A few months ago, my new friend, Lucky Laurie had sent me a message about using some of her space in Laughlin to stock and sell some Jack Shit shirts. My first thought was, oh hell yeah, but then reality hit me. Those booths at huge rallies cost a lot of money! If I am going to take up space at one of those booths with my product, it would only be fair that I kick in for the cost, right? Well that is just something that I could not afford to do. I sent her a note back and graciously declined. I told her that there is only so much money to be made on t-shirts and with the cost of me getting there and kicking her back some cash from the shirts and finding a place to stay, it would at best be a break even proposition for me. It wasn't but a few days when I received another message from Ms. Laurie. Either she had read my blog post about where the money from the shirts go, or someone told her that the money goes to taking care of Diane's medicine and shit and that is pretty much what the note said, she knows where the money goes and she doesn't want any of it, to get my ass to Laughlin and don't worry about a thing! HOLY SHIT REALLY? Wow, what a classy move! Each time that I begin to lose faith in humanity, someone like Laurie steps up and does something wonderful and gives me hope again! I was going to pack up the shirts in to a big ass army bag, strap it to the sissy bar on the knuck and make a mad dash for Nevada, or so I thought! The noise coming from the bottom end of the knuck motor was horrible and the fxrs was not up and running. I managed to get the fxrs up and running but the idea of a 600 mile shakedown run across the 100 degree desert did not sound like the smartest move on my part. Finally, two nights before, I said FUCK IT! I really did, I said it out loud, FUCK IT, I'm doing it anyway! That is when we realized that the bike I had purchased months before was unregistered and now the TITLE WAS GONE! No where to be found, it had grown legs and like Elvis, it had left the building! For the first time in my life, I would be attending a major motorcycle event without a bike and it hurt. It hurt my heart, my ego and my pride! I would be attending the Laughlin River Run, in a Ford truck! I have never in my life cancelled a date, an event or a show and I was not about to break this commitment now!
My biggest fear was where the hell was I going to park a truck? The stars had lined up and as I pulled in to the Pioneer Hotel's vending area, I was able to park 2 spots away from the vending tent! This could only work out better if I had a place to stay. I went up with absolutely no place to stay in a town of thousands of hotel rooms and they were all sold out!
On Saturday morning, I returned to the Pioneer parking lot fully expecting to see the tent closed down and packed up and my friends having given up. I did not find that. They got up early and did the very best that they could do to "re-open" what they had worked so hard on setting up and they did a pretty damn good job. By Saturday morning, the wind had died down to gusts of only 40 mph so most of the tent had to remain buttoned up and people were walking in I think just to see what was hidden in that "secret tent". I ended up moving a bunch of shirts and since the weather report had said it was going to be "beautiful", I was able to move quite a few Hoodies on Friday and Saturday night as most didn't even bring jackets. So I guess, thank you Mother Nature!
On Thursday night, I went up and met some friends at the Loser's lounge up the strip. Diane was having all kinds of computer trouble so I spent most of that time out in the Keno room trying to walk her through fixing it. My battery was about to die so I began my mile trek back down the road to the hotel so I could at least plug the phone in if she needed me. If you haven't been to Laughlin in a while or never, they local police dept. is not real big so they bring in the Las Vegas metro police. It is like a small military unit coming in to town and they act exactly like one. I guess one could argue that since the shoot out at Harahs casino that they have to be there like that but as I understand it, it was like that long before any thing bad ever happened. Also, the more cops you have, the more tickets you can write and the more arrests you can make and the more money rolls in to the town! BONUS I GUESS! Before I go any further, understand this, I am not a cop hater! Nearly every male in my family was either a cop or a fireman so I know cops and how they think and are supposed to act. While walking down the strip, I saw cop after cop after cop screaming down the road with lights and sirens on! They would go sliding in to the driveway of the Aquarius Casino. You would have thought some major battle was under way. I was walking and on the phone with Diane and told her what was up, she said, "stay away from it", but I could not! I had to see what horrible tragedy would require 20 police man to go blazing through town, through lights and around traffic like that, I just had to! Well I got down to the entrance of the casino where I saw one, yes ONE, Hispanic man in handcuffs against a car. About 30 feet away were a few Mongols with a few prospects and hang arounds. To the best of my knowledge, they