The Bitch is Back

And I now realize how old I am. Geezaloo, y'all - I'm tired. After a madcap long weekend in Vegas, followed by a rollicking good time at quite possibly the second or third best concert I've ever seen, I have been reduced to a freakin' zombie. There is so much to tell, and I am so not firing on all cylinders at the moment. And my hands and lips are all nice and chapped from the dry desert air. Oy. But I will soldier on for you, dear readers, just for you. There are at least two of you, right?

I haven't been to Las Vegas in 10 years, and back then, they were trying to bill it as a great family vacation spot. Rrrrright. Mom watches the kids at the pool while Dad gets tanked and loses the family nestegg at the craps tables. Now, it's all about "What happens in Vegas ..." - the most bastardized slogan since "Got milk?" The Strip looks completely different from what I remember, and while the hotels are trying to outsleek and outluxury each other, the streets are literally littered (say that three times) with "escort service" calling cards that are two or three strategically placed stars away from straight-up hardcore porn. These cards are nasty, and they are EVERYWHERE. My cohorts, M and T, picked up a few the morning before I got there and told me they had met some friends who wanted to party with us. Eww. But funny.

The Bellagio absolutely rocked. Our suite was way sweet, the buffet was painfully good, and I found my new game after getting lucky a few times at the casino. Usually I just play slots and peoplegawk, but I tried some roulette and was totally sucked in. M and I also spent the better part of Friday afternoon in the posh sports book, where I actually won three out of the five horse races I bet on, my picks being based purely on the horses' names. I mean, how can you NOT bet on Mr. Classy Action?

We spent a lot of time just walking from hotel to hotel, and damn, I am so old. I'm sore, y'all. From walking and eating too much. How pitiful is that? We gambled here and there and picked up lots of free drinks, but the main event of the weekend was the Elton John show at Caesar's Palace. I have to say, for a gay guy, he sure loves him some boobs. The show was designed and directed by David LaChapelle, and it's got his fingerprints all over it - cool, artsy videos and pictures, lots of graphics, lots of color, and lots of boobs. Including a GIANT pair of tatas that inflated and hung over the audience during "The Bitch is Back," while five videos of Pam Anderson pole dancing in a thong and pasties played over the stage. Then there was the huge inflatable banana with inflatable cherries on either side, the huge inflatable lipstick, and the huge inflatable roses. Think he was trying to tell us something? There was also the softcore film full of clips of various combinations of people dancing and getting it on to "Philadelphia Freedom," and the Justin Timberlake-as-a-young-Elton film that played during "Rocket Man." That was cool. And PeeWee Herman was in it.

My favorite piece had to be the film that played during "Someone Saved My Life Tonight." I'm all for artsy, but can someone please explain this to me: We open with an Elton look-alike putting his head on a pillow in his oven, and then a shirtless fairy boy (as in, wearing wings) (and sequin pants) separates from Elton's body and flies around the room. Cut to the fairy boy in an all red room with all white furniture and a woman with so much silicone in her, she was in danger of splitting in two. The woman is wearing pasties, a thong, hooker shoes, and a bridal veil, and the fairy boy dances around her. Cut to a cabin in the snow, like a snow globe, and the fairy boy is sitting and laughing with a giant purple bear, who is feeding the fairy boy honey with a giant wooden spoon. Then they go ice skating outside, and the bear swings around a smaller silver spoon, laughing all the way. Cut to random images of the fairy boy dancing, the plastic lady, the ice skating bear, etc., until the pace gets so frantic, and the fairy boy gets so out of control, the plastic lady goes apeshit and starts tearing up the red room and destroying a wedding cake. In the pasties, thong, and hooker shoes. Finally - now stay with me here - the fairy boy is dancing in a gray room, and shots of the Elton-in-the-oven, the ice skating bear, and other random images are interspersed with shots of the plastic lady strapped to an electric chair. And her crotch is on fire.

I am truly spent just relaying that last bit to you, so I'll leave you to ponder those images for now. Stay tuned ...