This is just a short note to say that we are now very likely to attend the Leaguefest in Las Vegas. I’m looking forward to meeting many of you in person over Memorial Day weekend!
Jason Kuznicki
Jason Kuznicki is a research fellow at the Cato Institute and contributor of Cato Unbound. He's on twitter as JasonKuznicki. His interests include political theory and history.
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Excellent! Spouse? If so, that raises our head count to at least ten.Report
Psst! We still need a list.Report
Oh yeah. More or less confirmed to date:
Still waiting for word from (in no particular order):
If you don’t appear on this list it’s because I either saw a “can’t make it” or have seen nothing from you. Let us know!
Anyway, if all the confirmeds and tentatives do make it, and bring spouses/dates, that’s a head count of up to 24, which by itself wouldn’t be so bad for our first attempt at a national meetup. That’s certainly enough to request our own room for drinks and dinner. I’ll hold off a little more to see if we can get some more people to make plans and commit before contacting management.Report
What is the plan with regards to hotels or whatever?
Is it one of those things where we’ll all want to be staying somewhere where we can reasonably expect to hang out together? I mean, I might prefer to sit around and drink in a bar that is very, very near my hotel (if not in it) to sitting around and drinking while thinking about the shuttle I have to take back to my hotel.
Is this just one of those things where this guy wants the Luxor, that guy wants Treasure Island, this other guy misses the Stardust more than anything else and so will be staying at The Greek Isles (“The Next Best Thing!”), and that’s pretty much that?Report
It makes sense to me for us all to be close, if not in the same hotel. I think Burt said something about maybe getting a group rate?Report
We’ll be at the LVH Hotel — formerly the Las Vegas Hilton. I had Vegas.com cards to burn, so I used them and have reservations there already. It’s off the Strip, but not much, and has its own faintly-desparate faded glamour. If you must stay somewhere else, I say go ahead, but Jaybird is right that it’s likely to work out best if we’re all at the same place. The monorail is one way you might explore getting there with minimal expense, although cabs were not particularly expensive the last time I was there.
So that brings up Phase II — where to meet for dinner and drinks?
There are several more than suitable venues for cocktails, most of which are themed in the cheesy way that only Vegas can deliver with a straight face, like the space bar built from sets left over from the sadly-defunct Star Trek Experience (really, this is so cheesy, how can we pass it up?), the bars attached to the various nicer restaraunts, as well as the obligatory sports bar and the also-obligatory poolside cabana bar. We can gather at one or the other of these places over the course of Saturday afternoon.
But I figure we’ll set the formal meetup for dinner Saturday evening. The LVH has four dining venues:
So what do people prefer? I suspect either the Italian or the steakhouse will be the choice, but I’m good with any of the four choices.Report
You guys should go here:
http://www.usmenuguide.com/table34.html
The grilled rack of pork with chipotle potatoes is suitable payment for an assassination.
By the way, I love the Hilton. She’s the last old broad left over now that the ‘Dust is dust.Report
We incline toward sushi, but any of these sound great.
I’m with Jaybird — on vacation, I typically want to drink very, very, very near my hotel room. Poolside is fine, but on a Star Trek set would be kitschy-cool too.Report
Assuming we go, we’d presumably throw our lot in with “steakhouse,” though we would never be opposed to sushi/hibachi.Report
Steakhouse.
(You could probably have guessed that.)
Report
So long as it has decent food and a decent bar, we’re happy.Report
We will both be attending, yes. The little one will be at grandma’s for the week.Report
Which airport are you flying out of? There is basically no way to fly from DC to Vegas without auctioning the first-born that you’re leaving with grandma, as far as I can tell.Report
I’m sort of fuzzy on the details. I just know it involves a lot of frequent flier miles and a nine-hour one-way trip with plenty of layover.Report
That’s why we’ll not meet on Friday, to accomodate those who have these kinds of issues. I guess we can do a pre-meet for those who actually are there Friday night, but the official get-together should start Saturday. I’m thinking we gather at the space bar and move on to whichever restaraunt the consensus settles upon.Report
The probability that I will be able to attend for at least a Saturday just went from 0 to 62%.Report
I’d love to, but my bank account says no way.
Report
Ultimately, this is how I feel. Unless I can pass it off as “research” or “learning a foreign language” or something like that — but I imagine that travel proposals to Vegas are just automatically tossed in the “NO” pile. If there does wind up being a Skype-in-the-rest-of-us-bums bit, let me know, though.Report
Shawn & JL, where would you guys be coming from if you did come?Report
IowaReport
Michigan, most likely.Report
Maybe we should have a Michigan mini-Leaguefest someday.Report
I’m down with that.Report
Hockey fan? My college just built a bar attached to it’s hockey rink. Of course we’re a little off the beaten path, but not far from AA. Of course I’d be willing to travel elsewhere in the state.Report
What is it with college hockey up here? I know it’s cold and all, but isn’t that a reason to go sit by a fire with a book, rather than play on the ice? Someone could get hurt!Report
College hockey may be just about the most testosterone-inducing, heckler-friendly, alcohol consumption-encouraging, sport on the planet. In other words, there is no better activity for the Northern American college male between the months of November and March.Report
Gotcha. Makes sense now, though I’m pretty sure that we’ve had a couple of comment threads lately that might qualify.Report