'My name is....ah Raoul Duke...yes, ON THE LIST, that's for sure. Free lunch, final wisdom, total coverage...why not?..Just check the list and you'll see. Don't worry. What's the score here? What's next?" -- Hunter S. Thompson, "Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas", 1971.

You have to prime yourself for a trip to Las Vegas, even if the visit is something as innocuous as a 3-day bachelorette party with 30-something women, nine of us in total and eight of whom are stable and sober members of society (present company excluded, regarding all adjectives).

Immersion in Thompson's drug-infested, mind-blowing, alligator-heart classic "Fear and Loathing" is one way to go in deep. Indeed, it was a worthy preamble to the anecdote told by Manuela, who flew from New York City Thursday eve, arriving first. Thus she got the jump start on a weekend of adventures, which means, crazy-ass stories.

About an hour into the flight from the big apple to the big bite, the plane's captain made an announcement.

"'I have two things to say," he intoned.

"One. THERE IS NO MORE ALCOHOL. You drank IT ALL. THERE IS NO MORE LIQUOR ON THE PLANE. Got that????

"'Two, do NOT abuse the flight attendants. They can give you no more alcohol. IT'S ALL GONE. YOU DRANK IT ALL."

Manuela, now a Catholic schoolteacher and mother of two who has a treasure trove of wild coming-of-age tales of her own, said arrests were made as soon as the plane landed. "They were a bunch of Guidos," she explained. Jersey shore boys, pounding 'em back. Those guys? On the list, that's for sure.

Then there was the Las Vegas airport -- the only time I've ever been in an airport with slot machines. Noteworthy was a beautiful young woman in a tight black T-shirt that read: LOVE IS A MOTHERFUCKER.

She had kids with her, too. As in little people. Children.

We had to wonder if there really is a recession, seeing the money/credit cards fly around Vegas. The casinos on the strip were 24/7, which is pretty normal. "This is the last big vacation weekend for awhile," explained many cocktail waitresses, referencing Labor Day weekend, and pouring yet another bottle of champagne for our group. ("Don't bother having her taste it," I said to the final waitress. "This is their fifth bottle. They can't taste anything.")

But alas, we looked positively conservative at the Thunder Down Under show -- a male revue that was so well done, so professional and tasteful, and so oriented to gymnastics rather than sex, that you had to wonder....just how masculine is this crew?

Sure, the guys invited women on stage to simulate orgasm, reach down the guys' pants, etc., but when the boys did their firefighter number, they were just plain cute as a dalmation puppy. Mainly, they were on-task and oh-so-polished; David or Jacob or Josh visited our table and his hands, when he touched ours, were as dry as a widow at church. Which made me want to see a women's striptease the next day -- I can't imagine that women preformers could take off most of their clothing, then run through a steamy crowd of men. Maybe women really are easier.

The sad fact of the day, as the clock wore down: Vegas does not do newspapers. Nobody read one, nobody passed them out, none of the hotels, from the low (Circus Circus) to the high (Bellachio) showed any interest in even a paying display of USA Today or the Las Vegas Sun News. But then, church was off the menu, too. Two Catholic parishes were nearby, but we never even heard the bells ring.

Then, nobody can hear anything on the Strip.