Las Vegas travel — again

That's what I get for waking up in Vegas: Tropicana showgirls, 2003.

After my California Super Bowl post, I’m on a West Coast roll. And since I have another trip in that direction looming, time to share more memories.

My first trip to Las Vegas came in 1995, and I was quite the newbie. I broke myself in by staying at the Tropicana, one of the graybeards on the Strip but one that seems to embody the tradition of Vegas glitz. That was in August, when the desert metropolis is quite the cauldron. I made the mistake of staying too long by the pool one day, and I was a french fry at dinner. Otherwise, it was quite an introduction. No huge gambling losses, and I even took in one of the dance shows at the Trop. (Hey, your mother would not be embarrassed.) And my first Vegas comedian: George Carlin.

My trips got more sophisticated in later years. In 2003, a woman friend and I saw Carlin’s show again.  There were more than seven words you can’t say on TV. But my friend said, “I laughed so hard my face hurt.” She and I also trekked the entire strip, from the Tropicana to the Hilton, to meet my sister, who was also in Glitter City with a Jazzercise crew. In the Vegas heat. We DID make occasional pit stops in the casinos along the way for water breaks, which also gave the chance to inspect the varied casino themes and architecture. (FYI, despite that long walk in the heat, the friend, who remains a California resident, still speaks to me. )The Hilton has (at least it did then) a statue of Elvis in the lobby, as he still apparently holds all kind of attendance records in Vegas.

The next year, the same friend and I hit the big time, Caesars Palace, for Celine Dion’s show. Talk about magnificent singing and dancing. “I Drove All Night” was particularly memorable, as well as her cover of Stevie Wonder’s “I Wish.”

In 2008, I needed a Western fix, and hit Vegas again from ATL (one pic below). I took in another dance show, at the Egyptian-themed Luxor. Lunch at Jimmy Buffett’s Margaritaville restaurant near the Flamingo also was fun.

Soon I will go armed with my video cam for the first time. Long overdue for a film on casino architecture, not to mention the always entertaining street scenes. Don’t touch that dial.

All that is Caesars: Images of Elton John, Bette Midler and Cher are behind me at Caesars Palace, Las Vegas, 2008.

My Super Bowl memories

Coach George Seifert, left, RB Marcus Allen discuss Super Bowl XXXII at a fans event in San Diego in 1998.

Another Super Bowl is upon us, and there’s more publicity than you can shake a mouse at. The Colts-Saints game promises to be a shootout, and a great story line no matter who wins.

I’ve been in the outer orbit of a couple of Super Bowls, thanks to my time in California, though I’ve never actually been through the turnstiles. Super Bowl 32 (phooey on the Roman numerals) played in San Diego was also a shootout and an exciting finish. And Super Bowl 22, also in San Diego, featured a memorable offensive explosion by one team.

Clark Howard and money

“Life is all about change.” The philosophy is not exactly groundbreaking, but not something you’d expect to hear from someone who is famous for money advice. But that’s what Clark Howard, consumer advocate and self-proclaimed cheapskate, said in summing up his speech last week to an Atlanta-area group of business owners.

SoCon10: Part of the crowd

The goal of SoCon10 organizers, like social media in general, is for participants to share info and be a part of the show itself. In that sense, the spirit was right for Saturday’s keynote speakers and breakout sessions. For instance, I first met social media head on in 2008, and now I’m something of a poster child.

I was enjoying the first keynote speaker Saturday (1/30/2010), Carol Kruse of Coca-Cola, when a tweet (you KNOW what that is) informed me that a picture of myself and fellow citizen journalist Terri Thornton from SoCon09 was included in a banner on the auditorium stage. That’s right … I was a few feet away from the stage in the second row, yet I learned about this via Twitter. The picture below in this post says it all.

SoCon10: Taking stock

“We ARE the media” was the quote I remember most from SoCon08, my first encounter with social media. And at SoCon09, indeed both the social and mainstream media worlds had changed markedly. As SoCon10 looms this weekend in Atlanta, the landscape again is different.

Within the past few months, a couple of events have shown how major companies have had to react to the volatile and popular world of citizen journalism. Pepsi, one of the world’s largest food products companies, decided it could do without advertising on the Super Bowl, in favor of a $20 million social media campaign. And the New York Times, like other newspapers battered by a loss of advertising and readers, has decided to start charging for some content in 2011. In Atlanta, the Atlanta Journal-Constitution is moving to smaller facilities in the suburbs.

Gen. Petraeus speaks in Atlanta

“In Iran, the best recruiting officer for the U.S. Central Command is Iranian President Ahmadinejad.” So said Gen. David Petraeus, head of U.S. Central Command and therefore the top brass for U.S. military forces dealing with Iraq, Afghanistan and other terror-related hot spots.

Petraeus spoke to a combined luncheon session of the Atlanta Press Club and the Atlanta Commerce Club on Tuesday (1/19/2010), in a conversational setting that included audience questions and live cameras from Atlanta-based CNN and local stations. The speech came at a time when U.S.-led forces are having greater success in Iraq but still face challenges in Afghanistan and a growing terror threat in Yemen.

Speaking on social media

I'm discussing Twitter-related matters during a social media presentation.

The one thing I can safely say that I’m an expert on is that there are no experts on social media. That is the sector of the Internet that’s growing rapidly, just as Internet usage in general did in the ’90s. Some people are very knowledgeable, or avid business users, or widely followed. But until they start handing out diplomas at major universities on this, I’m reserving the term.

However, it’s always nice to be recognized for achievements and personal passions. So for the second time, I spoke on social media in the Atlanta area. This time it was to a job-networking group, and last year it was as an Atlanta Journal-Constitution panel member to edify newsroom personnel. So it’s obvious the field has widespread appeal and many potential uses.

Lane Kiffin and coaching “contracts”

There are a lot of words in the dictionary. Many are quite common, but some are obsolete, such as “typewriter,” “VCR” and “scurvy.” There’s another one that is becoming useless, too: “contract,” particularly as it applies to coaches in big-time college football and the NFL.

Lane Kiffin’s departure from Tennessee after just one season shows that not even something in writing will stand in the way of someone’s intent to leave, or another school’s intent to lure a coach away. In recent years, Bobby Petrino and Nick Saban are other examples.

Mickey Mantle, Mark McGwire and …

Baseball legend Mickey Mantle with my cousin, right, and me in Atlanta in 1960s

Now we can add Mark McGwire to a list of athletes with tarnished reputations. Hey, it’s been a month or so since anyone piled on Tiger Woods, so …

Seriously, McGwire’s recent admission that he used steroids when he broke Roger Maris’ home run record in 1998 didn’t surprise anyone. He made a tacit admission during the congressional hearing on steroids in 2005 when he made NO real statement of any kind. Hey, he was under oath. At least he didn’t point an angry finger in denial as did Rafael Palmeiro; that was the best finger job since Bill Clinton in his initial denial regarding Monica Lewinsky. (And, of course, Nick Saban once told a Miami Dolphins press briefing that he would not be the Alabama coach.)

Pete Carroll, college coaches and NFL

It has already started. Some Twitter buzz is panning the Seattle Seahawks for hiring USC coach Pete Carroll. Seattle should have talked to Miami and Atlanta, the buzz goes, since those franchises had less than stellar results with Nick Saban and Bobby Petrino, respectively.

But that’s not fair, and really not that simple. A more detailed study of the situation shows that some college coaches have done fine in the NFL, and that it simply takes more than a coach to win.