|
THE WEATHER IN PARADISE
29 December 2004
That river you see outside my living room window wasn't there yesterday morning. It was just a little trickle of a desert
watercourse, difficult even to see amidst the grass except where it pooled into temporary rest stops for ducks.
Then it started to rain.
Within about an hour the trickle had become a full-fledged torrent, sweeping all sorts of debris along its current at
astonishing speeds -- plastic jugs and coolers, paper, tree limbs and sagebrush.
It was spooky to watch the rushing water while listening to reports of the tsunami in Asia.
It continued to rain on and off until this morning -- the river got wider and wider, with less debris in it . . . less
turbulent but still powerful.
We're due for some more rain this week. It will be interesting to see how long this seasonal watercourse remains a river
-- how long it will take to become a trickle again.
I took some video footage of the river with my Sony Cyber-shot digital camera -- it's a little shaky but it is the first video
I've ever offered on the site. If you've got a broadband connection click on the link below to . . .
WATCH THE RIVER FLOW
CHRISTMAS EVE
27 December 2004
The week before Christmas I had a cold that wouldn't quite go away -- it left me feeling run-down and lazy. I had a hard
time persuading myself to go out and get a Christmas tree, but when night fell on Christmas Eve I knew it had to be done,
so I jumped in the Navigator and went off to a lot I'd seen on Maryland Avenue near Desert Inn Road.
The tent on the darkened lot was brightly lit but totally deserted -- the lot attendant could barely be seen in the shadows,
packing up his tools. But he was happy to sell one last tree. He had plenty left and said I could have any one of them for
$20. It was spooky walking among the rows of evergreens all by myself, but I picked out a seven-foot beauty and the attendant
helped me load it into the back of the car.
I asked the guy if he'd had a good year. "We moved seven thousand trees," he allowed, apparently on a number
of lots around the city. "That's amazing," I said. He said, "I wouldn't call it amazing -- I'd call it a
miracle."
I hauled that seven thousandth tree home, decorated it, and then took a cab to the MGM Grand, where I planned to catch
the monorail for my first ride on the troubled system. It had just reopened earlier in the day after a long closure prompted
by wheels and other metal parts falling off of it in its first few weeks of operation.
Before catching a train I wandered around the MGM looking for some oysters, which I had a taste for. Found some at Emeril's
New Orleans Fish House -- fried in cornmeal with (I think) a bit of bacon grease. They were absolutely delicious.
Then I went in search of the monorail station.
This being Las Vegas, the route to the station led through a shopping arcade and was a good long way from the casino.
The rides were free on this night -- security guards wished everyone a merry Christmas. And there were lots of riders --
even though all the casinos I visited seemed half-deserted. The sleek trains glide along smoothly and silently behind the
casinos on the east side of The Strip, offering odd views of establishments meant to be approached from other directions entirely.
I got off the train at the Bally's/Paris, Las Vegas stop -- and again had to navigate a maze of shopping arcades to reach
the casinos. Bally's is a bland place with a non-smoking card room -- I won't be going back there again anytime soon. The
Paris is a bit more magical -- but just a bit. It has a terrific bistro called Mon Ami Gabi, and a fun exterior, but inside
feels gloomy, even with the ceiling decorated as a perpetually blue sky. Two legs of the base of the replica Eiffel Tower
outside come down through that ceiling into the casino, but somehow the effect is not whimsical. It just looks like a colossal
miscalculation.
I'm told the food and the view at the restaurant up in the tower are worth a visit, but the Paris is not someplace I'd
return to for gambling.
I next walked through the Flamingo, which is really depressing -- the famous old sign has become nothing but a logo and
is the only link to The Flamingo's legendary past as the first of the nutty and fabulous Strip resorts. It's gaming floor
is bright and boring and cold.
I walked up then as far as the Venetian, which has its own nutty charm -- and there I saw two large wedding parties making
their way across the casino floor, moving almost in formation. One party filed directly into the restrooms, the gowns peeling
off to the left, the tuxes to the right.
I took the monorail back to the MGM and got a cab home from there. It was nice to see the lights of my own tree blinking
away -- like one of the old-time Vegas casino signs.
PREFERRED
14 December 2004
Although I have been a resident of Las Vegas for only a short time I have already been recognized as a preferred shopper
by the Albertson's food chain, my local supermarket of choice.
