Priceline, if you haven't tried it yet

I talked to a friend who recently used Priceline for a 4-star hotel and rental car in Boston. I'm all for ways to save real money so he had my attention. He rented a full-size car from National Car Rental for $28/day through Priceline. His hotel at the Hyatt downtown was also a bargain.

I have a business trip coming up in Washington DC and the event hotel is $249/night. Most of the time we just suck it up and accept it because hotels in major cities like DC, NY, SF, Boston are very pricey. So I said, let me try this again. My past concern about Priceline is that you can't pick your hotel, just the area or neighborhood and then once the buy is made, you're committed. But my DC trip is near Dupont Circle (good area) and Priceline had a Dupont Circle area specifically. Let me try and see what what happens. It's one night and I simply didn't want to pay the $249 price I had.

First try, Dupont Circle area, 4-star hotel, $99 price bid. Score! I'm now staying at the Omni Shoreham Hotel, one Metro stop away from my event for $99. Really nice hotel. Maybe I should have bid less! ;-)

I recommend you give it a try. I'm going back to Priceline for my rental car for my next CA trip. Long live William Shatner!

Lake Mead Half Emptied

No it wasn't vandals or terrorists, but it has been slowly and quietly happening. Increased drought in the southwestern US and increased demand for water and electricity in the Las Vegas area have greatly impacted the water level at Lake Mead, which is the enormous man made lake created by the damming of the Colorado River at the Hoover Dam. See the stats and pictures here. As you can see from the stats, the water levels have been lower in 1968, but it took 19 years to fill up again. And the demand for water and power shows no signs of lessening in the area served by the Hoover Dam.