Vegas on the Cheap: Fall, 2005

Sept 23: Stephan’s Birthday: I was in Chaco Canyon this year for it, happened to be on the Equinox, and sure enough the sun set lined up wtih the walls. I drove home across Arizona chapparel, ruining the shocks on poor abused Strider the Ranger. The thunder people came out and danced in the skies, lightening stitched through the velvet black clouds. No wonder the Old Ones lived here. The visual displays are beyond belief............ and eventually the Road led back to my home for the time being.

Sittin’ on the dock of the bay, watching the tide roll away…….. You know, as much as I hate this place, the heat, the cliques the boredom and lack of cool trees, I sure was glad to see my little hovel in Lake Havasu. I spent two days trying to get the ground to stop moving under me, and slept a lot (unto afternoon naps). I’m too old to be traveling like that perhaps.

Anyway JoAnne, my long time pen pal (whom I tape long talking letters to occasionally, we both like to gab and it is a release I guess) was going to head out to Vegas on the 26th, (while I was out of school), so I decided to drive up to see her. She WAS coming out with her husband, and I know her husband works a pretty high stress job; I had plans no greater than to say hi and maybe grab lunch together. Allegedly they were to stay at the Bellagio.

So off I goes…….. reading the map I decided the shortest route to Vegas from here was a road that goes through a town Searchlight. I remember this name from my Uncle Bruce talking about it when we were kids…… apparently he ran up to Vegas on occasion. Man it was a long desolate road, two-laner, and very narrow. Searchlight is half way there. It must be the old road, because now from Los Angeles, you have two good sized freeways that go to Vegas. Vegas is huge of course, and I came in from the South through suburbs, could see the high rises of the casinos downtown, where I was headed. I eventually dodged over on a lateral road to downtown, it’s a basic simple town thankfully. It only took about 2 or 3 hours to get there.

Horrible traffic. Did I mention that I hate towns, and love the desert? It was hot, and I spent more time at stoplights than I did moving, I did find the Bellagio, figured it was in decent walking distance and parked my car in some rat maze behind an Irish themed casino and pub. Vegas slays me. I haven’t been there for over 10 years, and if possible, it’s gotten even more Disney-land like. The good news is, both Disneyland and Vegas are looking more and more like Europe all the time. All the casinos are connected via overpasses, and all of them have strips of malls. People who go to Vegas are determined to lose their money, if not gambling, then on overpriced merchandise. I did come up with a theory this time, that people and rats are probably more closely related than we think. There is no way that any creature, except one that is part rat, could enjoy the mazes, casinos and walkways and twisted corridors of all those hotels and shops and weird places. Long ago I heard someone say they design those casinos to keep you in, and make you forget there is a real world. Then they get your buyer’s resistance down, and you make silly decisions, and lose your boundaries.

I guess I’m no better than anyone else. I had a wonderful time exploring and looking at the marvelous architecture and décor. I checked room prices at the Bellagio and at the Mirage, and they want (single adult) $299.00 per night. ARE THEY HIGH???? I guess someone is, because all those places were full (big hotels too!), many of them speaking in foreign tongues too.

It’s like all the good childhood memories of Disneyland, all mixed up with the slime of the worst in humanity. What a bastardized town! They’ve even sanitized the slot machines, they don’t take money any more, they only take CARDS, hey just like VISA!!! The whole town was like something out of Blade Runner, only worse. I actually felt some of my old “urge to run all night” (like I used to do in the Navy) but thankfully the body was not willing and I crashed about 11:30. I only stayed one night (at the Motel 8 behind Bally’s). Some of the highlights:

· I wonder who the girl with the million dollar butt is, displayed over Bally’s? I was fascinated by the thought. Wouldn’t that be something, as a model, to have your nude butt hanging over the Vegas strip?

· The Mirage has a wonderful little volcano that erupts out in front, with waterfalls. I liked the Mirage the second best, the plants and jungle and bars were wonderful, and they had a good cover band playing too (an acceptable imitation of Stevie Nicks). The man at the ticket counter where I picked up my Moody tickets (they’ll be there Nov 19) was really nice, good customer service.

· The MGM Grand I didn’t get to until Tuesday, it’s my fave; I was exhausted Monday night and glad I waited. It is spectacular, I loved looking at the celebrity photos (silver screen and rockers both). The architecture is incredible in this casino. They seem to have some studios there, they are really shooting in. MGM has big acts coming there, the Eagles and Sir Paul this Fall.