In a simple but dignified check-out station ceremony I was presented with a small card to attach to my keychain, as a
token of the honor. It's not a purely symbolic honor, either -- as I am regularly granted discounts on the food and beverages
I purchase at Albertson's, simply because they prefer me to other shoppers.
I love taking out my keychain in swank locations around town, just to flash the card and bask in the envious and admiring
glances of the would-be hipsters around me. "Look," I can hear them whisper, "he's preferred."
Speaking of preferences, I recently tracked down a source for Mexican Coca-Cola here in town -- a tiny strip-mall bodega
near Topaz and Tropicana.
Mexican Coca-Cola, like Coke in most parts of the world, is still made with sugar, instead of vile-tasting and hard-to-digest
corn syrup. Real sugar in a Coke makes for a different drink altogether, and one delightfully familiar to anyone who grew
up in the Fifties or Sixties, before government-subsidized corn crops made fructose the more economical sweetener for soda
makers in the U. S.
Mexican Coca-Cola costs about twice what regular neo-faux Coke costs, but it's more than twice as good. It can be tracked
down in most areas of the U. S. which have any significant Latino population -- which is to say that it can be tracked down
most anywhere. Well worth the effort.
MR. LUCKY
12 December 2004
Last Saturday night I strolled over to the Hofbrauhaus -- a Bavarian beer hall reconstructed on the corner of Paradise
and Harmon. Along with the Hard Rock it's one of the notable establishments within easy walking distance of my apartment.
There was a large party taking up the entire smoking section, however, so I had to postpone the experience for another time.
I walked back to the Hard Rock across the street and ate at the coffee shop there -- Mr. Lucky's 24/7. It has a great
menu -- a terrific breakfast selection -- reasonable prices and is a pretty cool place, sort of 50's upscale retro. It wasn't
doing much business so I got a big leopard-skin upholstered booth to myself, in the corner with a good view of the room. Ordered
a wood-fired pepperoni pizza and was well satisfied. The service was friendly and incredibly efficient. It's going to take
a while to get used to this.
The action at the Hard Rock was a lot hotter on a Saturday night, and so were the people. Incredible numbers of great-looking
women, who didn't look like trophies but would have made nice ones. All very yuppie, of course -- nothing too hip about any
of it, but that aspect of things might change later in the night.
I really wanted to linger and play some more roulette, because the tables were crowded and excited -- and then it hit
me. I hadn't lost $80 on my first visit here, as I confessed in an earlier report. I'd only lost $60 -- forty at the first
table I tried and twenty at the second. The misremembered extent of my bonehead misbehavior merely reflected my chagrin at
losing anything at such a dumb game.
By any standard, the mistake put me $20 ahead, morally speaking, so I happily plunked down $20 -- hit 22 on the second
spin and thought, here we go . . . it's all flowing back in my direction now. Twenty minutes later I was busted, but had a
free beer in my hand, which I went and finished at the raised circular bar in the center of the floor. I has the satisfaction
of knowing that I had now sinned up to the level of my confession.
It was happening up there, all right -- young ladies dressed, or undressed, to kill, dorky guys trying to look prosperous.
The exceptions were the cowboys and cowgirls. There are lot of them in town these days, because this is the week of the national
rodeo finals at the Thomas & Mack Arena. You can spot them by their cowboy hats, wiry frames and a placid kind of look
which seems to say, "Why would anyone want to mess with a friendly person like me -- and die."
I saw two handsome young specimens losing money hand over fist at a $10 minimum blackjack table. They took it all with
wry good grace -- the spirit that won the West. I hope they were just dropping loose change from some serious prize money.
Before I left I asked a security guard if the casino had a card room.
"Not yet," he replied.
"It's coming?" I asked.
"It's on the horizon."
My guess is that it will be a smoking room, because of the young clientele. That could be dangerous . . .
SIN AND REDEMPTION
9 December 2004
Tonight I walked over to the Hard Rock Hotel and Casino -- about a two-minute stroll from my front door -- to check out
the image of the Blessed Virgin imprinted on a grilled-cheese sandwich, which is on display there for a few days before going
on a national tour. It was bought by an offshore gambling company on eBay for $28,000 from the woman who cooked it, about
ten years ago.
First I had to check out the casino itself and grab a bite to eat -- because you don't want to view a thing like that
on an empty stomach, as it might arouse impure thoughts, involving eating the sacred object.
I didn't see the Hard Rock at its best -- it's said to really get going only after 10pm and I showed up around seven.
