TALES FROM THE TRENCHES: LAS VEGAS PART ONE, GOD’S PEED by Andrew Leavold

May 2008: I still remember in cinematographic detail this vivid movie dream after the first two days in Los Angeles with no sleep.

It was a warped alternate version of Fear And Loathing In Las Vegas, in which Hunter S. Thompson had joined the writing team of Saturday Night Live during its inaugural 1975 season. Johnny Depp as Hunter is driving his Shark through the Nevada desert over jarring techno and credits obscured by tacked-on labels which read “The Actor”, “The Film”, “The Animation”.

Cut to the writers’ Kombi van, in which a bloated Dan Akyroyd from 2008 is playing Dan Akyroyd circa 1975. Dan is yelling at the driver, in a Foghorn Leghorn voice, about his concerns over employing Hunter: “Sir, ah said sir, I do believe we have made a SERIOUS mistake!” On the Kombi’s back seat, John Belushi freebases through a small tuba.

I realize at this point: I AM JOHN BELUSHI, and the cocaine smoke tastes like metal.

“It was somewhere Barstow when the drugs kicked in,” Johnny Depp quoted Hunter S. Thompson in Fear And Loathing In Las Vegas.

In Barstow, you can suck down as much or as little cocaine smoke through any brass instrument you choose, and you’ll still feel like you’re on another planet. Less than two weeks after the Hunter dream, Dani Palisa and I are in that same sweat stain on the crease in the map between California and Nevada, a one horse town in which said horse was getting carted off to form McDonalds soft serves.

If you want to experience the real America in all its yellow-stained glory, jump on a Greyhound. “Decent” folk fly, guzzle gallons of ever-receding fuel supplies in SUVs, or never leave the sanctuary of their God-fearin’ communities. No, here we are with the salt, the sod, the common man Barton Fink had waxed lyrical over. The Greyhound was grounded for the hour outside a huge barn next to a McDonalds inside an old-timey train carriage. Classy. Above us was a “No Panhandling” sign, and I was getting hustled for my last spring roll.

What we assumed would be a five hour bus trip to Vegas was in fact eight hours; the 11.30am Greyhound from Hollywood was already pulling out of the station by the time we’d finished breakfast and picked up the Hollywood Boulevard hostel’s payphone. Next bus was 2.30pm from Union Station in Los Angeles, and we had a LOT of baggage to carry.

On the train trip from Hollwood’s Vine St to Union Station, we discovered everyone in California has advice about Vegas, and consequently they all have a story of survival. A no-neck muscle jock sounding like the spawn of Robert de Niro and Joe Pesci’s desert rendezvous told us to head for the $25 all-you-can-eat buffets. “Oh, and the blowjobs! Just walk up to any chick in a casino and say, ‘Yeah, let’s do it.’ I swear to God, it worked for me and my buddies. Just don’t tell my wife, we got married there a few months before that, hur hur hur.”

There was a lineup of swanky top-of-the-line coaches at Union, and then a solitary early model Greyhound, one of those metal postboxes on wheels that looked like it was decorated by a six year old with ADHD: “Look, kid, here’s some blue paint and a brush, just paint a damn dog on the front. And fer Christ’s sake, get the brush out of yer mouth!”

I felt like Dustin Hoffman to Dani’s Jon Voight, and started humming the theme to Midnight Cowboy.

Dani laughed. “I think it’s the same bus!”

I asked a Pam Grier lookalike if that was our bus. “Naw,” she says throatily, “Bus always damn late!” She motioned us haughtily to the empty bay next to it.

Our Greyhound pulls in fifteen minutes later, barely a single model upgrade from the shitbox we’d been musically mocking.

Dani and I boarded this luxury vessel in Los Angeles, for the eight hour burn through the desert, surrounded by pimps, pushers, thieves and Kerouac-esque hobos. We sat in the second-to-last seats next to the Greyhound’s toilet, watching the Californian landscape turn browner and sandier by the hour. Sleeping behind us were what appeared to be a couple, shoes off and denim jackets draped over their prostrate bodies. Dani scribbled in my notebook, “This bus smells like a combination of damp towels, feet and broken dreams with a hint of urine.” This, of course, was before someone opened the toilet door.

