How suite it is!

Got lucky in Vegas... not that it's anybody's business. ;)

The road in is swift and straight, but people here drive like idiots and there were skidmarks, without exaggeration, every 200 yards on average, for at least 100 miles, spinning alarmingly off into the wild hereafter, tire carcasses everywhere. Nobody takes any heed whatsoever. Chanced upon Kane's Army rolling out for desert manouevers. Impressive!

Our room is immense and fully equipped: in no other part of the world would this be considered a 3-star hotel; and just $24.99 on hotwire. Of course, wi-fi is $13.99 extra, as if! It's free at Starbucks, (as was the coffee, because I had to wait two minutes; I said I got lucky!)

Lunch at El Pollo Loco (a sort of Mexican KFC, except edible) was REALLY GOOD flame-broiled chicken. The place was uncomfortably empty at first, but the locals were lined up a dozen deep by the time we left. Recommended.

We parked at The Venetian and just meandered. Won and lost $50 at Casino Royale, and walked away intact. Had free tickets to the Automobile Museum at The Imperial, but had to sprint back miles to the parkade, plowing through the lumbering crowds to retrieve them. Doh!

There's not a hint of recession here; all the cliches ever written about LV apply: ridiculous architecture, gaudy shows, incessant noise, jammed arteries, and jaded porkers sucking $1 beers and cigarettes, and stuffing endless bills into raucous, unforgiving slots. 'Wretched excess' doesn't begin to cover it. 3 or 4 hours and we'd had enough, so after some fine ribs at Tony Roma's, we cruised the strip a coupla times to gawk at the lights, and headed back to bed. There we caught the end of a curiously timely and touching episode of Beverly Hillbillies that should be required viewing in boardrooms everywhere. Jed just couldn't understand why Mr. Drysdale and Miss Jane wanted to help him avoid paying taxes: "My country's in trouble and I've got more than I need." Calling Bernie Madoff!

My only LV souvenir is a stack of hooker calling cards, thrust by the dozens into my hands by a phalanx of eager Mexican pimps, working the strip, livin' the Dream.

Life on Texada has never looked more appealing.