vegas day 1

I hadn't ever been to Las Vegas (other than to drive past on my way to California, and to go to the temple), so I was more than curious when an opportunity was created to travel there with a few friends. Arrangements were made and last Thursday Sue picked me up at my house, we picked up Azu'car, and we drove South, through a snowstorm and then the beautiful red rocks of Southern Utah. We arrived at McCarran just in time to drive up to the curb and call, "Love you long time?" to Tiffany. After checking in at the hotel, we went to dinner. In Germany.

Regretfully, I didn't take any pictures of the 3-piece band (one man holding a yellow sign with black letters reading CLAP), nor of the great hall in which we were sitting, with the long wooden tables and matching benches. I did, however, take a picture of the ginormous plate of noodles I ordered:

One of my favorite features of this particular restaurant is that the utensils lived on the table. Want to use another fork? Because you might be just like a four-year-old who doesn't want the macaroni fork to touch the salmon fork? You're in luck. The basket of forks is right there, to use at your discretion.

(Yes, those were all my forks.)


Our shared dessert was pretty. Just like Tiffany.

So awesome when you only remember to ask your waitress to take a photo after you've eaten. Because what would a picture be without take-out boxes?

After dinner we went to Palms (The Palms?) to go dancing. Tiffany, with all her connections, led us past all the men with the earpieces (serious, SERIOUS stuff there, guys. You can't just go to any club all willy-nilly by yourself. You need to be escorted and watched at every turn.) to what we thought was going to be the club called Moon, but as it turns out, Moon didn't open until 11, so we went to a different club to wait it out. At the appropriate hour, the escalator led us to Moon where my dream of sections of floor being lit up had come true. We went to a room where I thought cool air was being blown on us as a courtesy due to the fact that when you dance you might warm up; it took me a good five minutes to realize that we were actually outside. I enjoyed the view, updated my facebook status, and after Sue took this picture

we went to the very place in that picture. The club was called Ghostbar, and we were treated to the music of Flashback Heart Attack, an 80s coverband who wrote such hits as Turning Japanese. Dancing to that music was so, so much fun for me. Almost as fun was the man who approached us on the open-air floor and asked us each what we do for a living. He called BS when my answer was, "I'm a shepherd."* As a test, he inquired as to what a shepherd's most important responsibility might be; he implied that it is to ensure that, "the flock doesn't eat all the vegetation," while I suggested that it is, in fact, "to go after the one." Poor guy.

Could I go back, I would have stayed at that club longer because MAN it was a lot of fun.

Back at the hotel, I washed up and went to bed. The next day's adventures to come . . .








* - this was only one example of my playing the role of Abed Nadir during our entire trip.