Guys Weekend

Another weekend, another 72 hours with little sleep. This weekend was the “annual trip” for some friends of mine that have made the third weekend in November their “guys” weekend in Las Vegas. It’s a weekend of poker, football, comedy and lucky me, I get to be an honorary “guy” while they are here. It’s not so bad, really. I ditch them a lot to go do my own thing and they end up spending half the night in strip clubs.

So Friday night most of the group had tickets to go see Spamalot. I wasn’t really interested in seeing it, so I decided to skip it. One of the guys was flying in late on Friday, so I picked him up from the airport and took him to dinner at Firefly. Matt is someone I have known since high school. We only went out once and it was nice, but no spark. Actually, he was really interested in my sister. I don’t think there was much of a spark there either. Anyway, he’s married with 2 kids and I hadn’t seen him in a couple of years, so we had plenty to catch up on during dinner.

We left and met up with the rest of the group for drinks at the MGM Grand. It was good to see everyone again. I believe the original concept of the weekend sprung from the OSU-Michigan game that also takes place on this particular weekend each year. Most of the group is made up of Buckeye fans, but there is one lone Michigan fan in the mix. Poor Mark. He gets pretty abused during these weekends, but he seems to take it all in stride. Anyway, the guys decided to head out for some decidedly male entertainment, and I decided to go home. Tomorrow was game day and unfortunately for those of us on the west coast, that meant a 9 am start time.

The next morning I headed back to strip to the ESPN zone. This was where we watched the game last year. It was so incredibly crowded last year that the guys had decided to get there early and stand in line so we could at least have a table and chairs this year. I think one thing that we forgot was that last year’s game was played later in the day. This year, the crowd was still a good one, but it wasn’t nearly as bad as last year since it was so early in the morning. And thank goodness we had chairs, because I think my boys had maybe an hour’s worth of sleep. It seemed wrong to be drinking that early in the day, but I had already had a cup of coffee on the way there, so I felt ok. I had one bloody mary and then after we ate I had a cocktail. Still, I wasn’t ready to start drinking for real and luckily neither were the boys.

Once the game ended (OSU won), we decided to go our separate ways again and meet up for dinner. I promptly went home and back to bed for a couple of hours. Saturday night was really where our plans went in different directions. The Comedy Festival was in town this weekend and the guys were going to try and get tickets to see Eddie Izzard. I was so upset when I learned he was going to be here and that I wouldn’t get to see him. I bought concert tickets months ago for Billy Joel who was performing the same night. I need to remember to check the list of comedians for next year before I buy any concert tickets for this weekend. Last year I saw Barbra Streisand, this year was Billy Joel. Honestly, how can I not take advantage of seeing the big names when they come here? Why do they keep picking this weekend to show up?

I ditched the guys for dinner since they decided to meet kind of late and I didn’t think I would make it to the concert on time. The concert was great. Billy was pretty funny. After the first song (which I didn’t recognize), he introduced himself as Billy’s dad and said Billy couldn’t make it. He was rubbing his bald head as he was saying this. It was cute. In reference to his shiny dome he said “Remember, it’s not about having less hair, it's about getting more head.” Nice.

He sang a lot of his more popular songs and he also threw in more obscure ones too. After a song called “Vienna” he said “What? You thought this was going to be a greatest hits show? If you want that, you should go see the Red Piano.” It was funny because that’s what Elton John’s show is called. Remember when the two of them toured together? I never saw the show, but I always thought that would have been a great one to see.

The show was great and he kept things interesting. Periodically, we would break into Elvis impressions. He was quite good, actually. There was also a strange part of the show where he introduced one of the guitar roadies and had him come up to sing. It was weird. This guy who he called “Chainsaw” came up on stage and sang “Highway to Hell” while Billy played guitar in the background. Again, it was a fine cover of the song, but how weird is it to be at a Billy Joel concert singing Highway to Hell? And, I must admit, I never knew Billy could play something other than the piano.

After the show I checked in with the guys and learned they had been able to get tickets to see Eddie Izzard, so I was on my own again. I went home and went to bed. On Sunday, I was glued to my couch watching Food Network all day. It’s been nothing but Thanksgiving specials for a couple of days now. I finally pried myself off the couch long enough to test my pumpkin bread recipe. It turned out fantastic if I do say so myself. I am spending Thanksgiving with friends this year, and I wanted to bring something to dinner. Looks like I found it. I love baking!

Some of guys left that day, so there were only a couple left. I decided to once again haul myself to the strip to meet them for dinner. They had been playing in a poker tournament all day and they actually didn’t finish until around 8 pm. They were at the Venetian, which you know I love, so I occupied myself while they finished playing. Turns out my friend Jeff won the tournament. And, since first place was $4k, he decided to treat us to dinner. Who was I to refuse? Especially since he wanted to go to N9NE steakhouse at the Palms. So off we went to dinner. It was amazing. Both the food and the bill.

After dinner, I dropped them back off at their hotel and made my way home again. I’m tired, but luckily it’s a short week. This weekend is yet another concert, but at least this one is free. I get to see The Fixx this weekend and I am so excited. I tried to see them here in August and the concert was cancelled. I’m glad they are coming back!