JeffCroft.com

11.20.2006 // 22 Comments // Aldrich Ct. Townhome Vegas, baby. Vegas.

Comments

1. 001 // Ryan Berg // 11.20.2006 // 1:40 AM

   Please tell me that while you’re in Vegas you’ll be attending the Kansas vs Florida basketball game? Or at least Kansas vs Ball State?

   It would be a waste of a perfectly-timed Vegas trip if you don’t!

   Regardless, make sure to enjoy the buffets. I miss the buffets more than the gambling. And be sure to check out The Fremont Street experience downtown. It’s a cool lookin’ (and free) show.

2. 002 // Jeff Croft // 11.20.2006 // 1:53 AM

   Sadly, no — I won’t be attending any KU basketball. And you should probably be thankful — I’m almost positive the reason the ‘Hawks lost to ORU was the fact that I attended that game. But thanks for the reminder — I’ll go pack some KU gear so I can at least rep the block.

   And thanks for the other tips, as well. :)

3. 003 // Michael Heilemann // 11.20.2006 // 2:36 AM

   Dude, you’re so the money, and you don’t even know it!

   … Ehm, that’s the extent of my contribution :)

4. 004 // Julie // 11.20.2006 // 8:17 AM

   I hope that Bust is on the list of women’s magazines you’re reading, as it’s one of the only ones out there that isn’t so condescending that it makes me want to retch ;) … And the music reviews are great.

5. 005 // Ryan Berg // 11.20.2006 // 8:38 AM

   That’s a shame. It’s not like there’s anything to do in Vegas aside from watch college basketball…

   Anyway, enjoy your trip.

   And heck, you knowThe Kansan is always looking toward the future of online newspaper design, too (moreso than our Ellington/Django roots). Let me know if the JW can play nice with its friend up on the big hill.

6. 006 // Brian // 11.20.2006 // 12:10 PM

   If you have never seen it Blue Man Group is truly a blast. It is very entertaining although some argue it has jumped the shark. I still say it is fun. Also, there is an Indoor skydiving place out there. I did it in Florida and all I can say is don’t grin too big otherwise the slobber runs up your face. http://www.flyawayindoorskydiving.com/

7. 007 // Brian Ford // 11.20.2006 // 12:14 PM

   I’ve like to somehow create a playlist on the iMac and have the MacBook Pro copy the files in that playlist over to itself, so I have some music and video on the go.

   Can’t you put the playlists you want on your iPod and then plug that iPod into the other computer? The new iPod firmware allows you to upload music “off” of an iPod onto another guest computer. Hrm — except, now that I think about it — it only works on iTS purchased music. Stupid DRM.
   

   I’m heading off to Vegas early Tuesday morning for a vacation with the family (and girlfriend, as well). I know, it’s an odd place to spend Thanksgiving. But, I will be with my family,

   Oh yes, I believe I’ve heard of this trip — it’s the one Carolyn and I weren’t invited to. Despite being — you know…family.

8. 008 // Brian Breslin // 11.20.2006 // 12:49 PM

   Jeff, what kinda stakes do you want to play hold’em at? There are a number of daily tourneys around town for everything from $35+5 to 1000+ Last time I was in vegas I played a $55 at the imperial palace (not much fun, filled with bad players and really old people). I do recommend the sit-n-go tourneys at the MGM held whenever enough people signup. They have $60 and $130 levels. email me if you have any other questions, I might be able to pull up a list I had of daily tourneys, and give you recommendations on which places have good poker rooms.

9. 009 // Kyle // 11.20.2006 // 1:06 PM

   Looks like you just missed The Drive. Basically GM charges 10 bucks to test drive two cars on an off road or race track.

   A couple of my coworkers had a blast running a Hummer through the off road course.

10. 010 // Jeff Croft // 11.20.2006 // 1:12 PM

    @Brian P: Good tips, thanks man.

    @ Brian F: Yeah, the iPod sync thing is ITS songs only. My coworker Joseph pointed out Martian, which looks like it will do exactly what I want — but I’ve not tried it yet. Also, I wasn’t involved in the invitations for the Vegas trip. :)

    @Brian B: That’s good news. I’m mostly looking for tourneys (sit-and-go or scheduled) that are under $100 or so. My plan is to play several in that price range if I can find ‘em, and one higher-stakes ones while I’m there. Thanks a lot for the tips.

    @Kyle: Damn, that sounds awesome. Oh well. :(

11. 011 // Kevin Hamm // 11.20.2006 // 1:28 PM

    Blue Man Group is a must, especially with the new interactive text messages in the show. As for clubs, I’ll send you an email in a bit, I might have a guest list access for ya… heh heh

12. 012 // Jeff Croft // 11.20.2006 // 2:35 PM

    @Juile: I hadn’t checked out Bust, and I did check out Bust after your comment — it looks very cool, but I don’t think it’s got the same target audience as the site I’m working on. This one is for a slightly older crowd — more along the lines of Martha Stewart Living or Oprah’s magazine.

    Definitely glad to hear about another good woman’s magazine, though. I will check it out further. :)

13. 013 // Monique // 11.20.2006 // 2:47 PM

    I see Ryan already mentioned the Fremont Street experience so I second that - a total must-see. Of course, Binion’s is on Fremont Street and if you are interested at all in poker (the history, etc.) you have to go to Binion’s. If you’re into shows, you really out to get tickets to one or more of the Cirque du Soleil ones. I can’t recommend any of the singing acts as I never attended any of those. For the more adventurous, you can take helicopter rides over the Grand Canyon. Didn’t do it last time, on the list for next time.

14. 014 // James Asher // 11.20.2006 // 4:52 PM

    I was in Vegas fairly recently and only played poker at Circus Circus - laugh if you must. It was $65 I think and they had 4 games a night starting around 5, two hours apiece.

