This one is a long one, but entertaining. It happened in 2001 and was posted on my previous website (Which has since disappeared thanks to a crappy server that couldnt do anything right!!) Anyway, enjoy!!!
Now, this actually started on a Saturday afternoon, but ended Sunday morning, so I figure this could be a drunk on Sunday story.
Vegas, ca. 2001: Its Saturday around 2pm, and we've just left Circus Circus. Have you ever been there? I have mixed feelings on the place. First off, it's like a second rate casino in the middle of babylon. But damn if that clown out front doesn't really pressure you into going in. He looks happy and jubilant, but there is no question that he is forcefully directing you to game at the Circus Circus Casino.
Well, we really couldn't keep ourselves from going in and gambling. Hell, you're in Vegas, what else is there? I could have spent the new millennium in Vegas, and had someone asked how it was, my response would have been something like "man, I had a hard 16 and the dealer dealt me a 5, it was incredible."
There were three of us. Somehow the 20 people that had shown up for our friend's bachelor party just werent around at this point. I'm sure we could have found them on some table somewhere. Hell we just drove up from Texas to crash the party, and the third in our particular party had flown in from San Francisco for the gig.
Anyway, we had some drinks while playing blackjack, which I believe we were all up. Interesting comment by the Pit Boss, "Man, I never put more than 10.00 gas in my car. If gas was 10.00/gallon, I'd have to keep stopping to put in another gallon." I dont know why, but that comment has been stuck in my head for a year. Anyway, I digress.
Have you ever checked out the big Circus tent, The Adventuredome, in Circus Circus? Dude, it's like an amusement park. This was my first time visiting Circus Circus in Vegas (Even though I had been to Vegas at least 20 times before, I never wanted to lower myself to that place). I had been to Reno where some kind blackjack dealer gave us the low down on the ranches in the area, but Ive never seen anything like this. As Ice Cube would say "I was getting overwhelmed by Bebe's kids."
After winning some deformed coffee mug at some contest, and enjoying a good hot dog, I had to get the hell out of that place, so we took the glasses our drinks were in (which I could serve you out of if you humbled me with your presence at my pad) and took off.
Down to the Bellagio, for no real apparent reason. But what we discovered was the backdoor to Vegas. You know how they give you free drinks when you gaming, which sometimes can come to about 20.00/drink if you're not careful? Well, we hit the Sportsbook in the Bellagio for some gambling on the ponies.
First off, if you go at the right time, you're one of only a handful of people there. Secondly, the Bellagio has the hottest waitress' in the world, I'm convinced of that fact, and they're in plenty, which is even better.
So, what you can do is sit there and bet a couple dollars on the ponies here and there over the course of say 5 hours, and get free drinks all the while you're there. So you get loaded at very little or no cash expense to yourself.
Well, we sat there for a good while getting loaded. One waitress would come by every 10 minutes, and I must say I still talk about that girl with fond admiration and as a level of beauty which I compare others too. God Bless her mother and father for bringing her into this world. Of course, it could have been the drinking, but I'm sticking with my original story.
Another waitress would come by every 10 minutes, but staggered between the other girls stops. Now, my buddy Brent and I could not help but to get a drink every time she stopped by. Hell, why wouldn't you? It's free (for the most part). I'll never forget seeing his eyes when he realized that we could get shots for free from them. It was as if he was seeing for the first time. It was beautiful to be there for that moment.
After tying a really good one on (Im sure my speech was slurring badly at this point) I met up with a friend of mine at the poker tables. He's an old buddy of mine from my band days back in Texas, and I know anytime I'm in Vegas, he'll be at the Bellagio Poker Room. It's a given.
We drank some more as we played some blackjack. The local native friend of mine had gotten drilled for about a grand in 20 minutes, so he left in a hurry and we bid adieu. However, I was doing okay on my table, and we were having more and more drinks.
This is where I found out that Hasim Rachman had knocked out Lennox Lewis down in South Africa to take the heavyweight title, at 15-1 odds no doubt. Damn I was an idiot for not taking the gamble on that one, but who would really?
So we get drunker. I like to think that there should be a term called Vegas Drunk. Because drinking in Vegas is like drinking nowhere else in the world. You don't know you're drunk, can't tell what time it is, how drunk you are, how dumb you are. I mean, Vegas really knows what theyre doing to shadow your senses to your own stupidity. But damn, I love it so.
