now that you're near, now that you're here

i took a red eye here because i have some work to do tomorrow...just got back to chicago. almost wrote "the city of justice", but then realized that meant gotham according to r.kelly.

my mind is fried. fried! i am going on a half an hour of sleep in 42 hours. yeah! there's a fun point to that, and i'm all wired and nuts, but it's too late to do any fun junk because people i love are sleeping now. other people i don't love (although, sure, world-scope, i suppose i do love them too) are raging outside my window even though it's 2:39 - was there a night game tonight?

i walked into my apartment unaware of how i appeared. our summer subletter, philip, was on the couch, and laughed "whoa, vegas!", then i became cognizant of what a risky business a-hole i looked like. i had just staggered out of a cab, ipod on listening to like, some jagoff electronica; black jacket, torn jeans, burned out from no sleep, sunglasses on. come on, corey hart! where's the coke party?

me as that guy is hilarious to me. i don't think i've ever looked that serious in my life! LESS than ZE-ro (clap clap clapclapclap)!

so, since i'm up, here's a hodgepodge of things i forgot to post about while in vegas:
a. i don't think the weirdness of this is captured in my little phone cam, but here's something i'd never seen... they have these machines right when you hit the airport of flowers. they're in casinos, on the street, wherever. i guess it's not that weird, it's just a florist with no florist. but, the flowers rotate and the machine blinks. it's just a lot. something about it to me captures quite a bit of the false sentiment vegas has, and how something really organic still manages to be creepily material - hey, better grab these 93 dollar daisies for your call girl!

b. guess what was in my hotel? yep, that weirdass ceiling parade, you're right.... something else. yep, penn and teller too, good guess. but it's something else. don't know? you sure?
here's your answer, friend:
yeah, chippendales theatre. did you know that these were still around? i did, i guess, but only in theory. it was pretty surreal to walk downstairs to the lobby each morning and have these guys and their respective jocks in my face as i'm grabbing a smoothie. looks like they're grabbing THEIR smoothie in this pic. ha HA! still got it!

but there was something even better than having this theater in the building. seriously, there was. the answer to what that is? this wall on the outside of the theater. this wall, america, made me feel pure and unadulterated delight. to me, it is nothing if not a near-exact replica of the wall in the 1980 classic vehicle, Xanadu. please know this film. Xanadu was my favorite movie for probably 4 or 5 years of my life. i loved rollerskating, i loved ON-J, and i CERTAINLY loved the idea of skating high speed into a brick wall to hang out with some muses. you bet i did. the Rio Hotel recreated this knowingly. i have to believe it! chippendales, something i have about 1.2% interest in, then made me it's biggest fan. well done!

and speaking of the 80s - seriously, where's the coke party?