Sometimes when I have a big post to do, I procrastinate horribly. Let's set the way-back machine to two weeks ago, and I will try to re-assemble what a great weekend it was.

(start shuffle: now playing: Kate Bush - The Morning Fog)

Friday afternoon all the guests of the Hard Rock Casino's 10th anniversary weekend flew out to Vegas. We took a private plane, a new experience for your erstwhile narrator. Apparently musicians, actors, and generally wealthy folks use these things called "private airports" for their unique aviation needs. This one was near Burbank airport, a one room check in/waiting area, then you walk out on to the tarmac and get on the plane. Everyone in the mini-airport (which I will affectionately call "Hotshot Air") I recognized from TV or was a member or guest of Camp Freddy, or I recognized and couldn't figure out where the hell from. Where is imdb when you need it?

While waiting for the plane, I kicked it with Billy Morrison (who had a shiny new PSP) and his wife Jen. They are the nicest frigging people ever and it's always a treat to hang with them. Chatted a bit with Jerry Cantrell and Billy Duffy.

Me: "This Hotshot Air scene is quite impressive"
Duffy: "Oh, mate, you're spoiled now... you can never go back."

Shannon Elizabeth and her friend Heather (who Dave and I played poker with on that E! show) were there, so all in all there were a bunch of people I knew so I didn't feel too fish-out-of-water.

There was one of those weird little Paris Hilton dogs scampering around and when it got near me, I stifled my involuntary "kick little yipping dog" reflex, but only just barely. After about an hour we boarded Hotshot Air, and began to get this Vegas weekend business started.

Once at the Hard Rock, everybody checked in and went to their rooms. This first night (Friday) I was alone, as Riss didn't get in til Saturday morning. There was nothing to do until a big group dinner at Nobu at 8:30, so I got on my walking shoes and went for a jaunt down the Vegas strip.

The Hard Rock is about a mile off the strip, and the strip is a few miles long. I decided to go visit the Wynn, which was about as far from the Hard Rock as you can get in Vegas. Long walks are great for a multitude of reasons. Long walks on The Strip are experiences in themselves. Tourists on holiday, sun weathered local faces, mascara bleeding from crying eyes, dumb man-animal drunkards wobbling down the streets, and swarms of prostitute flyers being distributed all in the hot desert air. People act so strangely in Vegas. I've always found it fascinating. Like all these months of repression get an outlet (usually an unhealthy one) in the world's playground. The energy of the city is what I find attractive. An amazing outpouring of drama, both the joyous and the miserable. I got an eyeful of it all on my walk, which took about 45 minutes.

Checked out the Wynn casino. It had opened just the day before so everything was really jumping. Took a look around the giant man made mountain (more like a hill), the casino area, and the stores. Overall, it seems really like Bellagio II. Very, very much like Bellagio in terms of the casino and stores design, and the color palette. Of course this means that it’s very nice, but it didn’t hit me over the head with originality. I never got to check out the inside of the hill, the area with the waterfall cascading over the giant video screen. Apparently this is where the big water feature extravaganza deal is, but both times I went to check it out, it was closed. While I walked around the stores, I walked right by Steve Wynn, he was just touring around talking to people. The Wynn is, as you would expect, very nice, and up to the Wynn standard, but didn’t leave me with any real impression of breaking any new ground. After, I walked back to the Hard Rock.

Dinner at Nobu was tasty and extravagant to the point of being completely ridiculous. Huge plates of sushi and teriyaki and all of it was the best of whatever it was that I had ever had. Again, it was courtesy of the Hard Rock. Tara Ried was eating at a table just across from us, and was wearing a black evening dress that went pretty much down far enough to expose the top half of her ass cleavage. Insert your own joke here.

After the dinner, Dave and Carmen and the Freddy posse headed over to the Coldplay show. I am starting to see the benefit of staying at the Hard Rock: if you have show tickets, and want to stay in a great self-enclosed environment, this is the place. It was nice going from the room, to dinner, then to a concert all in the same relatively small hotel. The Coldplay show was good, I found myself liking the songs from the new record the most. I especially liked the title track “X &Y”.

After the show I was on my own again, so I took off to the room for some well deserved blow and hookers.

No, actually... my cards-gravity kicked in and I went back to the Wynn to try out the new poker room. I started walking once more thinking that I would get in a cab at some point, but again just enjoyed the walk and listening to my music and thinking, so I walked the whole way again. This time it was a full blown Friday night and man, motherfuckers get their drunk on! Wow, full-on alcohol research 101. It’s a mythical and mysterious line that divides joyful celebration, and pathetic mind-erasing substance abuse. I saw plenty of both, though it’s hard to tell them apart in the moment.

The poker room was nice, but the poker gods were not. Donated most of my tiny personal Vegas stash to the “Help Steve Wynn make his 2.7 billion investment back” fund. Good luck Mr. Wynn getting the remaining 2,699,999,700 back and breaking even!

Walked back to the Hard Rock. While not a profitable night, it was a great time all around, and I did get a weeks worth of cardio walking up and down that damn strip.