February 28, 2007
Benjamin Siegelbaum was born on February 28, 1906 in Brooklyn, New York, to a poor Austrian Jewish family. During adolescence, Siegel befriended Meyer Lansky, forming a small gang whose criminal activities included gambling and car theft, and later the two joined forces with Charles "Lucky" Luciano.
Bugsy eventually came to Las Vegas in 1941, backed by Al Capone to establish the Trans America race wire service. He would soon have bigger plans however.
Bugsy envisioned building a large casino and hotel to which gamblers would flock. His vision was fueled by the fact that gambling had been legal in Nevada since 1911, and construction of Hoover Dam had created a population boom in the area. Bugsy went back East and captivated his fellow mobsters with the idea of building a gambling mecca in the Nevada desert, and was given $1.5 million to begin working on his dream to construct a hotel-casino named "The Flamingo", his pet name for girlfriend Virginia Hill.
Siegel opened his still-unfinished casino on the star-studded night of December 26, 1946, although he did not have as many Hollywood celebrities with him as he had hoped. Soon the Flamingo ran dry of entertainers and customers, and the casino closed after only two weeks in order to complete construction. The fully operational Flamingo re-opened in March of 1947, and the Las Vegas Strip was born.
Happy Birthday Bugsy, and thanks for Vegas.
Posted by Ghostshark under Gambling, Poker, Vegas | Comments (0)
February 28, 2007
Starting today we'll be putting up a new drink recipe each day. Now, we won't be able to try them all before we post them, so if you do try one out, leave us a comment and tell us what you think.
Our first drink comes from Sotallytober.com called the Oreo Lebowski.
Ingredients:
1 ounce Vodka, 1 ounce Cream (half and half), 1/2 ounce of Kahlua, and 4 Oreo cookies.
Directions:
"Place all the ingredients in a blender with ice, and blend until creamy and dreamy"
Posted by Ghostshark under DOTD, Spirits | Comments (0)
February 28, 2007
Everyone that's hung out in a bar for any amount of time has seen someone pull off a trick with their Zippo lighter. The site Lighter Tricks is a collections of over 200 videos of tricks you can do with your Zippo. Amaze your friends, break the ice, or just strive to become a master of the Zippo. Regardless, you can sort the videos by top rated, new, or most viewed, and if you already have some Zippo-fu, you can upload your own video to win prizes.
You can hit the site and look around HERE.
Posted by Ghostshark under Cigars, Unique | Comments (1)
February 28, 2007
Gillette is having a contest and the grand prize is an all-new 2007 Dodge Charger. You also have the chance to win one of two first prizes which are for a Sony 46” High Definition LCD TV, one of five PlayStation 3 bundles for second place, and one of twenty 30GB iPods for third place.
The contest runs through April 30th, and you can enter once per day. If your interested, you can head on over to the site HERE to register. I'd suggest turning the sound way down on your computer though, to avoid blasting out some pretty cheesy music to your co-workers.
Posted by Ghostshark under Cars, Contests, Electronics, Gaming | Comments (0)
February 27, 2007
Cigar Weekly Member Michael Herklots (mherklots) describes some of his favorite pairings of cigars and spirits.
Lovers of The Good Life from around the world have long embraced the practice of pairing cigars and drinks. The goal is to develop a complete yet balanced sense of stimulation on your palate. Discretion is necessary when selecting the proper cigar to accompany a drink. There are two common methods. The easiest is to match common flavors. Smoke a fuller-bodied cigar with a fuller-bodied drink. However, with a bit of creativity, finding contrasting flavors that can then marry on your palate can ultimately be more interesting and satisfying. Here are a few of my favorite combinations.
Click on the more link below to see what he's come up with.
Read more…
Posted by Ghostshark under Cigars, Spirits | Comments (1)
February 27, 2007
Top Gear has an article on the KTM X-Bow:
A super-lightweight sports car with a tuned two-litre production engine promising motorbike-style thrills? Sound familiar?
This is the KTM X-Bow, Austria's rival to the Ariel Atom, which will debut as a full-scale prototype at Geneva.
Just like the Atom, it borrows a two-litre flat-four engine from a production car - in this case Audi's FSI - and tunes it to within an inch of its life. KTM insiders say that even the entry-level X-Bow will pack 220bhp, while the top-of-the-range edition could produce 300bhp.
