I took a minute—more like five minutes, actually—to explain the concept of international roaming to the
detective
constable. He seemed unconvinced at first that one could make transatlantic phone calls on a cell phone, but when I finally offered to call him back from the hotel landline he went back to his main line of questioning.
“So if you’re so smart, how do you explain your fingerprints being at the scene?”
“I can’t,” I said.
“I honestly can’t think when I might have been in an apartment in that part of London—unless—wait, what did you say the place was called again?”
Another rustling of papers.
“City Reach …”
I typed the words into Google Mail’s search box, and a few seconds later I laughed again.
“I don’t see how this is a laughing matter.”
“I do.”
I also knew why the name seemed familiar. Back in November, America had elected Barack Obama as its new president. I’d been back in London on election night and my friend James and I had hosted a live 24-hour webcast covering the voting and results. City Reach wasn’t a private apartment at all, but, rather, part of the serviced apartment block—a pseudo-hotel designed for business people who want a
more homey environment than a Marriott or a Hilton—that we’d used as our base of operations.
Of course my fingerprints would be there: I’d spent more than twenty-four hours in the place, writing, filming and occasionally sleeping.
“Did the owner happen to mention that their ‘apartment’ was basically a hotel?” I asked the still confused policemen.
More rustling.
“Uh, no … he didn’t. It’s registered as a ‘dwelling.’ OK, well, if what you’re saying is true then all we’ll need you to do is come in next week and make a statement so we can check out your story.”
“Uh,” I said, “I’m about six thousand miles away, and will be for a few weeks, so unless you’re planning to come and pick me up by private jet, that’s probably not going to happen.”
“Well, until then it’s just your word against the evidence. Do you have any witnesses to back up your story about why you were in the … dwelling?”
I laughed for a third time. The whole election coverage had been broadcast, for twenty-four hours straight, on the web. Not only did I have the footage on my laptop, but about a few hundred thousand witnesses watching online could back up my story. And then there was the small matter of an Icelandic rock star who could give me a cast-iron alibi for the night of the robbery, a night I’d written all about in the
Guardian
. It was like an episode of
Columbo
, I had so many public alibis.
DC Jamieson wrote all of this down and promised to call me back once he’d checked my story. He never did. After I put down the phone, I was still laughing. All of this was happening because I’d been wrongly accused—not once, but twice—of deliberately dodging cab fares. Now, because the police had my fingerprints on file, I was being wrongly suspected of burglary.
It was a classic story of wrongly accused criminality: from not committing petty crime, I’d graduated to not committing increasingly
more serious crimes. In a few years, unless I seriously didn’t change my ways, there was a real risk I’d end up not in jail for not committing arson—or perhaps even not-murder.
46
Two days later, I took the short flight from San Francisco to Las Vegas for the Consumer Electronics Show.
It’s a two-day event and my plan was to spend the first day avoiding the conference, getting happily drunk and generally doing everything I needed to do to write my column. The second day I’d do the actual writing of the thing, leaving me free the second night to catch up with Sarah for dinner before maybe heading to one of the after-parties.
By limiting most of my drinking to the first night, I could safely avoid a repeat of my last time in Vegas, or at least avoid Sarah witnessing it. That part was critical.
1202
“
I was down at the New Amsterdam
,
starin’ at this yellow-haired girl …”
I’d been in town less than twelve hours and my cocktail of feelings as I stood in the nightclub at the Luxor Hotel was hard to break down precisely.
Perhaps one part
déjà vu
, to one part heartbreakingly nostalgic, to one part trapped, to two parts what in the name of sweet Jesus am I doing here?
“
Mr
.
Jones strikes up a conversation with a black-haired flamenco dancer
.
”
Déjà vu
, certainly. It was, after all, the second time in a month that I’d heard someone giving a live rendition of “Mr. Jones” by Counting Crows.
