Wednesday

Wednesday 10.30am and we are dining at The Flamingo Buffet for breakfast although lunch is starting to make an appearance. Eating at a buffet is dangerous because quite simply you want to eat almost everything and do a damn fine job of doing so. I take the sensible approach and start with fruit, then move on to a small serving of bacon and eggs. The seafood is proudly on display so I feel obliged to serve myself some. At this point I decide to make a take away sandwich for lunch which consists of a bagel with smoked salmon, cream cheese and capers. So yum!!! One cannot leave a buffet without having had dessert and I am torn between something not so chocolatey and something almost breakfasty. I choose pumpkin pie which turns out to be a wise choice.

We have free time for the day so Miss Catherine and I head to the shops. First we go to the Forum Shops and check out the MAC makeup. I buy Plum Dandy lipstick, Melba blush and Dazzle mascara for very good prices. We go into a shop called Anthropologie and must be in there for at least 1/2 hour, everything is so beautiful. I will come back and make more purchases but for now I buy an apron. I know!! It's pretty nice.

Then we head to Wynn/Encore casinos which are new and oh so swish. Too pricey for me. We go to the Fashion Mall but really don't have any time left as we have to be ready by 5.30pm for our lift to Fremont St.

So it's back into my ravishing red dress and getting ready for the Rat Pack Is Back show at The Plaza. First of all we meet some of the group and wander down Fremont St which is like a mall with a roof that displays various neon light shows and advertising. It is an assault on one's eyes even more so than The Strip, probably because it is all contained under a roof.

Back to The Plaza and we meet everyone at the bar (where else) for a drink before the show. As we enter the theatre we are shown to the front tables and are known as "The Group". We try to tell the waiters we are not the group they are waiting for and should not be sitting here but they don't understand. It gets quite ridiculous and one of the girls persists by going back to the maitre d to get his understanding. Personally I don't care anymore, it's 3 minutes to show time and The Group aren't even here!!! So bad luck. Well as bad luck would have it, they realise their mistake and we are moved as The Group enter. Then the waitress brings us our drink orders which all look and taste the same, but shouldn't be, and in the end we just drink them.

One by one the actors come on stage and do their bit and while I am in love with Frank Sinatra (the actor playing him that is), Dean Martin looks very strange, facelifted and so fake tanned that I can't take him seriously (see photo). He looks a bit like Dean but he doesn't and I can't stop staring at him with an odd squint in my face. Anyway the show is lots of fun, good old fashioned and stupid jokes that you would have in that era and the sexual and patronising jokes towards women. The woman playing Marilyn Monroe needs to do some serious research as her speaking voice was truly awful and not like Marilyn at all. Please if you are going to play a real person then do them the courtesy and your audience of getting it right or at least close! I disputed the talents of this woman with a kitten but it didn't go down well.

Post show we went to a bar called Firefly upstairs for tapas. Unfortunately most of the food was spicy and/or laden with garlic so I really didn't have much choice. Everyone wanted to share by buying 4 or so plates but there was no way I could do this. 2 of us opted out of the sharing thing so I didn't feel alone. The food was quite nice and the cosmos were going down easily. Soon it was time to go home which was probably a good thing as it turns out I was a bit drunk, hence my adamant stance against the Marilyn Monroe actress.