Las Vegas

Here are a few photos from my very short trip to Las Vegas.
These include a night shot of the Strip from one of the pedestrian bridges:

Shops near Las Vegas Boulevard:

The inside of the Luxor:

And the Hoover Dam:

Photos: Sway Sovay

The Strip

I am headed for Vegas, baby!

...Even though Vegas is so not my thing...

I have a friend whose band has progressed to the third round of the Bodog Battle of the Bands, which means they get to perform in Las Vegas next weekend, so I will be going to cheer them on and experience a little bit of Vegas for the first time.

Honestly, I'm not that excited about Vegas itself as much as I'm excited about relaxing in a nice hotel for a weekend. That, and I mean, really, who doesn't love all those fluorescent lights from a distance? At any rate, it will be a change of pace, and since the last few months have been wing-dingers, I could so use a mini-break.

I'll be at the Luxor, the hotel/casino that looks like a pyramid. Kind of hard to miss...

I will post some of my photos after this weekend!

Photo: Mike Sparr

So This Is The New Year

I keep hearing that Death Cab for Cutie song playing in the background of my mind...

I appreciate January 1st for this reason: Even if I've neglected to seek some serious perspective on every other day of the year, at least on this day, on this first day of the new year, something forces me to lift my head and acknowledge all that I have or haven't made of my life in the past twelve months.

I can say without a single doubt that 2007 takes the place as my most difficult year to date. But you know, I wouldn't change a thing. Because even though it was a grueling ride, there was a lot of sweetness along the way, too. And I understand that the wonderful moments have to be fleeting, because if they weren't, they wouldn't mean as much, would they?

This is me, loving and appreciating all of life's rises and falls. Lovers come and go, parents and friends die, babies are born, jobs end and begin again, money ebbs and flows, and that's what it's all about. So goodbye, 2007, and hello, 2008. I hope that I'm still here on January 1, 2009, and that I'm happy and healthy, and that I'm even more in love with life than I am right now, at the very moment that I write this.

Times Square New Year's Ball
Photo: Ian Hardy

Changes

It's odd how a single day can change the rest of your life.

Just One More Thing The Airlines Have All Wrong

Okay, I just have to ask. What is up with flight attendant attire?

Do the airlines want these people to be dressed to actually help me in a crisis? Because see, personally, I feel like their uniforms adhere poorly to the "form follows function" rule or even any variation thereof which is strictly specific to clothing.

I just don't believe it makes much sense for female flight attendants to wear high heels. I mean, I know the airlines are running a business here, and so they want all the employees -- flight attendants included -- to be dressed very professionally. But you know, there's something about the uniforms that doesn't really add up. High heels just seem like they would be the most incapable article of clothing for any serious flight-related emergency. Wouldn't you agree?

Then again, I suppose one does have to admit that, were there an actual, serious emergency while a plane were in the air, it really wouldn't matter what the hell anyone was wearing.

What Did You See Today?

Today I am remembering a vacation I took to San Diego this past spring. My parents, my sister and I spent an evening on Coronado Beach. And it was still a little too chilly to get into the water, but we had a fine time just watching the waves come in. My mother remarked that she loved the ocean so much because it was a thing that never looks the same way twice. It's always different, she said. Always evolving.

I agree with her. The ocean does change continually, and it certainly never looks the same way twice. But personally, I feel the same could be said for any other thing in this world.

I want to view the world with a new pair of eyes each and every day. I don't want to assume I already know all there is to know about a blade of grass, or a particular building, or a mountain, or a person. I want every thing to always look at least a little different to me, day after day. I want to continually find things I hadn't noticed before. I don't want to say, "Oh, that's a tree," and then go on with my life, satisfied that I'm sure I already know what a tree looks like. I want to know what is different about that tree. I want to make new perceptions each time I see something.

I guess it all comes down to the element of surprise. I never want to stop being curious and learning about what's out there in the great wide world. I never want to stop making sweet little discoveries.


Photo: Sway Sovay

That Was A Good One

A linguistics professor was lecturing to his English class.

"In English," he said, "a double negative forms a positive. But in some languages, such as Russian, a double negative is still a negative. However, there is no language wherein a double positive can form a negative."

