Drink Rum

I awoke at 7:30AM. Despite the early hour, it was the most sleep I’d had in a week. I don’t remember falling asleep that night, nor do I remember much about it other than that it was restless. I felt better than the night before so I didn’t dwell on it at all.

I looked around the room and saw that it was a mess. I never really unpacked, but sort of just dumped everything in the room. I’d run in and out fairly quickly over the course of the weekend and by now things were pretty much strewn all over. My flight was at 1:30PM and I’d planned to leave the hotel at 11:30AM to get to the airport in time for security and what have you. So I had a few hours to figure out what to do. I decided to pack first. That took about an hour and then I went ahead and bathed in the hydro-flaying machine they called a shower.

At about 10ish, I called around to see if anyone else was awake. They were. So I popped over to Devin and Mike’s room. Everyone else was leaving on later flights so I was the only with a bit of a time crunch.

While conversing with the guys, Mike was packing up his clothes. At one point he pulled out the outfit that he’d been wearing when he was ground upon by Fudge’ems. (Go to the Dominos web site.) I don’t think Devin and Justin had seen the tainted clothing before and we all had another good laugh about the whole thing. We even took pictures of the outfit to preserve the moment for posterity.

By now it was time to go. The guys headed off to grab some food and I headed off to grab a cab to the airport. Duane was kind enough to carry my suitcase down the stairs for me since my knee was still pretty shot. The wait for the elevators was horrible. Farewell guys.

I had an uneventful ride to the airport and check in was quick. I had an hour or so to wander around the airport. That got old after about 15 minutes. I went back to the gate and found out that my plane was delayed and oversold. They were trying to find people to take a late flight out and get a free ticket for doing so. Duane was on that schedule as well, but was going to try to get an earlier flight. I tried to reach him to see if he was going to still be in Vegas all day and if so, I’d grab the late flight out. By the time I caught up with him, they were only offering flights the next day and I decided that I just wanted to go home after all. After a few hours of waiting around our plane finally arrived. It was packed and angry. No one is ever in a good mood returning from Las Vegas. They’re either mad that they lost money or won money and don’t want to leave.

I had my customary window seat and spent the majority of the time staring out the window. I did watch the film “Over the Hedge”. Decent enough. Certainly better than Mission Impossible III.

I’ve found that I don’t like traveling alone. The long periods of silence were very strange for me.

By the time I got home it was close to midnight local time.

My wife and dog were very happy to see me. They listened attentively as I told them the tale that I just told you.

Posted by Monty at 12:57 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

The saga continues. And Ends.

We met hurried back to the Imperial Palace to get showered and changed for dinner. Emeril’s is a semi-swanky joint and we’d decided to get tarted up a bit. After the shower, I felt a little winded… not a big deal. I figured the shower temp was a little hotter than I was used to and that might have made me light headed. I got dressed in my sexy Las Vegas attire, complete with my black velvet coat that has no real practical use other than to be worn in Las Vegas. The limo driver called my cell phone to confirm that he would pick us up at the MGM at 11:30PM. Our dinner reservations were at 9:30PM so I figured 2 hours for dinner was groovy. The manager at Scores was very clear to make sure I answered my cell phone for the limo guy because if he couldn’t reach us, he was moving on.

We took the Las Vegas monorail to the MGM. It was cheaper than a cab, but kinda funny to see all of us over dressed guys on public transportation. Half-way through the ride and less than an hour after the first call, the limo driver called again to re-confirm our plans. We arrived at the MGM and I bee lined us to the restaurant. We got there early, and I don’t know why I was in such a hurry to get there. I got yet another call from the limo guy re-reconfirming our plans.

This is honestly my favorite part of Las Vegas. Gambling is fun, but it can be very hit or miss though. I’ve eaten at Emeril’s (either the New Orleans Fish House or the Delmonico Steak House) every time I’ve gone to Las Vegas. It’s like a tradition I guess. The food is good, it’s fairly priced, and the service is great. The food used to be much cheaper, but they’ve remodeled the place and I guess they have bills to pay. Fancy dinner, limo, strip club… awesome. I just wished I could stop sweating.

The conversation at dinner was great. As with the rest of the trip sitting around with friends chatting was great. Justin was something of a wine aficionado so he took care of ordering the wine. We ended up getting a couple of bottles, but I only ended up drinking a glass and a half. By the time my food came, I was no longer hungry. The limo guy called again. Re-re-re-confirmed.

I had ordered a great Japanese tuna dish. The small piece that I ate was delicious, but I could stomach another bite of food. I kinda pushed it around on my plate and drank some water, but even that made my gut feel worse. The sweating was getting worse, but was invisible thanks to the jacket. I excused myself to go hit the restroom, but that didn’t help. I came back and we chatted a bit more, but I was feeling worse as time went on.

Then the limo guy called again. He said he was outside and ready for us. I told him it was only 10:30PM and we were still eating dinner… well… everyone but me was eating dinner. After thinking for a second that I’d screwed up my time zone conversion, he realized he’d looked at his clock wrong and told me he’d call back in an hour. I had to go back to the bathroom. I wasn’t sure if I was going to throw up or crap my pants.

I did neither.

I went back to the table and proceeded to give away most of my dinner to people to taste. Because I’d mentioned that we were celebrating bachelors, after dinner our waitresses brought Mike and Justin free ice cream with little candles on it. Something in how she said “congratulations you two” spooked Justin into thinking that our waitress thought that Justin and Mike were going to marry each other. I told him that he was imagining things and that the only reason he suspected that was that I, in fact, had told the restaurant that when I made reservations. Justin was now determined to clear his hetero name with the wait staff of Emeril’s. I told him that I was just kidding. Then I told him I wasn’t and it was all true. I didn’t tell them. It was just a running joke for the trip.

