read the sign man… The dude needs food _ photo Royal Hopper

The Logic of being a Sinner in Sin City

by Royal Hopper 

A shirtless man holding a sign walks down a line of cars getting a dollar or two from some of them. He spots you to his left with your window down playing with the radio and the camera you sometimes bring with you to take photos of the neon jungle and saunters toward you.

He stands in the window as if expecting something and then says something to the effect of “ I want you to know I wouldn’t be doing this if I didn’t have a good reason. I wouldn’t be doing this if not for my Dad .and something about Prostate cancer.”

I suppose in retrospect I could have handled it better and said something like sorry dude I got nothing for you or suspended my usual Sin City cynicism and fished a buck out of my wallet for the dude.

But _ it had been a long week and I didn’t react well. I am as progressive as someone working the job I work in the city I do it in can be but as a rule I don’t allow strangers to stick their head in my window when I am driving home or anywhere else.

“Look _ “ I said putting on my best Vegas security guard voice err security officer voice I mean, I have no beef with you man,” my voice steady and firm from long practice, “but you need to get out my face.” I don’t remember if I cursed or not but the point was made.

A 7 foot tall can of beer graces the side of a busy highway near the Utah Nevada border Thursday _ Photo Royal Hopper

“You are a wonderful guy,” he said sarcastically as the light changed and I drove away. Honestly the sarcasm should have bothered me more _ but it didn’t. The City does not suffer suckers lightly and I don’t like to be played. I don’t like people up in my face demanding things I had to work for.

When you live in the city you get used to desperate, bold people but living here doest make you like them anymore. One of the reasons I heavily favor government or at least government managed health care is because I know some of the people who ask for it do need it and they should get it without having to beg
Yes it is an unfair burden on Sinners like me to determine who is and who isn’t in need but that isn’t the point. . . To live in the City of Sin you have a mental wall up at all times _ you have to have that Sin City edge or you look like prey to the denizens who abound here .

Its not tragedy or comedy ..

Just because the shot perfect _ photo Royal Hopper

It is life in the City of Sin baby

Take care Sinners including you shirtless panhandling dude _ even you

Daisy Lady moving on down the road _ Photo by Royal Hopper

A bird in a tree at a Utah National Park _ Photo by Royal Hopper …

a cloudy day in Utah. Sue me I like landscapes _ photo by Royal Hopper

The couple that wheels together _ Royal Hopper

Pool players and Fashionistas

By Royal Hopper 

A model, a fashion designer and a writer walk into a Vegas café and sit down by three pool players and hobo named Phil. It sounds like the beginning of a bad joke..but that really happened in the City of Sin this week.
In fact three things happened in the City of Sin last week. It rained. Hordes of style hungry fashionistas 50,000 strong (blows my mind too) traded in photo shoots and fashion shows for scalped tickets to the nations biggest showing of samples and designs. The City of Sin temporarily developed a real sense of style. (No I don’t believe it either but hey lets spin this the best we can huh.)

The sign says Hungry please help _ Royal Hopper

These fashion saavy drama queens competed with a horde of pool playing bar flies for drama and the right to show off in the City of Sin; and people talked as people will.

“My buddy got hustled by a prostitute,” went one piece of a conversation that abruptly got quiet as fellow tourists, passersby and native Sinners alike began to listen. It was a week of conventions and conversations in the City this week.

Try it sometime. Walk through a casino or just down “The Strip” when it’s busy and really listen to the pieces of conversation occurring around. You may be surprised at the blunt honesty of the content.

“There is a lot of this crap in Vegas..” went another
“I’m afraid of boots,” yet another Sinner said _ and no I didn’t ask.

For some reason when they come to the City of Sin people feel like they can tell complete strangers things they normally tell their friends after several free drinks.

“I just didn’t take the shot I didn’t follow through and drive it home,” said one plaintive Sinner who I presume was talking about making a difficult billiards shot.

The after shopping walk home _ Royal Hopper

Two cousins found each other in a City of Sin convention center after 30 years apart and stood in the lobby of a Sin City hotel catching up and waiting for the buzz of a day’s worth of cheap alcohol to wear off. They smiled and laughed and talked to strangers like old friends.

The City of Sin is the most human place in the USA. It is not nice or classy or filled with life lessons that will make you a better person anymore than any other place. It is what it is. Underneath the themed neon landscape, the blackjack tables and half naked burlesque is a cross section of human failing, human triumph and human nature. As I have often said this city does not create the demons that haunt us or the angels that lifts us up or anything else for that matter. That is not its nature. The demons and angels you have with you here are the ones you bring with you. It is a tough city that does not suffer fools lightly _ but The City of Sin is not a monster. It is us _ at our worst and best.
That is life in the City of Sin brother.
Take Care fellow Sinners.
Love you all

The actual joke goes something like _ A model, a fashion designer and a writer walk into a Vegas café and order a carrot, a vodka a bag of marijuana and a girl named Cherry Pie. I never did hear the punch line ..