We leave the Bellagio drunk as a skunk and head over to Paris Casino across the road. Along the way, one of us comes up with the brilliant plan: "I think it's time to bet big." Now, saying this to some drunken gamers is an easy way to test the limits of your pocketbook quickly. I think it's about 9pm now, and we're stumbling across the road.
Going into the Paris Casino through Bally's Walking Escalator one will become hypnotized...you sit there on this escalator going into the casino as a soothing voice says out speakers "close your eyes, listen to my voice. Today you're going to win like you've never won before."
I don't know why we didn't bet at Bally's because I know that guy was right, but we went to Paris, which is adjoining Bally's. By the way, did you know that if you ever want to see anything in the world, you can find it in Vegas? I saw the Eiffel Tower there, and now I have no reason to travel across the Atlantic.
So we "bet big" at Paris. "Betting big" is a relative term, but to us that meant about 100.00 hands in blackjack. After about 20 minutes I was down about 800.00 and pretty pissed off. Time to hit the craps table.
But before the craps table, I had to take care of some business in the world-class bathrooms there. I recommend the Paris Casino for all your toilet needs while you're in Vegas.
However, as a drunk might do, I walked out of the bathroom and through the casino with toilet paper on my shoes, trailing me as I walked around. The only reason I could finally figure out what everyone is looking at was my friend's laughing so hard at me. They usually don't laugh that hard, so a quick perusal of my person found the problem. Hell, it was pretty funny for me.
Well, I called some girl a whore at the craps table. I think that was rock bottom for me that evening. She didn't deserve it, and I apologized, but the French inspired Paris Casino had the manners and pissy attitude of the French, and I was getting drilled left and right. I wasn't sure how I was going to pay for the ride home to be honest.
On our way back to the MGM Grand, where I had room on the floor of a room reserved for the bachelor party, we decided to do shots at every bar we could find. Now, in Vegas there are a lot of bars. I remember dancing to some crap at some casino somewhere at some point.
We stopped at every place and did Tequila and Jaggermeister everywhere. Not a good combo. We had no idea what time it was, where we were, or what was really going on. I do remember the Monte Carlo. I swear to this day that a Steve Martin look-alike was working behind the bar, but my companions disagreed with me on that one. When I asked him about it, he said that he never heard that before. I'm sticking to my story though.
This Steve Martin look alike advised us that if we wanted to locate some women that we'd probably want to go to this brewery in the Monte Carlo Casino, so off we went. My buddy Brent and I went in, showed our ID's and went on in. Both of us commented on how hard they had carded us, but went in and ordered three Alabama Slammers.
Waiting for our buddy Matt to come on in got tiresome, so we offered his shot to one of the girl's that were milling around us. Conversing with the girls, they asked where our other friend was. We nonchalantly, half joking but half serious, said, "oh, he's probably being detained by the cops, or in jail, but we're not really sure."
A couple minutes later Matt showed up, pissed as all can be, talking about how the cops detained him at the door. I can not do justice to his anger at that particular moment, so I won't try, but he went on to explain what happened: They took my ID and claimed it wasn't me, and then waved some cops over. They had be backed up to a wall, and 4 cops surrounded me. they kept questioning me about when I graduated (then proceeded to say I couldn't graduate that year) and all about everything. Man I was so pissed. I thought about trying to break my way out, but I didn't.
I wish I could do justice to the pleasure the story gave me at the time, but I cannot. I hardly remember all of it.
We went on down the street making our way to the MGM. Somehow, a group of about 4 guys were really enamored with us, and said that they wanted to buy us drinks down at Mandalay Bay. I'm always down for free drinks, but there was also a Fatburger along the way. So, I ran across the street and saw my life flash in front of my eyes as a car came flying around the corner. Dude, I had to jump out of they way of that car, and had I not jumped, I'm sure an extended stay in a Las Vegas hospital would have been in order.
But I got my fatburger and rootbeerfloat, ate it on the curb on the strip and headed back down to the MGM where the other guys were. Found them on the tables, gambled a bit and then to the bar again.
It was about 4-5am at this point, and we went into some argument about the fight (Lewis rachman). At this point I thought about trying to pick up one of the nice ladies sitting at the bar to go back to my room with me, but the thought of where (there were 10 people staying in the hotel room) to take care of business evaded my capabilities at that point.
Of course, I can't even be sure if they would have gone, and a slap could have happened with any kind try...I don't know how all that works anyway.
So I went to sleep on the floor of the hotel room. Woke up the next morning, made a lot of my money back the hour before we left, Brent and I got in my pickup and made the long drive back to Texas after dropping Phil off at the Airport.
Vegas, I love you!
