February has provided the results of a lesson imparted late last year. On a 2022 autumn afternoon, a recently arrived resident at my complex surveyed the then scene. A younger man of the immediate gratification generation, he disparaged our home. To him it looked “ghetto.”
Seeing the property through his eyes, I understood. Continue reading If the Shoe Fits Get Kicked by It
The title to this post is what I sought and found in Las Vegas. Many ask why I relocated to Nevada from New York. Too many surmise taxes, the weather, or crime chased me out of civilization. Not at all.
Of course, the tax rate is higher back East but services are extensive. Taxes are low out West but just looking around informs of a deficient society compared to what was left. Continue reading A Nice Soft Spot
An “Only in Las Vegas” sign portends the Big Mayberry should enjoy a substantial rebound in 2023. Continue reading More Bad Vegas
That time of year again. The season where convention and tradition insist we evaluate how good our lives have been despite setbacks and denials.
What’s particularly irksome is hearing all those sanctified savants who’ve proclaimed they’re “blessed.” As if leading patently unfulfilled or marginal lives is a wonderful condition, one that beats the alternative.
As the ancients knew, and modern mankind has forgotten believing technology has insulated us, there are fates worse than death. Continue reading Bad Vegas
Could it be that our real existences can frighten us deeper than what imaginations may conjure?
Atmospheric movies and artful live stagecraft can make flesh crawl. Or even startle audiences out of their skins. Continue reading Monstrosities
In Las Vegas, it’s easy to differentiate pensioners who retired from the main industry apart from those who flocked here thinking the city would be golden in their Golden Years. That also goes for locals who spent their lives here making livings in the region’s other professions.
Gray hairs who had spent lives bolstering our nation’s one-time industrial prominence and former service personnel who spent careers in the military predominate the second category.
A third bunch grew up in Las Vegas. They stayed, found careers here outside the neon, the noise, the notoriety. Through everyday satisfactions they were contented. Continue reading Some Found a Land of Dust and Disappointment
Heard one of the sweetest sounds ever when I returned from work. The complex’ custodian was power-washing the courtyard pavement. Continue reading Brightened Horizon
Perhaps this last weekend of May 2022 is the one that finally returns the visiting hordes who once flooded Las Vegas. After all, Memorial Day, or as it should’ve remained, Decoration Day, is seen as the unofficial start of summer.
According to hopeful leisure industry analysts, Americans are busting with all sorts of pent-up desire to getaway. Two years of Covid conditions have made us stir crazy. Where better to let everything hang out and fly the freakiest freak flags than Las Vegas? A city where even if strangers knew your name, they’d be too involved in their own personal deviances to notice others.
Anyone working directly in the hospitality industry or its adjuncts is counting on such participants who contribute to Las Vegas’ “What happens here, stays here” tall tales.
No matter what sort of happy faces the tourist bureau sketches, the numbers just haven’t been there. It’s fine that conventions and spectacles have returned to the city, yet post-Covid attendance has been generally woeful. Continue reading Reemergence Maybe
In the Mojave Desert, residents are on the cusp of our least wonderful time of year. Indeed, if Andy Williams had to sing about this season those lyrics would get stuck in his throat.
Summer. Already in mid-May Las Vegans can expect triple digit temperatures. As the month elides into June it becomes hotter with July and August turning everyday into a constant blow torch of torrid.
Throughout summer, I thank American breweries for 30 packs! Continue reading Let Us Broil
California is not sending it best people across the Mojave Desert into Nevada. Not visitors, necessarily, but those hopefuls intending to relocate.
For the most part, Californians flocking from the Golden State to settle in the Mojave aren’t the most sterling. Once here a sad portion of them tarnish the Silver State. Continue reading No Rainbow. No Pot of Gold.