LAS VEGAS!!!

I have never been to Las Vegas before, so I was pretty darn excited about going with my kickball team for the national championship fun games. Given the fact that I am who I am, everyone was extremely worried about my ability to stay alive in Vegas, the place where even virgin choir girls from Iowa go insane. Survival suggestions included wearing a "blackout helmet camera" to record my performances, tattooing my name, insurance and hotel information on my arm, memorizing the number of a bail bondsman, avoiding trees and not getting married. One person even prayed to God on my behalf. Naturally, this made me even more determined to behave myself and show them all who wears the big-girl pants. (That and getting arrested/ dying would pretty much terminate my legal aspirations...)

I arrived at 9:15pm on Friday, ready to join my mates in Sin City. Then I saw the taxi queue. I was forced to join a Guinness World Record worthy human centipede of a line, sandwiched betwinxt two smokers in the warm Nevada night. So vexed was I that when the ditz to my rear puffed some smoke from her cigarette at me, I blew it right back into her face, eliciting a startled gasp and a pissed off glare as she took a final drag and snuffed it out. I was warily reminded that Vegas is like another country, in that smoking ANYWHERE is permissible. 35 minutes later, I was finally on my way. Driving down the strip looked just like the views on CSI, so I didn't experience any genuine awestruckness. Upon arriving at our hotel, the MGM Grand, however, I was struck by the number of people who didn't appear to be in club attire--another myth I seem to have fabricated about Vegas. Needless to say, as the wardrobe I'd packed for the weekend consisted entirely of the fashion extremes of kickball clothes and flashy dresses, I felt a little self-conscious and a whole lot hookerish headed off to rendezvous with the others at a place called Bill's Salon and Casino in an shiny, cheetah print tube dress. Though I was glad my club foot prevented me from wearing anything that even vaguely resembled a high heel, because there was a lot of walking to be done.

At Bill's I found my teammates at the craps tables. I watched a few rounds before I decided to stop standing there like a dumb call-girl and play. (I am not one for gambling, readily admitting defeat when I lose and considering myself a winner when I break even.) The dealers were fun and the cocktail waitresses kept the shamefully watered down drinks coming. Despite setting a 1am curfew, Hanley, our captain, was up and overloaded on serotonin from his winnings, so we kept playing. There were highs and there were lows, there were desperate buy-ins and curses to the dice rollers on other side of the table that Fortune was not smiling on. There was even a drunk bitch who hurled green Appletini all over her hands/ some guy's shoe/ the casino floor, as her friend tried to drag her towards the bathroom. At 4am, everyone had pretty much broken even or close enough that the smart thing to do was cash out and leave.

Hanley then warned us not to go eat, promising that we'd regret the lack of sleep in the morning. Of course our room group took this as a direct challenge to do just that. Inspired by talk of a $5 steak breakfast, Martin and I abandoned the pack. After some failed attempts, we saw a sign for a $5.99 Rib-eye Steak and Eggs breakfast in bright lights. We were told we had to wait 20 minutes. Sleep was starting to sound like a real good idea, but we powered through. Martin ordered his medium-rare and to his thinly veiled disgust, I ordered mine well-done. To my amusement, both our steaks were cooked the same, probably warmed up in the microwave, the cooks well aware that the taste buds of people dining at near 5am in Vegas are likely barely functioning.

The next morning, all fitted in our snazzy, walking Adidas ad uniforms, we were the first team on the bus. I was starting to think that the fun games were imaginary until we saw the other teams start to trickle out. Suddenly we were surrounded by beer coolers, Mardi Gras beads, leopard face paint, booty shorts and noise. The ride to games featured a host of Asian massage parlors and run down strip malls. Viva Las Vegas indeed... By the time we got to the fields, we realized how hot it was going to be and were sorry we didn't have a tent. (While everyone else was busy warding off cancer and applying sunblock, Martin and I started our customary "Who's darker?" contest. So tired of arbitrarily being judged the loser, I almost went to go search for baby oil to lather myself in put a final stop to this nonsense.) We won our first game 11 -3, the other team getting the ref kicked out for not understanding the strike zone, then inviting us to do jello shots with them. With over an hour to kill before our on slot of afternoon games, we got beer at the store, ate, and watched the actual serious kickball championships, amazed at how the games basically boiled down to the speed and abilities of the pitcher, catcher and shortstop.

