During a presentation by the office of business development at the August 18 City Council meeting, officials gave an overview of a plan to attract diverse businesses to Las Vegas. On the heels of California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger's visit to lure Nevada businesses to California, Ward 3 Councilman Gary Reese was on his toes. "I'd make a motion already to send our mayor to California," he said.
"I'm leaving tomorrow morning," answered Mayor Oscar Goodman.
The headline in the Review-Journal on August 18 read "ATC scores, participation decline slightly in Nevada," causing us to wonder: Are ATC Vancom employees more worrisome than usual? Are air traffic controllers on the downward spiral? What does this mean? A quick read of the article's first sentence clarifies that the subject is the 2004 ACT test, and our students aren't doing so well. It's nice to know that won't prevent them from growing up to be headline writers.
"More trucking jobs available than drivers"
Remember when bobbleheads stood for something? Then Mayor Oscar Goodman got one, and it was still kinda quaint, but Norm Clarke, the Review-Journal's gossip writer, recently got immortalized in nodding plastic and the whole craze just seemed like a cheap gimmick. How we miss the old days.
Now, even somebody who's nobody can get dolled up. All most manufacturers require are a good photo, an e-mail address, deep pockets and patience. A standard order, 252 dolls, at the Morton Grove, Illinois-based Bobble Factory will run you $2,200 and take about three months.
"That's because the stuff is made in a factory in China," says Danny Baer, owner of the Bobble Factory.
"We try to make the individual dolls as unique as possible," Baer says. "You've got more normal people doing this than ever before."
Tonight's fourth installment of Black Entertainment Television's weeklong series, Locked Up, Locked Out, which chronicles five successful African-American parolees, has a Vegas angle. Jeffrey Henderson ran a multimillion-dollar cocaine empire in Southern California. He learned how to cook in prison. Released after nearly a decade, he moved to Las Vegas and quickly climbed the ladder of success: chef de cuisine at the Pallatium Buffet at Caesars Palace, then lead chef at AJ's Steakhouse at the Hard Rock and winner of the American Food and Wine Tasting Foundation's 2001 chef of the year. Away from work, he mentored juveniles and helped ex-felons transition back into society. Henderson returned Los Angeles a few months ago.
You might expect vibrating condoms to be the sort of thing sold at the Hard Rock's Love Jones lingerie boutique, but no, they're on the counter at the gift store, right next to the mints. Open the package and out spills a mini sexual science experiment. There's a condom, to be sure. There's also an offer for a free adult catalog, XXX videos and 50 percent off coupon from Adam & Eve. There's a set of instructions (English and Japanese), along with explanatory pictures (English and Japanese). Finally, there's the pink, patent-pending, "highest reputation in 32nd Geneva Inventions Fair" plastic ring with what appears to be some sort of small motor attached. This, ladies and gentlemen, is the Vicon.
Frankly, it looks more like a teething ring than a marital aid, and the idea of any electrically powered device being attached to our willies gives us the willies. The instructions provide some tiny measure of comfort: "The Vicon has been designed to provide the wearer with maximum stimulation and pleasure in a small and compact single-use unit." However, we can already sense some performance anxiety reading the line about the battery lasting 12 to 15 minutes.