November 25, 2003

The past few weeks seem like a blur. I threw a dinner party. I went to Books & Pie and the Symphony and the Opera. I took my first trip to Las Vegas. I even managed to convince the IRS that I do not, in fact, owe them the $25,000 they said I did.

My dealings with that other bureaucratic behemoth, the DMV, were less successful. I have been driving my car with expired tags for close to 3 months now. Why? Well, apparently, I forgot to include a copy of my insurance card when I originally applied to have my registration renewed, but it took them more than a month to tell me this. When I finally found out what the reason was for the delay and sent in my insurance information, it took another month for them to process my application.

But now, almost another full month has passed and I still haven't gotten my sticker. Apparently, it has been lost in the mail. So last week, I called to see if they could send me another one. I spent an hour on hold with them--a period of time in which I was so bored, I decided to whimsically pass the time by putting a $265 pair of shoes on my amazon.com wishlist. And then when I finally did speak to them, I learned that I have to wait a full 30 days from the date it was mailed, and then I have to fill out a form saying that my sticker was lost and bring it to my local DMV in order to finally get a new sticker.

Basically, I have gotten to experience the worst of the IRS, the DMV, and the U.S. Postal Service all in one month.

And then there was Las Vegas. While entering the Imperial Palace casino on my first day there, I overheard a conversation that pretty much summed the whole thing up:

British Tourist Guy: It's a bit, um...
British Tourist Woman: Tacky?
British Tourist Guy: Yes.

Las Vegas: it's dry, it's smoky, it's full of people! It's tacky and loud (in every sense of the word), but occasionally beautiful. I went there with Jen and K. to scout out locations and activities for a meeting we're arranging there next summer.

We headed there early on Sunday morning (so early that I had to wake up at 4:30 a.m., after 3 hours of sleep, in order to get to the airport on time, which probably contributed to the continuing sense of bewilderment throughout my stay there). We entertained ourselves on the flight by reading aloud from the SkyMall catalog. Who knew that so many useless products existed and better yet, that they were available for purchase right from the convenience of your airplane seat? Talking telescopes and Christmas ornaments! A globe that converts into a bar! An electronic ice cream scoop! An oil painting of a flying pig!

Clearly, people who can afford these things are not gambling enough.

Luckily for the serious SkyMall perusers on our flight, as soon as we arrived at the Vegas airport, the first things we saw were slot machines. That was the thing that most surprised me, really. By law, you have to be 21 years old to gamble. I went to Atlantic City once when I was 18, and I couldn't go in any of the casinos because I was underage and they checked ID. But in Las Vegas, there are no barriers to anything--you can wander from casino to bar to casino without ever passing through a doorway.

Actually, that isn't 100% true--the one barrier I did encounter was the fact that once you are in a casino, it is very difficult to leave. Everywhere you go there are signs pointing to the restroom, the shops, the restaurants, the spa, the pool, the casino next door, but nowhere did I ever see a sign pointing to the exit. Once they've drawn you in, they never want to let you go, it seems.

Not that I minded most of the time. There are some very cool resorts along the strip. We started out in the Venetian, which has an art museum featuring pieces from the Guggenheim and the Hermitage and has singing gondoliers ferrying people along the indoor canals. The Bellagio had beautiful gardens and a fantastic-but-cheesy fountain show and a skylight covered in amazing glass flowers. There was a live tiger at the Mirage, and a live lion at the MGM Grand.

We also saw the cheesy pirate show at Treasure Island--it used to be a straightforward pirate battle, apparently, but now is a sleazy lip-synch and dance spectacular involving pirates who are menaced by a shipful of scantily clad Sirens. Apparently, Vegas is backing off from the "family-friendly" vibe they'd been trying to perpetuate. While waiting for the show to start, we struck up a conversation with a local timeshare salesman who lamented the changes, but also impatiently called out "bring on the sluts!" when it was time for the show to start.

We accomplished a lot while we were there. We ate a lot and drank a lot. We discussed the question of which casino had the worst cocktail-waitress uniforms (the answer: Mandalay Bay). K. bet $0.70 in the slot machines and won $1.25 for a $0.55 profit, but Jen was unlucky and lost $2.00. I gambled vicariously through them. We watched a video of Siegfried and Roy talking about how white tigers symbolize the purity and goodness in all people. But mostly, we just walked around and exhausted ourselves. I wonder how long it will take me to fully recover.

We got back very late last night. And to top my trip off, when I found my car in the airport parking lot, it had a $60 parking ticket on it. The ticket was for not having up-to-date tags. Grrrrrrrr.