The restaurant with A.D.D.

Food is an instrumental part of any good vacation. So it sure was a good thing we managed to squeeze in a few really good meals after the, um, interesting dining experience we had our first night in Vegas.

A few days before our trip, Linda Lou, Rich's host over at Harrah's called to ask if there was any way we would be willing to go to an entirely comped dinner over at Cafe Martorano, the newest Italian restaurant at the Rio Hotel and Casino. She'd even sent a limo for us. Somehow we mustered up enough strength to oblige.

Of course I'm still not entirely sure what I make of the restaurant itself nor its proprietor, wannabe celebrity chef and soon-to-be reality TV show star Steve Martorano. The food was good enough but I could have done without the, ahem, attitude and atmosphere.

It was as if the restaurant was in severe need of some Ritalin. The decor and music literally changed every few minutes. You'd go from a disco ball and Sinatra music to strobe lights and Baby Got Back, all before you had a chance to scarf down the $1200-a-block cheese.

Ah, the insanely expensive cheese. This is where the attitude came in. Our waiter took great delight in telling us how much money Martorano spends on his ingredients and how that made the food so good. As I said before, the food was fine -- I particularly enjoyed the macaroni -- but if the food is really that good, I don't need my greasy waiter continuously bragging about it throughout the meal. Good food should speak for itself. Besides, by the third or fourth time that the waiter barked "Gimme your plate" I knew we'd lost a bit of the magic.

I'm also not too impressed with some of the restaurant's policies. For one, there's a strict no changes and no substitutions policy. Chef Martorano says he makes his food one way and one way only. Now I'm a very picky eater and we dine out practically everyday. I honestly can't remember the last time I ordered something without adding, subtracting, or substituting something. If I'm paying for something, it's going to be what I want. (Of course we weren't paying for anything that evening so I had to suck it up.) Somehow I managed to survive this particular meal but only because they basically brought us everything on the menu to sample so I could pick and choose what I wanted.

The other quirky rule is that you can't have a cocktail with dinner. Apparently Martorano believes a drink would distract from the taste of his food. We learned this the hard way when the drink Rich had just gotten at the bar was quickly abducted from the table. Sadly, the drink may have been the tastiest thing that night.

The appetizers included Martorano's homemade meatballs, shrimp scampi bread, and an eggplant stack made up of breaded eggplant, fresh mozzarella and other things I've only heard of on the Food Network. The meatballs were okay but nowhere near as good as the ones my dad makes. I'm generally not a fan of shrimp but I did enjoy the shrimp scampi bread. The eggplant stack was okay too, but mostly because of the cheese.

For our entree, we sampled the chicken cutlet downtown, some kind of sea bass (I passed on this) and the specialty macaroni. I enjoyed the chicken but it was nothing special. I'm also not clear on what makes the specialty macaroni so special. They could have substituted Kraft dinner and I wouldn't have known any better.

I lost track of how many desserts there were but I do remember a very good white cupcake topped in chocolate and some kind of mind-blowing cake. I was so stuffed that I passed on the cannoli and ice cream. For some reason, the waiter kept bragging about how the ice cream was Haagen-Dazs and encouraging us to try it. They must have some sort of deal with them.

The highlight of the evening wasn't the meal but rather a nice perk the casino threw in for us after dinner. They gave us $300 in promotional chips to play. Not being regular table game players, we headed straight for the roulette table where we were lucky enough to parlay the $300 in promotional chips into $300 in actual money.

While it may not sound that way, I actually really enjoyed the evening. A free limo, dinner, drinks, and $300? I could learn to live like this.

Another anniversary in Vegas

What could possibly top a trip to Vegas for our second wedding anniversary? How about another trip to Vegas for our third anniversary, this time comping the hotel stay, all our food, and throwing in free airfare?

Yeah, that'll do it.

This may have been a return trip to Las Vegas for us but we still had a lot of firsts to enjoy there.

It was our first time staying at Caesar's Palace, our first time in Downtown Vegas, our first trip to the Hoover Dam and the first time we saw a Cirque du Soleil show.

It was also the first time I insisted on switching hotel rooms.

In my defense, I was hardly being unreasonable. The first room they gave us didn't have a bathroom door. Now you can call me old fashioned if you like but I've always subscribed to the belief that what happens in the bathroom, stays in the bathroom.

(This would probably be a good time to mention a disturbing trend I've noticed with regard to the bathrooms in hotel rooms lately -- the door is becoming less and less present. We stayed in a beautiful room at Bally's Atlantic City a few weeks back but the bathroom had a swinging salon-style door. Even the room we switched to had just a partly frosted glass door. Am I wrong to expect a little toilet privacy nowadays?)

I should also add that the second room they gave us was much nicer and featured a large whirlpool tub next the bed. It also had a slightly less-than-classy mirror above the bed but the hotel tower was built in the 80s so I'll forgive that along with the popcorn ceiling.

But this trip was about so much more than just our hotel room. It was also about my life-long dream to visit the Hoover Dam and recite the same lines as spoken in such venerable movies as Vegas Vacation and Beavis & Butthead Do America. I can't even begin to explain how big a thrill it was to utter the words "Uh, is this a God damn?" and "Damn. Heh heh. I'll be damned," a la Beavis. I wish I was joking.

Seriously though, the Hoover Dam was more impressive than I imagined. Aside from the fact that the hydro-electricity it produces only came as an added bonus and wasn't part of the original plan, I'm absolutely floored by the thought that a government project could finish two years before expected and at no cost to the American taxpayer. Ah, the Depression era. Good times.

Anyway, now that we've completed two full Vegas trips, I still feel like we've only scratched the surface. There's so much more to see, do, and eat.

And speaking of eating, stay tuned for my next post where I'll describe a somewhat unusual evening at what is meant to be a new Vegas hotspot.

My Purple Evening

The Baltimore Ravens are having a contest to find the team's biggest fan. I'm pretty sure I'm not it.

My wardrobe lacks anything resembling a football jersey. I don't have the energy to tailgate. And, while I do love watching the Ravens play from the temperature-controlled, soft couched, no-line-for-a-dirty-restroom comfort of my home, I'm hardly a crazed superfan.

I did, however, have an awesome time at A Purple Evening, an event held for the female fans of the Ravens. After all, we girls do like playing dress-up and it's not everyday that we get to dress up as a team mascot. (And yes, that's me dressed as Poe in the picture above.)

Joining me for the evening were Kristen and Michele -- two wonderful ladies who thankfully agree with me that the pink-colored jerseys for women are ridiculous. Have we really gotten to the point where purple is no longer feminine enough?

Anyway, the ladies' night gave us a chance to try out a few things we otherwise would never have tried. We got to go down on the field at M&T Bank Stadium for a chance at kicking a field goal, explored the Ravens' locker room, and even had the opportunity to partake in the ritziness that is the club level.

We've already decided to attend the event next year. When we do, we'll have a much more organized game plan. I, for one, will dress more appropriately for the evening and hope to be clad in a Matt Stover jersey. We will also arrive sooner in order to sign up for some of the on-field fun.

On the Ravens' end of things we're hoping for a slightly more organized event where the fact that you have to sign up in advance for the clinics is better publicized. (Then again, I was also hoping for a better outing in Sunday's game against the Browns but I guess we can't always get what we want.)

Oh, and we're also hoping the team will make those cute Purple for Women t-shirts available, even though the logo looks like a deodorant ad.

In the meantime, we'll get to giggle over the pictures from this year. I'm particularly amused that the NFL feels the need to post its rule against gambling on games right in the middle of the team locker room. Then again, considering the arrest records of our players, maybe they know what they're doing.