I grabbed the check for dinner, as I often do, and the guys split the wine bill. We headed out across the massive casino that is the MGM Grand (the world’s largest hotel) looking for the front door. About this time the limo driver called again. He was out front. I told the guys to go out without me and I was going to stop in the gift shop and buy some Pepto. I’m glad they had Pepto, but not sure why they’d have it in a gift shop. Hey kids! I went to Las Vegas and look what I brought you back! Pepto! Yay!

Pepto in hand, I quickly trotted and met up with the guys in the limo. I’ve forgotten the driver’s name… you would have thought that I’d remember that after all the calls. I do remember that the guy was from Miami. Everyone seemed to enjoy themselves in the limo. There are a couple of great of all of the guys in the limo with all of their big bucks fanned out in their hands and me holding a bottle of Pepto. Despite chugging half of the bottle, I still felt horrible.

The limo guy drove us around to the back of the club. Secret, special entrance. The limo guy let us out and we tipped him $40. He seemed happy, I guess. Then we were introduced to a guy in a black jacket that looked like he worked for John Gotti who in turn introduced us to a guy in a white jacket that looked like Tony Clifton. He ushered us in the backdoor and down a hall, the whole time saying, “you take care uh me, I take uh care uh you”. We passed the girls’ dressing room on the way in and in case you ever wanted to know what happens behind the scenes… girls sit around topless, smoking cigarettes, putting on make up, and talk about boob jobs. He led us to a table and Duane asked how much we should tip the guy. I wasn’t sure. Since I’d already secured the table with the manager, the guy didn’t really do anything other than walk us in. I didn’t know what etiquette was for this. We gave him a $20 and he looked pissed so Duane gave him another $20.

My legs were like jelly, so I sat down quickly facing away from the stage. The club had changed completely since the afternoon. The music was louder, the tables were fully to capacity and there were hundreds (no hyperbole) of dancers everywhere. A waitress came to take our drink order. Between the five of us we ordered 2 beers, a cocktail, a shot, and a water (I’ll give you three guesses who had the water). The bill was $42.00. Apparently this was unhappy hour, unlike earlier in the day. The music was crazy loud and the bass thumping in my headed was horrible. My stomach felt worse by the second and I was drenched in sweat. I thought to myself that if I could get off the main floor and into a more quiet area, I’d be in better shape. But the only way to get to a quiet place was to pay a girl $100 for 3 songs in the upstairs rooms. I looked around to see if I could find Daisy, but she was no where to be seen. There were girls everywhere, but no of them had her natural charm. With my heart racing, I soon realized that I couldn’t feel my hands anymore. I had to get out of there. I leaned over and handed Duane a $100 bill and told him to make sure Justin and Mike had a good time. He and I had previously discussed setting them both up in the private room area and agreed to split the cost. With that I announced that I was going. I don’t remember what people said or did from that point as I was solely focused on finding the exit. I was walking on numb legs and my vision was murky. I made a wrong turn in the club and ended up at the bar instead of the door. Frantically, I finally found my way out.

Once outside, I felt a little better. Not enough to go back in though, sadly. While I waited for a cab, I watched the bouncers roll a couple of drunks who were trying to pee on the palm trees out front and watched several “grabby” customers get tossed. In the cab, I chatted nonstop with the driver. I had no reason why I wouldn’t stop talking to the driver, but I rambled and rambled and rambled. That was when my brain split in two.

Half of me was talking and talking. The other half was trying to figure out why I was talking and started telling the other half to shut up. Oddly, I still felt like a spectator to the thoughts in my head and certainly wasn’t directing either side of the internal conversation.

I paid the cab driver and walked straight through the casino, up the elevator and into my room. I threw my clothes on the floor and crawled into bed. I was feeling better at this point, but still very uneasy. I decided the best thing to do would be to sleep. And of course, I couldn’t.

I just laid there in the dark. Thinking.

I was in Las Vegas, but instead of having fun I was laying in bed. I’d missed or barely participated in the joyous evening that I’d spent so much brain power putting together. It was like a dream come true.

I wondered whatever happened to Daisy. That’s when my brain started talking to itself again.

“Daisy, Daisy…”

“Shut up and go to sleep.”

“I’m afraid, Dave.”

“I’m not Dave. Go to sleep.”

“I can feel my mind going…”

“It’s not going. I don’t think…”

“I know I've made some very poor decisions recently, but I can give you my complete assurance that my work will be back to normal. I've still got the greatest enthusiasm and confidence in the mission. And I want to help you.”

“What? Why is the only thing you can do is quote 2001?”

“My mind is going. There is no question about it. I can feel it. I can feel it.”

“I think you’re right.”

“Daisy, Daisy, give me your answer do. I'm half crazy all for the love of you. It won't be a stylish marriage, I can't afford a carriage. But you'll look sweet upon the seat of a bicycle built for two.”

“Stop singing.”

“Daisy, Daisy, give me your answer do. I'm half crazy all for the love of you. It won't be a stylish marriage, I can't afford a carriage. But you'll look sweet upon the seat of a bicycle built for two.”

“Please stop singing.”

Then the phone rang.

I don’t know if it woke me up or broke my lack of concentration, but I stared at the phone debating whether or not to answer it. I was convinced that it would probably be me on the other end of the phone. I answered it anyway. It was Devin. I had forgotten that I had his camera in my coat pocket and he wanted it back. He’d left the club shortly after I did but instead of laying in his room losing his mind, he was at the craps table winning several hundred dollars. A few minutes later he knocked on my door and I handed over his camera. He asked how I was doing and I lied and said I was feeling a bit better, but in truth I was somewhat confused about what was going on in my head.

