bud light unloading

Beer delivery at a Sin City corner store _ Royal Hopper

Rainy Days Mondays and an Even Exchange

By Royal Hopper
You see a “discarded” human being walking down a Sin City back street
looking over his shoulder at the darkening sky and droplets of water already falling from it in the distance.
He frowns at the rain clouds and sneers in disgust at the wind as it suddenly picks up blowing odd pieces of paper _ portions of ads for fully nude dancers, paper menus for pizza take out, half price show tickets for shows long since departed the sandy concrete confines of Sin City for cooler places like Canada and pieces of unread newspaper _ into his weather worn face.

lady with u,brella

A rainy day in the desert _ Royal Hopper

Tugging at his collection of warm weather clothing he sighs and walks over to a corner and moves an abandoned construction container and reveals a
pile of discarded “stuff” in a pile behind it.
The man (lets call him old street looking dude) calmly walks up to the pile and examines its contents. He strips down to his gym shorts taking of his slim weather worn T shirt and dirty well worn golf shorts and broad brimmed baseball hat off as he and sifts through the pile of stuff with a practiced eye long used to spotting useful items in piles of discarded junk.

He eventually dons an archaic jogging outfit and a water resistant jacket testing his new clothes for comfort as he squints and looks into the gathering wind measuring the coming rain storm against his own resolve and the clothing he has just acquired.

working man

A Sin City Working man _ Royal Hopper

He looks at the pile as if pondering something perhaps measuring his contribution to the pile against what he has taken from it. He walks over to a nearby shopping basket pulls something out of it and deposits it in the pile. With a satisfied smile he then pushes the container sideways to once more cover the cache and conceal it from well meaning eyes. The new clothes are at least clean and with them he looks almost respectable. Looks can be deceiving.

As you might have guessed the weather has been weird here in the desert _this past week one moment cool and spring like and the next hot and dry ..you know like the desert.
You always remember the days it rains in the desert. You don’t always remember what happens on those days but you always remember the rain. The rain brings false mystery and a necessity that is sometimes lacking here but it doesn’t change anything.

man and child

Kid and Dad _ Royal Hopper

The City of Sin is still the City of Sin
The Sinner in the Coat is the same Sinner that wore gym shorts a minute before..or a suit once upon a time
Chameleons change color, birds fly south, and squirrels hide in the ground. That is how they survive bad weather, hungry predators and uncertain supply chains. They put on the social uniform that matches the weather or they leave for someplace that matches the one they have.

your stop liquor

An afternoon walk in the City of Sin – Royal Hopper

Love all You Sinners
Take care

cool statue shot

Cool statue outside the Park near T Mobile Arena _ Photo by Royal Hopper

Air Day and the Folly of Discovery

 

by Royal Hopper

 

It was cold this week. Then it was hot.

For awhile even the crazy Body Builder guy who likes walk around with no shirt on _ put on a jacket and only flashed people when he was inside. Canadians got suddenly home sick as they strolled down Las Vegas boulevard in their hockey jerseys and people actually wore coats that normally sit in the back of their closets by the cargo pants and print floral shirts they bought from the sale rack in 1989 _ the horror _ oh the horror.

a wind socj doll shot

The wind _ Royal Hopper

Then suddenly _ without warning it was Las Vegas again. It was hot and sultry and the fair skinned and faint of heart ran for the sun screen, sun glasses and Bugs Bunny T-shirts they promised never to wear in public.

The first Air Day of the season hit the City of Sin like a ton of artificial neon decorated rocks.

wg sunset shot4

sunset _ by Royal Hopper

What is Air Day in Las Vegas exactly ? Its different for everybody. It comes on different days at different times of the day and is a different experience for everyone but it is a day you remember the entire year if you pay attention.
Air Day in simplest terms is the first day of the year you feel compelled to roll up the windows and turn the air up full blast. It symbolizes the end of what us here in the City of Sin laughingly call winter and the beginning of the long hot unbearable summers in this desert Paradise.

Air day means no more blasting your music with the windows down on the afternoon commute. ( I work swings sue me) Air Day means the costumed picture posers will soon be out in force. Soon Big Bird will be posing side by side with Darth Vader and The Power Rangers will compete with five different kinds of Elvi for a busy Vegas street corner.

The first one I saw was a Princess or a Ninja or a Ninja Princess. The second looked like cross dressing Ninja Princess but could have been a guy who woke up in a strange room sans clothing and grabbed whatever he could before being chased out of the room he doesn’t remember going into by security or a husband or boyfriend of the Ninja Princess passed out on the bed.

statue of liberty shot

statue of liberty the Sin City version

For me Air Day was April 18, my sister’s birthday.. Happy Birthday Sis.and the first day I just gave up and turned the air up full blast and welcomed the oppressive Sin City summer with resignation that comes with years of living in the desert..

That is how it is in the City of Sin

Love You Sinners .. . . . Take Care

family in the rain

A family in Vegas out ofr a walk on one of the rare rainy days in the City of Sin _ Photo by Royal Hopper

What do things mean and Look Ma’ no hands

By Royal Hopper
When you see a couple clad in black leather riding on the back of a motorcycle. The one on the back with long hair and breasts was waving her hands as the motorcycle moved through the intersection.

