Double Down

This was not Las Vegas. It was, but it most certainly wasn't. I'd just left a valet named Dan standing in the dark parking lot of a place on the corner of Paradise. He had my cell number and I had his. That night, he was going to get hooked up and my friends were going to get hooked up and it seemed like all was well.

I had a different kind of urge in Las Vegas. I didn't need what everybody else in Vegas was looking for: drugs, women, or a casino host monitoring my every bet. I needed to get out while staying in. I needed to see something different. For one night only, I had taken on the role of making sure everybody was having a good time. We were a silly group, bound to not get in trouble unless we tried.

"What do you know about the Double Down?" I had asked the valet.

Dan rolled his eyes. "People in all black. Loud."

His words were meant as discouragement. He really wanted to get on with calling his buddy in the stretch limo so they could start divvying up the kickbacks and making me think they were doing me a huge favor, when in fact, they were just passing a little of their deal on to me. Price of doing business.

"Perfect," I said and told him my friends would be back in an hour and half to make good on the little deal we'd just struck.

So, there I was, leading a dozen guys--only two of them already messy enough to begin qualifying us for any Dirty Dozen discounts--down a dark side street and toward a place called the Double Down Saloon. My friend Joe Speaker had recommended it to me. The dive called itself the anti-Vegas, and after spending two months in Sin City already this calendar year, I wanted anything that wasn't Vegas. What's more, I wanted to make sure my friends saw more than the lions at the MGM.

Even though my back was turned to all of them, I felt the group pull back as soon as the place came into view. It was small, barely lit, and looked like the type of place where a knife fight might actually be something you could order from the bartender. The first off-strip place we'd hit, we actually ran into Mr. T. In this place, I figured we stood a better chance of seeing George Peppard, despite his fatal 1994 pneumonia.

The Double Down was packed and about the size of a bathroom in a Strip Vegas hotel. A band played in the corner, loud and shredding enough to make me wish I'd remembered to pack Advil. I looked on the wall where signs advertised the Bacon Martini and Ass Juice. Two girls dressed in all black looked as us as we walked through the door.

"Who invited the frat party?"

I stopped short. "Frat party?" I looked back at the guys behind me. Sure, Marty, the bachelor, no longer had bright red punk hair. Sure, my hair has been cropped back from shoulder length to a manageable mess. But frat party? That was just insulting.

"We're the farthest thing from a frat party," was all I could really manage over the noise. I started pointing at my friends. "Doctor, D.A., Bar Owner..." When I realized I was making her case for her, I shut up and ordered four Bacon Martinis.

"What's in it?" I asked the bartender over the lead singer's scream.

The guy looked at me like I was his mother. "Bacon and vodka."

That's when a calm started to come over me. The chicks at the bar were rude. The bartender was rude. The guy at the front door had been rude. Not once since we had crossed the property line had someone offered me a timeshare brochure, a drink in a yard-long glass, or show tickets at a show in exchange for just a few minutes of my time. The bartender poured like he was drinking the mess himself and not like he learned by watching Tom Cruise in Cocktail.

The drinks came across the bar at me. I took a sip and felt my gorge rise. Perfectly disgusting.

I handed my drink to my brother and said, "Make sure somebody else drinks that." I walked over to the corner of the room. There was no stage, save a small riser for a drum kit to rest. Four natty old couches made the boundary for the musicians to play. I collapsed on one with a cold beer in my hand and watched the next band set up.

For the next hour or so, I watched three guys in neckties rock out. I learned later they were the members of SKORCHAMENZA, a band that's been tearing up Vegas for the past several years. I left a little while later with a good memory and three pictures on my cell phone.


The men's room of the Double Down Saloon


Justin Vega, SKORCHAMENZA guitarist


SKORCHAMENZA drum kit, pre-show

Las Vegas is one of those odd places on earth where everything looks different, but everything is pretty much the same. The city itself is much different than most places in the world, but after you're there for a while, it's almost impossible to find anything that will make you say, "Heh, how about that? That's something different."

The Double Down Saloon was one of those rare places. Sure, I was just a tourist there for a couple of hours. I stayed just long enough to enjoy it, but not long enough to make the locals start worrying we were going to ruin their joint--a brief diversion accented by loud music, bad booze, and a staff that didn't give a damn whether I was there.

I never tried the Ass Juice.

Maybe that will be an adventure for another day.

The Devil and Mr. Otis

The first time I saw him, we were outside the the elevators on the 26th floor of the Masquerade Tower of the Rio All-Suite Hotel and Casino. He wore a long, black, leather coat--the length intriguing because it was longer than a sport jacket but not as long as an overcoat. His hair was jet black and held a slight curl. His eyes, though, were the first things to really hold my attention. Within seconds of standing next to him and waiting for the elevator's familiar ding, I knew he would never blink in my presence. Further, I knew he wasn't looking at me. He was looking in me.

I remember the slightest of chills. The guy was probably in his mid-20s, but his eyes said he was a thousand years old. When we got on the elevator together, he stole a brief glance at my Nikon.

"You getting some good pictures?" he asked.

Those were the first words the Devil ever said to me.

***

I don't--or perhaps I should say didn't--believe in the Devil any more than I believe in there being a capital "G" God that runs the show. Even though I felt uncomfortable with the guy while we rode down the 26 floors to the casino, I didn't ever actually think he was the Devil. However, I thought it might make for a fun story later. I watched the Devil walk away slowly as slot machines clattered and the Rio's brimstone stunk up the joint with smoke, booze, and food.

