MattMaroon.com

There’s nothing more amazing than walking down the Las Vegas Strip when the town is relatively empty. At any normal time in any normal economy, you’re at least somewhat insulated from the sheer insanity by the throngs of drunken, middle class convention-goers who form a pasty white buffer between you and the madness. But the weekend before Thanksgiving at the outset of what may be the next Great Depression feels like that empty Times Square scene from Vanilla Sky but with hookers and margaritas, both measured by the yard.

Normally it’s fairly easy, if you stick to the middle of the sidewalk, to avoid the throng of Mexicans pushing their little prostitution advertisements at you. But when there’s almost nobody else in town it’s just you and them, mano y mano, and I get the feeling that they’re getting a little more aggressive for fear that if they don’t drum up some johns quickly they may not be employed next year. None of them have resorted to just shoving the hooker baseball cards into my pocket yet, but when it happens I won’t be surprised. If they do, I hope I get a rookie card. It might be worth something one day if she ends up getting busted in an airport bathroom with a Congressman. And I’m curious what sort of performance statistics they put on the back of those things.

On the way to my hotel, my friend Russ and I were walking by and one of them tried to sell us tickets to somewhere that had “naked men”. We were well-dressed (I had on an orange cable-knit sweater from Brooks Brothers and boot cut Banana Republic jeans) but really? I was a little offended (not to mention a little shocked that anyone of any gender or sexual orientation would want to see naked men) that someone would assume that any guy whose pants didn’t have a hole in them must want to see other guys with no pants on at all. I would say that my wedding ring should have prevented that, but this is 2008, or at least it was until November 4^th.

Apparently Treasure Island (now, out of a misguided sense of hipness, called TI) has gone adult-themed. When I first came out here, about a decade ago, the little pirate show that runs twice an hour was aimed at children, with pyrotechnics and cute little “yo ho ho and a bottle of rum” type songs. Now it’s full of half-naked women dancing to hip-hop. Maybe that’s what piracy is like nowadays, which would surely explain why so many Somalians are making it their occupation. If so, I do live pretty close to Lake Erie…

I also saw in passing a girl I once met (she, umm, “dated” someone I knew) working in a bar right on The Strip. I remember when I first met her she told me she worked in marketing at Imperial Palace, which is, by the way, trying to follow in Treasure Island’s scantily-clad footsteps and rebrand itself as IP. Unfortunately, when both your casino and your cocktail waitresses were made before World War II, no amount of abbreviation can make you cool.

When she said she worked in marketing I was just barely sober enough to hold back “really, because I would have guessed you for a stripper”. If you saw her, you’d understand. One glance and it was clear there that the only college diploma in her past was the one she probably regrets having done unspeakable things with at a frat party.

So today I found out that what she meant by “marketing” was that she pours margaritas behind a glass wall while wearing a shirt scientifically designed to look as if at any minute it might buckle under the weight of her surgically-enhanced cleavage. Only in Vegas could the job description for someone whose one and only requirement is a double D cup have the word “marketing” in it.

Regardless of the incredibly low occupancy rate Vegas is still Vegas, perhaps even more so than ever. You may be able to get a room during CES, which is any anomaly akin to being able to buy the latest Tickle Me Elmo in mid-December, but the buildings are still bigger and more expensive than anywhere. And as if to say “fuck you” to the millions of people struggling to pay their ballooning adjustable rate mortgage, they’re opening even better ones soon. While the rest of the world is worrying about layoffs and deflation, MGM is building a complex that costs five times more than GM.

As the town’s biggest fan, I can only hope les bon temps will keep roulering. Las Vegas is the American city, the one place I tell visitors from other countries they must see before they return to their soccer and public health care. For the most part, if you’ve seen one big city you’ve seen them all. Cracked concrete as far as the eye can see, weird smells you can never quite place but are sure they’re from some as yet undiscovered combination of bodily fluids, and clothing stores so expensive that the few people who can actually afford them are too smart to shop there. If it weren’t for the weather and the funny accents you probably couldn’t tell New York from Chicago or Los Angeles or London.

But Las Vegas is unique, totally unlike anything else you’ll ever see. It’s half good and half bad, but it’s one hundred percent American. It’s over the top in every way, and it could never be replicated because no other country has the proper blend of opulence and ignorance that, when mixed together and baked at about 120 degrees Fahrenheit in July, form this rich and gooey capitalistic cookie.

And that’s why I love this town, “marketing” jobs, Mexican pimps, and all.