Living Las Vegas

At Home in the City of Lights

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Top Vegas Hotels: Bellagio, Luxor, Rio

Roads from the Ashes: An Odyssey in Real Life on the Virtual Frontier, by Megan Edwards

Events in Las Vegas

The South Coast: Baptism by Fire

In Rome, it’s the Spanish Steps or the Pantheon. In San Francisco, it’s the Ferry Building or Coit Tower. But in Las Vegas, it’s always casinos that give you your bearings. The Stratosphere tower and the beam from the Luxor Pyramid anchor the two ends of the Strip, and everybody in the valley identifies neighborhoods by means of the nearest gaming destination…

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The Bots Came Back: DARPA Grand Challenge 2005

Whenever I go out into the desert to look around, I always run across one of three basic humanoid groups: geeks, grunts, or gearheads. The geeks are there because scientists are often banished to the howling desiccated wilds to carry out their explosive or radioactive experiments or to simulate life on other planets. The grunts are there because large arid expanses are perfect places for soldiers to drop bombs, play war games, and even fight real wars. And gearheads have been fans of dry lake beds ever since cars were invented because they are free of radar guns and traffic lights.

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San Gennaro Does Vegas

To outsiders, it might seem strange that a city with world-class rollercoasters on its main drag gets excited when a carnival comes to town. You’d think that a portable Ferris wheel might be a little ho-hum to people who can go up in the Stratosphere tower any day of the year, and that a petting zoo featuring a goat and a rooster could seem awfully tame compared to the white tigers at the Mirage or the lions at the MGM Grand.

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Lights, Camera, Countdown: The 48-Hour Film Project Comes to Las Vegas

“Let’s make a movie!” The proliferation of affordable cameras and editing software has made such exhortations far easier to act upon than they were in the olden days of celluloid and splicing. Thanks to digital technology, more and more people every day are indulging their inner Spielbergs. With so much creativity finding its way onto hard drives and DVDs, it’s no wonder that phenomena like the 48-Hour Film Project are in growth mode.

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Karaoke at the Bootlegger

“Karaoke.” Try suggesting it to your out-of-town visitors and see what kind of response you get. Among my friends, it ranges from “You’ve got to be joking!” to “Eeeew!” So then I have to say, “No! This is different! It really is!” And then they look at me sadly, knowing in their hearts that Las Vegas has stripped me of every last vestige of good taste.

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