That’s right, a crisp $10 bill will be mailed to the first person to correctly identify what this thing is. If you click the photo, you can even see a larger picture.

You need to be specific.

You can clearly see by the timestamp when the photo was taken, so that’s a clue.

And it was taken within 3 miles of the Las Vegas Strip.

But that’s it for the hints.

Does $10 sound like an awfully cheap prize?

Yes it does, and yes it is.

Welcome to VegasRex.com

I dare you to repeat the title of this post 10 times, fast.

I don’t know how I missed this since I walk by it all the time, but on my way to the Hilton Poker Room yesterday I noticed a group of people (pictured above) huddled over laptop computers at the Fortuna Coffee Shop in the lobby of the Las Vegas Hilton.

Almost nobody was drinking coffee, and the shop employees didn’t seem to care a bit.

I decided to rudely interrupt a lady that was looking at a giant picture of an avocado on her laptop screen. Am I joking? No, she was just staring at a picture of a large avocado that she had pulled up in her web browser. Whatever …

So I asked her what the shop charges for Wi-Fi.

“Nothing” she said, “That’s why I come here all the time, the wireless access is free”.

I thanked her, and left her to further scrutinize the avocado.

So basically, the lobby of the Las Vegas Hilton is now a free hotspot … because the Fortuna is in the lobby.

I don’t know if they do any content filtering, but I can say with 100% certainty that you will at least be able to research avocados.

And really, what more could you ask for?

Speedway Motorsports, owner of the Las Vegas Motor Speedway has announced that they will be performing major upgrades to the property, to the tune of $100 Million. This will include a completely re-modeled infield with Vegas-Style Neon, and changes to the track itself to make it faster.

As if that wasn’t enough to get Cletus to consider a permanent move to the desert, there is even talk of moving the Nascar Awards Banquet from New York to Las Vegas.

Some in Nascar say that the organization is being “mistreated” in New York because of high hotel and restaurant bills.

Las Vegas is seen as a much more hospitable locale. Basically, some Nascar folks are realizing what the rest of the country has known for the past 10 years.

Las Vegas is rapidly becoming the center of the known universe.

If you’re not in Las Vegas, you’re camping out.

The 2007 Miss America Pageant is being held tonight at the large casino with the eternal identity crisis, “The Aladdin Hotel and Casino” a/k/a “The Planet Hollywood Hotel and Casino” a/k/a “Who The Hell Are We? For The Love Of All That Is Good In The World, Won’t Somebody Please Tell Us Who We Are!” Hotel And Casino.

It will be televised nationally tonight on the “Country Music Television” channel. What does a beauty pageant have to do with country music? I have no idea. Maybe one of them plays the banjo during the talent portion of the competition.

But here is the interesting thing … tickets are currently on sale to the general public. That means that I, personally, can walk right up to the Aladdin box office and actually sit in the audience of this thing.

And I have to tell you, part of me is tempted to hop over to there to to view this spectacle just out of sheer and utter morbid curiosity. I want to see if the contestants bitch-slap each other during commercial breaks. I want to see if Mario Lopez convinced Screech and Zach to make special guest appearances.

The other part of me realizes that I would spend good money to be bored to tears, and when I am bored, I would certainly start making trouble by shouting inappropriate comments like “Show us your tits!”. How many people can say that they have been thrown out of the Miss America Pageant?!

I’m also pretty sure that there is a “no masturbation” rule at the pageant, which would completely render the experience pointless.

On second thought, maybe I’ll just save my money and Tivo the thing so I can fast-forward to the swimsuit competition and be done with it.

But if you are in town, buying a ticket to this thing might be a good way to sleep off a drunken stupor. You may even see yourself on TV passed out in the 15th row. So make sure to tape the thing.

Seeing yourself slumped over and drooling on National TV is one of the most unique Las Vegas souvenirs you are likely to get (besides gonorrhea).

In a move that has come as a huge, overwhelming surprise to ….. nobody, the Hooters Hotel and Casino has been sold.

About 10 months ago the old San Remo Hotel was turned into the Hooters property at a cost of about $130 Million. And just this week it has been sold to a private California investment group for $225 Million.

This is a actually positive development for the property, because since it has opened, it has actually lost $16 Million.

The Hooters brand is expected to remain in place, although I imagine that if it doesn’t go into the black post-haste, a new theme will be forthcoming.

I predicted trouble for Hooters when I toured the property on opening day. Not because I did not want it to succeed, because I did.

But what I observed on opening day, and subsequent visits, was basically a Pittsburgh Hooters Restaurant, with a some slot machines and gaming tables.

Now I ask you, who is going to fly thousands of miles to stay in a Hotel themed after a restaurant that they can visit in their own hometown?

Apparently the answer is as I predicted back in April … not many.

Hooters Las Vegas had a chance to take “tastefully tacky” to the next level. A level that they could not take the restaurant to in say, Des Moines, Iowa.

This was their chance to really cut loose, get bawdy, dress the girls in real “boingggg” outfits, and show some skin the likes of which Vegas hasn’t seen before.

Instead, they opted to take the standard Hooters uniform (which is actually much less revealing than the uniforms at the old Orleans Hotel), and maintain the status-quo.

Well, nobody comes to Vegas for the status-quo. What would be the point? People stay home for the status-quo. And I really think Hooters management dropped the ball in a big way.

We have the Playboy club which has opened at the Palms, the Pussycat Dolls are on their way to Caesar’s, and over in the corner we have Hooters … the family restaurant with girls in tight shirts.

Sure, that plays in Birmingham, Alabama … but here in Las Vegas, it was met with a collective *yawn*.

If the Hooters brand hopes to bolster any enthusiasm here in town, they need to get rid of the orange jogging shorts, and up top, they need to set those puppies free. Let them bounce, let them jiggle, let them sway, let us rub them for good luck …

Now THAT would be Hooters Las Vegas.

Let’s hope the new owners understand this.

A fast-food casino won’t cut it … we want, no, we DEMAND boobs!

And if you are advertising “Hooters” in this town, then dammit, you better deliver.