2:30pm found the weather at a barely tolerable temperature, and us playing a team from Phoenix. They were good and we were a little shaken up initially, but we pulled through, Martin managing to bring in the tying run. We then all sat in a 12 foot amoeba of shade, watching a Prius hit a truck directly in front of it as two teams, one dressed as state pageants, the other as pink tacos, played each other. We beat the Bad News Bears and were starting to feel loopy from the beer and the relentless sun and the lack of food and the continuous kickball. Our final game was against a team who had qualified for the real championships. They were really good and it didn't help that our ref was drunk, even stopping play to take a knee and chug when he got "iced" by the other team. We ended up losing on some bullshit rule about ball deflection off a player only being grounds for one base advancement, even if it was intentional. Defeated, tired and sore, we left, trying to get into party mode for the night, even though our bodies were exhausted and the lure of free libations and debauchery wasn't enough to make sleep sound completely blasphemous.

After managing to shower and dress ourselves in club appropriate attire, we ate and took off for the free kickball after-after party at Lavo, some club run by the Tao group. It was as to be expected--cool enough decor, offensively priced cocktails, bottle girls in minimal clothing, flashing lights, loud top 40 music, etc. The boys started dropping like flies, not willing to shell out enough money on drinks that would enable them to tolerate pretending to enjoy dancing. By 1:15am, I felt like an old cripple, my foot and knee having a contentious civil war with the rest of my body. We left the club, ears ringing, heads pounding.


As it was our last night in Vegas, and me and Brittany's first time, we tried to see what else was going on. We met up with some of the guys at Bill's again, but were not in the mood to for another epic night of craps. We hit up the penny slots, I balling out by playing a entire $1, but Britt was losing and some 21 year old was trying to chat us up, so we left. That's how I wound up back in the hotel and asleep by 2:30am, too wiped out from all-day kickball and clubbing on 2 hours of sleep from the night before to be ashamed of my non-existent Vegas sea-legs.

Everyone else left at THE ass crack of dawn on Sunday. Martin and I didn't leave until that evening, so we took our sweet time packing up, then checked out and went in search of brunch. We were determined to eat our $25 worth of the buffet, but as we were full after plate one, even spite couldn't help us polish off more than 2 plates apiece. We were amused by the number of wedding parties we saw. Let it be known to all that I will NEVER get married in Vegas or Disneyland. Period. We decided to leave the stale, depressing air of the casino, fueled by the broken dreams of washed up strippers and club promoters turned double-chinned card dealers and the sad, chain-smoking, aesthetically, financially, mentally, physically fucked masses of middle America gambling away their life savings, to go get some sunshine!

The strip was not much better, as I limped along annoyed by being among the throngs of tourists, Martin grumbling when I insisted on taking the escalators instead of hobbling up the stairs to appease his imagined sense of pride. We walked into the mall of the Wynn Encore and were assaulted by unnecessarily expensive brand names. We role played that I was a spoiled, young gold-digger and he was my sugar daddy, which consisted of me pouting at every window containing a gaudy, high profile item until he conceded and agreed to buy me two of everything. (He was eerily adept at handling such senseless vapidity, negotiating and placating like a pro. Me thinks he's had quite a bit of practice in dealing with barely-legal, brain-dead girls....)

We couldn't take the heat anymore and returned to the hotel where we saw two lackluster lions lying in their display, undoubtedly artificially docile from high doses of tranquilizers. Luckily, we ran into Jen who was on her way to the airport with Hanley, so we jumped at the chance to leave. Martin was kind enough to drag my bag though the airport, so I introduced him to the 21st century and showed him how be environmentally correct by using only his phone to check in. Still unable to stomach alcohol, we just sat down outside of a sports bar and chatted for a while, he impishly contaminating my water by plopping candy into it. We continued our Dave Chappelle style hate by judging all the people walking by, deciding the middle aged women trying to "live it up" in Vegas were the saddest, because no one wanted them (save shows like the Chippendale's and The Thunder from Down Under which surely rely HEAVILY on their patronage...). We were on the same flight, but the gods were cruel, upgrading his seat to a bulkhead while me and my mutinying joints were relegated to the cramped back of the plane.

Upon arriving back home, I was not sure I have any desire to return to Vegas again, save making it to the real kickball championships or strictly for business. I was even a little sad to realize how old I am and how unappealing the idea of clubbing and being hungover ALL WEEKEND LONG is, but also glad that I am past the age where that is a life goal. All said and done, I did enjoy myself and the people I went with, which, in the end, is all that matters :)