Sin City

What happens in Vegas, doesn’t always stay in Vegas…

(just click on the photos to get a clear view of them…)

Day 1: The Three-Martini Night

Thanks to my wonderful hubby, we got to travel to Vegas the day before my 40th birthday in style…

I felt like Nancy Drew in her roadster. Unfortunately, fashion does not always allow for function, and–four hours of convertible later–my hair turned to a nice texture of straw with a little string thrown in for good measure.

After dinner, we went to The Lounge, high atop our hotel, to witness the neon desert in person.

We got there about 10:30, and I ordered a martini. I’m a Tanquerey girl because I like a little bite, and I love vegetation. The more olives the better. The funny thing is, I don’t drink anymore. Not since I sought help for the infertility and my witch doctor acupuncturist suggested I restrict my intake of alcohol (and caffeine, sugar, wheat, and dairy). But you can’t really turn 40 without a little help from your friends, so I managed to break every one of those restrictions this week.

Now, back to the drinking…

Several martinis later, I was waxing on to my ever-patient husband all about the road of life, and how I was seemingly forever taking exit ramps, when I happened to glance down at my cell phone:

Oh, NO. I am fucking the freak out. How did this happen??!! I am freaking through my last minute of 30-somethingness, and then

it’s over. And I’m over it. Or mostly over it. R. told me that I had the death conversation (with myself, apparently) at about 2:00 AM, but I don’t remember too much of that.

Day 2: Here Comes the Sun

On my birthday, we decided to catch some rays by the pool. We soon discovered that there are distinct arenas with distinct demographics out at “the beach” (it’s Vegas, baby, so a beach in the desert is a beach in the desert). By the wave pool, there are your single twenty-somethings in teensy eensy bikinis. There is Jessica Simpson and Fergie on the loudspeakers. There is a lot of coconut oil in the air. I’m only half-sorry to say that we didn’t stay…

we headed over to the Lazy River, a little Motown, and the waft of Coppertone, where all the women slung sarongs around their middles (like me), and most of them had kids splashing around…and I’m thinking…oh, god…this is it…this is 40…and I LIKE it. I LIKE the Lazy River. After all, there’s a current to carry you along…

which means you don’t have to work too hard, right?

That evening’s libations were more tame…well, except for the absinthe. We decided we needed a little of the Green Goddess to usher in the new decade…

even though it’s a fake version of the GG since this country does not allow the sale of wormwood-infused liquor. Even though they (”they”=the alcohol scientists, of course) now know that the wormwood in absinthe does NOT make you go insane and do harm to yourself or others. So, my best guess is that what we were really drinking was sambuca with green food dye.

But I really needed it because I was wearing these:

And, once again, fashion was NOT allowing for function. Holy crap. I thought my feet were going to fall off by the end of the night. And we still had more walking to do because hubby got tickets to see the new Cirque de Soleil show, LOVE, based on all the Beatles tunes. And we had some company. Which meant I had to do a lot of standing in line. In Those Shoes.

There were some cool stage props, but mostly this was a lot of Soleil without a lot of Cirque. R. was particularly disappointed. I believe he was mumbling something about “mocking his generation.” Or maybe there was just one too many miniskirted clowns on skates.

Days 3-4: Trade Show on a Stick

The rest of our time inVegas was taken up by the trade show for the palm tree farm and by eating.

Being Vegas, some of the companies with booths at the trade show decided they needed to Do It Up Right–so they hired one of the Cirque de Soleil performers to trapeze in the air above us. No nets. No ropes. Just flipping out.

They were selling some sort of motor for fish tank filters, I think. Who the hell knows. Who the hell cares.

We got to take the in-laws out to dinner at some schmoozy place that had their wine list completely computerized:

Ah, the wave of the future. Someday maybe we can even just take our wine in pills, like the astronauts. I wonder what that will do to toasts. Not to mention Holy Communion.

This place also had a hamburger dinner on the menu that–I shit you not–cost $5,000. Don’t believe me? Here’s the beef:

It does come with a bottle of wine that I imagine makes up about $4,975 worth of the $5,000. But still. You’d have to win pretty damn big at the tables to swallow that. (By the way, we lost $80 in about 2 minutes at the slots and gave up on the gambling for this trip. Losing fast is no fun. I’m not sure why losing slowly is so much more acceptable, but it just is.)

Finally, I will leave you with what I now consider to be The Message of Turning 40 for me: A Ladybug Sighting!!!!

There she was, on my plate no less. A-plum-tomato-and-black-olive-studded LADYBUG. And I ate her right up.