“
You know
,
she dances while his father plays guitar …”
As for the heartbreaking nostalgia, as I said, the song is one that always reminds me of my ex-girlfriend. An ex-girlfriend who frequently made it clear during our relationship that if Adam Duritz, the band’s lead singer, was to so much as glance at her, she would dump me like a hot shit-covered potato and retire with all haste to his hotel room for the rest of her life. Combine that fact with how badly our relationship had ended and, unless I’m paralytic on burning wine, the merest note of one of their songs is enough to make me want to throw myself off a bridge.
“
… and so
,
she’s suddenly beautiful …”
And I was certainly trapped. Whereas in Iceland I was standing at the back of a bar, this time I was right at the front, pressed hard against the low stage and unable to move in any direction. The room was full to bursting point and I was wedged in so tightly that escape was impossible.
And as if all that wasn’t weird enough, on this occasion, rather than being serenaded by a bald Icelander, the person doing the singing—standing right on the edge of the stage, not two feet in front of me—was my cooler, richer, more talented nemesis: Adam fucking Duritz himself.
Which just leaves the question of what in the name of sweet Jesus was I doing there?
1203
The Luxor is an odd hotel: from the outside it looks amazing—a gigantic pyramid of black glass, with a bright white spotlight bursting from the top: bright enough, they claim, that one could use it to read a newspaper two miles up in space. The shape of the building means
the elevators have to travel up and down the sides at a forty-five-degree angle. It’s all very impressive.
Inside, though, it’s a slightly different story. For a start, the Egyptian theme collapses almost immediately when guests are confronted with the enormous—and I mean enormous—American flag hanging from the ceiling. It’s as if the designers were concerned that, without the flag, American guests would stay away, worried they were somehow supporting terrorism by booking into an Arab-themed hotel.
Beneath the flag, a big section of the lobby is taken up with a food court including Starbucks and a McDonald’s, each with a line of obese tourists waiting to pay inflated Vegas prices for food they could buy in any other city on earth. The rooms themselves are fine—decent even—but once you take away the fact that you’re in a pyramid in Vegas, there’s nothing in them that you wouldn’t find in a mid-range Holiday Inn.
Still, I hadn’t chosen the Luxor for its rooms, I’d chosen it because it was the venue for several of the CES after-hours parties, including the main Intel-sponsored one at the end of the first day which—according to the online chatter—was the must-attend party of the conference. I’d spent the whole of the first day, as planned, doing absolutely no work whatsoever. I’d watched a
Monk
marathon on TV in my room at the Luxor (only $95 a night, even with the conference going on—viva Las Vegas) before ordering room service for lunch and spending the rest of the afternoon drinking champagne while idly checking Twitter updates from actual attendees to see if there was anything I might possibly write about.
I’d made a few notes, but I still didn’t have anything approaching an angle for the column. Had I actually bothered to go to the conference, I would have discovered that there was actually no shortage of angles: CES was sharing a venue with the Adult Video Network conference—a convention for porn stars. You live and learn.
But, anyway, by the time I left the room it was almost 6 p.m. I’d just have to hope I found something useful to write about at the Intel party, assuming I could first figure out a plan to talk my way in. And what better place to come up with that plan—I decided—than over another glass of champagne, in one of the hotel’s bars. I put on my party shoes, which is to say my only shoes, and headed down in the forty-five-degree elevator to the lobby.
The party was due to start at 7:30 and by 7:15 I was almost out of ideas. I’d spent over an hour on my phone, emailing every contact I knew who might be able to help—people who I knew were in town, Intel PR people—but an entry wristband remained elusive.
If I didn’t get a reply soon then I’d have to chance it on the door, which, given how exclusive the party was supposed to be—people had been bitching online all day that they couldn’t get on the guest list—could very easily end in embarrassment.
There were at least 1000 journalists in town covering CES so my “I’m a journalist” card probably wouldn’t work either. Seven thirty came, then 7:45 … still no replies. It was hopeless.
“Hey!”
I looked up, expecting to see a waitress pestering me to buy another Egyptian-American-themed drink. But it wasn’t a waitress.
