"You know, in retrospect, the luggage scene was really fascinating." - Tom Servo
Rather than the minute-by-minute play-by-play, I’m going to try to go stream-of-consciousness while (as always) maximizing hyphens (and parenthesis). 1% notes, 99% memory. Roughly chronological:
Friday afternoon is not the optimal time to do anything in Los Angeles. The freeways jam up good. The airport jams up good. The freeway near the airport? Jams up good.
Having a mild case of the OCD makes the airport security shuffle a little nerve-wracking. Did I get everything out of my pockets that might set of the metal detectors? With all the bullcrap electronics I carry around, am I going to arouse some sort of suspicion? Is my belt going to set off the metal detectors? Do these shoes have any metal in them? Are my pockets empty? Christ, it takes me ten minutes before I even get in the line.
Even with the traffic and the security, I find myself 30 minutes to kill. Time to warm up the liver for the weekend.
America West, flight 112. Gate 4b. Seat 8e. Twenty-something Jen Harmon look-a-like sitting next to me in the window seat is reading People or Us or something. I think these magazine publishers, along with the cosmetics industry, are executing a high level government-backed conspiracy to keep the average american woman from realizing how fucked up things are. (For men, they use Maxim and pro wrestling.) Eventually, it puts her to sleep, allowing me to focus fully on the latest Dr. Dobbs. Hmmm, testing.
I get my bag off the carousel and head to the shuttle company window where I proudly present my Expedia voucher for a ride downtown at my special discounted rate. As the woman behind the counter mulls the whole thing over, I say, “I need to get downtown, not to the strip.” She looked at me like I asked to go to the moon. Perhaps I did. 45 minutes until a bus will even show up to take me downtown. D’oh. Off to the cab line. At least 200 deep in a Disneyland style snake-line that winds back and forth. While waiting, Hank calls. He was going to play in the $1500 WSOP event #2, but a third party fumbled the pre-registration on his behalf and he was shut out. He doesn’t sound too upset about it. We agree to meet up later at either homebase (the Plaza) or Excalibur.
Moses, my cab driver, likes mid- to high- limit stud only. “This hold’em bullshit” is too easy. He likes “a game that makes you think.” Too many cheaters and colluders online. Oh, and the Wynn poker room sucks, too. And L.A., too. That’ll be $35. Good luck at the tables.
Next: The Rio has long hallways.
