Morals from Sin City

I recently went on a little getaway with my husband.  We wanted to go somewhere quiet, quaint, romantic...so where did we go?  Vegas, baby.

Las Vegas is aptly nicknamed "Sin City".  Visitors board their flights as perfectly respectable, law abiding, churchgoing citizens, but once they've landed at McCarran airport, all bets are off.  Who needs restraint and decorum when booze is free and gambling is legal?  Yes, it's easy to succumb to the debauchery that abounds in Sin City.  But, as I discovered on this trip, it's just as easy to learn a lesson or two.

Usually the only moral people leave Vegas with is, "A fool and his money are soon parted."  That and maybe, "Beer and liquor never sicker, liquor and beer never fear."  So this trip I decided to play it cool, abstain from any memory erasing behavior, and take notes.  Here's what I came away with--these are words of wisdom--take heed people!

1. You only have to bet big to win big.  Unfortunately, you only have to bet big to lose big.
2. Expensive does not always mean good.  it does however, always mean expensive.
3. Sunshine is free.  Shade will cost you (to the tune of $500 per day for a poolside cabana).
4. Hookers are hard to spot when everyone is dressed like a hooker.
5. What barely stays in your too tight dress when sober, will absolutely, positively not stay in when drunk.
6. Dealers and croupiers are not experts at winning.  If they were, they would not be dealers and croupiers.
7. There is a direct correlation between the amount of money one saves by having lots of free drinks and the amount of money one loses by gambling while intoxicated.
8. Bargains don't come cheap.  At least not when the cab ribe to the outlets costs $40.
9. What happens in Vegas does not stay in Vegas.  It gets posted on You Tube, Face Book, My Space, and for all you famous people out there, TMZ.
10. If there is anything truly beautiful and wondrous in the world, you will find a cheap replica of it in Las Vegas.  Really.  They have New York, Paris, the pyramids, the canals of Venice, and now that Madame Tussauds Wax Museum has opened, Brad Pitt.  I don't know what the moral is there, but I'm sure it will come to me.  Probably while I'm floating down a fake canal, in a fake gondola, guided by a fake gondolier, with a fake Italian accent.

Don't get the wrong idea--I had an incredible time.  I will definitely go back soon.  But, I will do so a bit wiser now that I've learned these valuable morals.  Or...I could just squeeze into something with a hem up to here, a neckline down to there, order myself a double shot of tequila (on the house, of course), and live a little.  Because perhaps the most important lesson of all is:  When in Rome, or in this case Caesar's Palace...well, you know the rest.