But I got a chance to survey its layout and potential. I really wanted to like it but I couldn't, quite. The casino floor
is surprisingly small but doesn't seem intimate somehow. It's circular, with a circular bar in the center, cunningly designed
so that you can't really see the action from it. There are corridors running off like spokes from the edge of the gaming area,
leading to shops and restaurants. There is something pleasing but nothing magical about the space.
The pool area, deserted in these chilly days, looks interesting and inviting -- it's supposed to host quite a scene in
warmer times.
I ate at the Pink Taco, which may be the high point of the property. Done up in a fanciful impersonation of a Tijuana
joint, it has good cheap food and the sort of expert service you get to expect in Las Vegas -- even though the staff is made
up of kids. Vegas just has this aspect of things wired.
There was a Rat-Pack era themed steak house which looked cool but perhaps not cool enough to justify the prices.
After my tasty carnitas burrito I went looking for the miraculous sandwich. I walked up to a lady working a totally deserted
"wheel o' money" type game and asked her, "Where is the grilled cheese sandwich?" "What?" she
said, as though I was crazy. "The one with the image of the Virgin Mary on it," I elaborated. "Oh!" she
said -- like, 'Oh, right -- THAT grilled cheese sandwich' -- and directed me to it.
It was in fact on display at the Hard Rock Cafe, which sits off by itself on a corner of the property lot and looks like
a deadly scene. I still had to ask for directions to the sandwich, because it wasn't being advertised in any serious way.
It was sitting in an elegant display case in the merchandise shop. The sandwich itself -- actually half a sandwich with one
small bite taken out of it -- reposed in a cheap plastic box surrounded by cotton balls. The image on the sandwich looked
like a stencilled-on portrait of an old silent film star. But why should the Blessed Virgin manifest herself in some conventional
guise borrowed from Renaissance art? She might well have looked exactly like Bebe Daniels.
Properly edified, I went back to the casino and quickly lost $80 at roulette. Playing roulette at anything more than a
$1 limit table is really stupid -- unless you enjoy flushing money down the toilet (though God knows there are worse ways
to part with money.) By then I had a free drink in my hand, which I went and finished sitting on a sofa across from the check-in
desk, watching the people flow by.
At least at this time of night the crowd at the Rock is neither young nor hip -- thirty- and forty-something males, for
the most part, with younger women, all mostly large-breasted. (The age difference and bust measurements presumably reflect
the liquid assets of the males, according to some complex formula which only a tartlette could calculate precisely.) I was
happy to walk home, light a fire and pour myself some egg nog. I felt bad about losing the money. But then I remembered the
awesome grace of the Holy Mother, deigning to present her image to us on such a humble snack-food variant. Can there be any
doubt that she'll be praying for us, now and in the hour of our death?
What a Gal.
And after all, I got a free drink out of it, not to mention a handful of Hard Rock matchbooks, for lighting fires.
EASY
7 December 2004
I know New Orleans has a claim on the moniker, but Las Vegas is really The Big Easy. The service economy on which it lives
has infected everything -- from the friendly greetings of store clerks to the design of the streets and malls.
The friendliness of strangers has a small-town Western flavor, though, and isn't just a commercial strategy -- I think
it also has to do with the provisional nature of Las Vegas life. In all exchanges there's an undertone of this thought --
"Well, we've all managed to end up here . . . God knows how it will all turn out but we might as well make the best of
it." Sort of like the camaraderie that grips strangers swept up in a public disaster. Male clerks address me regularly
as "pal" or "buddy", female clerks as "honey" or "sweetie" -- and there's a real democratic
warmth in their voices. This is Las Vegas, where anybody can get lucky, where anybody can go bust. That fancy car I'm driving
-- well, I might have to sell it for quick cash tomorrow . . . and the clerk I'm talking to might hit a jackpot next week
and pick up my wheels at a cut-rate price with the proceeds of that lucky strike.
That's the operative theory, anyway.
Driving around is a revelation compared to the experience in Los Angeles -- another car-oriented town. Los Angeles's accommodation
of the car has always been a compromise, ever since the oil companies engineered the destruction of its trolley system, a
model of public transportation, in the Twenties.
