Grand Ole' Cirque (Saturday Night)

Vegas. Saturday night. How about dinner and a show? How about Iron Chef Wolfgang Puck and Cirque du Soleil? Susie and I hopped a cab to the MGM Grand..and waited in horrifyingly bad Strip traffic forever. I think it cost us over 10 bucks to go three "Vegas" blocks. I say "Vegas" blocks because they're a lot longer than regular blocks. Our first stop was the Wolfgang Puck Bar & Grill, which looked promising what with its Prickly Pear Mojitos and nerdy-cute bartenders. Dinner was a selection of small plates: truffled potato chips with Maytag blue chese, grilled sirloin skewers, beef barley soup, and yummy crab cakes. Dinner was nice, but not roll-your-eyes-back-in-your-head nice. Basically, if you're at the MGM Grand and want food and don't want their food court, go to Wolfgang Puck's. Otherwise...try Joel Roubechon's newest place, The Mansion.

Our real purpose in going to the MGM Grand was to see Ka', one of many Cirque du Soleil shows in town. To describe it is to rob it of its incredible impact. Just go see it. Trust us. The New York Times said that it was the most incredible achievement ever in Western Theater. Imagine an opera, but with acrobats rather than singers. Throw in some wushu artists, clowns, and a stage that rotates and flips itself to vertical, and you'll have the barest inkling of what this show is all about. Awesome cosumes? Check. Crazy pre-show where performers attach themselves to cables and fly around in the air above the audience? Check. Bursts of flame? Oh yeah check. Do not miss this show or else you will have deprived yourself of an opportunity to sit slack-jawed going "oh my freakin' god" for an hour and a half. Plus they sell alcoholic peach liquor slurpees. It's a good time.

Somewhere between Wolfgang Puck's and Ka', we stopped at 32 Degrees. They feature frozen drink drinks (i.e., with booze), but we settled for the $2 jello shots, in the classic flavors of red, orange, green, and yellow.

Post-Ka', we took a series of moving walkways back to our base camp at the Luxor. This wended us through several casinos: New York New York (cool! ) and Excalibur (a little on the dodgy side).

Earlier, while on the plane from SFO to Las Vegas, we got the idea to rent a convertible and drive to Hoover Dam. So, we went to bed early Saturday night (i.e., at 1:00am) so that we could pick up our Mustang convertible on Sunday at 9:00am.