To this day I don’t know what happened to me in Las Vegas. It could have been many things, maybe a combination of things. It could have been lack of sleep. It could have been the effect of mixing wine, beer, and liquor. It could have been too many pain killers or more likely… not enough. Most likely, though, is that I got myself so worked up about planning the perfect evening that my brain snapped a bit. A doctor told me that it was a panic attack, but I don’t know what one of those is so I have nothing to compare it to. There’s also the chance that spending nine years in a high stress work environment may have done irrepairable harm to my mental outlook. My brain maybe so attuned to stress that it’ll take the simplest tasks (like planning dinner) and turn it into a massive mental project. My ability to enjoy anything is limited these days. The only time I can relax is when my brain is chemically relaxed or distracted (such as by conversations about Floor Trash Brand cigarettes and hookers in the desert).

I was going to finish the saga in this post, but there’s still one more chapter to add. Sometime this week… I promise.

Posted by Monty at 3:03 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

I don’t remember where I was in the Las Vegas story… probably describing random events that had little to no significance. Hopefully, this entry will hold more. When I write, I write as I think. I don’t have an outline or plan. I’d probably do better if I did, but would be less likely to include tangents. I just write as my brain remembers and when I get to a stopping point, I do. Anyway… here we go.

So Mike, Duane, and I headed off to Scores. For those that don’t know, Scores is a chain of strip clubs that got started in New York as Howard Stern’s naughty hang out type place. I looked at some places on line and it seemed to be the best looking one of the bunch. We had to wait a few minutes out front of the casino for a cab. It was 5:00PM and too early for dinner and too late for hotel check outs, so cabs were slow in coming. In front of us were two gals doing the waiting thing too. Shortly after arriving in line, a group of groomsmen came by in tuxedos carrying cheesy, plastic yard cups that were half full of the vomit inducing, $2.95 frozen margaritas/daiquiris/syrup that they’d obviously been drinking steadily. The groom was a puffy, pink ham of a man and he was accompanied by several other oddballs, but most notedly a diminutive figure with a mouth completely out of proportion with his tiny stature. The little man would have had a career as a toady in the 1930’s. I never caught what the little man’s name was, but the puffy groom’s name was Matt. I know this because little man introduced him to the two gals in front of us.

Little Man: Hey ladies, this is my friend PHAT Matt. That’s P-H-A-T, as in Pretty Hot and Tempting.

Gals: Ok.

Little Man: We’ve got a big suite upstairs and lots of alcohol, do you want to get with this man?

Matt: *burp*

Gals: No thank you.

Little Man: Heh, heh… al-right.

Me: (to Mike) Did you see that little guy? I think he escaped from a circus or something.

Then we got in a cab and left. Our cab driver was puzzled as to why we were going to a strip club in the middle of the day, but he took us there anyway. Upon arrival, we noticed a big sign out front about dress codes being enforced. Mike went in to make sure we were ok and the nice lady at the front desk said we were fine.

Happy hour at this place was very happy indeed. No cover, free buffet, and free drinks. Awesome.

Score was a huge club, two stories with a big winding staircase in the middle. It has a big library feel to it. Nice lighting, big stage, huge bar, very nice. When we got there, the place was pretty dead. It had only been open for 30 minutes, so I guess that’s why. I was a bit concerned that the ladies were going to be pretty skuzzy since it wasn’t prime time, but boy was I wrong.

We sat down a table with a nice view of the stage, but back far enough that we could keep the boobs out of the chicken wings. I was feeling a little woozy so I ordered a Corona and didn’t bother with food. Within minutes a stripper was in Duane’s lap. She had her back to me, so I couldn’t see her face, but she had a fairly typical blond stripper frame. She and he conversed briefly and very soon she was naked and dancing for Mike. He seemed a bit surprised. Not surprised like when a doctor tells you that you have gout, but more surprised like when you get a BB gun for Christmas surprise. Duane leaned over to me and confided that the girl hadn’t really asked if Mike wanted a dance, but asked Duane if he’d hook up his bachelor buddy… to which he said yes. The girl took that as her cue to go gyrate on Mike. In hind sight, it might have been nice to warn him. I got bored and went up to the stage. By bored, I mean that there was a super hot leggy brunette on stage and I watched her do her thing on the catwalk. It’s kinda cool being the only guy sitting at the stage. After she was done, I went looking for her, but never found her again. She was hot. I decided to go talk to someone about special arrangements for having the bachelor party fun there that evening. To make a long story short, I talked with the manager and we got hooked up with a limo and a central reserved table for that evening. Awesome. I do love me some limos.

I went back to the table and Duane was sitting there having some food with the stripper from Mike’s dance. Mike was sitting at the stage and there was another hot girl on. I decided to leave Duane with the hungry stripper and join Mike. He had a very neatly arranged series of cash piles on the stage in front of him and was wondering if the gal on stage was going to ever come get them. I sat down and plopped two dollar bills on the stage and the girl came right over. Mike was hurt, but not so much as that he couldn’t laugh at the situation. He even offered to get me a dance from her when she was off stage. That was very nice of him and I graciously accepted. She popped backstage and told us she’d be out in a minute. Awesome.

We rejoined Duane at the table and he had a “thanks for leaving me guys” look. After getting a good look at the hungry stripper he was seated with I could see why. She was a bit of a troll. She told us her name was Shamequa, or Shandala, or Sasqwatch or something like that. She ordered herself a drink and when it arrived she acted like she didn’t have any money to pay, so I bought it for her. I was instantly perturbed.

