Another Love Letter to Las Vegas

Long time readers will remember our affinity for Las Vegas, if not, you can find it here, here and here or just go here for all of them. Anyway, we spent another spring break in the adult Disney World and came away with these observations/incidents:

Early Winners

On the plane, we treated ourselves to cocktails with some complimentary drink coupons. Since it was vacation, we ordered a second round without the coupons. We offered the credit card to the airline hostess who just looked away. Free drinks! Winners already!

Sightseeing

In pretty much every major city these days I believe, you can find people dressed in superhero costumes that will pose for pictures with tourists (which begs the question, "shouldn't you be out fighting crime?"). Downtown Las Vegas (Fremont Street) takes this to another level. You can pose with showgirls, strippers, beefcake guys, women in catsuits, guys in thongs and some guy that operates a dancing wooden Indian puppet. I'm pretty sure you could lay down in the street, put out a tip jar and a sign that says, "This is what Elvis looked like when he died", and you could make a small fortune.

To top it all off, we saw a 60 year old woman wearing angel wings, jean shorts, and exposing her large, long, pendulous breasts with only duct tape covering the nipples. I'm not sure if you could pose for pictures with her, but one could argue the duct tape resembled a Captain America shield. We just moved out of the way because I'm pretty sure she could have kicked my ass even if she wasn't Captain America.

Juuuuuuune!

One night while playing blackjack in a casino, an old hippy-ish gentleman with a long beard came rolling by in a wheelchair with a sound system blasting "Jackson" by Johnny Cash.

The Chinese blackjack dealer sighed, "Only in America."

"Only in Vegas," I corrected her.

That Guy

We went to brunch at Bouchon which is a nice restaurant at the Venetian. We were seated next to a large man in a track suit with a Donald Trump knockoff toupee and bare feet. Now, yes, this restaurant is near the pool, but really, he couldn't slip on some sandals at least? Then we overheard this conversation on his phone:

"So yeah, we can get your wife on the board. I mean with your help and mine, we can do it. And then we have zero liability."

Yeah, that doesn't sound fishy coming from a barefoot guy in a track suit in Las Vegas.

Bring Your Own Broads
One night we finally ventured into "Oscar's Beef, Booze and Broads" which is a steakhouse owned by the ex-mayor.  Apparently, the broads part of the name referred to the fact female hostesses would sit at your table and engage you in conversation.  Kind of like if Disney World had a "Hooker Experience" ride.

Anyway, we finally asked our server where the broads were. 

"Oh she only comes in on weekends," she replied.

She?  There's only one?  The sign promised us broads damn it!  I guess we'll bring our own next time.
 

Reason #3879 Why I Love Las Vegas

So I'm sitting at a bar next to a couple of local guys boozing it up on St. Patrick's Day. Their conversation went something like this:

"You want a shot, bro?"

"You know it, bro."

"Man, that was a good shot."

"You know it, bro."

"You want another one, bro?"

"You know it, bro."

Later one of them said to the bartender, "Hey did you see that protest on the news? What was it, anti, anti, what do you call it? Anti-seminism."

"Uh-oh," I thought. "He means anti-Semitism which means he's probably about so say something disturbing or at least grossly inappropriate."

Then he started talking about pregnant women, and I realized he actually meant, "artificial insemination." Or maybe "anti-semenism."

Glenpyramid Glen Vitamin

On our last night in Las Vegas, I sat at the bar getting in one last session of video poker. A young gentleman in his twenties with a beard and half black hair and half blue hair sat down at the end of the bar and ordered a beer. The bartender set down the beer, and they started chatting like they knew each other.

Blue: Just got back from dinner on top of the Stratosphere.

Bartender: Yeah? How was it?

Blue: Alright. I didn't know fancy dinners took so long. We were there 4 and a half hours! I wasn't paying so I figured I'd stay til the end.

Bartender: Took my girlfriend there once. Was good but probably not worth the price.

Blue: Yeah, I had the sirloin. Better than Golden Corral but you know, a sirloin is a sirloin. You can get them anywhere. Anyway, I'm expecting some friends, can I start a tab?