· Cheap bastids……….. no one will give you water even, unless you pay for it. The Ferengi are alive and well on planet Earth, and they own Vegas!

· I was told that the Hilton has the Star Trek Experience, and I hope they don’t plan to tear it out before I can get back in November. I didn’t find it this time, and I also skipped the Luxor (the Pyramid) and the Mandalay Bay, which both sound really neat.

· I really liked the statue of Julius Caesar in front of Caesar’s (he’s one of my fave heroes) and I really liked the golden statue of Aslan in the lobby of the MGM. Some dignity in the landfill of cheapness.

· I walked all over the place! Tried to take in the pirate show at the Treasure Island, but one of the mermaids was sick or something, so they cancelled the show. It was a trip to just watch the people lining up on the sidewalk for the free show!

· For future reference, the Motel 6 next to the airport looked good, and I know they are cheap. They are right behind the MGM.

· Though I went into Caesar’s I could not figure out how to get to Planet Hollywood, WHAT A RAT MAZE. I also drove THRU the parking lot of The Hard Rock (avoiding a traffic jam), it was off the main strip. I suspect I didn’t miss anything in either place.

My room was right over the parking lot of a minor casino. It was quite active. In the night, they hauled someone away on a gurney, and about 4 am someone peeled out with the parking brake still on.

Tuesday morning, I called JoAnne’s room one more time, and she and Thom were STILL not answering (I suspect they hit the streets, and were having a good time too, or took the phone off the hook, either is likely). Anyway it felt GOOD that I was getting exercise and walking off all those Whoppers, but I was still kinda burnt out from “too much fun”. Also I really felt a spiritual attack from all the sleaze that literally lays in the gutter in Vegas. The latest is you can collect cards of hookers (or phone dollies, wasn’t sure, I was afraid to touch or read them!) and these are stuck into newsstands, on chain link fences, handed out by creepy hucksters on the sidewalks. No one sweeps the streets, there was filth everywhere. Here really was the flower of Human thought in design, and it was juxtaposed on this veneer of trash and flesh peddling. It’s like Vegas is the pinnacle of American mythology, the shopping and the shallow thoughts, the beauty and the slime.

Gambling is like eating sunflower seeds. It sooths, but doesn’t satisfy. Meals were expensive of course, and I stuck to Nachos and dip from the 7/11. I did indulge and buy a $3 Vegas dog somewhere. It was ok.

I found a wonderful tie in to a book I read recently Beyond the Outer Shores, which was a biography of Ed “The Doc” Ricketts (close friend to John Steinbeck and Joseph Campbell, two of my heroes) There was a tank full of LIVE sardines!! Of all things. It was Cannery Row in the middle of Sin City. I swear, it’s an Underground movement.

The MGM has this place called The Centrifuge, a huge dome space with odd acoustics and dome lighting, a bar in the center. Rooms around the edges. Very cool architecture.

And I felt kinda lonely. How many lonely men were blending into the crowds that lined the streets and malls? Do they gravitate there hoping to find company in the mindless crowds? There was so much of the “happiness for sale” and so much of it was sex oriented, I felt slimy. It was not a good opinion I had of the human race when I sat down in front of an aquarium of fish in the MGM.

Yes they have fish there (one was a Tang). It’s in the Tropical Rainforest café, which is the twin to the one in Downtown Disney. Upstairs that morning, no one was there yet, I had the fake gorillas and the plastic jungle all to myself. The fish weren’t plastic, they were real reef fish, swimming sadly through a fake reef. I watched them quite a while and thought how metaphorical it all was. There were these beauties (and it was so sad……. Any dead reef is sad after you’ve snorkeled in a living reef) waiting around for someone to feed them. They sure wouldn’t get food from that colored concrete rock in their tank. The parrot fish, which has a beak that can grind up coral, looked pretty bored. He had nothing to live for. His beak would break if he tried to eat that stuff.

It was amazing looking at all those different fin arrangements, and the fish ballet. Just think, each of those well designed fish filled a different ecological niche because of their structure. But they lived on a reef full of fakery.

The stuffed gorillas actually came to life a few times, with fake hoots. One was swinging from the branches. Real gorillas never swing from trees. Who am I to correct these plastic fakeries? Or to care? (how do they dust it all???) I finally left for my car, walking past some lame-brained tourists taking pictures of a very cheesy fake crocodile. Never did find JoAnne, and Vegas had grossed me out enough, so I didn’t wait any longer. Oh well, there will be other times.