A voice from the back of the room piped up. "Yeah, right."

Brewing

Some days I'm almost positive that I need to form some sort of addictive habit.

Cigarettes are probably the go-to addiction of choice, but I've just never been the smoking type. (Wait. Is there a smoking type? See, I don't even know.)

There's gambling -- but you know, I really don't have that kind of money to be screwing around with.

There's theft, but the law isn't really something I want to screw around with either.

Drugs, but I'm not that kind of girl.

Proclivities of a carnal nature, but I'm not really that kind of a girl either.

And then there's always alcohol, but aside from the whole wealth of problems associated with alcoholism which I don't really want to risk, I live alone -- so if I drank myself into a coma no one would find me for days.

I guess coffee will just have to do.

I bring this up because it seems to me like time always passes so much quicker for people with a compulsive method for passing the time. And while I would never genuinely wish the days of my life away, sometimes I would seriously love for life to move a little faster toward a time when I have a better foothold on everything.

I feel restless. Like I'm either not where I'm supposed to be at this point in my life, or like I'm waiting for something that hasn't arrived yet, but definitely will, someday. This is kind of a dissatisfied feeling. And the strange thing is that I have a great life, and I shouldn't have any reason to feel dissatisfied. I mean, sure my life isn't as perfect as what I see when I close my eyes, but whose ever is? Certainly there's nothing for me to be unhappy about.

Right?

Man, I just can't shake the feeling, and it's driving me crazy. I'm waiting on something, but I have no idea what it is or how to speed it up. Or I'm lacking something, but it's not something little, it's something huge and I'm just too stupid to recognize what it is.

Maybe this is what a quarter-life crisis feels like.

Growing Up Is Hard To Do

I don't think people should go straight from being teenagers to being adults. I just don't think it's fair to gloss over those in between years -- between when people begin telling you that you're an adult and when you realize you've actually become one.

I think we should have teenagers, then in betweeners and then adults. I can't speak for everyone in my age category -- and probably not everyone my age feels like this -- but it seems like there's a group missing from the titled phases of aging.

I know I'm not a teenager any longer, but I don't feel like I'm a full blown adult yet either. I guess, on paper, I am. But I always believed that becoming a true "adult" was supposed to be accompanied by the feeling that you could adequately take care of yourself and whoever else came along. And see, I don't feel like that. At least not yet, anyway.

There are just so many things that a person in his or her twenties has to get straightened out. It's like... when you're born, you know nothing about the world you land in, and you have to start from scratch and pick up everything as you go. Well, I feel like that's happening all over again. Like after college I got dropped into a new world again, and I'm learning everything as I go.

There is a lot that you don't have to concern yourself with when you're a child. Or even when you're in high school or college. You may choose to, but you're not really forced to until later. And then you start seeing everything from a totally different perspective. Going to the dentist isn't just going to the dentist any more, it's scheduling and working out insurance. Dinner isn't food any more, it's grocery shopping and budgeting and deciding whether you want to pay with cash or a card. And sometimes, people aren't just people any more, they are their ages, and what they do, and whether or not they're married, and where they went to school.

What makes a person an adult? A greater will to deal with responsibility? Knowing how to take care of oneself and others? Understanding more about the social and public systems? Doing things you don't want to do just because you know you have to now?

I think this is one of the hardest phases in life. People this age are granted access to practically everything, but it can be hard to get a firm grip on all of it. Jobs, relationships, housing, family, money, life in general, and even ourselves. Persons who are much younger or much older look at people in my age group and are supposed to think, "They are in the prime of their youth and should be having the time of their lives." And sometimes, that's probably true. But I also feel like a lot of the older population forgets what it's like to be right here, right now, in this stage of life where you aren't sure about much, where you don't always know who you are or what you're doing, where your life is going, or even where you want your life to go.

Despite everything about the way me and my life looks on paper, I think I'm still an in betweener.

On Productivity And The Opposite Thereof

Wait, is that dust on my window? A couple of bugs?



Spiderman and a sidekick?



Are Alain Robert and a friend in town?



Nope! It's the ever impressive acrobatic window washers of the Phoenix metropolitan area.

Man, I love window washing day. I just never get a lot done.

Photos: Sway Sovay