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Another Rammstein Vegas highlight: This isn't going to make sense to people who don't live in food deserts, but the More buffet at the Luxor was nirvana. I'm hardly a foodie; I don't eat goat testicles in gruyere, and tofu smells like rancid gopher pit, but what I enjoy, I enjoy immensely, and since my move to Endstage Mayberry, my food choices have been drastically reduced. Roomie is afraid to cook anything more complex than taco meat, and so my food options are limited to Hot Pockets and whatever the local restaurants can provide. For those unfamiliar with the palate of the locals, the menus of the restaurants here go something like this: Fried chicken, mashed potatoes, overcooked green beans, wilted salad, fried chicken, corn, fried chicken, and chicken-fried-chicken smothered in sawmill gravy.
No, I didn't mistype that. There is such a thing as chicken-fried chicken. As far as I can tell, it's twice-fried chicken smothered in sawmill gravy, and it's delicious. If I could, I would swim in sawmill gravy and condition my hair with it. Chicken-fried-chicken, is, however, monstrously unhealthy, even if it does taste like sex when served with sweet tea and fried dill pickle chips. I can feel my arteries clogging with every bite, and I shudder to think of my cholesterol levels after two years on this diet.
So, when I got to the Luxor and realized that I could have fish and meat and salads with fresh greens and vegetables and fruit and soup that didn't taste like the can, I went a little berserk. The first night, I ate two kinds of fish, some ham, a salad, a bowl of chili, two kinds of cheesecake, and three bowls of clam chowder. I can only imagine what CC thought as I sat there, wolfing down plate after plate and bowl after bowl. I can only apologize and offer that I was desperately trying to eat my way out of a long-standing nutritional deficit. I ate so much that first night that my stomach felt leaden for the rest of that evening into the next morning. And the next morning, I ate more.
That I ate at all the day of the concert was solely because of CC. Had she not been with us, I would not have eaten anything until after the concert, when my digestive system could no longer sabotage my efforts by needing to empty the ballast just as Rammstein took the stage. When we went to MSG, the only thing we had to eat the day of the show was a doughnut, and I only ate that because I hadn't eaten anything since a slice of pizza twenty-four hours before and didn't want to go facedown on the concourse from a sugar crash. But CC, unencumbered by a balky digestive system, needed sustenance. and so we ate at the buffet again.
And my digestive system did attempt to betray me. Shortly after Combichrist left the stage, this conversation between my body and me ensued.
B: Uh, we need to go to the bathroom now.
M: No.
B: We need to go right now.~rumble~
M: I don't care. Rammstein is about to take the stage.
B: You went to the buffet, and you haven't gone in two days. You need to go.~cramp~
M: I don't care. I didn't drive 2,300 miles and spend five nights in crappy Motel 6s, fighting off spiders and peeing in truck stop bathrooms while some dyspeptic trucker conducted a vociferous bum opera in the adjoining stall, just to miss half the show because I have to poop.
The argument raged on until the beginning of "Fruhling", when mind triumphed over matter and the need receded. Yet another laurel to lay at Rammstein's mighty feet. Not only do they inspire timid disabled folks to push the boundaries of what they thought they could do and expand their formerly suffocating horizons, but they grant them glutes of steel. Bless you, gentlemen.
Another Rammstein Vegas lowlight: It snowed in Flagstaff. In May. When it's supposed to be hot, or at least warm. It had been warm the previous few days, when we were traveling through New Mexico and eastern Arizona. Windy, but warm, and the skies had been gorgeous and clear, with horizons that stretched forever. The second we rolled into Flagstaff, we saw a digital sign that read, "Winter conditions ahead." We were mystified, and then, it began to sleet, and as soon as the sleet plicked on the windshield, it turned into icy snow. It was bizarre and magical to see snow in Arizona in May, and I laughed in wonder. Roomie got panicky and tried to stop for the night at a Motel 6, but because they were within driving distance of the Grand Canyon, they were sold out, and so he grudgingly pressed on to Kingman, where we spent two days before the final push into Vegas.
