Every year for the last four years, I have documented every date night, collaborative project or big event that Katie and I have experienced together. These short, journal-style essays are collected and – around this time of year – submitted for printing. This becomes a Christmas gift for Katie every year (spoiler, but not really) simply called DATE NIGHTS. 

The rest of #naBloPoMo will mostly be made up of things I’ve written but not published anywhere, and today’s is an excerpt from Date Nights 2025 (officially at the printer).

Back in March, I talked about a trip Katie and I took to Las Vegas for KBIS. This excerpt is from that trip.

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We started our first full day at KBIS by chowing down on some Pop-Tarts in the room that we’d packed because my wife is a genius. While we waited for the shuttle outside, Katie started expressing some doubts that we were with the right people. I confirmed multiple times that they were wearing the same badges we had, and the shuttle we were all boarding said KBIS. She then confessed her incredulousness came from a lack of “fabulous bitches,” saying currently she was the only one and she’d better start seeing some more.

Our first mission at the convention center was to find a place to grab lanyards for our badges. We found the station no problem, but the lanyards were American flag-printed and Katie was disgusted by them.

“These are not cute,” she complained.

On a positive note, we were just a minute or two late for the first seminar she wanted to attend. We hustled to find the ballroom only to be informed we weren’t allowed in attend because we hadn’t paid for that upgrade. We inquired about the cost of said upgrade and were told it would be $1,200 for the two of us. Katie politely told KBIS to stick their heads in doo-doo and led me down to the food court for a breakfast stress-eat.

Having seen no fabulous bitches as of yet, being forced to wear an un-cute lanyard and being told we had to pay $1,200 to sit in a room and learn was already enough. Then steaming-mad Katie nearly blew her stack after biting into her $17 breakfast burrito only to find no meat inside. Thankfully she found a bit of sausage after another bite or two, because otherwise we would have seen a fabulous bitch’s carnivorous rampage, the likes of which had never been seen before.

We decided to attend some of the free events and make the best of the day by touring the North Hall, and things got better almost immediately. We received swag bags the moment we walked in the door, and within seconds got our hands on some cookies, candies and some way cooler lanyards that we immediately equipped. 

We toured about a quarter of the floor before hustling to the back to watch a panel on exterior design, which was pretty interesting and informative, even for me. My biggest takeaway from the panel, however, was the interior designer saying her clients wanted a “Moroccan feel” in their house, so they all vacationed in Casablanca together. I told Katie that if her male clients ever wanted to whisk her away to Casablanca, I would go on a punching spree.

We had some time to kill before the next round of speakers, so we got in line at a barbeque restaurant outside we’d spied on our way in. The line was long and very slow, which was a drag but it gave Katie time to witness multiple people complaining about the quality of the food for the price. We decided to jump out of line and grab ready-made sandwiches from the food court that we could just take back to the panel space. We ate our sandwiches while listening to a woman brag about doing things Katie has been doing for years. Yawn.

We quickly finished our tour of the hall and called it a day.

Back at the hotel, we lounged for a bit before breaking into the booze we’d packed. In our suitcases were a few bottles of champagne, a travel mug full of rum and a case of mini-Diet Cokes. We pounded one of the champagnes and made a couple rum-and-diet cocktails while we hung out by the window. 

After freshening up a bit, we caught an Uber to Fremont Street (otherwise known as “Old Vegas) and toured the grounds before having dinner at a spot called Eureka. We were SO impressed with how much more affordable everything was on Fremont! It’s still crazy touristy but way more affordable. We also never felt unsafe despite what people say about it online. We had a few more cocktails with our dinner that included fish and chips, a reuben quesadilla and some truffle fries.

We quickly gambled away $100 at the Four Queens but Katie earned it back and even added an extra $100 on the roulette wheel at Binion’s across the road. Lady Luck in the house! We hung out on the street for a bit to catch the 10pm Shakira show under the lights and decided we’d had all we could stand. We called our Uber and stood behind the Four Queens for our pickup.

Our driver was a very nice, very helpful man, but he had the weirdest haircut I’ve ever seen. He was a middle-aged guy with about five or six strands of hair on his whole head, and each were spiked straight up about three inches. The sides of his otherwise bald head were covered in glitter and he looked like he’d been shot in the temple with a red paintball. 

Only in Vegas, I suppose?

-jtf

This is post 17 of 30 in my most recent attempt at tackling NaBloPoMo. Funsies and such.