll bring you a free drinks to help deal with the inevitable trauma of all of your bets crumbling to dust.

DRINKING
The only Turkey I need for Thanksgiving is Wild Turkey, amIright? Heavy drinking is generally a necessary part of any holiday, usually because being around family for an extended period of time is essentially impossible without a little help from alcoholic beverages. But just because you've narrowly escaped an awkward familial reunion for Sin City doesn't mean you won't want to indulge... and of course Las Vegas is as good a place as any if you feel like having a drink, or two, or many more than two. It will come as no surprise that I'll recommend some of the more divey corners of Sin City when looking for a place to post up for some serious drinking... my first endorsement from when I started this blog nearly two years ago was The Double Down Saloon, and the punk rock dive remains a favorite. Downtown has a nice collection of interesting watering holes located near one another, including hipster hang The Griffin, the artsy Artifice, or nightlife spot for geeks Insert Coins, amongst other great choices.

Enjoy high end cocktails at The Chandelier in The Cosmopolitan (a bar that is, as the name implies, actually built into the inside of a massive Chandelier, with glowing beaded lights) or the mixology mecca The Downtown Cocktail Room, while Beer lovers can enjoy an excellent selection of Craft Brews at the off the Strip Aces and Ales or Public House in The Venetian, and winos can delude themselves into believing that their alcoholism is a classy habit at The Rio Wine Cellar & Tasting Room, Double Helix Wine & Whiskey in The Shoppes at The Palazzo, or Aureole in Mandalay Bay (a restaurant and bar with a Wine tower so tall that the beautiful ladies who fetch the bottles for you have strap into a pulley system).

GAMBLING
While betting money you'll most likely lose pointlessly doesn't seem to fit in the holiday spirit, think about it: Thanksgiving is a holiday about celebrating America, and what is more American than Las Vegas? And how do you celebrate the city more than by indulging in the main reason for its existence? We call this line of logic "justification" or "enabling," but whatever you want to call it, if you're in Las Vegas, you're gonna end up wagering at least some money. Do it right by finding the places that feature low minimum bets so you don't lose your shirt too quickly, such as Bill's Gamblin' Hall on The Strip or basically all of the places in Downtown.