Work

I used to work right on the Strip, in the middle of all of the casino activity. I now work about as far away from it as you can get and still pretend you are in Vegas. Out at the eastern edge of Henderson, about 25 miles away.


Those are the casino towers, over to the right way down there.

Every payday these two guys show up to wash cars. They bring a little tent and a truck with a water tank and power sprayer and do a pretty good job.


Must be nice to work outside in the shade. When it gets up to 110 they can spray each other with the hose.

We have two little grass patches out front. Since we are out in the desert a lot of animals come by. I've seen roadrunners and quail and coyotes and chipmunks, but the most obvious are the bunnies. Looks like one family, as it started out with two big bunnies, moved to two big ones and four or five little ones and now they are all about the same size. They move between the two grassy areas, munching and just sitting. Usually in the evening all of them are gathered together at the corner, just waiting. They are used to people walking by, and just stare back not moving. But walk towards them and they'll sprint away.

Around the office

Unfortunately I currently have to work at a job. No, not independently wealthy yet, I still depend on those paychecks to get by. My last employer was the Sands Convention Center, where I provided computer programming services for running the place, and created web sites as required. The Sands Convention Center is attached to the Venetian/Palazzo hotels (sorry, resorts). As visitors coming to Las Vegas declined along with the economy all of the big Las Vegas resorts had massive layoffs. The Sands was unaffected by several over at the Venetian, but eventually we were included in a round that covered about 2,000 people. The Venetian laid off 2,000, the Sands only 20, but proportionately it was a larger percentage of the Sands workforce. It doesn’t take too many permanent people to run a convention center, we brought in temporary workers to help put on the shows, the full time staff just maintained the place and organized renting the place.

I was out of work for a while, and eventually hired by a company located way out at the edge of Henderson, one of the cities that comprise the greater Las Vegas area. Our building is out at the far north eastern edge of the Vegas valley, with no other building within a mile of us. The building is split into areas, and filled with cubicles. Upstairs we have low walls, but downstairs the cubes are smaller and taller, providing isolation for the sales staff talking on their phones.


I’ve got a cube near the outside wall, with a window right behind me., with a view of the open desert and the mountains.


As a result of our location we have a lot of animal visitors to our small spot of grass out front. There is a group of seven or eight rabbits that are out every morning eating the grass. Yesterday one of them was a little different; it seems like he had a little run in with a coyote, as his left ear has a nice bite taken out of the very tip. Just had my cell phone when he was close to the window, so you have to look closely to make out the missing tip.


Besides the rabbits there are lots of little chipmunks skittering around. They are to small and fast and don’t stop to pose for me to get a good photograph. A family of a dozen or so quail also come by. Yesterday a road runner made his appearance, out on the grass with the bunnies.


But the warm summer also brings out some other desert citizens. Last week a rattlesnake was found in the shade of the building. Our office manager is a little snake paranoid, so we have several snake bite kits scattered around, along with a special snake stick to pick them up with – it’s about two meters long with a grasping hook at the end. The stick was used to move this guy (no photos of that, sorry) and it ended up being a young snake, about a meter long with only three or four rattle segments.


Still big enough to cause some pain if he bit anyone.

Last jewelry show photos

Reorganizing my photos, sorry but I’ve lost my list of ones that I have used before, so there will probably be some gaps and repetition. I found some shots taken during the big jewelry show from outside the event.

During setup the carpets are covered with heavy plastic, to protect the flooring from all the traffic and mostly the wheels of small forklift trucks used to move display equipment around. It all gets gathered up and trashed, then after the show new sheets get put down to protect during the move out. It’s pretty heavy plastic sheeting, with nylon strings embedded for strength.