BANG! It was like being punched by an invisible shit fist. Broken or barely functioning, the can evidently hadn’t been serviced in a month.

We’d just passed a sign saying “Las Vegas 140 Miles” when it became too much for the Mexican – let’s call him Cheech – seated half-way down the coach. He tried to enter the toilet before we could warn him…SMACK! While we choked on the familiar tidal wave of dookie fumes, Cheech held his nose, tried to wave off a swarm of see-through flies, and went through an entire pantomime performance of being as nauseated as we were.

Attracted the attention of the driver, an enormous mean-looking African-American spilling over the sides of his seat. “Please, stop thee bus…” He was prepared to water the cacti.

“Uh-uh. I ain’t stopping the damn bus for nothin’. Sit the hell down!”

Cheech resumed his performance of sword-fighting fecal fairies. “But it steeeeeeeeeeeenks!”

Man, I could feel Cheech’s pain. I tapped him on the shoulder and offered him an empty water bottle. He looked delighted, and gave me a cheesy grin and a thumbs-up.

Dani and I then watched Cheech shift uncomfortably under his jacket, trying in vain to position the bottle. After five minutes he gave up and his yawning chasm of penile panic returned.

Quarter of an hour later and still clutching the empty bottle, he made a final assault on the toilet. He made a comical motion of holding his nose, then opened the door. Dani and I held our breath. A minute later he emerged triumphant. Most of us applauded, and he hi-fived passengers all the way back to his seat.

The couple behind us, meanwhile, hadn’t stirred for a while. When the Wife sat bolt upright, naturally I almost sprang out of my seat, before turning to acknowledge her triumphant return from the Other Side.

She fixed my T-shirt with an unwavering, trance-like glaze. “What does ‘Search For Weng Weng’ mean?”

“Um………it’s a film I’m trying to finish.”

Pause. “Who’s Weng Weng?”

“The two foot nine James Bond of the Philippines.”

Another deadpan stare. “That sounds like the bomb.” Pause. “I’ll pray for you.” She grabbed my hand. I turned to Dani, who by this moment was feigning sleep to avoid joining her Godologue.
“Jesus Christ, our lawd and saviour, please let Andrew find Weng Weng. Our Father who’s in Heaven, I pray to you, let Andrew finish his movie.” I could feel Dani vibrating with canned laughter in the next seat.

By the time we hit Barstow, a now wide-awake Dani and I had been granted the couple’s recent history. They’d been roughing it on the Santa Monica pavements for several months until the Husband’s father sent them two Greyhound tickets home to Vegas. She was round and clearly off with the pixies; he was lean, with a scruffy grey shag of hair and a pocket full of strip club two-for-ones he offered us for a tenner (we declined). He showed us the Special Forces Tattoo on his arm; he was kicked out of the Army ten years before and now sported blackouts from a brain tumour. “There, there, baby,” she later cooed, gently stroking his feet as he jerked in his sleep.

In Barstow I sat watching the stationary Greyhound. I’d almost finished a bag of spring rolls from Panda Express that came with a free fortune cookie. Homeless Wife sat next to me and looked mournfully at my remaining spring roll.

“What do you have there?” I motioned towards the polystyrene box in her lap.

“Someone’s leftovers.”

My heart sank. She looked at my bag again. “Can I have your leftovers?”

I dug into my pocket and offered her a fiver. “Honey, go buy yourself some real food.”

She beamed at me, then disappeared into the truckstop, returning five minutes later with a small paper bag translucent with grease.

“What did you get?” I asked as she went to join her horizontal husband on the Greyhound’s back seat.

“Some egg rolls to have with my leftovers.”

I glanced toward the “No Panhandlers” sign near the exit. Some signs clearly weren’t meant to be taken seriously.

I finally cracked open my complimentary fortune cookie from Panda Express. Looking skywards, I mouthed the words, “Am I doing the right thing here?”

The cookie’s message: “Yes, do it with confidence.”