Shortly thereafter, the sexy gal from the stage came over and sat down in the chair next to me. We chatted for a bit. She had a bit of giddy nervousness that I found very disarming. It turns out that this was only her third day of stripping. She said her name was Daisy. That name was a problem for me. Daisy isn’t a stripper name. To me, that sounds like someone who milks cows for a living. Of course in some circles, daisy is slang a certain part of a woman’s anatomy. Maybe that was her angle. I don’t know I didn’t ask. A few nights prior, I had watched 2001. In the scene where HAL is dying (being turned off) he sings a silly little song about Daisy. It was a very bizarre moment. A scene in a movie about a computer going crazy and then being shut down and my own brain taking a leave of absence had a disturbing coincidental anchor. Daisy. I didn’t let that bug me much. Much. I did bother me though and I chatted with her for quite a while. She eventually did do her magic dance for me and it was wonderful. She had a Chinese character tattooed on the small of her back and I asked her what it meant. She said it was the symbol for love… and I could love her ass all night long. That’s actually a quote. That was a very intriguing phrase and I laughed quite a bit at it. She wasn’t laughing though… just smiling. I stopped laughing too. At some point in the conversation I accidentally used a phrase that I use somewhat commonly, “That’s a Daisy”. It’s in reference to a line Doc Holliday used repeatedly in the movie Tombstone. I don’t remember what context I used it in, but it confused Daisy. Probably as much as my retelling of the event has confused you. I quickly changed the subject and told her about our experiences with Little Man and PHAT Matt. She laughed… because I’m funny. Or pathetic. But because I’m creating this story, I can change it to suit my own ideas. She laughed because I was wickedly clever and sexy… not because I was carrying large amounts of cash and was exhausted and likely slurring like Jerry Lewis on hour 18 of a telethon.

By now, Duane had gone off and found a sexier woman to chat with. Mike did as well. So I was sitting at the table with Daisy and Sasqwatch. Sasqwatch started to complain that the other guys ditched her. I was half tempted to ask Daisy to come with me to another table and ditch Sasqwatch as well, but I didn’t feel like getting up just then. Daisy mentioned later that Sasqwatch was rather unpopular with the working girls because she’d try to steal business.

We’d been at the club for over two hours at this point. We had the front desk lady call for a cab. Duane’s new stripper friend scolded me for taking him away from her, but I assured her that we would be back later. Daisy gave me a hug and then I got up to go find Mike. In the process I saw an absolutely stunning blonde on the stage. I gave her a smile and she smiled back, but I had to find Mike because our cab had arrived and I didn’t have time for eye flirting.

I finally found everyone and slowing got them moving towards the door. Sasqwatch asked if we’d be seeing her tonight as well and I politely replied, “Maybe”.

I looked back over my shoulder and the blonde on stage was waving at me and motioning for me to come over. Duane was still saying goodbye to the gal he was hanging out with so I went over to her. She said hi and that she’d been trying to get my attention for some time. I replied that with her body, she had no trouble getting my attention. She was sad that we were leaving, but told us to ask for her when we came back. I asked her what her name was and she said “Casey.”

“Casey with a ‘y’”? I said

“No… ‘K.’ ‘C.’” she replied.

“Awesome”.

I tipped her a few bucks and we headed out the door.
Once we got in the light of day, Mike noticed that his shirt had some sort of residue on it. Same with his britches. He was trying to figure out what it was when he realized that it was rubbed on him from his dance with Sasqwatch. It basically looked like she (now renamed Fudge’ems) wiped her ass with Mike. It was probably the funniest, nastiest thing I’ve ever seen. Duane and I laughed until it physically hurt at Mike’s tainted (heh) clothes. When we got in the cab, Mike was frantically trying to get the brown glaze off his clothes, butt it wouldn’t budge.

Oh the humanity.

Posted by Monty at 12:43 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

There's no FART today. I've not been paying much attention to the world around me this week so I don't know who's being silly and who isn't.

Today's post is basically a health status report.

Knee: Knee is about as good as it's going to get. That's good and bad. I can do just about anything I need to on a daily basis. Up until recently, walking required thought... watching my steps, making sure I wasn't limping, etc. I've gotten to the point where walking is natural. Stairs aren't natural. Going up and down steps is still tricky and still uncomfortable. I've got a snazzy knee brace that works a real treat though. For heavy load days I can strap that thing on and go crazy. It's very handy. I'm ready for paintball with that thing.

Brain: My brain is still broken. Insomnia is getting worse. I'm averaging less than 3 hours a night of sleep and those hours are only semi-restful. My brain just won't go to sleep. I'm tired as hell... just can't sleep. Ambien doesn't even knock me out. Doctors are baffled. We've been playing with a wide variety of medical cocktails to see if anything short of anesthesia will knock me out. So far, nothing has done it.

Weight: Down 20lbs. That made me happy. I've got another 20 or 30 to go. Moving in the right direction though.

Heart: Probably the biggest health improvement I've got. My cardio is rock solid. My blood pressure has dropped from 167/94 to 122/82 and my resting heart rate (aka pulse) is 84. That's pretty cool. My doc is thrilled with that. I did some tests where you basically spike your heart rate for 20 minutes and then see how long it takes for it to get back to normal... mine took 2 minutes to go back to the resting rate. 2-10 minutes is good, the faster the better, so my heart is bueno. Apparently, by accident, I've been during endurance training instead of aerobic training. Who knew? I have to slow down my exercise routine to burn more fat. Strange but true. According to science, there's this magic number (there's a real formula for it and everything) that is your target heart rate range for burning 85% fat calories during exercise. If you go under the number you don't do diddly... if you go over your body only burns around 25% fat calories, but starts putting out toxins and increasing muscle mass (if protein is around) and increases your cardio endurance (and heart size!). So, I've been doing 8 weeks of the endurance level stuff. Whoops. Now that I have a heart rate monitor and these handy formulas I can figure out exactly what I'm doing. Instead of doing all endurance level stuff, I'm going to do aerobic twice a week and endurance once or twice a week. Science!

