Some Random Observations

Anyone who hangs around me long enough is eventually going to hear a frequent observation about Las Vegas.  "Half this town is out to cheat the other half of town!"  I've been saying that at work and I've said it often enough that some of my co-workers are saying it too. 

I have one big problem with that observation:  no one's been able to prove me wrong.

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It isn't the casinos who are out to cheat you here. They don't need to.  The mathematics are on their side.

Yet there is no shortage of visitors who all believe that they have this "system", that they are somehow going to pull a fast one on the casinos and walk away with enough to buy a Ferrari or Maserati.

When they find themselves taken to the cleaners, they might accuse the casinos of being in that half of town that cheats, but they're wrong.

It's the time-share salesmen who hang around in casinos who are doing the cheating.  And mechanics, dentists, entertainment brokers, and half of the rest of town.  (I do know one honest mechanic here; I should mention him sometime).

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There seems to be an established process here for how a lot of the restaurants work:  no matter how busy the place is, or how many people are waiting in line, there is only one cook. 

If you're in a family of four and all of you order the same thing on the menu, the cook will simply prepare the meals one at a time.  For example, let's say that all four family members order hamburger and fries.

First the cook cooks one hamburger.  Then, he fries up one, and only one batch of French fries.  The waitress then carries it out to the family.  Then the cook cooks the second hamburger.  Like with the first, he will not simultaneously cook the fries with the burger.  He just won't do it.  Likewise with the third and fourth orders.  All items have to be cooked one at a time. 

Will it ever occur to the cook to cook all four orders at once?

I don't think so.

I've just never seen it done that way here.  I'm wondering if there's a Clark County ordinance forbidding that practice.

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There are also a lot of panhandlers here, and as of late they are getting aggressive.  I was meeting a local friend for breakfast Downtown a couple of Saturdays ago, and we went inside the Mermaids casino for a bit.

A panhandler actually came inside the casino to hit me up for money.

Downtown panhandling became such a problem that the City of Las Vegas cracked down in mid 2014.  The panhandlers could hold up a cardboard sign, but they could not vocally ask you for money.  On my last few visits, some of them started testing the boundaries.  And now they're coming inside the casinos to ask you for money.

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I had thought for a few days that my next blog entry was going to be about The Donald and the noise he's been making in his campaign for the Presidency.  He's saying a lot of things that resonate with a lot of people, and the Establishment Republicans are terrified of him.  I personally find Establishment Republicans to be vile and disgusting, and if they're upset about Donald Trump then that's a good thing.

But I don't know what to make of The Donald.  Is he for real?  Where was he on illegal immigration ten years ago?  I don't remember him beating that drum back then. 

Sure, I'd rather have him than Hillary "What Difference Does it Make?" Clinton, or former Maryland Governor Martin "Give Me Your Guns" O'Malley........not to mention Elizabeth "I Have High Cheekbones" Warren of Massachusetts. 

But my feeling is that I really don't know who he is.

 

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That's going to be it.