So I’m in the spa this morning after waking up stupid early (can’t sleep in Vegas, ever) and after a great workout, I get in the whirlpool and there’s three guys there, (let’s call them Black Guy, White Guy and Old Guy) and we start to talkin’ and bondin’ as only naked heterosexual men in an oversized bathtub can, and we meander onto the topic of unique personal experiences. Black Guy (who we could easily nickname Huge Black Guy) is a guidance counselor at a local Community College and he tells this (somewhat boring) story about how he turned some kid’s life around. White guy (who we could easily nickname Ex-Alcoholic White Guy) preaches some AA shit to us which, as much as I respect “the program”, can get a little cloying. So I regale them with a few stories about my days in the nominally illegal Diamond trade which Ex-Alcoholic White Guy is extremely interested in – a little too interested if you ask me – to the point where I thought he might actually be Ex-Alcoholic Federal Agent White Guy, at which point I clammed up right quick..

And then Old Guy tells us this story about how a friend of his was working in the building when 9-11 hit and how that guy went downstairs and in the melee saw a little old lady struggling. So he picks her up and starts heading in a certain direction and she yells to him “No, go the other way”. So he does and as they are heading in the other direction an entire section of the building falls right at the spot they were originally headed. In the aftermath he lost track of the old lady, and never saw her again, but of course he never forgot that she essentially saved his life while he was trying to save hers.

Well, I guess Old Guy wins!

OK gotta go play some poker. As the sailor once said to the prostitute “This may be quick, honey”.