When I signed my contract with my new apartment in Las Vegas, I had a decent range of dates during which I could decide to move in – a range of one month, to be exact. Being a part of the esports industry, I was pretty excited about the grand opening of the new Esports Arena in Las Vegas, so I made sure to pick a move-in date that would allow me to already be in Las Vegas by grand opening day.

If you weren’t already aware, the grand opening date was yesterday, the 22nd. I personally wasn’t too much of a fan of the party that was going on, or of any of the gaming events that were taking place, but I was still curious about the Arena and wanted to be there in person for this historic moment, so I made my way over to the Luxor Hotel & Casino.

I ended up leaving early after snapping some photos, but I did get a good feel for what the Arena was like. My favorite part was the fact that, because it was in a hotel and casino on the Las Vegas Strip, there were a lot of people, especially those of older generations, who ended up wandering in. Although they looked like they had no idea what was going on, I’m glad that it looked like they were at least enjoying themselves; the fact that the back of the Arena has classic box arcade games helped a bit as well.

A few days ago, I explained that a big day would be coming up soon on the 20th, but like tradition, I tend not to really tell people what’s going on until it’s either already happening, or the event has passed. I do this mainly because I don’t really want to announce things before I am 100% certain they will happen, because I don’t like announcing things then having to announce that the particular thing is no longer happening, but I also do it with security in mind, as I don’t really want people to be able to keep track of what I’m up to.

Well, now that it’s the 21st, I can gladly share what I’ve been up to lately – for the fifth time in the past year and a half, I moved once again.

Back in late November of 2016, I moved from my hometown in the Chicagoland suburbs to Tempo Storm’s first team house in Southern California. From there, I moved to Tempo Storm’s second team house (all while setting them up and preparing them for move-in for our players). Afterwards, I moved out of the team house and into my own one-bedroom apartment. After my lease ended, I moved back into one of Tempo Storm’s team houses, upon which I did mention on my blog that I would be moving to Las Vegas (after I had signed my lease electronically).

Of course, for security purposes, I didn’t want to announce exactly when I was moving, but that day came and passed – it was on the 20th. I am now settled into my Las Vegas apartment (which was pretty easy because I didn’t really have that many belongings).

Because I get motion sickness if I drive for too long, I made a few stops along the way, one of which was in Baker, CA. While I was eating some Subway, I looked up and literally saw a billboard for Esports Arena Las Vegas:

I knew that Esports Arena was gonna be huge, but the fact that they literally have a billboard advertising in Baker (and I actually saw a few more on the way to Las Vegas too) made me pretty happy that the esports industry was growing to be this large.

After unloading all my belongings out of my rented minivan into my new apartment, I climbed up to one of my favorite amenities of my new apartment building, the rooftop lounge. This is the view of the Las Vegas Strip from out in the suburbs:

Today was our final day in Las Vegas before our flight back home to Los Angeles, and in the morning, we went to Mandalay Bay to visit the Shark Reef Aquarium and Polar Journey. The Polar Journey wasn’t really that interesting, as it seemed like it was more geared for children than adults, but the aquarium had some interesting parts to it.

The tour started with a lot of displays and fish in tanks. I decided to post this particular photo because Karen is extending her arms out trying to hug a fish inside a tank, while you can see my reflection on the left side of the photograph taking the picture.

The path then led to an area fully enclosed by a larger tank. You can also see a guy with a blue helmet underwater cleaning the tank in the bottom-right corner of the photograph.

Deeper into the tour, there’s an open area where you can reach in and touch batoidea in a sandy tank. There were a lot of kids here, and I was more interested in seeing whether or not a kid would fall into the tank while reaching for a ray, rather than actually looking at and touching the rays themselves. I also found it confusingly unsanitary because, although you can wash your hands after touching the rays, you don’t have to wash your hands before … so basically, that pool is essentially a festering ground of bacteria.