There'll be one more post about my Vegas trip to tie up loose ends and recount a few miscellaneous anecdotes, and that will be that. If you have Roomie friended on Facebook, there are numerous pictures from the trip, including the Strip, the Luxor interior, a Texas sunset, the New Mexico landscape, and the ridiculously small toilet we were forced to use at a Super 8 in Vernon, Texas. I took most of the landscape shots from the car, and Roomie took the Vegas shots. If there is any interest, I can get the pictures from him and post a few here.
No, I didn't mistype that. There is such a thing as chicken-fried chicken. As far as I can tell, it's twice-fried chicken smothered in sawmill gravy, and it's delicious. If I could, I would swim in sawmill gravy and condition my hair with it. Chicken-fried-chicken, is, however, monstrously unhealthy, even if it does taste like sex when served with sweet tea and fried dill pickle chips. I can feel my arteries clogging with every bite, and I shudder to think of my cholesterol levels after two years on this diet.
So, when I got to the Luxor and realized that I could have fish and meat and salads with fresh greens and vegetables and fruit and soup that didn't taste like the can, I went a little berserk. The first night, I ate two kinds of fish, some ham, a salad, a bowl of chili, two kinds of cheesecake, and three bowls of clam chowder. I can only imagine what CC thought as I sat there, wolfing down plate after plate and bowl after bowl. I can only apologize and offer that I was desperately trying to eat my way out of a long-standing nutritional deficit. I ate so much that first night that my stomach felt leaden for the rest of that evening into the next morning. And the next morning, I ate more.
That I ate at all the day of the concert was solely because of CC. Had she not been with us, I would not have eaten anything until after the concert, when my digestive system could no longer sabotage my efforts by needing to empty the ballast just as Rammstein took the stage. When we went to MSG, the only thing we had to eat the day of the show was a doughnut, and I only ate that because I hadn't eaten anything since a slice of pizza twenty-four hours before and didn't want to go facedown on the concourse from a sugar crash. But CC, unencumbered by a balky digestive system, needed sustenance. and so we ate at the buffet again.
And my digestive system did attempt to betray me. Shortly after Combichrist left the stage, this conversation between my body and me ensued.
B: Uh, we need to go to the bathroom now.
M: No.
B: We need to go right now.~rumble~
M: I don't care. Rammstein is about to take the stage.
B: You went to the buffet, and you haven't gone in two days. You need to go.~cramp~
M: I don't care. I didn't drive 2,300 miles and spend five nights in crappy Motel 6s, fighting off spiders and peeing in truck stop bathrooms while some dyspeptic trucker conducted a vociferous bum opera in the adjoining stall, just to miss half the show because I have to poop.
The argument raged on until the beginning of "Fruhling", when mind triumphed over matter and the need receded. Yet another laurel to lay at Rammstein's mighty feet. Not only do they inspire timid disabled folks to push the boundaries of what they thought they could do and expand their formerly suffocating horizons, but they grant them glutes of steel. Bless you, gentlemen.
Another Rammstein Vegas lowlight: It snowed in Flagstaff. In May. When it's supposed to be hot, or at least warm. It had been warm the previous few days, when we were traveling through New Mexico and eastern Arizona. Windy, but warm, and the skies had been gorgeous and clear, with horizons that stretched forever. The second we rolled into Flagstaff, we saw a digital sign that read, "Winter conditions ahead." We were mystified, and then, it began to sleet, and as soon as the sleet plicked on the windshield, it turned into icy snow. It was bizarre and magical to see snow in Arizona in May, and I laughed in wonder. Roomie got panicky and tried to stop for the night at a Motel 6, but because they were within driving distance of the Grand Canyon, they were sold out, and so he grudgingly pressed on to Kingman, where we spent two days before the final push into Vegas.
There'll be one more post about my Vegas trip to tie up loose ends and recount a few miscellaneous anecdotes, and that will be that. If you have Roomie friended on Facebook, there are numerous pictures from the trip, including the Strip, the Luxor interior, a Texas sunset, the New Mexico landscape, and the ridiculously small toilet we were forced to use at a Super 8 in Vernon, Texas. I took most of the landscape shots from the car, and Roomie took the Vegas shots. If there is any interest, I can get the pictures from him and post a few here.
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