With a kerb weight of just 700kg, that's a power-to-weight ratio of 428bhp per tonne. Wow.
The X-Bow was initially envisaged as a joint project between KTM and Audi, but the German giant dropped out when KTM refused to fit the X-Bow with weight-adding safety equipment. That's why there's no windscreen on the X-Bow. But fear not - crash helmets will come supplied, and there's even cabin stowage space for them.
Sadly the photo you see here are merely of a scale model, because the X-Bow is still in the testing stages and some way from reaching production.
Posted by Ghostshark under Cars | Comments (0)
February 27, 2007
Round one of Maxim's Hometown Hottie 2007 contest is up. You can head on over to the Maxim site and look through and vote for 10 out of the first 100 entries HERE.
Posted by Ghostshark under Internet | Comments (0)
February 26, 2007
From their press release:
Samsung today announced a new addition to its Ultra portfolio with the introduction of Ultra Smart F700.
The Ultra Smart is a part of Samsung’s Ultra portfolio which boasts a full touch screen as well as QWERTY key pad. It reflects the recent trend in telecommunications industry of touch screen user interface and, for users who are not yet familiar with a touch-screen-only user interface, it also implements a QWERTY key pad and VibeTonz technology which allows them to feel the buttons accompanied by responsive vibrations. A “Drag and drop” method of touch screen was adopted for easier menu navigation along with music play list control for an expanded multimedia experience. Volume, play lists, brightness of screens as well as other menu control can be controlled utilizing the touch screen.
As speed is becoming crucial for data communications, Samsung has included the latest trends in mobile to the Ultra Smart F700. The Ultra Smart reflects the latest speed of 7.2 Mbps under the High Speed Downlink Packet Access (HSDPA) network. Once the 7.2 Mbps HSDPA network completely deployed, F700 users can download an mp3 song (about 4MB each) in 4.4 seconds. A full HTML browser along with the QWERTY key pad enables easy access to the internet for e-mail and data services.
Using the new F700, business and creative professionals are able to view content on a stunning 2.78" color display. The device features first class entertainment with a top-of-the-line 5 mega-pixel camera with auto focus and Bluetooth. With 7.2 Mbps HSDPA, it makes it easier to watch videos, listen to songs, share high-quality photos, or catch up on email on the move.
“The introduction of our Ultra Smart F700 reflects the needs of today’s consumers by including features such as touch screen, enhanced connectivity to mobile internet, and access to an array of multimedia content,” said Geesung Choi, President of Samsung’s Telecommunications Network Business. “The Ultra Smart F700 is a good example of how mobile phone will evolve in the future. Samsung will focus on bringing products that reflect and pursue our position as a premium leader”.
No word yet on cost, or when these will be on the shelves.
Posted by Ghostshark under Electronics | Comments (0)
February 26, 2007
SkillGround is an online gaming arena where you can download real video games for free, and play in a secure and fair environment for cash prizes or just for fun. They've set up a Skill Ranking system which is supposed to ensure you will always find someone around your level to play against, and so you have less of a chance to run into a player that has way more play time than you. All you need to play the games is a PC and a broadband connection, and then to download the games. You can play for free for as long as you want on SkillGround, and with a cash account you can also play for real cash prizes.
The games are two first person shooters, a racing game, and a fighting game, and seem to have two modes of play, One On One and Deathmatch. You can join the free games at any time, but if you want to play in the cash games, it looks like you just have to post the entry fee, and then rack in the cash if you win. The number of prizes in a deathmatch game depend on the number of players, with up to three prizes for an eight person game.
Player money awards are posted for at least a little bit, and I've seen players win anywhere from $0.85 to $8.50. If you have some kills, and want to test them against other to make a little cash (or donate to other as the case may be), head on over to the SkillGround site HERE.
Posted by Ghostshark under Electronics, Gaming | Comments (0)
February 26, 2007
Every month one lucky cigar smoker will win a free box of 25 Boutique Premium Cigars and a Cuban Crafters Guillotine cigar cutter. The winner of the monthly free cigars drawing gets to choose any box of cigars offered on the cubancrafters.com cigars website. When you register as a user of this cigar smoking website, you automatically qualify and your name is entered in the monthly drawing.
You can sign up for the contest HERE.
Posted by Ghostshark under Cigars, Contests | Comments (1)