Outside walking in one morning I came across the local police starting to gather. This is the wide area of sidewalk just to the left of the main entrance doors, which are off to the right of this picture. It’s where the police cars park, a lot of regular black and white units, undercover cars and SWAT SUVs. Walking past I can see the SWAT guys putting on their armored vests and unpacking rifles and big guns. This is about 6:30 am; the show opens at 10 so these guys are getting ready early. The sidewalk will fill up, and more cars are put around the corner and also on the center divider as well


Around back before the show starts items are beginning to be delivered. Back by the loading docks these types of vehicles start to gather, waiting to drop off boxes and boxes of goodies.


Yes, pretty impressive array of vehicles used to deliver people and goods. It is the most complicated show we have all year, and the one that takes the most to put on. It does not bring in the largest crowds however, but is the most expensive to put on.

On Monday when my coworker J and I went for our lunchtime walk we ended up inside (well, it was 101 at that point and a little warm for us to be wandering in the sunshine outside dressed pretty) and the casino was packed. There was a long line for the poker area, a tournament had started last week and there were lines to get in every day since the opening, the first day (I think it was Wednesday) there were over 100 people in line and the room already looked full. There was also a slot tournament going on right across from the poker room, these run every month so are nothing real special, but we do stop and watch people just punching buttons like crazy. The rest of the casino was fairly crowded, with a lot of people at the slots and assorted table games. We were please to see all the activity, what with the publicity about reduced visitor count and gaming takes with the economic downturn.

When we got back to our facility in the rear of the complex we were discussing our summer slowdown. There are very few conventions during July and August, for some reason people don’t come to Vegas on business during those months. I guess they go on vacations, and hit cooler places for business trips. But the first week of September things pick up, with two months solid of all rooms in use. There was a billiard show last week, and a table tennis tournament, making use of two of our five halls. Then nothing up there until mid July when Wheel of Fortune comes to tape shows for five days. Contestants are in this week to be screened again for the shows, but that’s over in one of the ballrooms of the big resort hotel casino meeting complex next door. This week there are activities for kids – some type of boot camp to get your kid trained to be a model or something.

Back in the lobby we met someone from the accounting department, who discussed one of our tech guys getting laid off. Being out of the office we had not heard of any people leaving, but she talked about a half dozen other people being let go. J and I had just talked about this one and myself being the most expendable, and sure enough, after I sat down at my computer I got a phone call inviting me over to the Human Resources office where I was told I was also being let go. So these will probably be the last photos from that facility, and I am off searching for work here in town. Maybe I’ll find something with another casino, and can continue with Strip photos, if not we go back to general stuff around town.

Monday at work

Another Monday – not a very busy weekend around our place. We want to redo our kitchen, and I’ve been trying to figure out what it should look like. I’ve got most of the design done; just have to figure out when to start. (Of course we are going to do it ourselves – why pay somebody else to have the fun?) Our house was built in the 70’s, and has one of those drop down light boxes with fluorescent fixtures in it. That is going to come down and the ceiling raised. I like the overall glow of the big lamps, so probably will put some other fluorescents in, but also will put a lot of can lights – I’ve always liked a lot of light when I’m trying to do something. So that will involve climbing into the attic and moving aside all of that blown in insulation, otherwise our kitchen will be knee deep in fiberglass when the ceiling comes down. And in Vegas you really don’t want to be in an attic in the summertime. If it’s 110f outside it’s usually a little hotter up under the roof.

We’ve got a group coming over on April 14, don’t really want to start before then in case it’s not done, so that means the middle of April for the attic work, and it’s already supposed to be around 80f by the end of this week. Oh well, as long as there is a lot of water around. Maybe I’ll go up and move the insulation around next weekend – better to start doing some of the stuff now.

I haven’t shown you my desk at the new job yet. Not much to look at – we are in the basement next to the big hall. No cubes, there are only two of us sharing space with the help desk techs.


As far as behind the scenes – this is the hallway I take each day to get to the employee entrance, near the parking garage. It should be obvious that employees don’t rate has high as customers. Also used as parking for the food carts and delivery stands.


Here’s what the hallways out front look like. A little different, no?