Las Vegas wasn't incorporated until 1905 and wasn't much more than a train stop until the introduction of gambling and
the construction of the Hoover Dam in the Thirties. Its first real boom didn't happen until the Fifties and up to now space
was never a problem. The street system reflects that expansiveness and a modern sense of automobile transport. The major boulevards
are the size of Interstates -- rarely crowded except at peak rush hours. The intersection lights are well timed and all major
intersections have left turn signals -- obviating the desperate rush to beat the lights that you find in Los Angeles. The
signage is well designed to be legible from a moving car -- a pattern adapted from The Strip where casinos originally competed
for highway drive-in business from California.
The new malls have spacious parking areas logically arranged, and parking everywhere is free -- another departure from
Los Angeles, where cramped parking facilities function only by charging fees to keep out the merely curious.
I had to visit the new Fashion Show Mall this week and was dreading it -- remembering the pure hell of the Beverly Center
or the Century City Mall in Los Angeles at Christmas -- but the experience couldn't have been easier. There were satellite
parking garages located near each of the mall anchor stores, with wide driving aisles and spaces. There were a lot of cars
there but there was no problem ascending to the less crowded sections and then easy access by foot to the mall itself. The
ease of entry seemed to affect the mood of the shoppers in the mall -- there was none of the desperation familiar to me from
Los Angeles malls during the holiday season. The idea seemed to be -- well, if we don't find it today, we'll just come back.
Why not?
So easy.
WHEELS
6 December 2004
While packing up the loft in November, more than slightly hysterical, I raced through the maze of book boxes to get what
I thought was a vitally important phone call. On the excited journey I banged my little toe against the sharp edge of a rocker
on a rocking chair, producing an instant of unbearable pain. I bore it, however, and made it to the phone -- at which point
the caller hung up.
I think there was a supernatural prankster involved in this.
The pain subsided -- the toe, and the whole right side of my foot, swelled up and tuned black and blue. From that point
on I was unable to wear a regular shoe on my right foot. I hobbled around for several weeks in an old slipper I found in my
bedroom closet, until it disintegrated, then bought a pair of black slippers at Macy's.
The toe did not heal quickly -- I believe it was broken or fractured -- but caused me no great pain as long as I went
barefoot or wore the slippers.
I've been testing it out regularly with real shoes and yesterday I found I was able to wear a pair of Clark's Desert Boots
(perfect!) without pain. To celebrate I went off to buy a bicycle, for local transportation in my strange neighborhood.
I got a really cool Raleigh Retroglide One, which looks sort of like an old 50s cruiser but is made of aluminum, making
it easy to haul up the exterior stairs to my apartment. No gears -- pedal brakes only. Cheap.
I love it. Others, no doubt, will love it, too -- God knows how long it will last chained to a Vegas lampost -- but as
long as it's mine I'm going to ride the hell out of it . . .
BEING NOWHERE
4 December 2004
I love driving around Las Vegas, partly because I love driving anywhere in the Navigator, which is the most comfortable
and best designed car I've ever piloted, and partly because Las Vegas is just stone cold weird, visually speaking.
The high perch of the Navigator with its Cinerama view is a perfect platform from which to take in the spectacle. The
navigation system on the car is such that I rarely get lost, but I love it when I do. I'll find myself is some strange precinct
with gigantic building supply warehouses interspersed with tiny malls hosting shops that sell things like designer g-strings
and fantasy sex costumes -- "Where the Stars Shop" -- and across the road will be a vast area of undeveloped desert.
The city is so flat that you rarely get a glimpse of its setting in the valley floor, but there's a western stretch of
Desert Inn Road where the ground rises -- a couple of days ago I hit this stretch driving east at dusk and suddenly saw Las
Vegas whole, the carpet of lights, the brightly-colored spine of the Strip casinos. It reminded me of a passage from "The
Great Gatsby" in which Fitzgerald describes entering Manhattan by car over the Queenboro Bridge at dusk, with the lights
of the city coming on, and feeling that anything could happen.
I'm not sure there's much of that feeling left in Gotham -- the yuppies have decided that only nice things should happen
there -- but it's a feeling that powers Las Vegas, as crucial to its survival as the electricity for the lights and the water
from the Colorado River. It's a messy town, a dreamer's town -- because dreams are always messy.
Yesterday they delivered the bed, an Eastern king -- so insanely large after sleeping in the crummy little double in New
York for so long. I'm afraid I might get lost in it and never be seen again. I slept like a baby in it, though, after some
egg nog by the fire, and woke to find that my subscription to the Las Vegas Review-Journal had started.
I guess I'm really here now.
|