You could almost here the conversation muffled by the helmets that concealed their faces . . . “Hold on baby,” he would say . . .

a signs

Signs, Signs everywhere a sign and a 60s music reference _ Photo by Royal Hopper

“You mean like this,” she seemed to be saying as the drove through the intersection or like this “she said waving them the other way and then in his face as he drove .”or like this,” she would say as she waved her hands again in frustration as the light turned green and you move on through the intersection.. . . .

At a Vegas show some years ago there was a fight. One man it seems wanted to know what is was all about Life and the show .. . . .

What does it mean _ what does it mean he would shout

a omlet house guy close up

Selling ad time in the rain _ Photo by Royal Hopper

He wanted to know and he was a man _ a man with some clout

The others_ the others more simply _ simply wanted him out

Make him go _ make him go they said to those who should know

Shouted the man _ I wonder did he mean yes or did he mean no

The man shouted and pointed at his, head his heart and his toe (it rhymes okay)

The audience didn’t care they just wanted to watch the show

That poem is based on a true story incidentally. There was a disturbance in a Vegas theater years ago caused by a man who refused to stop shouting at the stage and several equally intoxicated audience members who were tired of him interrupting their show and were determined to pick a fight.

a rainy day on Vegas street

A family in Vegas out ofr a walk on one of the rare rainy days in the City of Sin _ Photo by Royal Hopper

Some couples who argue will argue anywhere. ,< One of them will always say hold on baby and the other will always take that as an insult.. One of them will usually be an independent drama queen and the other a long suffering, well meaning dweeb who puts his foot in his mouth trying to say the most innocent of things. There will always be someone who tries to figure out what things mean long after it has stopped being helpful to ask.

Communication is the key to peaceful living in any couple and in any relationship in any society. Asking question can be brave and necessary _ but there are times it pays to just be quiet and enjoy the show _ to just let mystery be mysterious, the Free fly their Freak flags and the drama queens wave her hands and be who they are.

That is life in the City of Sin _ Sinners
Love You guys
PS I saw the same couple on the same motorcycle a few days later the guy must have gotten the hint

good driving in vegas shot

Sin City _ Photo by Royal Hopper

Living in the past in the City of Sin

 

By Royal Hopper

He walks past you as stroll down the polished marble hallway in a Sin City casino and for a moment you are whisked back in time.

As you gaze in disbelief at the blue button up print design shirt, the long sweeping Wyatt Earp mustache and the bell bottom pants and lost in the disco era shoes you are momentarily swept back to the days of solar powered watches, smiley face icons and leisure suits _ back to the days 60 cent a gallon gasoline bright green polyester, big rings and jewelry on tough guys _ to the days when mustaches on young guys was cool and the debate over your class song was so intense the administration had to intervene and pick a song nobody really wanted.

sil of guy in shadows

Sin City _ Photo by Royal Hopper

Then you snap out of it and realize this is not 1970s Texas .. This is Las Vegas and dress like the 70s guy with his mid length hair and long brushy mustache is just another old dude who cant let go of the glory days. It then hits you. With growing sense of apprehension you realize that the guy is probably a few years younger than you _ sigh ?

On your way out of the casino you spot a kid with the same hairdo you sported in 1978. It is the third such 70s perm you have spotted on a young face in as many years and you restrain yourself from pointing out to the young people that the hairdo was bad in 1978 and it is bad in 2016.

Still further down the Sin City path you see the cast of Sin City show meandering down the avenue. They are French and dressed like characters from American culture _ there is a midget Elvis, a female torch singer (look it up) and a mass of poodle skirt wearing chorus and a Madonna look alike who it turns out was not a cast member.

lady with stroller and hood

Sin City _ Photo by Royal Hopper

Neither was the Hair Metal guru who followed closely behind making sure everyone saw him. The tattoos were real and the T-Shirt was vintage in perfect condition.

They were not cast members of the Vegas show they were just people who could not let go of 1987 and had dug deep in their closets and their supply of hair spray to do it.

Vegas is not the same place it was _ in the 50s, 60s, 70s or even 80s. In some ways it is bigger, more over the top, more in your face than it was before. In other ways it is more sterile, more casual wear, more plastic, more bean counter controlled and corporate than ever was before. Go figure. . . . .Back pack guy 2.JPG

It is what it is _ the City of Sin . And perhaps it is long past time for some of us to let go of the past and live in the here and now.. . . . And finally put those leisure suits, ripped concert shirts. . . .pleather jackets and lace over shirts and super sized cans of hair spray _ away
You can feel the tension in the between the Bee Gees loving “Mods and Zepplin loving Freaks and the Metal Heads and Hip Hoppers .. No not really _ nobody cares ..This is the City of Sin and if you got cash ..let your freak flag fly baby..

back of goth girls

Sin City _ Photo by Royal Hopper

Take Care Sinners

Drive down the Boulevard on normal day and date
You see a lot of things

A bearded Hipster teaching a dog to fetch

A wanabe artist making a sketch

A fortune teller looking at his own hand

And reading his own fate

What is today, what is tomorrow

And what does it bring

A pro standing on the sidewalk and shouting at the wind

A drunken cowboy running across the highway

A dog in a tutu, a Mormon on a scooter and giant bottle of gin

It is just life everyday in the City of Sin