(A few minutes later, a guy in his mid fifties showed up and sat next to Blue.)

Blue: English Dan! How the hell are you? (They shake hands) How was your flight?

Dan: A flight's a flight.

Blue: Tell me about it. I'm wiped. Just got back from dinner on top of Stratosphere. Didn't want to go but Dad woke me from my nap and insisted.

(Me thinking: He's there with his dad. Interesting.)

Dan: Stratosphere? What you doing up there?

Blue: Oh man, I'm sorry. Geno called this afternoon. Said he wanted to meet the whole team but his only free night this week was tonight. So he took us up there. Man, I told him you couldn't make it but he said that's his only night and he'd make it up to you.

Dan: Yeah? How so?

Blue: He'll probably buy you lunch or a drink sometime.

Dan: Yeah? On top of the f*%$ing Stratosphere?

Blue: Geno's good for it. I saw the bill. Over two grand. And Geno's a good tipper.

(Me thinking: Okay, so these guys work for Geno in some capacity along with Blue's dad. And I can tell by looking at English Dan, he's been around the block a few times. He's not bought into this company and wonders if he's going to get paid while Blue is the young idealist thinking he's going to score big.)

Blue: The food wasn't very good anyway. You didn't miss anything.

Dan: Where's everyone else?

Blue: I think they're still at the Stratosphere. Geno took everyone up top to ride the rides. He paid for everything. (pause) Don't worry, Geno's gonna make it up to you.

Dan: How? Take me on a f*&%ing rollercoaster ride?

(another guy, Ray, in his twenties with short brown hair sat down with them)

Ray: English Dan! Good to see you!

Dan: Yeah, you go to the Strat too?

Ray: Just got off the rollercoaster. Geno woofed his dinner on it! Chunks of tenderloin flying out his mouth at 75 miles per hour and falling 150 stories!

Blue: Yeah, they still there?

Ray: The man can't be stopped. Went to the bar, had a shot, then did the sky jump. Unbelievable. Man, this is a long walk from the Stratosphere. How'd we end up staying here? (Main Street Station)

Blue: Because last year we were at California Club. Dad got drunk and trashed the room. We got banned for life so Mom booked us here.

(Me thinking: Getting weirder. He's here with mom and dad and apparently they like to party pretty hard.)

Dan: So how was your dinner Ray? Blue said not so hot.

Ray: Fantastic! Best salad I ever had. Dressing was amazing like a cool ranch blue cheese thing. And it just got better after that.

Dan: F*&% you.

Blue: Come on Ray. Wasn't English Dan's fault he missed the dinner. I was just telling him Geno promised to make it up to him.

Ray: He's right English Dan. I sat next to Geno and Geno said, "who's not here?" And I said English Dan. And he's asking me how he can make it up to you. And I said it's gotta be something good like a big ol Po'boy or something.

Dan: F*&% you.

Ray: Aw, English Dan, I'm just bustin' your balls. Geno's good for it. I don't know what he's gonna do but he's gonna make it up to you.

(Me thinking: Why do they keep calling him English Dan? Can't he just go by Dan? And why don't I have a tape recorder. From now on, I need to bring a tape recorder to Vegas.)

Ray: So where's mom and dad?

Blue: Mom's in bed already. Tired after all the traveling. Last I saw Dad was at Stratosphere. He got pretty lit up then walked down the stairs from the top of the Stratosphere. Can you believe it? What's that, like 300 stories? Anyway, hostess sees him come out of the stairwell, and he's drenched in sweat. She's like, "what happened to you?" And he says, "I was looking for the restroom." She points across the lobby and he says, "Oh don't worry, I found one on the 50th floor."

Ray: Oh man, I love Dad.

(Me thinking: Okay, so mom and dad must not really be their parents because they're definitely not brothers. Some sort of code name.)

Blue: Anyway, we meet Mom and Dad at 9:00 for breakfast. Then we set up shop at 2:00. Geno's gonna be in and around. He's got meetings all week.