    I also know that the Venecian has a nice looking Poker room and had probably six games a day. Most were around $75 I think, also these were 1 or 2 rebuys - which I didn’t like.

    Quite a few casinos on the strip have poker rooms, just gotta find the game you want to get into.

    I’ll agree The Fremont street experience was kinda cool. Just don’t venture off of fremont too much, otherwise you run into a lot of bums and potent smells.

    Going to the top of the stratosphere is kind of neat. Tallest building west of the mississippi and all. If you do go up there, ride the Big Shot - I think that’s what it’s called. Basically it’s the debtonator on top of the stratosphere, that shit is scary. The other rides there are a joke though, so don’t waste your money.

    Also, the ride at the Sahara, it sucks. Well, it doesn’t suck per se, but it’s not worth the money.

    The fountains at night in front of the bellagio are pretty cool.

    Also, go see the water show outside TI if you’ve never seen it. Song of the Sirens or some shit. Cool and free.

    And as a sidenote, there is a chipotle on the strip, it’s next to casino royale, and the price is the same as any other chipotle, so it’s a nice cheap place to eat. And if you go there, look for the bum who rummages through the trash and likes to smoke weed in front, he was pretty cool.

    And lastly, wear good shoes otherwise you will blister the living shit out of your feet.

15. 015 // Dylan // 11.20.2006 // 9:16 PM

    Wow, I am highly intrigued and impressed by the “node” commenting system on the Django Book website. Interesting concept, well executed too. It even degrades fairly well with styles or JS disabled.

16. 016 // John // 11.21.2006 // 8:16 AM

    You’re only 2hrs from Hoover Dam, maybe not the hottest thing in Vegas, but definitely worth seeing.

17. 017 // raman // 11.21.2006 // 3:58 PM

    What about which casinos have daily Hold ‘˜Em tournaments at a reasonable buy-in?

    It’s running on ancient/cheap server but this django site has information on tournaments:

    http://www.thepokeratlas.com

    e.g.:

    http://www.thepokeratlas.com/venue/nevada/bellagio-hotel-and-casino/tournaments/thisweek/

    do you want some type of feed/interface with vegas tourneys and buy-ins?

    cheers,

    raman

18. 018 // Joshua Works // 11.21.2006 // 5:10 PM

    WOWOWOW!(TM) That node commenting system is definitely impressive, and I can certainly see a lot of utility for certain situations (in The Django Book’s implementation, it reminds me of the MS Word’s “Track changes” tool).

    But if I may make this comment overly-meta, it gets me thinking about the point CROWDCTRL was trying to make about the “usefulness” of comments (on your site, and in general), and especially, to Jason Kottke’s one-time point about the indirect relationship between “the opportunity” to leave comments and their ultimate value. That is, the more chance users have to leave comments, the less valuable those comment become; or conversely, the less opportunity you give users to have their voice heard, the more effort they’ll put into making their commentary valuable or thoughtful.

    I definitely don’t agree with CROWDCTRL’s analysis of comments - it’s far more complicated than whether comments are inherently good or evil. I’m not even sure if I agree with Kottke’s theory either, because even on the rare occasion of him enabling comments, there’s more than a handful of asinine, lewd, flaming, and valueless “me too” comments.

    And so back to the Django Book’s implementation of the node comments: here they’ve given users almost an infinite amount of opportunity to comment on every last word of the book, and the result is far more specific than I imagine anyone really cared to get: mostly nitpicky, everyone’s-a-critic copywriting. If ever there was a situation for that to be valuable on the web, I think this is it — a beta book that needs to be proofread and improved by a community — but I’d be interested in knowing how that all works out with Adrian and Jacob. Seems to me like there’s a lot of “This sentence doesn’t work for me. Maybe try moving it up a bit.” than actual feedback.

    Anyway, I can’t help but feel like this comment is somehow hypocritical, so I’m going to shut up now.

19. 019 // Joshua Works // 11.21.2006 // 10:32 PM

    So I did some reading of the new Django book tonight, and, gosh, I find it almost impossible to resist the urge to leave my grammatical, stylistic, and literary criticism out of it. Maybe because I find so much to dissent against; but maybe only because I know I have a forum to speak my mind (if not “be heard”).

20. 020 // Leigh // 11.22.2006 // 12:12 PM

    We’re playing the 7p at the Sahara tonight.

    Buy In: $40 Starting stack: $2500Dealer Bonus: $2 = 500 chipsRe-Buy: $20Rounds: 20 minutes
    

    PS: love your blog design

21. 021 // Adam // 11.22.2006 // 1:53 PM

    Jeff, in regards to Quicksilver, there is not usually a need for a specific module when it comes to web searching a particular site. Make sure the “Web Search” module is installed, which includes a Flickr search by default. However, if you would like to make it even easier, follow the instructions at http://coelomic.wordpress.com/2006/01/02/quicksilver-tips/ to setup a trigger, except substitute a flickr query for the google info. The resultant query should look something like http://www.flickr.com/search/?q=*&w=11111111%11N11 ; just run a Flickr search from within your own gallery to find the URL pattern. Then you can setup CMD-SHIFT-F or something similar to cut straight to a Flickr search query.

22. 022 // Zeke // 11.22.2006 // 4:36 PM

    If you have an iPod you can plug the iPod into your laptop, and then play songs directly off the ipod. This is kind of lame because you could just listen directly to the iPod.

    The better solution is to put the playlist on to the ipod then use senuti (itunes spelled backwards) to take the off the ipod and store them on the laptop.

    If you don’t want to use a program you can just enable disk access on the iPod and manual put the folders of music onto the ipod and then on to you laptop.

    Senuti is by far the best solution since you can copy playlists and all that jazz.

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