Every pound of weight I lose is 7 pounds of pressure on my angry knee that I don't have to deal with every time I take a step. So I've basically taken 120lbs of pressure off the knee. Good thing.

I think if I could just get to sleep, I'd be solid.

Oh and sometime in the near future I'm going to start swimming again. The goal is still to get SCUBA certified by next summer. The 100 yard endurance test was what stopped me before. I'm going to take the classes and training locally in a pool and then go do the two final open water dives in the Caribbean.

Posted by Monty at 11:08 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

My god I must have slept for an eternity. At least it felt that way. No one had called my room yet, so I didn’t know if anyone else was up. The sun was shining brightly through the window and gone were the purple glowing light boxes that provided so much fun the night before. No, now the angry yellow sun focused in on me as if it was god’s flashlight. He knew I was up to no good and he was calling me out. I just wanted to keep sleeping, but brain was ready to start the day. I looked at the clock. 7:30AM.

7:30AM in Las Vegas is the worst time of the day ever. The only people that are up are the senior citizen crowds, towing their oxygen supply around in handy green cylinders, the extraordinarily obese people on their way to the first of their seven all-you-care-to-eat buffet bonanzas, and the last dregs of the all night party machines. The latter of the three are the most miserable people on earth. Without fail, they are in that cottony mind frame, where they’re beyond the apex of their drunken stupor and only moments away from the crushing debilitation that will be their hangover from drinking dozens of Miller Lite’s and several yards of icy margaritas. They’re always at the craps tables… throwing dice off the table… cheering every roll only to realize the misread the dice and had lost. Then they clap for themselves and reassure themselves that next time they can do it. Their wives and girlfriends often hang on as long as possible, but most of the time they just stand glassy-eyed at the end of the table, propped up so they don’t fall to the floor. Everyone once and a while a sudden cheer or boo will startled the emaciated harlot into brief consciousness and she’ll utter the immortal phrase, “did we win, can we go to bed now?” That is always answered with, “just one more roll, baby. Just one more roll.”

That process starts about 3:00AM. They’ll one more roll it for hours. By 8:00AM I was bored and wandering the casino looking for a banana. I walked past the craps table and saw that scene. Five people still playing. None were having fun. It’s was mechanical. Same bets, same dice, same results, repeat until rich or broke. I could see by the chips on the table that the people they had lost quite a bit of money and were making desperation bets to get it back. They’d lose those too.

I found my banana. That and a bottle of water was my strolling breakfast. I walked outside for a bit to get some smokeless air. It felt good. It was comfortable outside and I had the strip mostly to myself. I got a good walk in and headed back to the room feeling pretty refreshed and in amazingly clear mental state despite getting little sleep over night.

I called my wife and talked to her for an hour. Since it was afternoon at home, she was up and half way through her day. She mentioned that she’d gone and bought an air hockey table at a yard sale that morning. Awesome.

While other guys might have had jealous or scornful mentalities because their husbands were “whoring it up” in Sin City, my wife bought an air hockey table. Just in case you were wondering whether or not I have an awesome wife… there ya go. We chatted a bit and decided to take a shower and such. Get cleaned up a bit.

The bathrooms at the Imperial Palace are mostly unremarkable with single exception being the water pressure in the shower. I stepping into the shower and the super powerful fire hose burst of water instantly eroded my scrotum. Just blew it completely off. I started dancing around trying to find a safe spot with no body part touching the abrasive geyser of water that was trying to kill me. Luckily, I caught my scrotum before it went down the drain and was able to reattach it with the handy sewing kit provided by the hotel. Just in case you’re ever in a hotel room and notice a free needle and thread, beware the shower saw. You’ve been warned.

While I was being flayed in the shower, the rest of the guys were getting up. Mike and Devin had played craps until 6:00AM, but seemed none the worse for wear. We debated briefly what to do for breakfast/lunch. Half wanted breakfast, half wanted lunch. Mike looked like he just wanted to make the vomit. The whiskey he’d been pounding hand over fist the night before apparently tried to kill him and wasn’t completely finished with the job.

We opted for the Chinese Tea House. It’s the 24/7 café type place. It was nearby and complete with a bathroom. We sat at a cozy table in the middle of the joint, smartly not placed too close to anyone. We spent most of the meal discussing the HBO series Deadwood. Mike does a disturbingly convincing impression of Calamity Jane. Both Justin and I had a prime rib sandwich and fries. Like the chicken fingers before, they served about 4 pounds of rib on bread. I easily left behind enough food to save Africa. I don’t remember what the other guys had, but I believe everyone was happy. I picked up the check for the meal and we headed off for some Las Vegas fun.

We ended up going back to the rooms to get some things, change, and drop off something. The elevator situation was getting worse by the minute and we ended up opting to just take the stairs. Four flights of stairs up and down would eventually destroy my poor wittle knee. But at this point in the day, it was mostly and annoyance.

We were going to go for a little ride. Devin drove to Las Vegas from Los Angeles so we all hopped into his car to speed off to our destination. I should also mention that Devin’s car is one of those high-end street racing type cars. And cramped if you put in five people. Devin’s bobbing and weaving in traffic made Mike’s stomach try to revolt on a few occasions. The trip didn’t take very long and we arrived at one of my favorite places in Las Vegas… the Las Vegas Gun Store.