(Me thinking: I started to get the picture. Geno is the head of a pyramid scheme. Mom and Dad are the local bosses of the team while Blue, Ray and English Dan are at the bottom of the pyramid. Blue and Ray are the suckers while English Dan knows it's going nowhere. I just can't figure out what they're selling. But the whole conversation reminded me of the film "Glengarry Glen Ross" except without the suits and without the real estate and less profanity. My best guess was that they're selling vitamin supplements. But I also realized I had now spent an extra $20 on the video poker that I wasn't planning on spending just to keep listening to them. But it was worth it.)

Ray: What do you say we hit that Fremont Street experience. Supposed to be pretty cool.

Dan: I'm going to bed.

Blue: Lighten up English Dan. I told you Geno's gonna make it up to you. Hey Ray, did I tell you I saw the check at the Stratosphere? Over 3 grand!

Ray: Yeah and I bet Geno left a big tip too. English Dan, when Geno buys you a beer, hold out for something better than a Miller Lite. Like a Guinness or Stella Artois or something.

Dan: (flips off Ray)

Ray: (to bartender) Hey, can I get a cup of coffee?

Me: (I hit the cash out button on the machine and stand up.) Coffee? Coffee is for closers!

More Notes From Las Vegas

We recently returned from Las Vegas (again). Here's a few notable stories:

For some reason, I had a difficult time adjusting to the time difference on this trip. This led me to going downstairs to get coffee every morning at 7:00 a.m. One morning, I rode the elevator down to the lobby; as the door opened, a man and his wife came barging in, pushing me to the back of the elevator.

"Oh sorry," I didn't think anyone else would be up this early," he said.

I managed to circle my way around them and stumbled off the elevator without saying what I really wanted to say, "No, jerkwad, civilized people wait for the doors to fully open, verify no one is in the elevator or let them get out before entering the elevator themselves. Or in a moment of forgetfulness, when they bump into someone getting off the elevator, they apologize then get out of the way rather than barreling ahead pushing the person back onto the elevator."

I don't know, maybe they just thought I was joyriding the elevator.

One morning I happened to walk past a slot machine tournament. I stopped for a minute to take in the action. If you haven't seen one, well, it's exactly what you'd expect. Thirty or forty mostly older people sitting at slot machines constantly slamming their hands on the "max credits" button. And on top of that, no one seemed to be having fun. It seemed to be the equivalent of working in some foreign sweatshop factory stamping U.S. corporate logos on some cheap product. Except at the end, a winner would be declared.

Anyway, I don't understand why they just don't put bricks on the "max credits" button and people can bet on which machine will reign supreme. Seems it would be easier and more fun.

One early evening, I found an empty seat at the bar and started playing some video poker while minding my own business. The gentleman next to me started sighing loudly and mumbling, "wow, just wow."

I refused to take the bait but then he finally turned to me and said, "Did you hear the news about Robin Williams?"

"Yes," I said without looking up. "That's awful."

Then he shoved his cell phone showing an article reporting the death into my face. I wasn't sure what to do, did he not hear me the first time or was he trying to demonstrate that you can look at newspapers on cell phones?

"Yeah, that's terrible," I said and went back to playing my game.

He continued to sigh and played with his phone. Then he heard a group of people at the end of the bar talking about Robin Williams. He ran to the end of the bar and showed them the article on his phone. Meanwhile, I scanned the bar for another empty stool but no luck.

He came back and sat down next to me. "It's amazing, I was just watching some of his videos on youtube just last night," he said.

"Then it must be your fault," I wanted to say but did not.

After a few minutes of silence, he tried a new tactic. "Hey, did you hear about that baseball player that swung the bat and it broke in half and he didn't even hit the ball?"

"Must have been a powerful swing," I said without looking up.

I thought he had finally taken the hint as he went back to playing with his phone. But then he started playing some sort of loud concert video footage on his phone and put the phone on a little stand on the bar so I guess everyone could enjoy whatever it was along with him.