I came back to Havasu “the other way” which turned out to be a much better road, and actually shorter (I had to go slow on the Searchlight road, even though it was shorter distance). The mountains ARE beautiful between here and there, and again I passed through that band of Joshua Trees I love so well. It’s so sad that one really can’t capture the beauty of the American West on film. I went over the Hoover Dam, found it fascinating. There are two seraphim (male angels?) made of copper out in front, near the operating offices, very 30’s art deco. Missed the photo op as I didn’t feel like stopping but I’ll go back someday for those, very neat art. I really liked the Hoover dam area (Lake Mead?)

As always I got a big kick out of some of the truckers, and they were all polite. One had a bumper sticker on the back, it said “Be a flirt, lift up that skirt” with appropriate cartoon. Ah only on the American highway.

Epilog: Yes I’m home* now in Lake Havasu, doing a lot of house cleaning! I took this vacation to get caught up on doctor things. Went to the dermatologist: I have this spot on my left temple where my Ex smacked me upside the head over 20 years ago (now you know why I stay divorced) that looks suspiciously like skin cancer as it won’t heal. The doctor sliced a neat little square out of it (biopsy) and it bleeds a lot: I’m staying in until it heals. Besides the sun really is vicious here. And I have some new glasses getting made, bifocals (without the line). The gals at the eyeglass place laughed and said “you made it 10 years longer than most people!” I guess that’s true, I just hate things on my face, and haven’t had medical either. Much of it will be picked up by insurance. The funny thing is they look a lot like Stephan’s eyeglasses, those were just the ones that look good on my face! So…….. yes all is well here. Hope your Fall goes well there too. Love and stuff, Christie sue

*I’m only here on a short visit—Ross Hutchison

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Last Moody Blue show of the 2005 tour, Las Vegas, NV

Life can be like December Snow, can’t it? November 19, 2005 I saw the closing show of the Moodie’s tour for the year. They looked tired. They did "One More Time to Live" live, it really hit home, and was kinda scary (in fact it was very scary*) but fit the mood. It was a good show, but everyone still looked their 40 years of touring. It wasn’t necessarily a bad feeling. Justin did "Nights in White Satin" with a deep look of calm and contentment on his face, just like he was ready for his own couch in front of the telly. You could tell it was personal, and perhaps he was reflecting just how much that song had done for him. The lyrics were born of sadness, but his life was changed by it too, for the better. Just what you want to be, you will be in the end………

The moment was spoiled. As "Nights" came to an end, the front rows, as if on cue (and perhaps it was, as most of the front rows were "die hard fans") rushed the stage, and crowded down front for the finale. They looked like white corpuscles moving in for the kill. Justin immediately reacted: he looked like he had just been splashed with cold water, and if he had been wearing a fur coat, his hackles would have come up a mile!

Ah well. All the Moodies finished the show with style, and waving, smiling and bowing, all vanished off stage, guitars held high.

I hadn’t seen many of the other fans in recent years, I’ve been busy working, with family, and other priorities take the place of what once was real fanatical fan mania in my own life. After the show, I went to the Mirage café with Bob Bradshaw and some other ladies (for the life of me, I don’t know their names. If I’ve met them on line, I’ve blacked it out). Everyone was tired, many had followed the band to other cities in the tour. Many of them were hungry, and digging in (with dedication) to pies, coffee, breakfasts, and late night snacks.

I guess I must be cured of the fanatical fan-dom. They were nice folks, but I had nothing in common with them, and found myself thinking of the nice warm bed back in my room. I sipped a glass of water, excused myself, smiled and departed.

At midnight, all the doors look alike. Looking for the exit, I opened one door off to the side in the café. It opened onto Backstage. (Wow how about that good security, eh?) It was a dirty hallway, floored with cheap linoleum and lined with amps, peopled with bustling, bandanna-wearing roadies. Show biz is funny that way, the show out front can be beautiful, the illusion complete. Take one look backstage, and see the real grunge and grubby conditions performers have to put up with, and it doesn’t look so glamorous.

Not one to pass up an opportunity, I yelled at a roadie standing there, "Hey I have a stupid question!" He was a friendly chap, and grinned back at me. "What does the word ‘snakes’ on the amplifier mean?"

That got his attention. "Huhn?" his mind was obviously blown. I explained it, babbling a little. You see, for the past 15 years I’ve been lurking around front rows and backstage at the Moodies shows, before and after, during strike, and peeking into the wings during shows. There is always this same stencil "snakes" on the black cases. I thought maybe Graeme had a weird Freudian sense of humor and had personalized his amp or something.

