Wednesday.
I decided that after the long drive, I'd unwind for a moment in my hotel room and perhaps take a look at the view I was promised (it faced their emerald-green golf course), but the thing I most wanted to do was swim in the hotel's pool.
I can't remember the last time I swam in a pool. We didn't have a swimming pool at our house growing up, but I had a cousin who did, and in those days being a welcome house guest, I'd visit him frequently and, consequently, would swim often.
I was a pretty good swimmer in my youth. I wasn't bulky enough for football, and while I had some skill at basketball, I frankly didn't much care for organized sports. Swimming was an invigorating, solitary experience: being an astute fellow who paid attention to science class, and filled with the knowledge of the human body's relation to it, I felt as if I was conquering the very element of water itself.
In my adult years, most of the pool parties I was invited to were instances of me indulging in the "party" part of the event, and I have since left the "pool" aspect of it for the brave and the fool-hardy.
[Things I purchased for this trip: extra toothbrush, travel-sized deodorant, "medicinal" tea bags, and swim trunks]
But of course, planning on making the first evening in Vegas a serene and calm one was an exercise in futility.
