Part One.

I’m asking her to come visit me for a few days. I was just there; in the City (San Francisco for the not as familiar with California’s unique dialect,) just to hang out and have some fun. I wound up doing much more; I was so confused most of that journey, just arriving from the Coachella festival and exhausted from the desert heat. She agrees to come down. Some of our college friends living in the City (much stronger and luckier people than Your Friend and Humble Narrator) want to come with her, which means she’ll most likely drive rather than fly. Of course I’d rather have Alice’s attention all to myself, but I haven’t seen our other friends for several years. Our hopes get too high and we don’t have all the company we’d expected. At least Alice is bringing Nikki with her. Nikki had just moved away from the City towards California’s Central Valley (somewhere near Sacramento) for family reasons, but she still remains the closest of friends. The ladies leave Sacramento at roughly 6:30 Monday evening; I’m still at work. I have the next five days off, so we have plenty of time. They arrive at roughly four in the morning.

The two came to visit me three years ago, just after Spuds and I broke up. We had a nice apartment; two bedrooms, washer and dryer, and a massive roman tub. She left most of the furniture but much of the décor left with her. At its peak, the apartment looked like a 12-year-old girl ransacked a few thrift stores and blew a few hundred bucks on after-Halloween sales. I carried much of what was left with me when I moved, but it wasn’t on display when Alice came to visit me by herself later. All my posters and ephemera were packed away and after my breakup and move I didn’t have the energy to make my modest apartment into a home. I had no one to impress and Alice was visiting to help me recover during a bad time. When I moved a second time (in with a friend) the posters and chatchkes came to life out of their boxes. Something about living with someone else gave me the energy and desire to lay out all my votive candles, Pez heads, and Halloween pumpkin lights. I still have more lights in boxes in my bedroom, but they’ll come out whenever I need to use my bedroom for anything other that someplace to pass out in.

The girls have a few plans for Vegas; hitting a casino, getting a lap dance, etc., so we have a loose itinerary. I would have liked to hit Lake Mead or Hoover Dam, but whatever. Our first goal was getting unpacked and ready for bed. Nikki brought an air mattress (she’d acquired many things she’d never buy herself when her mother passed away recently) but forgot the pump so she was relegated to the couch. Alice and I had my rather poor mattress in my unadorned (read: slobby) bedroom. Sleeping can be difficult in this loud environment. My poor, uneducated neighbors blast music from their cars as they drive into the parking lot and the garbage collectors have insanely loud equipment. Being on the ground floor doesn’t help any. We won’t sleep much anyway.

For some reason my visitors like to eat breakfast. My roommate ate all the hummus and pita so we opt to go to Einstein’s a few blocks away. They want bagels and espresso. Fortunately I live just near UNLV so we can walk to just about anything. In this harsh environment, it’s easier to drive anywhere, even just a block away, but the girls are used to the car-unfriendly environment of the City so we walk it anyway. It becomes daily ritual. I don't think I've eaten breakfast that many times in years. I shied away from the coffee and just had a bagel and either juice or a soda.

We don’t do much during their visit, only a few activities outside of hanging out in my apartment. Of course I’d rather just sit, drink, and watch WWII documentaries but my guests were somewhat restless.

We hit Cheers. It's only a few blocks away and I like dive bars. I think the girls had some fun, but I know how bad the place probably smells to a non-smoker. Plus all the men fawning over Nikki probably annoyed the girls at some point.

At some point, we make our way to Freemont Street with my roommate. The driving here is bad, the worst in Las Vegas. You actually have to pay for parking in some parts. It’s just as crowded as the Strip is, which is something I was trying to avoid. We make our way past Binion’s and the 4 Queens to Fitzgerald’s. The rainbow signage [with its queer overtones] amuses my guests. They play some jingoist segment on the overhead screen; something about the USAF saving the world from alien invaders. So bad it’s not even campy. Alice places $5 bets on number 23. I don’t think I’ve really explained the significance of the number, but she’s seen me hit on it so she forgoes her normal 11, 7, and 13. Of course she doesn’t hit. She becomes cranky as she grows hungry. I don’t understand, I can go two days without eating before the dizziness reminds me to force something down. We look for something near, but all the buffets and fast food places are closed. She can’t decide what she wants to eat so things are getting difficult. We wind up at a greasy spoon a few blocks from my apartment.

More later.