"NO!!! That means that those are the long cables that go out into the audience, they connect back into the House…" the roadie trailed off. That made sense. It’s been a few years, but I’ve done my time as a theater electrician and I got it finally. I thanked the nice young man, and went on my way, letting him do his work.

Almost out the café, it finally dawned on me what I had just done (duh), and I went back, and slunk through the door, and actually stepped into the grubby hallway. Honestly if I had met a Moody Blue on his way to the loo, I would have slid to the floor, passed out, right there on the ugly tile-work. I did walk (cautiously timidly pussy-foot) a few yards, and checked out the walls……. They were covered with autographed photos of all the performers who had been there. THEN some prissy little control freak manager swished out of an office like a mad Pekinese, and ran me off. I went quietly. (I felt like telling him to put on a frilly apron, and mop his filthy floor!) It was an interesting experience though, a bit like Alice going through the magic door.

Writing this was "going through the magic door". On the other side is a wonderful garden of delights with thorny, fragrant roses, but there are also wicked queens, and flimsy houses made of cards. There were goofy games with all manner of wacky creatures, with many a cry of "off with her head!" And it was always a lot of weird, dream-like fun. I hope your journey is always as magical as mine has been, and I hope that, since you are obviously a Moody Blue fan (just like me) that you can always say it with love.

*This one of those places you need to take out the album and play the song. "Confusion, revolution, evolution…………". It was closing night. They sounded angry and tired as they sang the words. Live performances have a much more visceral impact than mere album recordings. The generation that the Moodies and I belong to, the Viet Nam baby boomers, we tried so hard to bring world peace. But even though we have made SOME headway, the problems still aren’t fixed, and all the conflict and war still seems so stupid, wasteful. Why don’t all the terrorists go plant some trees instead?

If future generations read this book, and listen to their music, will it help? Will the message finally reach everyone?

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Live Long and Prosper: Was it the next morning? It must have been. I really am a die hard Trekker, and HAD to go see the Star Trek Experience. After some cruising and asking questions, I finally found the place. The Hilton (?) is off the main strip, on a parallel strip which has a monorail running up and down it. It was morning and a Sunday, so I had the place pretty much to myself. There were billboards up. Apparently some of the Star Trek characters, Vulcans, Andorians and such, periodically escape and do an Away mission to the rest of the town on the monorail. How fun that would be! I calmly walked into Quark's feeling very at home actually. It wasn't what I expected, but not too bad considering the limited area they had to work with.

There was the store of course. It was wonderful, I bought some blood wine for my brother, some Andorian ale for me, and a shot glass with the sign of the Klingon empire on it, red plastic, and it lights up! I LOVE this. It became my companion and I drank quite a bit of tequila out of it on lonely weekend nights in my little Lake Havasu bungalow. And I bought a mug with the Enterprize on it. It really was a lot of fun, shopping there.

There was some sort of television with a Klingon holding forth (I forgot the message, but it ended with "Ka-PLAGH!" and that was a treat). Then there was a shuttle ride, I didn't spend money on it because it looked like a clone to the one I rode in Huntsville, and before that at Star Tours in Disneyland. It WAS lunch by this time, so I had the space equivilant of clam chowder (they called it Space Squid soup, or something just as imaginative). An Andorian with very tight pants roamed around chatting with the clientel at Quark's. I think it was the blue beer I enjoyed the most.

I think it was this morning before I found TSTE that I also explored the Mandalay Bay. I literally can't remember which bit of architecture goes with which building. I remember a wall somewhere that had bits and pieces of what looked like old Greek statues in the walls, like butts and boobs and body parts, all set in and back lit, very arty, and very naughty. I loved it. I found a horse exhibit somewhere too, but I don't know where. So long as you look at the architecture, and not the gutters, Vegas can be pretty. I bet some of the night shows are beautiful too.

 Ah well we can on ly dream so much, and then we must refocus on Reality. I lasted until the early weeks of December, then my father had a stroke and I resigned my teaching position in Lake Havasu, packed up loaded Strider and went HOME. The students (8th graders) were horrible anyway, so many drugs in the town, and I think the principal was drinking more than was good for him. Everyone drank there, even me (not my normal thing when working). I'm glad this chapter of my life was over with by the end of 2005. I still can't believe it took until Summer of 2007 for the Moody Blues to again tour someplace near where I live, that is, the Pacific Northwest. And it's so beautiful here too.............