…athough come to think of it, I never told you I was gone. Monday, the 104° temperatures in my part of Los Angeles weren't quite bad enough so I jumped on a Southwest flight to Las Vegas, where it was 115°. Five degrees hotter than that and you would have seen half the showgirls' chests there melt.
…although come to think of it, I don't think there are any more showgirls in Las Vegas; not since Jubilee! closed at Bally's. Never mind that. Actually, I went there for the Licensing Show, an annual event where licensors (folks with characters or properties or even well-known trademarks) interface with licensees (folks who pay money to put those characters, properties and trademarks onto merchandise.) I am neither licensor nor licensee but I had business-type meetings with a couple of each so I Southwested there Monday afternoon.
The above photo is not from this trip. I didn't take any photos this time and in fact, didn't even see a walkaround Cookie Monster costume. It's from the last time I attended the Licensing Show, which was in 2011. When I reported on it back then, I promised you a photo of "me posing with one of my favorite TV stars." So that's it. But I'm getting ahead of my story.
I didn't experience one of those longer-than-your-flight TSA lines we hear so much about lately; not at either airport. I did though at LAX encounter a TSA employee who apparently had never dealt with a passenger whose replacement knee set off the metal detector. That took a while.
The flights both ways were crammed full, as all Southwest flights tend to be. On the way there, I was crammed next to a man who was unable to stop talking loudly about how the United States is doomed unless we elect Donald Trump. I was under no delusion this fellow's mind could be changed but just to amuse those around us, I had a go at it. I'll discuss our exchange in a future post here but I'll give you a little preview…
I asked him a few questions about how Trump would fix some of the alleged disasters about which he rants. My fellow passenger's reply was always along the lines of "He'll bring in the best experts!"
ME: In other words, he has no plan at all. He'll just find someone who does. That's real leadership. Bozo the Clown could do that.
HIM: Bozo the Clown is not a successful businessman. He doesn't have his name on dozens of buildings!
ME: No, but Ronald McDonald has his on thousands. Hey, maybe if you vote for him, you'll get fries with it.
We did about 600 air miles like that. It ended when we hit the turbulence that results when you fly over desert when it's eighty quadrillion million degrees on the ground.
How did I cope with the Vegas heat? By not going out into it. The convention, which is still going on as we speak. is at Mandalay Bay. I was staying in the Excalibur, which connects to the Luxor which connects to Mandalay Bay. It's a helluva long walk, especially for a guy with a new knee but I didn't have to venture outside at all except going to and from cabs. If you add it all up, I was outside the jurisdiction of air conditioning for about 90 seconds.
That was one reason I stayed at the Excalibur. Another was that since I was traveling alone, I didn't need luxury. I needed a bed, a desk on which to write, a sink, a toilet and a shower. At the Excalibur, the cheapest rooms have all that and the shower is an actual shower, not a shower-tub combo. I could have spared myself a lot of hiking if I'd stayed at Mandalay Bay or the Luxor but at the Luxor, some rooms don't have desks and at both hotels, most lower-priced rooms have shower-tub combos. Shower-tub combos are something I avoid when possible. I suppose they're manageable if you're shorter and narrower than I am and have a better sense of balance.
The Licensing Show is huge and vast and it involves a side of show business that most folks rarely see. There, people speak a language I do not understand…one of marketing and demographics and penetration into certain areas that I've never longed to penetrate. But there's also creative stuff. And celebrity appearances. And people in big, goofy walkaround costumes playing characters who are available for licensing. It feels a teensy bit like Comic-Con…enough that I kept feeling I should be upstairs somewhere moderating eleven panels.
I was going to stay through today but I completed all my planned meetings Tuesday morning and was getting weary from all the walking, plus experiencing a bit of back trouble. The bed in my hotel room was hard enough that I think the Excalibur previously used it as a drawbridge, plus — and this is going to seem silly in a town the size of Las Vegas — I was having trouble finding a place to sit down. The chairs in my room and the bed were all built low to the ground, which is not good for my new knee. As I passed through the three hotel-casinos, every bench I passed, every resting spot around the convention…they were all too low for me.
So I spent Monday staggering around, looking with little success for someplace to sit that was good for my knee. At one point at the Licensing Show, a lady representing a Korean animation firm asked if she could tell me all about their operation. I really had no interest in what she was selling but my legs were fatigued and begging for relief just then and I noticed their booth had high stools. So I said to her, "I'd love to hear all about it if I can do it sitting on one of those." Anything for a comfy chair.
Later in the non-convention part of Mandalay Bay, I spotted not a bench but a fountain with a proper-height wall around it and I just parked myself on that wall for a half-hour, hauled out my iPad and read Kindle books. It may have been the high point of my trip and it felt so good that while there, I also used the iPad to move my return flight from Wednesday afternoon to Tuesday evening.
Some people love to gamble in Vegas. Some people love to dine or see shows. My big thrill there this trip was sitting on the edge of a fountain.
Let's see what else I saw while in Vegas. I watched but did not put any money into an elaborate Flintstones slot machine…or any other such devices. There were also new slots of Batman (decorated with pics of Adam West, Burt Ward and other cast members) and Wonder Woman (with Lynda Carter). The Flintstones one got me wondering: Does Nevada still have that law against making gaming devices look attractive to children or has everyone just decided to ignore it?
I played no Blackjack, either. Years ago, it was my game of choice and I got to be really good at it. Then one day, when I was "ahead" collectively for all the Blackjack I'd played in my life, I decided it might be nice to remain "ahead" forever. I quit Cold Turkey and haven't wagered a buck on the game since, though I used to stop and watch others have at it and "play along" in my head. This time, I didn't even do that.
Mandalay Bay is connected to the Luxor by a mall with about forty stores in it and I had to walk through it several times. In it is a collectibles shop and apparently most days, they have Pete Rose there signing autographs for some fee. I didn't find out what it is because though I felt sorry for the man, I had no intention of paying it.
Why did I feel sorry? Well, remember the scene in This is Spinal Tap where the band sits sadly in a record store when no one shows up to get their signatures? The scene in the mall store looked a lot like that, with a guy out front practically begging passers-by to come in and get a ball signed by a living legend of sports. My last time past, Mr. Rose seemed to be writing his name on a jersey for some fan so I felt better about the whole thing. If you ever become a truly great baseball player, try to not get caught betting on games.
I dined Monday evening at the Excalibur Buffet, which really isn't cost-efficient for a guy like me who's had Gastric Bypass Surgery. Even if I wanted to, I physically could not eat enough food to justify paying $24 a plate. But I needed grub just then, the convenient alternatives to paying that much were Pizza Hut and Popeye's fried chicken…and I knew the Excalibur Buffet had really, really good carved roast turkey, which is my favorite entree. So I went in, paid the $24 and just to amuse the cashier, told her to close the place down because since I was there, there'd be insufficient food left for any who came after me. She laughed.
I had my one plate of two slices of turkey, some whipped potatoes and gravy, a bit of stuffing and I also grabbed a piece of BBQ chicken, some glazed carrots and a few meatballs. No beverage, no dessert. I've given up all foods high in sugar and all drinks that are not water. It was a plate o' chow that in a sit-down restaurant, you might pay ten bucks for, twelve tops, but it was pretty good.
It took me about ten minutes to consume it and as I got up to leave, the cashier lady was circulating, playing hostess. She saw me and asked, "Going back for seconds?" I told her no, I was done. She said, "You mean I closed this place just so you could eat two damn pieces of turkey?"