We headed up to Reno on Saturday morning and made a stop at Thunder Valley enroute. Enjoyed a wonderful lunch at the Red Lantern - beautiful restaurant and delicious food - and all comped. AND I hit a lot of great small jackpots and turned $40 into over $700 - so we headed up to Reno feeling pretty flush and excited.
It's always so much fun to win and even better to walk out the door with the cash in your purse.
The drive up was uneventful and we checked in. The Richard Marx concert started at 8PM. Right before the show, I won $1200 on a slot machine - and sort of wanted to keep playing. But we went to the concert and had an absolutely wonderful time. We even made it to the 'big screen' tweets before the show -
Richard was acoustic and alone and it was wonderful. He's very witty and charming and easy on the eyes. His music was very 'big' in the late 80's and early 90's when we were courting and falling in love so it was a nostalgic, wonderful night with my beloved. So glad we went - and yes, I did have a tiny pouty moment when I wasn't sure I wanted to stop playing the machine that had just rewarded me nicely - but I'm so glad I got over it and gave in to enjoying the show. It was a lot of fun!
The next morning, we enjoyed a great buffet breakfast (2 for 1! And comped!) and then we drove east of Carson City (about 30 minutes from Reno) to drop off J. to play golf. I headed back to the casino and immediately went to the machine I played the night before. On the 2nd $100 I put in, this happened:
Super duper excited! Asked for some in cash and the bulk in a check - which took forever. Note to self: don't ask for a check. It took a long time and in that long time, I put $ back into the machine (also hitting a $361 minor while waiting so that helped). I texted J. about the win and then had fun playing.
I meandered over to a favorite machine I've played before - and ended up way up - hit 2 line hits of $1,000 each - and left the machine with quite a bit more than I started. The next day, I played the same machine again and hit another hand pay of $1,800! Two hand pays in a couple days and lots of other wins that added up - and just like that! Our impromptu trip to Europe in October is mostly paid for!
We drove back to Carson City and headed east to Dayton to look at homes. Found some we really liked and the rep mentioned that she had a river front lot that was going to be released in the next week and sent us down to look at it - we loved it! These homes are priced $200K less than the ones in Reno we looked at last year - and that includes the $90K premium for this particular lot. We're trying to decide if we could purchase it as a 2nd home - it's actually doable from the financial perspective but practical perspective? It doesn't make a lot of sense. Not yet. And in discussing the location, we both think we'd be happier being closer to a larger city. Dayton is very small - drive through it and blink and you're past it - and while it appears to be where the next big growth might be south of Reno, we're still not convinced.
At the same time we were talking all this through, we hit a huge financial milestone that we celebrated with a high five! And now it just seems like though we could make a 2nd home work, it's still probably best to wait. There will still be plenty of building in 3-5 years when we are closer to being certain we are 'ready' - and the longer we wait, the more this house appreciates in value and the more we save. Buying a 2nd home is feasible by acknowledging that we would only be saving for 'essentials' - like homeowner insurance and property taxes. Trips? Wouldn't happen. We'd be house poor - and that's something we never want to be.
And....on the subject of trips. Oops! We did it again! Booked a 15 night cruise in October, 2018, through the Panama Canal - saw it pop up on Facebook (we've been watching for them to open up next year) and called and booked it right away!
And to cap off a great week, B. is home!! Arrived yesterday late afternoon - and promptly headed out to In & Out with a friend for dinner (their tradition). He left early this morning for a couple days of tent camping with a big group of friends - he will return the morning of the 4th.
H. showed up briefly yesterday to say 'hi' to his brother and then he and R. headed back to her apartment. I'm trying to adjust to never seeing him and at this point? He lives with her. They aren't calling it that because of her divorce situation (I think) but he's never home. I'm learning to just expect we won't see him - and I think the next step is to stop urging him to do what needs doing and just text him a reminder and leave the two of them to it. Though she's not any more motivated or timely about things than he is - so this will be interesting. He hasn't moved any stuff there yet - and in fact, she still has quite a bit of stuff still here - but other than that? He lives elsewhere.
I have a ton of things I want to get done but HBO has a Game of Thrones marathon on ALL WEEKEND LONG - Seasons 1 through 6 in one convenient 5 day period! We've been saying we wanted to get back into it so this is the perfect way to do it!!
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