And finally, my favorite area of the aquarium was the purple-lit tanks with jellyfish. This photo doesn’t do this tank justice because of the low light and the low detail on my camera, but the jellyfish inside the tank looked translucent and illuminated.

The ticket to get into the Shark Reef Aquarium was US$25.00 per person, which is far more than I would be willing to pay normally, as I’m not really much of a touristy person. But, because I was in a group, I was ok with joining in, and I’m glad that I at least got some photos out of it.

For the past two days of our Las Vegas trip, I’ve mainly been focusing in on specific topics – Cleo at SLS Las Vegas and Heroes of the Dorm 2017. But, I’ve done some other stuff and taken other photos apart from just those two events, so I decided to spend today sharing those.

I personally think gambling is one of the stupidest things you can do. People tend to look down on children and teenagers who want to spend money on online games to purchase micro­transactions, even though the cost of these items are usually average out to around US$10.00 or less for a majority of items. But, you see today’s middle-aged adults – the very exact adults who supposedly cannot comprehend their children’s desire to spend money on games – dumping money on gambling via slot machines and lottery tickets.

Because of my strong opinion against gambling and my negative beliefs about it, I have never been to a casino before (and this was my first time in Las Vegas). I obviously wasn’t here to gamble, but it’s literally impossible to go anywhere in Las Vegas without seeing slot machines, so I decided to embrace it for at least while I was here. Obviously NOT by actually gambling … but by photographing the slot machines and lights. These are slot machines from SLS Las Vegas, the hotel in which I stayed during my stay.

Part-way through our dinner at Cleo, one of our friends who had lots of travel and airline problems finally landed in Las Vegas and was arriving at the hotel. Two of my friends, Matt and Karen, accompanied me in walking out to the front entrance in hopes of greeting him upon his arrival. We were unsuccessful in finding him, but we were successful in finding this mirror room, so we snapped a photo.

Yesterday, during Heroes of the Dorm, I got to sit up on the media balcony away from the crowd so I could conveniently take notes and produce content while the tournament was going on. Karen had access to the media balcony as well, so she sat next to me. Next to her was world class esports journalist Travis Gafford. This is a photo of Karen excitedly clapping her Thunderstix while Travis attempts to get some work done on his laptop.

Earlier today, we went walking around Las Vegas. One of our stops was at the Taco Bell Cantina, a Taco Bell that sells alcoholic drinks. Although I personally don’t consume alcohol, most of my friends walking with me did, so we stopped by the restaurant (and even then, I was still curious to see what it was like, even though I wouldn’t be ordering a drink).

Across the street from Taco Bell is the Veer Towers, my favorite highrise condominium complex on the Las Vegas Strip. The Veer Towers are two neighboring towers that lean slightly off at an angle from each other, with the motto “Some choose to follow, others are born to veer.” Some units in the Veer Towers are around average for a condo on the Strip, while others are extremely expensive due to the view of the Strip and the water show to the north.

If I end up amassing enough money, I may end up living in that building some day. The style of design is an ultra simple and modern style that I like, and I enjoy the feeling of being high up in the sky, looking down at bustling activity on the ground, while peacefully having a quiet area to myself to relax and observe.

After stopping by Taco Bell, we went to one of Gordon Ramsay’s restaurants. I wasn’t hungry by that point because I had already eaten, and the prices were a bit too high for my comfort zone to just order something anyway, but because we were touring the city as a group, I still went to the restaurant and sat at the table with my friends.

We sort of got unlucky with a bad waitress, who, among other things, was miserably slow, tried to recommend a meat dish to my vegetarian friend, never refilled our water, spilled water on my phone when we called out to her for water refills, then proceeded to try and charge a mandatory gratuity for a “large party” when half of us didn’t even eat. Needless to say, I didn’t want my friends or I to suffer from the unfairness, so I complained in order to pass on the mandatory tip that she didn’t deserve.

Waitresses are obviously not a reflection of the food, though. Although I personally didn’t order a dish, I photographed a friend’s asparagus dish with the biggest asparagus I had ever seen in my life.