new year countdown in las vegas

a couple of my friends and i braved the rainstorm on the last day of 2004 to troop to the sin city and celebrate there the end of the year and welcome 2005 with a bang.

we were supposed to leave around 9:00 am to avoid the mad rush to vegas but we ended up leaving around lunch-time. traffic was bad, not because of the horde of cars but because the hard rains prevented motorists from driving beyond the legal speed limit. by the time we reached victorville, the sun started showing. hah. thank you mother nature.

las vegas boulevard (aka the strip) was already teeming with pedestrians by the time we got there. the last time i was here during new year's eve was during the millennium and the year after that. next to new york, i think new year in vegas is the next best thing. we checked in our hotel and had our power naps. it was going to be a long night.

aside from welcoming 2005, las vegas also welcomed the new year with a big bang since 2005 is also the city's hundredth year. knowing the fact that the city spent more than $50 million in fireworks alone, it made me think about how far this amount could go if it were donated to the tsunami/earthquake victims in southeast asia. i know it would probably never happen but i really wondered.

back inside the casinos, drinks were overflowing, people were everywhere and gamblers were having a good time. i observed an asian couple, probably tourists, who were betting $1,000 a hand on black jack. and they had two tall piles of $1,000. they did not even seem to mind if they lost five, six, seven times in a row. sigh.

i lost 20 bucks when i played the slot machine. i felt bad. that's 20 bucks down the drain. oh well.