We woke up, showered, powdered our noses, and were off to the Bellagio for The Buffet. Me and Dan made a stop at MGM for Ka tickets. Then we took the monorail and walked to the Bellagio. And that’s when we saw the buffet line. It was overwhelming. The worst thing about it was that we didn’t see where it ended. And we didn’t notice that it snaked at one point. It took an hour, but the hunger doubled it. Jason said the wait-to-worth-it ratio was lower than Superman. But I’ll disagree. From what I remember, it’s basically as good as the buffet at Mandalay Bay, and it was prime time for lunch so there would probably be a line there also. Prime rib and crab always makes me a happy camper at buffets. It’s always great when you pour yourself half a cup of clarified butter and it’s gone by the end of the meal. They also forego the soft serve machines and have a gelato stand. The mint chocolate chip was awesome but the tiramisu tasted like rum.
Jason and I had this fantastic vision that this would be one of the greatest weekends ever. We decided to see Wally again and go to some club with his cousin Laura and her nursing classmates. We’d be going with girls! Which seems to be a good thing usually, unless the girls include your girlfriend. But what do I know about that! What I’ve boiled it down to is that we wanted to party and we were already in Vegas and decided to leave. If it were the disco disco highway, me and Jason would be Jeff Goldblum and his dad in ID4 on the empty side of the road. We got greedy and karma paid us back. ULR. On the plus side, we were with Wally again and the drive back was over with (Not that I should complain since I wasn’t driving).
No. No. That’s not the right. No. You stupid jerk. Dumb. Dumb George Michael dumb.
We got ready, headed downtown, and tried to get in line at Club Envy. But we were late and we weren’t sure what was going on. It seemed like some people knew what they were doing and everyone else was in another line. The people that knew what they were doing were getting bottle service. We got in line. And we stayed there for an hour. We were getting closer to the front and I was under the impression that people were getting in slowly, but it was just people slowly leaving the line because no one was getting in. I was being stubborn about it but I finally looked around and realized that if groups of dolled up girls coming out of party buses weren’t getting in, what were our chances?
So we went to Deco’s. And we were mostly just bummed out—and deep down inside, we still are, I’ll never get over it. I wake up in the middle of the night and the words “Just one hour earlier” repeat in my head and since I can’t sleep I spread a giant map across my desk but not a normal map it’s a time-map with all of our activities that day and, by candlelight only, I write equations on a glass panel with dry-erase markers trying to extrapolate when and how we wasted time that added up to the hour earlier that we needed to get in.
Sunday
Woke up and had no plans for the day. Since we committed our fair share of gluttony at the Vegas buffets, we decided we’d go for lighter fare for the day. Then we changed our minds and went to a Brazilian churrascaria, where they bring around large chunks of meat on rods and slice pieces off for you. And it doesn’t stop. I always feel obligated to take things I don’t really want, like sausage or the turkey with cheese melted over it. Which would be perfectly fine on any other day, but not when they’re using beef cuts as sentences. “Filet mignon wrapped in bacon?”, “Rib-eye?”, “Garlic and butter tri-tip?” It’ll be a long time before you hear me answer ‘no’ to any of those. It feels like Russian roulette except with a heart attack instead of a gun. We were trying our best to drown our sorrows in beef. And our best is pretty good. The last time I felt that full was last year when we went to the Brazilian sword rod place.
And we were sitting near the bar, so we caught the last set of the Wimbledon final. Great match. Basically every time there’s a Federer and Nadal matchup, I wake up and I’ll usually have a text message from Junior from some odd hour in the morning asking me things like, “Got your capris on?” or “Did you use scissors for the mesh in your cut-off or did you just tear them?” Real mature. I take the high road and compliment him as the true fan who’s molded Rafael’s biceps onto his own arms. But I think I’ve joked about liking Nadal for so long that I actually sort of like him now. Mostly because all he seems to care about is tennis, and not things like learning English or not wearing capris.
During the ‘itis
Then we went to K-1, a go-kart spot. Which is usually a ton of fun. But it was a little less this time around—we were a little too competitive (and too tired and too full). And somewhere in the middle of the race, I got rammed hard on both sides, enough so that I had a decent bruise on my knee where it struck part of my cart. We went to a 7-11 to gas up. Each of us got one of the new Mountain Dew flavors. I forget the names, but two of them tasted like Baja Blast (which I think is exclusive to Northwest territory Taco Bells) and the third tasted like popsicle. All of them were too sweet, in a bad way meaning not the NWO way. Then we went to a bowling alley and actually bowled this time. If you can call it that, because me and Jason were sucking it up. And Wally had some kind of anomaly game with a hambone. Depressing.
I showered at Wally’s house, we said our goodbyes, then Jason dropped me off at San Diego International. My flight home was fairly typical, except for some yelling d-bag. “How do I get a cocktail on this plane? Cocktail please! Cocktail!” and “Wow, quiet flight, nobody else is talking and I guess nobody wants to drink either!” He’s probably one of those guys in the theater that yells things during movies. It’s not the noise distraction that bothers me, it’s just that they’re always so pleased with themselves.
Going, going, back, back, to (Northern) Cali
Getting home taking the bus and light rail took longer than my flight. It’s the same trip I took on Wednesday to get to the airport, just reversed, but it’s rough nearing midnight when all you have to look forward to is work. Car was still at the park and ride. I was beat by the time I got home. I basically dropped my bags and slept. The next day I drove to work and the right turn only sign was covered by a cardboard sign with block writing in pen similar to panhandlers’ signs, “SVL Closed.” They turned off all the power over the weekend and when they powered the site back up, something exploded. That’s what the word was. IBM is one of the top companies for telecommuting, so everyone would just be working at home. Except I didn’t have my laptop on me. Unfortunate. So I got groceries, unpacked, cleaned, and slept.
There as an emergency number to call and it felt exactly like snow days in high school. It was closed Tuesday also. So I cleaned some more, slept some more, and made a triumphant return to the gym. Rumor was it would be closed Wednesday at least until noon but probably the entire day. So I set my alarm to call at 7am, get the good news, and go back to sleep. Except the recorded message gave me bad news. It felt like The Grinch wasn’t satisfied and stole Christmas in July also. That brought an end to my 4th of July weekend.