I finally took the hint and cashed out. As I got up, I said, "Dude you really need to find a friend."

Incidents on Fremont Street

Everytime we come home from Las Vegas, I try to think of things and/or incidents that demonstrate why we think Las Vegas is the greatest place on earth. For example: the Las Vegas airport has a widely advertised liquor store. You can get the party started before you pick up your luggage. Ever wanted to flag down a taxi by waving a bottle of vodka? You can do that and then tip the driver with a shot.

But in the end, my thoughts always come back to the people-watching. You get to see the entire human social strata in Las Vegas. You see people dressed to the nines stepping out of limos bumping into others wearing tank tops and pulling a cooler on wheels filled with Natural Lite behind them.

Several times during our stay, we saw a man with well-groomed beard, smoking a long pipe sitting at various card tables. In fact he looked a lot like this guy except without the hat. Thereafter, I referred to him as “Captain.” And pipe smoke at a blackjack table is highly underrated.

Various characters continued to entrance us: one night we walked down to the newly remodeled Plaza, which was nicely done, but it's still the Plaza. We sat at the bar and played a little video poker while a group of guys in their early twenties gathered nearby. One of them stood behind us for a while yammering into his cell phone. I won't bore you with the entire conversation but it went a lot like this.   (No, I didn't kill or even injure him.) After he hung up, he came back to the bar to talk with his boys:

“My man's got a stack we got to burn over at Bellagio. Then we'll get the limo and hit Hustler. We got bottle service set up,” said the lead dork.

[My interpretation: his buddy had $100 in chips he wanted to lose at the Bellagio so he could look like a big shot. Then they had reservations at the Hustler Gentleman's Club. But I digress.]

“So can I come to Bellagio?” asked dork #2.

“Nah, you guys hang here.” [--insinuating his friends weren't cool enough to be seen with him at the Bellagio.] We'll meet you at Hustler. We'll be the ones in the limo. Did I mention we got bottle service? And a limo?”

Did I mention that this conversation took place at the Plaza? These guys are talking up a big, classy, expensive evening, but they're staying at the Plaza. Cabbies don't even like to take people to the Plaza because they know that they'll be too cheap to tip. (In the lead dork's defense, at least he was going to pretend like he was staying at the Bellagio.)

To top it all off, the lead dork's credit card got rejected for a $4 bar tab.

Confession: we actually stayed at the Plaza once, a long, long, time ago. Yeah, that was a cheap trip.

But time and again, it's the senior citizens who remind me why I love Las Vegas so much. One morning about 9:00, St. Pauli Girl went downstairs to get coffee. She passed by an older woman who had stopped a cocktail waitress and was whispering, “I know it's kind of early, but do you think I could get an amaretto sour?”

This next incident happened on a previous trip. I was sitting at a bar playing video poker (do you see a trend here?) while watching sports highlights on a big screen. Two little old ladies, one with a walker, shuffled up behind me and tapped me on the shoulder.

“Excuse me, young man,” said one lady. “Did you happen to see if the Boston Bruins won?”

“Actually, they lost 5 to 2,” I replied.

“G**d*** it!” the other lady said loudly. “F***ing idiots!”

That was my number one reason for loving Las Vegas until this next incident occurred on our most recent trip:

We were standing in the middle of Fremont Street one afternoon probably trying to figure out where to gamble, eat, or drink next. We happened to be standing across from the infamous Girls of Glitter Gulch strip club which normally has women like this standing outside trying to woo passersby inside. (Why is she carrying a pen like that? Does she really get a lot of autograph requests?) I've never actually seen anyone venture inside the strip club.

Just to my left, I saw a well-dressed couple in their early seventies. They stood staring at each other for a minute, not talking, then the man took his wife by the hand and they strode confidently into the strip club.

Recently I saw someone post on Twitter that an older couple still holding hands is the cutest thing.  I think an older couple holding hands and walking into a strip club is much cuter.  And that's why I love Las Vegas. 

 

Boobs and Blackjack

We just got back from our almost-annual trip to Las Vegas, which is always an excellent source of blogging material.

