What I Did in Vegas....or.....What Happens Here Sucks

Hung out in the Big Apple last week. Had a blast. The week before that I hung out in the Big Easy. Had a blast. This week, I was in the Big Stupid.

For those of you who've never been, here are a few of the many things to do on the Las Vegas Strip. First, if you're not a gambler:

• Take a walk outside on black asphalt in 105 degree heat.
• Cool off by bathing in the 105 degree water of your hotel's outdoor pool. Be careful not to get sun poisoning in the 105 degree heat.
• Go to a show. Some prime choices are Celine Dion, Wayne Newton or David Copperfield. Curb your enthusiasm.
• Shop for gaudy, overpriced merchandise at a 300% markup.
• Go to the Mirage Hotel, stand outside in the 105 degree heat with 200 of your closest friends and wait for the volcano to erupt. The volcano erupts every 30 minutes. It's a propane volcano. Say "Wooooooooo" in unison with everyone else, just like you do whenever your outdoor grill lights up.
• Pay $200 for a steak dinner at the Palms. Bring your earplugs.
• Hang out by the 5 cent slot machines and watch throngs of pasty-faced septugenarians in polyester clothing, noses connected via surgical tubing to oxygen tanks, fat hanging over their motorized wheelchair seats, pushing buttons in mindless repetition as fake coin noises (there are no more real coins dispensed) and electronic bells resonate through everyone's skull plates. Every once in a while, take in a deep breath and savor the refreshing second hand smoke.
• Hang out by the $1000 minimum card tables and watch Arab and Chinese business magnates put up the equivalent of the gross national product of Bolivia on each hand of Baccarat while women with fake boobs and scanty evening gowns press their thighs up against them hoping to get few of those K-note chips dropped into their cleavage.
• Go to a strip club and get blueballs while jaw-droppingly beautiful women who hate your guts smile and flash their silicone implants at you and the nearly equally undressed cocktail waitress runs each of your credit cards to the limit every time you buy a drink.
• Listen to one of the lounge bands as they duplicate to the tiniest cymbal tap every single Top Forty hit every played on Soul Train. Marvel at how they never actually end a song, but segue each and every number into the next closest sounding song in their repertoire. All this while sleeping standing up. If you're lucky, you'll get to see one of the many trade convention attendee geeks in a plaid golf shirt dancing awkwardly to the KC and Sunshine Band medley with a transvestite whom he is too drunk to realize is a man. Snicker as you picture the reveal later on.
• Come back the next night and watch a different set of sleepwalkers do the exact same thing with the exact same songs. Note that the transvestite is back, but 'her' companion of the previous evening is not.

Sound like fun? If not, then try your hand at gambling.

This is a ritual where you simply hand over your hard-earned money to a bunch of crooked gangsters. The cool thing about gambling is that you're set up to lose, they explain to you that you are set up to lose, and you still do it, thinking you will win. Ha Hahahaha.

Hey, I have a proposition for you. I have a big noisy machine here. Dump your money into it. For every dollar you put in, you will get an average of 92.4 cents back.

What's that you say? Stupid deal? Nonsense. People fly here from all over the world just to do this.

OK, I have a better proposition. I'll deal blackjack, you put up cash and play me. The rules are such that there is an edge in my favor as dealer. In other words, unless you cheat I will always win in the long run. Not fair? Nonsense. People are lining up to play.

What a place.

Next week I'm going to Cleveland. Hallelujah.