Beer and Blog Las Vegas

Rally wrote a great piece on the state of B&B Vegas, so I won’t rehash it. Simply put, Thursdays are busy days and quite often overlap with other tweetups and LVIMA (like this Thursday). We want to see the group grow and thrive again, and need your help to keep it going. Please take this survey to help get Beer & Blog Vegas back on track. And if you’re interested in volunteering to help out the elder drunks with planning and venue coordination, please make sure you leave your email in question #8. Thanks, and hope to see you at our next meeting.

Also, there’s a Stone Beer Dinner happening at Whole Foods on Las Vegas Blvd on Thursday, June 10th.  Cost is $30 per person, and the apparently have some tasty brews and bites. More information can be found here or you can RSVP with Sara in Marketing at sara.taylor@wholefoods.com.

Time to address something that’s occurred the past two weeks:

Please take responsibility for what you order.

Sometimes the server brings us a single check for the entire group because they have to. Like at the Hofbräuhaus. Like at the Gordon Biersch Maibock tapping. The servers at places like this sometimes cannot split our checks (hey, it happens). And besides, servers generally groan when they hear separate checks (you should really check out Waiting In Vegas and her FAQ). It’s not cool to stick the last few people ponying up the extra cash for your beer and food imbibing. We all know it will never work out perfectly: Under $5 is generally not a big deal, but when it gets to be $40-$50 two weeks in a row, we have a problem.

Please take responsibility for what you order.

If you need to leave early, speak with the server and see if you can close out your section of the bill. If not, please leave enough cash to cover you tab AND a tip. We are a large group and often 18% gratuity is automatically added to the bill. Besides, the server generally works hard to keep beers filled and food coming out at the proper temperatures.

We want to keep going to nice places with great brews, but without respecting your fellow Beer & Bloggers the group will slowly disappear. None of us are independently wealthy, and many people work hard for their pay (especially the freelancers and entrepreneurs). Please help us because we don’t want Beer & Blog Las Vegas to have the reputation as stiffing the server.

To sum up:

1. Be respectful of fellow beer & bloggers and bartender/server.
2. Be responsible for your order.
3. Pay your bill in full.
4. Tip the server generously.
5. Read Waiting In Vegas for a server’s insights.

Your elder drunks thank you for your cooperation on fixing this problem.

Happy Birthday Amanda! by Cayusa

Yep. It’s true! Beer & Blog Las Vegas is a year old this week.  We’ve come a long way in a year, from planning in 4 days to a number of different venues.  To celebrate, we’ll be making the pilgrimage to our first home, Freakin’ Frog on Maryland Parkway, across from UNLV.  Official  day is Thursday 1/14 from 5:30 to 8:30 p.m., but there are always people there starting around 5.  Feel free to enjoy one of the many beers and the wifi. And we’ll also need to raise a pint for the 2 year anniversary of the Beer & Blog organization.

Here’s to the start of another great year!

We're special!

No, there won’t be  large yellow bus that has ‘Special’ written on it, but next week’s edition of Beer & Blog will be held at Dick’s Last Resort in Excalibur.  With any luck, the weather will be cooler and we’ll be rockin’ the patio.

This change is only for September 24th.  We will be sure to let you know if we do a permanent change of venues via Twitter and FaceBook and the likes.  Besides, we need to find a place that can tell the difference between Stella and Stout.  Anyone have any suggestions that have a decent beer selection and strong WiFi?

Whuffaoke kicks off in San Francisco

For everyone who wasn’t at Beer & Blog tonight, Whuffaoke’s stop #3 is Vegas, baby! The main event is Friday at Town Square from 7 p.m. to 11 p.m.  The Winnebago will be parked somewhere around the Yardhouse.  Bring your requests and a sense of humor.  Stop by and say hello to the Whuffaoke team: Tara, Tony, Alex, Emma, Karen, and Ridley the Tweeting pug. Special thanks to Liza for running ground support for Whuffaoke!  Also, if you’re looking for some new threads, why not sport them Whuffaoke style? Get them through SpreadShirt.

And send good thoughts to the team… the Winnie had a rough go of desert traveling from San Francisco to LA today.  They made it, but will need lots of “I think I can!” thoughts to get over the mountains and into Vegas.

