Gina and friend at the Dolphin Experience, Mirage Hotel, Las Vegas

Wednesday, July 2nd, 2008        

Is there ever a time when you want to hear all about someone else's vacation?  It brings to mind neighborhood get togethers where the hosts set up the screen in the living room to show slides from their recent vacation.  And there are dozens of family members in front of the Louvres, or Disneyland, or Grandma's house in Georgia and on and on.  The only time you are ever really given license to tell about it is when you are assigned that famous "what I did on summer vacation" essay when school starts.  But as a blogger, I am never really on vacation as everything that happens is just life experience that can end up in the blog.  As a throwback to all those teachers who assigned that essay, and with my own little twist, here is a list of things I learned on my own very brief summer vacation to Las Vegas, Nevada, complete with snapshots. 

I learned that.....

...the person with the worst cough and sneezing at the gate waiting to board the plane is always the one who will sit next to you.

...the most rambunctious kid at the gate waiting to board the plane will sit behind you and kick your seat the whole way.

...you can tell a lot about a person by how they respond to a bear buckling her seat belt on a flight.  Personally, I think I have the highest risk of being injured or destroyed during a flight incident because of my diminutive size and low body weight.  If not buckled in safely, I could end up anywhere and in the absence of id or a gps bear tracking system, who knows how I could ever get back to where I belong. 

...the Mirage just ain't what it used to be in its Siegfried and Roy heyday.  The lions and tigers in the Secret Garden are still the most well groomed, spoiled, gorgeous creatures I have ever seen.  It might be good if their hotel guests were treated half as well.  And worst of all, the volcano is completely shut down, dry and ugly.  Think of all those excited kids who couldn't wait to see the volcano erupt every night.  What a disappointment.

...when the hotel doesn't actually have the "superior view of the strip" room when you check in even though you ordered it weeks in advance, it is not good practice to try and downgrade you to a room on the second floor just because it has been remodeled.  No one who went to the trouble of ordering a superior view room wants to stay on the second floor and they sure don't want to be reminded that your more expensive superior view room has not been remodeled and is as old as the hills.  (The woman who told us this is the kind that gets very testy when a bear buckles her seat belt on the plane.  We just didn't get along.)

...all of the above is worth it just to experience Cirque du Soleil's Love show featuring all Beatles music.  It was like being in John Lennon's head when he wrote Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds and imagining what he was seeing.  And then seeing it.  I still think that the creators of this show were channeling John for their inspiration.  Hey, remember Marvin Gaye talks to me all the time.  It's possible, you know. 

...the most perfect creative moment is when you can't separate all the pieces.  When every costume looks like no one ever really thought it up, it was just something that someone put on at that moment.  And every dance step looks completely spontaneous and every now and then the entire group just happens to kind of do something together.  But just for a moment.   When the light seems like nothing more than your eye's ability to see things in a certain way.  And everything combined is a perfect snapshot of the whole.

...you don't need drugs to have a psychedelic experience. 

...those of us who consider ourselves somewhat creative are most likely limiting our thinking.  We follow too many rules of the way it has always been done and cannot imagine what it would be like to really create without boundaries. 

...you can have a thrilling theatrical, musical experience without a single woman cast member dressing in an overtly provocative way.  Even in Las Vegas!!

...when you are winning in the casino, those around you don't like it all that much.  Every squeal of delight is met with increasing bitterness and anger, as they pull yet another twenty out of their wallet, lusting for their own winning streak or just wishing yours would stop.  And it would seem that they really don't like a bear pushing the spin button on Wheel of Fortune, especially when it seems like every other pull results in a much desired spin opportunity.  (I tried not to make a scene but it is so much fun when everything is going your way!)

...the casino at the Mirage pretty much shuts down by 4 am and it seems impossible for the scantily clad waitresses that prowl the floor to believe that no matter how many times they ask you, you still don't care for a cocktail. 

...it's a lot better to gamble with house money than your own and it's a lot better to leave Las Vegas with more money than when you arrived.

...when you are leaving home, you should take a good look around at all the things you love about it and take them all in slowly and fully.  Look at them as though you will never see them again, forcing yourself to imagine that.  Appreciate what those things look like, smell like, and how they make you feel.  And then look at them that way every day.  You won't always have everything you have today, you know. 

...all you need is love.  But then I've been telling you that for quite a while now.  

GR