Invisible Friends and aholes with cell phones

By Royal Hopper

You see them every day

Summer in the City of Sin _ Royal Hopper

in the city of sin. People who talk to invisible friends are every where. The man on the street talking to giant elephants named Henry or the invisible President of Venezuela who they are sure is there to take their magic beans or lucky playing cards. There are very respectable people who give names to slot machines and throw curses at them like a witch doctor.

We all look for Boogie men in everything we do. We try and make the things that vex us into some kind of powerful mysterious force of nature _ like the gambler who was caught unleashing a stream of curses at a slot machine and calling it by the name he had given it.

Everybody shops some time _ Royal Hopper

The demon Fredericka, as he dubbed the slot machine, was trying to take everything he had. It is not that he had a gambling problem and was spending his beer money on a machine designed to take his money. No, it is the machines fault. The machine is a demon. The flaw lies not in the monsters we create. It lies in us. It is just life in all its glorious imperfection.

It is kind of like the way people blame their cell phones for their being stupid self absorbed drama queens.
A man stands in the middle of the road eyes wide open one hand on his cell phone the other gesturing at the voice on the other end.

Then there are the aholes with cell phones

He looks right at the vehicle approaching him and leans in its direction as if the desire to see something down the road is more important than perhaps being hit by a 3 ton pick up truck.

walking in the city – Royal Hopper

Maybe he is a really dumb car jacker or someone attempting an insurance scam who has never tried crossing the street in the City of Sin or maybe he is just one of a growing Sin City class of annoying clueless pedestrians talking on their cell phones secure in their superhuman immunity as they cross into busy traffic in a city famous for being drunk, stoned crazy or just apathetic. Some of the walking Cell Phone Dead are definitely smooth operators so caught up in their schemes that they are clue less o the danger surrounding them.

Yet later in the week a man is screaming at someone on his cell phone so loud even the 260 pound body builder walking by cringed a little. The phone is dead. The person on the other end gave up talking some time ago _ but the angry man keeps screaming because _ I guess it seems right..

.. . . . . Later still a well dressed man stops in the middle of a cross walk so intent on continuing his conversation the cars sounding their horns as he blocks traffic do not phase him a bit.

Moonrise in the City of Sin early August – Royal Hopper

We all are who we are. Technology and culture just gives us the opportunity to realize who we are..
An ahole with a cell phone is still an ahole. Life in the City of Sin is still life in the City of Sin.

Love You Sinners
Take Care

This City is one big backyard garden _ Royal Hopper

Getting gas in the City of Sin _ Royal Hopper

Everybody has a meeting in the City of Sin

by Royal Hopper 

Buddha Pest rampaged across the City of Sin this week, and Amina Acid and 315 Zombies were right behind them as hometown denizens of Sin City the aptly named Sin City Roller Girls prowled the hallways and asphalt byways of the City of Sin. Roller Con made its annual journey through the city Elvis, Bugsy, Big Bird and company.

Where the hell did I put that thing –Royal Hopper

About this time of year in the city of Sin the streets and hotels fill with costumed characters, multi colored Mohawks and skates as the Roller Derby spent the week in its natural home The City of Sin.

In case you havent figured it out yet Las Vegas is the place people go to let their freak flags fly, to wear red Mohawks and leather kilts and dress like psychopathic Cupie Dolls strolling through a casino arm in arm and this was the week for that kind of stuff.

People come to the City of Sin for all kinds of reason but one of the most common reasons is to hold a meeting of some kind.

Driving past an intersection on Tropicana on the daily commute I spotted one of the not so secret unofficial underpass meeting places of the city’s denizens.

They could have been a group of sign holders waiting for rush hour to garner donations or a group of commuters who found a place to meet or buy grass or talk about their favorite soaps. Whatever the case this group of concrete loungers had gathered in the dead space between the apartment/commercial zones on Tropicana and the fast food shopping jungle of the suburbs. They were lounging in the shade on the concrete a few feet from Sin City commuters hurried to or from work or errands on a hot summer day.

Even in Vegas – Royal Hopper

Tough pony tail football jersey chick sat next to seen his better days weird hat guy and across from them sat back pack guy and random down on his luck guy waiting for his next shift at the Mini Mart so he can afford a cheap apartment guy.
The minutes of the meeting were held with high fives and fist bumps as the traffic light turned green and observers went on their way.

Miles away in the safer confines of a local casino a similar meeting takes place with similar archetypes. This time the meeting takes place at a local bar inside the casino.. Tough pony tail guy calls the meeting to order with a bad joke, seen his better day guy puffs up at the punch line making the starched creases on his 40 year old company blazer stand up as he bristles at the joke, weird hat guy gestures with his hat, random down on his luck guy borrows a $20 for the waitress and waiting for his next shift guy realizes he is on vacation.

Vegas Baby – Royal Hopper

Everywhere you look in the City of Sin someone is having a meeting. Some meetings decide the fate of millions of dollars, some the distribution of left over weed and a random $20. Whatever the case it is always life in the City of Sin.

Take Care Sinners