“Sarah! I wasn’t expecting to see you until tomorrow.” I looked guiltily at my glass of champagne. I was still almost sober, by my standards at least. Thank God.
“I’m just on my way to dinner. What are you up to?”
“I’m trying—and failing—to find a way to crash the Intel party.”
“Are you kidding? The one that Counting Crows are playing at? Why would anyone want to see Counting Crows?” And then her face turned to pity.
“Oh, yes, I forgot about your girly taste in music.”
“Well, quite.” Actually, I had no idea Counting Crows were playing,
but a column’s a column. “I’m pretty sure I’m not getting in though.”
“You can have my wristband if you like.” She reached into her purse and pulled out the neatly folded strip of paper. “I can’t imagine anything worse.”
I could have hugged her—but that would have wasted valuable seconds. It was almost eight o’clock and, assuming Counting Crows would be on stage around nine, I only had an hour left to work the room, getting the information I needed for my column and then escaping before I was punched in the ears by musical memories of my ex-girlfriend. There was no time to lose.
Fast-forward half an hour and my work was done. Sarah’s wristband had allowed me to go straight to the front of the queue and, with a single lap of the crowded club, I’d spoken to half a dozen of the attendees and had scribbled a list in my notebook under the heading “
everything you need to know about CES 09
.”
Mobile computing company Palm was launching a new phone, apparently, and Microsoft was talking about a new version of Windows. Various companies were launching new flat screen TVs. All very dull, but enough hard facts to wrap up in some color about Vegas and the Luxor and my having to escape from the venue before Counting Crows began playing.
And so that was that: in just half an hour my entire week’s research was done, leaving the whole of the next day free to write up the column before a catch-up dinner with Sarah and then a flight back to San Francisco the next morning. And, more importantly, I’d avoided having to see Counting Crows.
I was just drunk enough to be emotional and the last thing I needed was to have to actually watch Adam Duritz singing my ex-girlfriend’s favorite song.
I headed for the door.
And I
almost
made it.
But just as I was passing the stage, I felt a tap on my shoulder. It was Brian Solis, the PR guy who had organized the party I’d nearly ruined during my last trip to Vegas. The room had really started to fill up in anticipation of Counting Crows, so Brian was saving himself a spot right at the front of the stage; apparently he’s a huge fan.
Given my behavior at his party, I figured the least I could do was to buy him a drink to say sorry. He gladly accepted, we shared an apology-forgiveness hug and I ran to the bar. I reckoned I could still make it out before the show; or at worst I’d have to suffer through one song. By the time I’d made it back, forcing my way through the crowd with the drink held above my head, the club had filled to capacity.
And that’s when it happened—the exact moment I handed Brian his drink right at the very front of the room, the stage lit up and the whole crowd surged forward, pinning me to my spot. I was right at the front of the stage and I literally couldn’t move in any direction. “
Sha la lalalalalala
.”
Of
course
they opened with “Mr. Jones.”
But still, as Counting Crows worked their way through a set list consisting almost entirely of my ex’s favorite songs, each of them sung straight into my face by the man she’d have left me for in a heartbeat, I managed to force a smile.
This would certainly be color for the column, and not only had I managed to get through an entire day in Vegas without being thrown out of anywhere but I’d caught up with Sarah—sober enough not to offend her again—and had even had a chance to apologize to Brian. See! I could do it if I tried: have fun, get work done, spend much of the day drinking and still not alienate any of my friends.
You know what happened the next day.
Of course you do.
1204
The day started fine. I woke up around noon—a slight hangover, but nothing ridiculous—and wrote up the column as planned. I had to start early as the time difference meant that my 6 p.m. London deadline was in effect a 10 a.m. Las Vegas deadline.
Having finally filed around 3 p.m. local time—only five hours late—I spent the rest of the day soberly wandering around Vegas, hunting for porn stars, wasting money at the blackjack tables and generally enjoying the most ridiculous city on earth without getting drunk. I was due to meet Sarah for dinner at seven so fortunately I didn’t have a huge amount of time to kill.