At this place you can rent just about any weapon you can imagine that fires a bullet. They do have an RPG on the wall, but it’s not for rent. They’ve got modern assault weapons, belt fed machine guns, world war II submachine guns, pistols, revolvers, everything.

Mike and Devin both picked out to chrome shiny .357 pistols. They weren’t revolvers, but big bolt action pistols like something out of Robocop… dead or alive you’re coming with me creep. Duane grabbed a fun MP-5 submachine gun, and Justin and I went for 9mm Berettas. Duane, being former military, had a field day with his gun. He stitched nice, healthy lines of death through his unfortunate target. I did marginally well with my first clip, but I noticed all of my tightly grouped shots were an inch or two low for the rest of my shots, I was punching out large swatches of bull’s-eye. Previously I’d tried the smaller .380 Beretta and was more impressed with its accuracy when firing moderately fast. With the 9mm version, I did just as well as previously on the .380. I think it had to do with getting more comfortable with the pistol. I went through 50 shots pretty quickly and waited for the rest of the guys. Duane had gone through his 50 rounds in about 20 seconds. That’s what a fully automatic submachine gun will do for you.

A good time was had by all and the gun range was a pleasant surprise for the bachelors. Back to the hotel/casino we went to wash off the gun powder and oil from our hands. While everyone was doing that, I took the liberty of setting up dinner reservations at Emeril’s New Orleans Fish Market. It’s been a tradition of mine ever since I started going to Las Vegas to eat there. The dinner would be late (9:30PM) but we were on Las Vegas time and late dinners are cool. I told the reservation lady that we were celebrating our two bachelor friends getting married. She feigned interest.

We decided to hit the craps tables again. Once again, we took turns throwing down large piles of cash at low roller tables. As more money was laid out, the pit boss kept turning around to her manager pleading for help. “$500 coming in… help! $400 coming in… help! $600 coming in, HELP!” I think it made the poor lady nervous that there was $1500 in cash strewn about the table. Oh well. Heh heh. It was only a $5 table. Duane would once again spectate, but this time there were two stunning cocktail waitresses from some Eastern Bloc country that were worth spectating over. While the rest of us gambled, he went over to the bar and ordered a Cranberry and Vodka cocktail. The bartender gave him a buy one get one free deal. So he knocked those back fairly quickly. I offered to teach him how to play craps and since the table was slow, it was a good time to do so. He bought in with $20 and help his own long enough to get a few more free drinks. I had been down a few hundred at one point, but worked my way back to $8 profit. I decided I’d had enough and tipped my $8 winnings to the dealers.

Mike was ready to go to so we tried to figure out what to do next. It was 5:00PM at this point and the Scores strip club had just opened. Happy hour at the strip club. Our goal was to scout a location for the big event that night. Devin wanted to keep playing dice and Justin stayed behind as well. Duane, Mike and I hopped in a cab and off we went to house of bump and grind.

Posted by Monty at 3:18 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

When last we met, our hero… meaning me… was in his Las Vegas hotel room trying to muster the strength to go down stairs to the casino and gamble. Previously, I’d been walking all over the Las Vegas Strip in Harley boots and my body was paying for it. My knee was grinding bone on bone with every step. The pain killers had worn off by now and I could see when I changed shoes that one of my toenails had sliced the neighboring toe open and it was bleeding quite a bit. On top of all that, my back was sore from the flight and walking around trying to keep body weight off my bum knee. I contemplated taking some more pills, but decided that I might do more damage than good and out the door I went with some Visine in my pocket and a makeshift bandage around my toe.

The tennis shoes made walking much better and once I hit the casino floor I stopped feeling old and broken and felt like getting my game on. The tables were $10 minimums at this point. That can get expensive. Over the course of the game I would have anywhere between $10 - $150 on the table at any given time. We decided to buy in like high rollers. Duane was going to spectate and ogle the cocktail waitress, but Devin, Justin and I tossed down a pile of cash that looked to be over $2,000. We also tossed in our VIP cards and the table came to a screeching halt. The box man (the guy who sits at the craps table and hangs over the house stack of chips) was going crazy over all the new money in play and called over a pit boss to help. The players at the table started making comments about us. Some were envious, some snotty. The basic bankroll at the table had been between $100-$300 per person and the three of us just bought in with triple that amount. We finally got all of our chips and the game resumed. Craps is a great game, but the action really doesn’t translate well into words, so excuse me if I leave out the boring details.

On a whole, the table was hit or miss… mostly miss for me. I was playing very aggressively and at one point had lost $400. I worked my way back to only being down less than $200 and left the table. Craps is a game about numbers and probability. There’s nothing else to it. Despite that fact, it is also the most superstitious game you’ll find in a casino. Justin, for instance, claimed to be a horrible roller or shooter and opted out of throwing the dice on his turn. Everyone gave him grief. On his next turn up, he gave in to peer pressure and tossed out the dice. First roll… 3. Craps. Loser. Second roll… 12. Boxcars. Loser. Third roll… 2. Snake Eyes. Loser. Fourth roll… 3. Craps. Loser. Four horrible rolls in a row. $40 out of my pocket. And Justin is standing there saying I told you so. And he did. I did find that anytime Justin made a “field” bet, it would hit. Anytime the point was 10 and I made a “field” bet, the shooter hit the point. Without exception. These are all mathematical improbabilities. It breeds superstition in the game. Luck is only defiance of probability over the short term. There’s no mojo or juju that makes it work. If there was, Microsoft would own it.

After I pulled my money off, the table ran hot and cold and finally very cold. We decided to grab a table at our favorite Tiki-esque bar and drink.

