I went to Vegas and all you get is this lousy blog post.

I went to Fabulous Las Vegas for the first time and liked it a lot more than I thought I would. Actually I expected to like it: It's a big party, what's not to like? I was armed with a paycheck, and spent all of it.

The Vegas strip is like the most extravagant strip mall there is. They have other towns in miniature there. It feels like a city as an amusement park. Vegas is full of fake boobs. I've never seen so many fake boobs before. (I've never been to LA.) But they weren't all fake, and I tried to chat up the cute hostess without fake boobs at Stripburger and she let me take a (sadly blurry) picture of her.

I went back to Stripburger another day to try to find her but failed.

In Rome, I was amused by a headless angel:

and though I haven't been back to New York in awhile, I did get to New York, New York:


I dislike gambling in theory because it is designed so that you will always lose in the end (how is that legal?!). But in practice I enjoy it. And how brilliant casinos are to change all your money into these colored chips. I'd have a hundred dollars on the craps table at any given time and think nothing of it at all. I'd toss five dollar tips to the dealers, ten dollar throw-away bets here and there, and it felt like nothing until I took stock at the end and realized I was really quite a bit in the hole. After realizing how much I was wasting, I decided to just go ahead and not worry about it. Like spending money on food, or Cirque Du Soleil shows or whatever else. I didn't feel rich, but money seemed really trivial. Those people there are geniuses. At the buffets, I parked myself and ate massive amounts of food. I figured that this was my one chance to beat the house: the odds weren't quite in my small-stomached favor, but if I persevered, I thought I might have control of the outcome and win. I believe I did.

Funnily enough, my favorite hotel/casino was Hooters. It is somehow the most family-friendly place there. I don't know why but it is. Families would roam around. Kids ate at the restaurant. (great wings!) There's something nice and warm about it. And when the scantily clad dealers took all your money, they were somehow warm and apologetic about it. Not cold and clinical like everywhere else. Ah Hooters! I give a hoot...

When I was finished with Vegas with time left before my flight, I walked to the airport to prove that it could be done. It can. I was starting to think there was an airport admission fee because airports all seem blocked by a big maze of highway and appear only accessible by vehicle. But if you follow a very narrow sidewalk, cross some large streets that have no intersections, disregard the fact that there is no one else walking, and have an hour or so to spare, the airport is indeed pedestrian-accessible if not quite pedestrian-friendly. This test should be done at every airport. Maybe I'll give JFK a shot next time.