I had a very cool weekend

Literally. This is the first time in my life I've been in sub-zero temperatures. I was at Lake Tahoe for the weekend :).

I had some work to finish, and am I glad I managed to finish it. I'd almost cancelled the trip because of it. But there I was, at 3 in the afternoon, waiting impatiently for Manish to arrive. You must understand that I was a little apprehensive about the trip. Basically because I'd already spent way past my blanket and my toes were starting to poke out. Any more expense would only have led to further cold.

Manish and Priyanka arrived just 15 minutes late, and off we went. I'd spent most of the day sleeping, so I was wide awake and ready to click some photos. Unfortunately, darkness fell, and opportunities had to wait for the next day. We arrived at our hotel after a mid-journey coffee break, and some meandering to find our hotel. That was 7:00pm.

At 8, we left for Harvey's, a casino across the California border, into Nevada. And boy what a night we had. We started well enough.

I won some $50 on the slot machines and another $50 on the roulette table. Then we set off for dinner at the Hard Rock cafe. Excellent ambience and good music can do wonders for the soul. A great steak and a long-island-ice-tea later, we decided to gamble some more. We spent some time at the blackjack table, and Manish made a few dollars and Priyanka tried her luck too. After that I wandered back to the slot machine. I ended up losing all but $20 of my profits.

I took what was left, went to the roulette table with a $40 start, and as they say, the rest was history. My escalating sine wave looked something like this:
-20 > 100 > -40 > 150 > -60 > 300 > -80 > 540 > 480

Then I bailed out :D. With a little bit (read big) of help from Manish and Priyanka. With around $400 more than I arrived with. Manish however had a streak of good and bad luck at the poker table, ending with bad, consequently losing around $40.

We went back home after that. I was so happy that I couldn't sleep until 4 in the morning.

The next day was for some snow fun. Unfortunately there hadn't been much snow yet, though we did manage to find a few spots where I could careen dangerously down wretched slopes, as the photo here clearly shows :). Hey it was my first time in snow. My nose didn't take to it too favourably, unfortunately, and we decided to call it a day from there on.

We made our way back. We stopped at Manish's friends' place for some tea (something I was sorely in need of), and an hour later I was back home, a weekend well spent.

Thanks Manish and Priyanka for a great weekend. I'll really remember this one :).