I was done drinking for the evening. My complementary $190 rum and coke that I received at the craps table was sitting as well with me as Michael Jackson sits with a little boy. So we sat around the table exchanging jokes, and laughs. By now it was after 2:00AM local time and I’d been up for almost 24 hours and was feeling it. We laughed very hard around that table that night over jokes that I’ve now forgotten. It’s pretty funny that five guys who haven’t seen each other in three years or more can come back together and instantly feels like a time that past almost 15 years ago. As happy as that was, it was also sad. Sad to know that this time, too, would pass. Duane would go back to Chicago. Devin and Justin to California, Mike to Atlanta, and me back to Washington. I was broken out of this depressing thought by the words “strip club”.

I have to back the mental truck up here a bit and discuss two previous bachelor parties, Duane’s and my own. Both involved going to a strip club in Washington called the Nexus Gold Club. They call it that, I’m guessing, because an evening there requires at least one gold ingot. I’ve never used the word ingot before, so I just wanted to use it. Anyway, the dealio in this joint is that a girl will come over and dance on your table for $20. That in and of itself isn’t a big deal, but once word gets around to the dancers that there’s a bachelor party in the house, you’ll have girls dancing 4 or 5 at a time. At $20 each for 5 girls is $100 for every three minute song. Multiply that times a couple of hours and watch the money go bye-bye. Even with 10-14 guys, that gets pricey. So both of our bachelor parties got extremely expensive. Because of that, folks were a little gun shy about heading off to a Las Vegas club.

Not me. Strippers are awesome. It’s like going on an expensive date with a hot girl, you don’t have to worry about being charming (but I am anyway), and you’re guaranteed to see her naked.

Because it was late, though, I advised against going to a club. Most Las Vegas clubs aren’t 24/7. The few that are get scarier after 2AM. By scarier, of course, I mean hepatitis. I just noticed that I use a lot of commas when I write. I hope I use them correctly. Oh yeah, so anyway, I was (more commas) tired and advised against going to the club. I’d been to clubs very late and very tired before and the experience wasn’t worth the expense. I might be the only person that can claim to have fallen asleep in a strip club. Not passed out, mind you, but fallen asleep. So when the idea came up, I advised we go immediately or not at all. We ended up doing the latter. We did promise each other (or maybe I just promised myself) that we’d go the next night.

After another round of drinks and jokes, we opted back to the craps table. By this point (comma) I was a zombie and didn’t really feel like doing anything that required a brain. Mike, Justin, and Devin threw down more piles of cash and threw the old bones while Duane and I hung back and talked about Floor Trash brand cigarettes.

Back in the old days, Duane, Devin and I (and Justin for about 15 minutes) worked at McDonald’s. We had a manager that could best be described as the fast food manager guy in the movie Better Off Dead (same guy that was “Porky” from Porky’s) even down to the detail of putting his false teeth in a soda cup. This guy also smoked those discount cigarettes that cost like ten cents a pack. I don’t remember the real brand name, but I dubbed them Floor Trash brand cigarettes since I imagined that they were produced with the crap tobacco that was lying around on the floor in the cigarette factory. I figured they often came with special bonus materials like lint, roach droppings, band aids, and perhaps the AIDS. That conversation kept Duane and I entertained for about an hour. After that though, we noticed Justin was gone. Duane and I were sitting at slot machines behind the craps table, but Justin thought we left and so he had decided to hit the sack. Since it was now 4am and I wouldn’t be the first one to sack out, I decided to do the same. Duane did as well.

I got back to my room and tried to get undressed. My knee was the size of a pumpkin and my toe was still bleeding. I felt old again, but even more so I felt tired. As I went to sit on the bed, my momentum kept me moving and I just kinda fell into it. My body said “close enough” and I closed my eyes to the first night in Las Vegas.

At 8AM (four hours later for the math impaired) my brain said, “Rise and Shine, Dum-Dum!” It’s a good thing I got a good night’s sleep because Day 2 was to be a much longer and much more active day.

They should create a sarcasm font.

Posted by Monty at 12:52 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Friday's Amazing Retard Trophy goes to George Worthless Bush this week.

Not for the usual stuff. Not for lack of vision. Not for his sexual alignment with the religous right. Not for ignorance or maliciousness (circle one). Not for any of the usual things dum dum has done.

No, this one goes out for his dim witted idea to have a 9/11 speech on Monday.

It's scheduled for 9:01PM EST, which means it'll pre-empt Monday night football.

I think that, in and of itself, should be reason for impeachment.

What amazing enlightenment are you going to bring to the 5 year anniversary?

How's Iraq? Screwed? Ya don't say?

Afgahistan is all right though... wait... no it isn't.

Luckily everything in Iran, Korea, and Lebanon are working fine and the economy is booming.

What in the hell can Dubs say that warrants a national address? 3,000 dead Americans... terrorist hate freedom... gays are bad.

Awesome.

Posted by Monty at 12:26 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

OK, I hadn’t planned on this taking over a week to compile, but I’ve been sick and my attention span hasn’t been up to the task. Anyway…

Devin and I met up after my long, tedious flight. We were both hungry (I hadn’t eaten that day) and wandered around the Imperial Palace to find a place to get a quick bite to eat. I saw a sign for the Burger Palace and we opted for that. I was horribly disappointed that I did not get to see that big headed king from Burger King commercials. I mistakenly assumed that Burger King lived in Burger Palace and I could have not been more wrong. They should remarket that place as Lowlife Palace. But then again I wouldn’t have eaten there if they called it that.

Even the dumpy dive fooderies in Las Vegas do everything overboard. I ordered the chicken finger combo. It was $7.99, which is kinda pricey for chicken fingers served by a guy in a paper hat. But they delivered unto me a cardboard board that had at least two pounds of chicken in it and a side of 4,000 calories of French fries. There were four “fingers”, but each one was basically a chicken breast. I ate about half of it before I wanted to die. The BBQ sauce there was the best.

