Las Vegas, Nevada: Today was all about celebrating Jimmy. And all about getting another 20,000 steps. Ouch, are my feet and legs complaining. We walked to the Margaritaville restaurant and met Kris and Steve for lunch. Gee, guess what we ordered:
Though I can't proclaim Las Vegas is a paradise in any way, Jimmy still vends a decent burger. After lunch, we all walked back to our hotel by walking through so many other hotels. First stop was a cruise through the Forum Shops at Caesar's Palace. NIKE released a re-make of a 1988 Jordan shoe today and people were lined up for miles to purchase the shoe. One per customer. Parrotheads watching Sneakerheads.
The next hotel was The Bellagio, where we checked on the progress of the new spring art and flower installation in the lobby. It was amazing the progress the workers have made in two days. We heard it may be complete Sunday evening. (Sidenote: there were more people watching the workers at the Bellagio than people in line to buy sneakers.)
By the time we returned to our hotel, we barely had enough time to rest our feet before heading to our early dinner reservations at the MGM Grand Hotel to fuel-up for the concert. It is our tradition to go to Wolfgang Puck's café and order Truffled Blue Cheese Potato Chips.
This is the 50 year anniversary of Jimmy Buffett's famed White Sport Coat and a Pink Crustacean album, so Brother Steve wore a white sport coat with a pink lobster broach to the show tonight! Genius.
The tickets tonight were purchased for the October 2022 show. That show was cancelled when Jimmy became ill. We still have no idea what was/is wrong with Jimmy, but there is a glaring new addition to the stage this evening: teleprompters. He flubbed-up last weekend in Las Vegas and he flubbed-up Tuesday in Palm Springs. I thought it was due to one of the Reeferette back-up singers, Nadirah Shakoor, being ill and not doing her usual solos... but now I am not so sure. Is my 76-year-old favorite singers forgetting the words to his own songs? Not sure anyone but a devoted Parrothead would have noticed the errors, but teleprompters are definitely a clue to this puzzle.
It was quite a night and quite a show. Again, no encore. Jimmy just sang all the songs he is supposed to play and then they turned on the house lights. Again, the country singer, Scotty Emerick, was on stage to start the show, and the Las Vegas trumpet player, John Lovell, joined the band again tonight. This was my 46th Jimmy Buffett show.
We will remain in Las Vegas one more night, only because traffic between Las Vegas and Los Angeles is KILLER on Sunday and we choose to avoid that nightmare altogether.
Until my next update, I remain, your very happy correspondent.