A walk in Las Vegas

Start: Luxor Hotel

"Are we going to Paris, Daddy?"

"18 years old and hungry": girl with small dog. Repeated many times. Teenage boys and girls on the bridges between hotels.

"Just a penny." Older man with white beard.

Rounding the corner behind a hotel, four men lined up, backs to me, hands in cuffs; another man stood behind them, talking loudly, as yet another seemed to listen. A bicycle cop arrived as I passed.

"Shame on all of you! Thinking about all that shit all the time." This man has several small cardboard signs; on one of them I read "Kim Kardashian." He wears a small camouflage cap. His eyes are big, but don't make contact.

College shirts: Wisconsin, Something State, Arizona, Something else state, Rebels. Girl soccer teams. The "little haole girl" on the team of white girls who beat ours up. One of their mothers, next to the bathrooms after (the only shade), said they should have beaten us 10-0.

Peacock girls. Feather girls. High heeled girls. Butch girls. Drunken girls. Prostitute leans over a small blue sports car in Paris. Queer cowboy, flashes "no pictures" at my camera. Statues. "Bring me to life" reads a sign in front of a dirty stuffed dog.

Couples. White couples, brown couples, Spanish speaking couples, Black English speaking couples, Indian couples, London accented couples.

Buff African American cop having his photo taken with a young white guy holding a beer cup. Hard to tell at first if the cops were real or street hustlers.

Children holding hands. Kids in strollers. "That was neat!"

"Did you see Darth Vader crossing the street?"

"Did you see that guy lean over in the middle of the road to tie his shoes. They were flip flops. The guy in the car honked. He just kept tying his flip flops."

"I'd a run him over."

"Barely legal Asians." Blondes. Boxes full of girl photos. Homeless people handing out "girls straight to you in 20 minutes."

Back to the Luxor. Bare chested man with back pack heading toward the elevators.

In my room, the repeated riff on "Being alive," a ringing bell, noise of frat boys ("you want my peepee," one asked Sharon in the hall the other night).

Photo of my daughter asleep at a table, 26 minutes ago, surrounded by blue and red plastic cups.