Look. I'm a simple guy. I mow the lawn, tell Tasha jokes, keep bees, and wash dishes sometimes. A simple, down to earth life.
Vegas ain't like that. Vegas is something else.
Tasha and I drove to Shadow Lane, a premiere spanking party held in Las Vegas. The first indication that Nevada was a bit different occurred when the car passed over the AZ-NV state line. At that point, Arizona was a desolate wasteland. Brown, infertile soil bleached dry by the sun, studded with rocks. Too arid to sustain life. The moment we drove over the border, things changed. There were buildings and billboards. Things started hopping. They got progressively more hopping until we reached Vegas.
After the party was over, we decided to check out the Strip. After all, we couldn't miss up the opportunity to play tourist.
Wow.
Vegas is nothing short of insane. It was 106 degrees when Tasha and I visited, and there was no natural source of water. And yet some crazy visionary, mob boss Bugsy Siegel, thought that he could build a gambling mecca from nil. He built the Flamingo, spending an unheard-of $6 million plus on the building, and Lord only knows how much on water rights. Since then, Vegas has spiraled into a fantasyland, an X-rated Disneyland, where reality is firmly excluded. There are casinos like Paris-themed Paris Las Vegas, Venice-themed The Venetian, ancient Rome-themed Caesar's Palace, piratical-themed Treasure Island, ancient Egypt-themed Luxor, decadent Europe-themed Bellagio, NYC-themed New York New York, Arthurian-themed Excalibur, Hollywood-themed MGM Grand, island-themed Mandalay Bay, and South Seas-themed Mirage, among others.
It's a surreal place. An impossible place where young women become showgirls and wear massive feathered headdresses and bikinis. I suspect that ahem not all of these young ladies' components are natural. Fake boobs, crazy themes, and an artificial reality which glorifies free spending, drinking, gambling, and high living. A tribute to the gods Mammon and Mammaries. Hell, we even saw an area for pets to relieve themselves which was Astroturf instead of grass!
Everything is cheap, subsidized by the massive income flow from legalized gambling. I got a buffet breakfast at my hotel for $8, which included all-you-can-eat lox and bagels, pizza and other Italian food, seafood, Chinese food, Mexican food, salads, fruit, desserts, and damn near anything else they could think of. A hotel room that would have cost at least $200 anywhere else, for $42 a night. In my moralizing moments, I asked myself whether it was ethical to profit, even indirectly through ridiculous low prices, from others' gambling losses.
When I looked out the hotel window, I saw a huge golf course. Arid land, watered at who knows what effort, used to raise pristine, manicured grass. And some insane people on the links, driven to play golf in 106 degree weather!
Vegas is a once-in-a-lifetime trip to see excess gone wild. An unforgettable place to visit, but I couldn't live there.
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