were not involved in this, but I don't know. None of the police were speaking to any of them? I was so damn thirsty from my walk and so bummed out that I had gone this far and nothing was going on, I went in to the casino and got a drink. There was nothing going on in there either, so I took my drink out the front door of the hotel. Now this is where the story goes straight to hell! As I walked out, I see this pretty attractive, fit, girl and her boyfriend or husband in the driveway. There are cameras everywhere, after all, it is a casino! As I walk out the door, she punches him right in the face and his hat goes to the ground. He bends over and picks it up. I guess upon seeing that he didn't react, she hit him again and again, over and over with a closed fist in the face and head! Now there has to be 35 cops 50 feet away and they are so concerned about the one person that these heroes arrested that they pay no attention to the poor guy getting his ass beat. The guy stands with his arms locked down at his sides and only moves to pick up his hat each time she knocks it off! Shot after shot in the face and he does nothing. He can see all of the police a short distance away and must figure that any moment, they will come over and stop her, he does nothing to defend himself! This had to go on for 5 or 7 minutes, it's hard to tell. I just walked away shaking my head. Well the harder she beat him, finally drew a reaction from the crowd and with each punch in the face, a roar came and another punch in the face and another roar. It must have been 5 or 6 real loud roars from the crowd, finally one of the now massive group of cops noticed. After a few more roars, they began running towards the couple. The guy still standing with his arms locked at his sides. A pack of cops ran towards him and I thought, Jesus Christ, finally this guy will stop getting pummeled! Boy was I wrong! The amazing heroes of the Las Vegas Metro Police put this guy to the ground so hard that when he hit the ground it sounded like a cinder block being dropped off of a house! WAIT A MINUTE HERE, THIS GUYS IS GETTING HIS ASS BEAT and now he is getting it from the cops? They handled him like he was a piece of shit. The girl, treated much differently of course. So both are handcuffed and her drunk ass is gingerly taken towards the now huge pack of police cars and of course, THE MONSTER is walked over being man handled real rough. Usually it takes some time for bruises to form, a mouse to form under an eye or an eye to close from being hit, but as this guy walked to the cop cars, you could see how badly he had been beaten! If nothing else, man oh man could that chick throw a punch! I could not believe what I had just witnessed! This victim of repeated assault was just assaulted again by the police. It was not like they were called to a domestic disturbance and had no idea what they were getting in to. While on their 50 - 75 foot run towards the couple, they could see that the guy was in know way even attempting to defend himself yet they put him to the ground like an animal!
I began to walk towards the cops to ask them what the hell was wrong with them and a woman security guard from the casino lot grabbed me and said, "don't do it honey", "they will arrest you as fast as they just did him", "Metro has ruined this event"! I stopped and said that it was okay, I was not drunk or anything and she shook her head and said "sweetie, it won't matter to them"! IT WON'T MATTER TO THEM? What kind of shit is that? I took her advice and stood there dumbfounded! I could not believe what I just witnessed. I in-fact just witnessed two separate assaults and it was disgraceful! At one point on Thursday night at the Pioneer Hotel parking lot, there were actually more cops on the property than there were people! I understand the need for security but what I don't understand is the need for intimidation and I guess I never will! They were so amped up and ready to go that I feared that I would be taken down for jay walking! So when I say there was good and bad about this trip, now you know what I mean. I have never seen the run so dead. The people were all in town, but Casino Drive, which you would liken to Main Street in Daytona where people run hot rods and bikes up and down, it's a real see and be seen type of atmosphere, was absolutely empty. The entire fun of the event is sitting alongside the road and people watching and on this weekend, there was none to be had! I GUESS NO BODY WANTED TO GO TO JAIL FOR ROLLING THROUGH A CROSSWALK!
In the end, I got to see friends that I hadn't seen in a while, I got to meet people that I have only known on line and I made new friends that I didn't even know yet and that part was great.
That's my 20 year old nephew who built this shovel as his first bike and rode all the way to Laughlin on it and picked up all the pieces that fell off along the way, way to go Jay Bird!
Will I be at Laughlin River Run next year? Probably? I'll just try to be extra careful not get beat up by a girl, I understand there are harsh penalties for that!
Until we see each other on the road,
Keep the wind in your face,
Tits in your back
and The Man off your ass!
Your friend,
Jack Shit
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