Once upon a time (July 2, 2013), I boarded a plane to LA. A friend from Jersey (we’ll call him “Bill”) and I went to visit a friend who lives there (we’ll call him “Brian”). The following day, we three amigos drove to Vegas. The desert temperature rose to a soaring 120 degrees, but we were ready to bring a different kind of heat to Vegas.
Overall, I wasn’t too impressed with Sin City. A vast majority of the people we encountered were very regular or irregular in an annoying way. For example, getting into the elevators in our hotel was more like a cruel game than a way of getting from floor to floor efficiently. There were three elevators across the wall. Seems normal enough, right? Ok. The problem is that when we would press the button to summon the elevator, a door would open. Inevitably, the open door would be the furthest from the button pressing station. Still doesn’t sound so bad, right? Ok. The door would remain open for a millisecond. It was almost as though we needed to record the door opening then run it back in slow-motion to see that it had actually opened. Needless to say, it was difficult moving 10 feet or so to the door in time to catch the elevator. So, we’d press the buttons nearest the elevator we just missed. As shit would have it, the elevator door where we had started would then open and, you guessed it, it would close before we could traverse 10 feet to get on the damn thing. This would happen about five times before we could finally get in the door on time. One day, we were attempting get from our floor to the lobby. We probably would have had better luck jumping out of the window, but we weren’t feeling particularly suicidal that day. We pressed the button and prepared to bum-rush the elevator door. Of course, we almost missed it, but luckily, I was able to get some portion of a limb in the door before it closed. Well, what do I see when we entered the elevator? Two guys in there. Annoyed that they hadn’t hit the “door open” button, I looked at them and said, “Where are you from?” They replied, “Wisconsin.” I responded, “What the fuck were you doing in here? Making cheese? You couldn’t have held the door?” The next minute in the elevator may have been the longest moment of their lives. (For Bill’s rendition of the elevator story, click here.)
On the second night, I decided we needed to spice things up. We had just witnessed the sorriest excuse for a Fourth of July fireworks display.
Next stop: souvenir store to get some gear. Zebra hat? Check. King hat? Check. Cowboy hat? Check. Beads? Check. Pink monkey with Vegas written on its abdomen? Check. We decked ourselves out in these items, including placing the pink primate around my neck and we were on our way. We decided to ruin lives at Hakkasan that night. Only the cyber lords know how many of our pictures there are floating on the net from that night. People were convinced we were ravers and kept asking us for whatever we were on — which was nothing other than life highness.
The following night was supposed to be our last night before heading back to LA. We went to Marquee. When we arrived, once again adorned in our “raver” gear, the bouncer didn’t want to let us in because Bill was wearing a T-shirt. I employed my expert negotiation skills and convinced him to let Bill in under the condition that Brian provide Bill with a vest to put over the T-shirt. Apparently, in addition to a strict dress code, the place has a no monkeys in the club rule. I begrudgingly checked my monkey into a cubby to be picked up later.
Finally, we were in. I was thoroughly unimpressed with the place and I felt bare without my furry pink pal. We were standing outside choreographing new dance moves when a Canadian named Ricky started chatting with us. Bill demonstrated the moves. And, in standard form, I busted the Canadian’s balls. Nevertheless, he took a liking to us and said his friends had a table inside. He invited us in to meet them. Most of the friends were from the UK. I didn’t know British people were capable of being as cool as these guys were. I figured they may have had something to do with the crappy fireworks display the day before, but decided to let it slide. I chatted with a bunch of them and eventually made my way to Mr. Hong Kong.
TO BE CONTINUED….
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