Las Vegas is a pretty surreal experience; you can pretend you are in New York, Paris, Monte Carlo or even the Sahara, assuming the desert has a roller coaster as well. (Note, the Sahara closed down a few years ago.) However, we prefer to stay downtown because we like the cheaper gambling, plus it's much easier to find blackjack games with more liberal rules. Hence, downtown Vegas has been traditionally associated with old people who come for the cheap rooms and cheap gambling. Oh wait, that's us.

In the past five or six years, downtown has made a serious effort to attract a younger crowd and families that would normally stay on the strip. The Golden Nugget opened up an awesome new pool (as well as a new tower) and not much later the Plaza underwent renovations, which included Oscar Goodman's (ex-mayor) new restaurant called “Oscar's Beef, Booze and Broads.” Supposedly, it's a classy old-time steakhouse with the added bonus of “broads,” women who will sit at your table and have conversations with you about sports, Vegas, politics and/or wine. I suppose this gives patrons the excitement of "escorts" without the legal hassles or sex.

This year, to up the ante even higher, we discovered two casinos (Golden Gate and The Las Vegas Club) that offer live go-go dancing between the tables. Even more amazing, the scantily-clad young go-go dancers are also the dealers!  (seriously) Yes, you have to deal twenty minutes of blackjack then get on the table and shake it! Coyote Ugly may have hot female bartenders who dance on the bar at intervals, but they won't pay you 3 to 2 odds on blackjack. The whole dealer-dancer experience sure makes busting more fun.

I've never been to blackjack dealer school, but I suspect that the curriculum has changed, at least for the women. I'm guessing morning classes consist of basic dealing while the afternoon classes are held in small cages on a stage at the Classy Foxes Go-Go Club. I've also been trying to imagine the hiring interview for recent female graduates of blackjack dealer school:

“How many hands can you deal in a fifteen-minute block of time? And can you try on this outfit? I need to see if you can make the fringe swing back and forth effectively enough to distract players. And just so you know, the tips aren't as good as strippers make, but you get to keep your clothes on. And it's more money than Hooters waitresses make and you don't smell like a grease fryer at the end of the night. Although you might smell like a cigarette butt. Do you smoke?”

“Yes.”

“Great, you'll love it here! Now get on that platform and shake those moneymakers while I deal the cards, and you stop me when I bust or if I should double down.”

St. Pauli Girl and I played at the Golden Gate one night, not for the girls but because they had a six-deck, hand-shuffled shoe. (That's my story and I'm sticking to it.) We had a good time playing, and St. Pauli Girl and I enjoyed people-watching while making side bets on the cup size of our next dealer. There was a dealer a few tables down sporting the librarian look. Well, that's assuming your local librarian wears long leather boots, fishnet stockings, hip-hugger shorts, and a fringed bikini top that's two sizes too small. Okay, so she was more like a stripper with glasses than a dancing-and-dealing librarian.

After a while, St. Pauli Girl decided to call it a night but I wanted to play a little longer since I was on a roll. Players came and went. One guy sat next to me and started playing two hands at a time. At one point, the dealer didn't see him wave his hands to stand on his deal, and she asked for clarification. In a thick, deep New Jersey accent, he said, “Hey, I waved my hand! Are you f---'in blind?”

“Well, I didn't see it, and I have to make sure they see it upstairs.”

“Grow up, honey. The game moves fast. This is an adult's game. If you can't keep up, maybe you need to get out.”

Her eyes narrowed and shot daggers at him and she very adeptly and very quickly dealt the next hand. To add insult to injury, the guy didn't know what he was doing. He stood on 15 against a dealer 10 and didn't take advantage of any double down opportunities when he should have. He finally left in a huff after five or six more hands. After he departed, I said to the dealer, “I would like to apologize on behalf of all of humanity for jerks like that.”

She smiled and we had a good laugh about it.

“You know, this may be hard to believe,” I said, glancing around the casino then pointing at the empty chair, “but I think that jackass was the biggest boob in here.”

Ha! I kill me!