(Photo by Rod Begbie and used under a Creative Commons BY-NC-SA 2.0 license)

On July 17th & 18th, Tara @missrogue Hunt is bringing her Winnebago to Vegas for some karaoke fun.  Think Cash Cab except in an RV with singing… bound to be a ton of fun!  You can check out the Whuffaoke web page for more details, follow them on Twitter @whuffaoke, or check out the Facebook page for more information and events.    The official hashtag for the event is #WhuffaokeLAS.  I’ll post updates as the events unfold!

It’s June and another month week WordCamp beer festival has passed.  For those of you who didn’t go to Lee’s Beer experience, we’ll be gathering at Bar Louie to raise a pint and hear about the awesome (and horrible) beers from the lucky attendees.  And if we’re lucky we’ll also hear all about WordCamp San Francisco from @VegasGeek and @ToddHuish. Summer is here, and many people will be taking vacation.  If you’re traveling, take a look at the links to some of the other Beer & Blog chapters and pay them a visit.  Even though summer numbers tend to dwindle, we still had 4-5 new people stop in to say hello last week. 

Also coming up this week is the Monster Vegas Tweetup organized by @unmarketing.  It takes place on Saturday from 7-9 at Diablo’s in the Monte Carlo.  Make sure to follow @unmarketing to find out the events of the night.

See ya Thursday!

A few quick reminders for everyone for the busy week that’s upon us.

The Forrester meetup is on Monday.  Here are the details:
Forrester’s Las Vegas Tweetup – 2009
Monday May 18, 2009 from 6:00pm – 8:30pm
Dos Caminos
inside the Palazzo Hotel/Casino
3325 Las Vegas Blvd.
South Las Vegas, Nevada 89109
Suggested Topic: The pros and cons of SaaS vs. on-premise
Come meet and mingle with @coreymathews, @rwang0, @forrester, and others.
Forrester Research will be hosting a Tweetup at Dos Caminos in The Palazzo Hotel & Casino.
Join us for snacks, cash bar, and a great time!
Website: http://www.forrester.com/events/eventdetail?eventID=2374

My Vegas Scene is running a contest to win a pair of CineVegas passes. Visit their web site to enter and for the rules.  If you’re not interested in the passes, hit the website to vote for a winner once every 24 hours.

Interop is in town from the 17th to the 21st.  All the events and expo happens at the Mandalay Bay Conference Center.  There’s the possibility of a Tweetup with some of their attendees on Tuesday night around 8:30 p.m.  Sara is working on finalizing the details, so watch your twitter timeline for a tweet from Beer & Blog Vegas with the official place and time.

Two days until a very special edition of Beer & Blog Las Vegas at the Freakin Frog.  This week we’re playing host to the Beer & Blog founders, Justin (@justinkistner) and Christine (@emailstine).  Some of you may remember them from the inaugural Vegas meeting.  Doug (@douglaskarr) will also be here scoping out our operations to get ideas for the new chapter in Indianapolis, IN.  And who knows… we may get even crazier and throw in a few other surprises.  You’ll just have to come to find out for yourself.

On other business, we’re looking at taking a field trip to Bar Louie in the upcoming weeks instead of meeting at the Freakin Frog.  At this point, it’s tentative and we’ll be sure to let you know if the venue changes.

As always, please DM @BeerNBlogVegas or @Sara_Mooney, or leave a comment below if you’ll be attending.  The staff of the Freakin Frog thanks you — as does your council of elder drunks.

Hi, Beer and Bloggers!  Here are a few events you may be interested in… all happening on the same weekend.

First, our very own John Hawkins (@vegasgeek) will be speaking at WordCamp Reno on April 25th.  If anyone wants to make the 8 hour drive or $50 flight up there, check out the site for registration information.  He’d love to see a few familiar faces in the audience!

For those of you who want to stay closer to home, the Roller Derby comes to town on April 25th.  Andrea (@fjtoyota) will have them for sale for $5 (that’s $2 off the regular price!) at the Thursday Beer & Blog meetings.  Please see her if you’d like to purchase a ticket.  No news on if there is beer at the Roller Derby at this point.

And for those of us who cannot attend either event, we expect great blog posts from those of you who do.  See everyone on Thursday!