MGM Grand, Las Vegas, Nevada

We just checked into the MGM Grand. Since Sarah's background is in hotels, we know to be polite, calm, and extremely patient. Yes, you should practice these things anyway but even more so when checking in because most of the time you are not actually assigned a room until you arrive. We have been very successful thus far and were very excited to try our "first time in Vegas and we're traveling the country" charms on this nice woman at registration. We were, as always, extremely polite, didn't ask for anything extra, and smiled and laughed a lot. She said she had a room available with a view, which we were thrilled about.

We got all the way to floor 17 and find that our room is right next to the employee closets, a sign of a lot of noise during the night and early morning but no biggie. Then we find that our room is handicap-accessible. This is really not a huge deal except the showers absolutely suck in these rooms. Our view? Mostly the side of a building although from one angle you can see Excalibur. Stains are evident on the sheets and one of the bedspreads is torn.

Are we acting like spoiled babies? Perhaps. I think we are both just disappointed that after shelling out way more than we would have liked to on a room for a first-time, one-time trip to Vegas, this is what we have. Maybe we should have been nicer?

Grr. Anyway, the MGM Grand really is beautiful and very large. Our first order of business (after venting, of course) was to check out a buffet. Since we were still pretty tired from yesterday's excitement, we decided to stay close to the room and just head downstairs to the MGM Grand Buffet. Pretty delicious. With full bellies we thought it was only fitting to head to the penny slots for a little gambling. I mean, what else do you do in Vegas, right?

At the end of the night, Sarah is down $25 and Halley is down $15. The penny slots we were at were not that great but on the way back to the room we found some really great ones. If anyone has a suggestion or two for a great penny slot casino we would love to hear about it!