Barry Manilow ’08 – 1st Day After – Coming Down From The Euphoria…

Well, we finally managed to see a major superstar named Barry. It’s not every day of the week you can say something like that. Now, we have to get past this empty feeling that has overcome us. Empty until tonight, when we have two more shows, back-to-back!!

Yee-Haw!!!

Last night, we took the night off. We opted to roam the strip, and see hotels that we have never been into before, plus revisited a few we haven’t seen in years. We are calling this our “Retro-Vegas” tour, After staying at New York New York for the past (many, many) years, we decided to stay closer to where all our shows were being held, thus our first-ever check-in at TI, formerly Treasure Island. Not so long ago, Treasure Island held raucous pirate fights in a lagoon outside the front of the hotel. Now, as TI, voluptuous women called The Sirens pillow-fight in their underwear, while being sprayed with water.

Ha-Ha!! Just kidding. But something very much like that really is the new nightly show. Vegas has shucked the “family-friendly” philosophy the city adopted a few years back, and now shamelessly panders to the young moneyed crowd, hunting for celebrity viewings. Thank God Mrs. That Dan Guy and I are beyond that sort of shallow ego-gratification. You won’t ever catch us waiting more that a couple of hours to see if the star of Spamalot perhaps hits the piano bar at The Wynn to knock back a few vodka tonics. Three hours tops…

So, Retro-Vegas took us yesterday for a stroll through some of the last-remaining miniature casinos: Slots Of Fun, Circus Circus, The Riviera, and The Sahara. We haven’t been into most of those charming little institutions since the first few years we used to stay more centrally located, in the middle of the Strip. We also hiked over to The Stratosphere, where I attempted with little to no success to convince MTDG to try one of the attractions on the top of this towering tower. I’d have had an easier time convincing a steer with a broken leg to hop up on a BBQ. She had none of it.

So, we are moving slowly today, to conserve energy so as to get through our two big shows. More on all that tomorrow…

Chow for now!