Devin observed that if we stayed in the Burger Palace for the whole weekend, we could say that we were the coolest people we saw during the trip. He was right. I’m not very high on the social ladder of the world, but this place was full of either white teens who thought that they were gangsta rappers and a group of folks that could have probably been described “kid touchers”. Oh and there was another 500 woman. I think she dove in the trash after my uneaten chicken. I didn’t leave her any sauce though. Tough break.

During dinner and catching up, I got a call from Duane. He and Justin were downstairs. Since Justin was one of our two bachelors for the party, we could now go party. Devin, who is Justin’s brother, and I went to the check in and met up with the guys. I mistook a fat lady for Duane. Duane had dropped about 50 pounds since I’d last seen him and that threw me off. Justin also appeared to have grown a few inches vertically in the three years or so since I’d seen him. Sadly, at 5’10 I was saddled with the title of “Shortest Guy” in our crowd. But I put gel in my hair so I also got the title of “Tallest Hair”. After that we stopped giving me titles. I gave myself a few secret titles when I was alone of getting a lap dance. Word.

We wandered up to the Duane and Justin’s room and helped them unpack. By help I mean sat on the bed and did nothing. At one point Justin went into the bathroom to freshen up (the polite language for tossing a deuce) and Devin decided to build a fortification outside of the bathroom door out of one of those folding luggage stands that you find in hotel rooms and never use. I think Justin was tipped to the fact that something is up due to the laughter that went instantly quiet when he flushed and was replaced with many “sssshhhh’s”. For a moment I envisioned Justin coming out of the bathroom and tripping straight into the wall and putting his head through it. That would have been entertaining to get a stripper to dance on him. But alas, Justin just stuck his head out and shook it at us as we collectively sighed in disappointment.

Sitting in the room trying to trip Justin got boring (as it’s wont to do) so we hit the casino. Mike was almost there so we decided against gambling until he got there. We headed over to the Tiki Palace Bar and Pub for a few drinks. I had my old standby rum and coke and it made me instantly ill. I don’t know if it was lack of sleep, a bad mix with pain killers, the fact that I had had neither caffeine nor sugary soda in 6 weeks. I finished off the drink, but felt like death. I enjoyed a water for my second round.

Mike called and told us to meet him at group check in by a big tree. I figured that meant he was outside or at the wrong hotel because there weren’t any trees in the Imperial Palace. We had pagodas, dragons, cocktail waitresses, casino games, and cocktail waitresses, but no trees. We wandered around for a few minutes and finally asked a security guard for directions. When I approached him he went for his gun, but turned out to be helpful after he was sure I didn’t mean to rob the casino. Mike was wandering as well and we bumped into each other near the elevator bank. Back up to the rooms to get Mike settled.

Here is where we determined that the elevators were dreadfully slow. I have no idea why. My only guess is that the “overload” syndrome was repeating itself on every floor. We did find a secret set of elevators that moved quickly, but after I shouted, “Hey, these elevators over here go fast!” everyone swarmed to them and soon they were just as bad as the main ones.

Earlier when we were in Devin’s room we’d noticed that if the lights were out, the purple neon lights outside would cast two purple square light patterns on the wall and they were great for doing hand puppets. It reminded me, and I made this observation then, of the spelling/pronunciation game from Sesame Street or the Electric Company where to heads were silhouetted on the screen facing each other and one would say “c” and the other replied “at” and then both said “Cat”. When we went in with Mike, I told the joke again. I do that, but Mike hadn’t heard it and it was funny regardless. Mike and Devin decided to give it a try and stepped into the purple light to cast their shadows on the wall.

“P”, said Mike.

“A”, said Devin.

“What the hell?” said everyone else.

“Pah”

That was the word they came up with. From that point on anytime anyone did anything silly or boneheaded it drew a “paaaaaaaaah” from the group.

The electric company games were fun, but we came for adult games and Trix are for kids. That doesn’t make sense, but I don’t care. I needed to work that in somewhere.

Craps was the game of choice that evening, but the $5 minimum table at Imperial Palace was full. They had a couple of $10 tables but that was a bit pricey. I figured that we could find better so we headed up the street in search of cheap tables on a crowded weekend. If you’ve ever been to Las Vegas on a summer weekend you already know how this is going to play out.

After walking around for quite awhile… long enough to piss off my knee and make my little toe nail cut the toe next to it on my right foot, we gave up. We went back to the Imperial Palace. En route we did have a look at to Las Vegas strip icons. One was the Mirage volcano eruption that was met with a universal “ok” from the group. The second was the illegal immigrants who stand between the casinos and flick porno cards at you. They stand there and flick the cards against their arms and when you look to see what the flicky flicky is all about, they hand you a card with a naked chick on it and a phone number. Most of the cards have different girls on them and you can make a game out of it. I call it Porno the Gathering. The “hand” I got dealt was pretty strong. I had a pair of Samanthas and a swarthy Jessica. According to the card, Jessica was “wild” so I made her a Samantha too. My three Sams beat everyone. Justin didn’t get “dealt” any cards so I gave a few of mine to him. They make great souvenirs to take back to your fiancé.

I had to go back, once again, to my hotel room to change shoes. My toe was bleeding and so I needed to clean that up and put on some better shoes for standing around and playing craps. As I sat on the bed my body told to lie down and go to sleep. No, I said. No. I would go downstairs and be a gambling degenerate. I stood up, dusted myself off and proceeded to the elevator.

In the next installment… I promise… there will actually be some gambling.

Posted by Monty at 3:13 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)