I didn't think much about it until the next day when I started to get on the elevator and found the Devil was already there. He smiled with a row of too-white teeth and still unblinking eyes. This time he didn't say anything.

Over the course of the next week, the guy was everywhere I went. One day, he showed up at a poker tournament. I spotted the back of his head from across the room. Even though he was wearing a suit, I knew it was him. His mane of pitch-hair was hard to miss. By now, I'd grown a little wary of the guy. My little joke about the Devil had grown unto a genuine discomfort with his presence. I wanted to take a picture of him, but every time I started to aim the lens in his direction, he looked up and--again--in me. I've never been afraid to snap the shutter on a camera before. This time, I didn't. It was if I couldn't will myself to have a digital record of the Devil. By the end of the week, I avoided the guy at every turn. If I saw him walking in the hallway, I turned around or ducked into another room.

Now, keep in mind, if I were joking here, it wouldn't be the funny. If I were speaking metaphorically, it would be more than a little trite. The fact that I'm serious makes it more than a little weird.

After a few drinks one night, I ran into the guy in the hallway and couldn't avoid him. He didn't seem startled at all when I walked up and stood directly in front of him.

"Who are you?" I demanded. If I hadn't had three beers in my stomach I would never have had the courage.

The guy spit out a name and said he was from Austin. For some reason, I replied in kind.

"What do you do?" I demanded again.

His omnipresent smile grew a little wider.

"What do I do?" He still never blinked. "I guess you could say I'm a jack of all trades."

Jack of all trades? I took a step back. I was now sure the guy from Austin was either a drug dealer or, in fact, the Devil himself.

He never looked away from me, never blinked, and never stopped smiling. The rest of the conversation is lost in a wash of near-real fear. So, at the end of the conversation, when the guy asked me what I where I was headed, I further narrowed my read on the guy. He was either was a drug dealer or the Devil. Moreover, he either wanted my ass or he wanted my soul.

The Devil scared the fuck out of me and I never spoke to him again.

***

Lest you think I'm making this up, there are several people I told about this as it happened. They started spotting the guy for me and warning me about his presence.

During one of my last night's in Vegas, I was looking for a back way out of a convention hall. I saw a door and headed toward it. It was very late at night and I thought I saw someone sleeping. I turned around and my friend Gene was standing there.

"There he is," he said, nodding behind me.

I turned back around, and there was the Devil. I shuddered and found another door as fast as I could.

For the rest of the night, I hid. A joke and story subject--a mere character in my little one-act life show--had become an irrational source of fear. By the end of it, I was actually afraid to be alone with the guy.

The Devil knew my name. The Devil knew my patterns. The Devil knew where I was.

The Devil knew Otis. And now Otis had seen the Devil.

***

I'm home now and haven't left the confines of my house for the past 36 hours. Apart from taking my kid to get a haircut and maybe getting one for myself, I don't see myself leaving for a while. I know I am safe here.

I'm not saying my run-in with the Devil made me fear hell. I'm just saying that I think I've spoken with its fearless leader, I'm an easy mark for the son of a bitch, and I don't need to be pushing my luck.

Sick Boy

(Las Vegas, NV) She's an Asian woman who doesn't speak a ton of English, but I imagine her conversation in the housekeeping room of my floor goes like this.

Housekeeper #1: The boy in 012, he sick boy. He have problem.
Housekeeper #2: It's Vegas, everybody has problems.
Housekeeper #1: No, he sick boy! He masturbates! He cokehead! All day long!

I couldn't blame her for making the assumption that I'm a chronic masturbator and hooked on coke. On days when I can't clean up my room before I run out to work, I leave behind at least one empty bottle of lotion and a Kleenex that may or may not contain evidence of a nosebleed. There are days I should just keep the "Do Not Disturb" sign on the door.

The simple fact is, the evidence is confusing. I'm too tired to pleasure myself, and I don't use cocaine (the one thing I don't need in my life is another addiction). In truth, no matter how much water I drink, I can't stay hydrated. No matter if I drink no booze for 48 hours, I can't stay hydrated. The result is lizard-like skin and frequent nosebleeds. Nothing I can do.

This is not for a great effort to remain healthy in an environment that caters to being as unhealthy as possible. I'm even betting on how healthy I can be.

The main source of food during the 16-hour workdays here is something they call The Poker Kitchen. Cold food involves wraps and salads. Hot food ranges from burgers to stromboli. Last year, I pretty much ate one piece of over-cooked pizza a day. This year, my first day on the ground, I accepted a bet from Pauly that I couldn't last the full seven weeks without eating a slice. To this moment, I'm good. However, this is the first day I have been tempted.

I'm $30 to the good in what Pauly calls "Throwing Things" prop bets, in which one or the other of us tosses something (water bottles, matchbooks, a Milwaukee's Best show girl) into a container. Also so far this year, I have accepted no prop bets that require me eating or drinking anything. Last year, I made hundreds of dollars on those (note: crayons are easier than daiquiris and crackers).

In a dream world, I could set up a staged scenario in which the housekeeper walks in on me, Pauly, and six of our friends from South America. The room would be a snowstorm of cocaine and an oil slick of Jergens.

My first question to the maid would be, "Would you eat two Keno crayons for $400?"

"You sick boy! Sick boy!"'