Vegas Diary: Part Tomorrow — The Lady Opportunist
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Vegas Diary: Part Tomorrow — The Lady Opportunist

This is not to say that I should have known better and come here earlier. No, you have to be ready for this place, unless of course you were born here and have been immersed in it your whole life.

I say you have to be ready, because Vegas finds a way of zeroing in on your vice. Finding your deepest weakness and exploiting it by offering you what you think you want while painlessly extracting its own needs.

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Las Vegas Tour Company
Contributor, Poetry Contributing Writer Contributor, Poetry Contributing Writer

Las Vegas Tour Company

on the corner
of Casino Center and Colorado with the studded thongs and the leashes around their slim necks and those high- waisted hot-pants hiked up to that sinched waist terrified by the possibility of beauty, while forgetting what
it might
be
...slowly
losing
life

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Hope Idiotic | Part III
David Himmel, Fiction David Himmel David Himmel, Fiction David Himmel

Hope Idiotic | Part III

A MONTH LATER AT WORK, JUST BEFORE LUNCH, CHUCK BURST FROM HIS OFFICE into the area where Lou and I sat. He ran his hands through his short hair, clawing his scalp.

“Fucking Jesus!” he said.

Lou and I swiveled our chairs toward him and leaned back ready for the meltdown.

“Department meeting!” Chuck said. “Now! Cuba Café! Neal, you drive!”

“I can’t. I have to get gas.”

“Good. Get it on the way back.”

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Hope Idiotic | Part I
David Himmel, Fiction David Himmel David Himmel, Fiction David Himmel

Hope Idiotic | Part I

SHORTLY AFTER THE HEIGHT OF AMERICA’S FLAGRANT PATRIOTISM FOLLOWING 9/11, and just before the dawn of The Great Recession, there existed a wonderful Italian restaurant called Bella’s Ristorante. It was built into the foothills of the Black Mountain Range just outside of Las Vegas in Henderson, Nevada, a few short and dusty miles from the Strip at the edge of a wealthy suburban subdivision. My best friends Chuck Keller and Lou Bergman adored the place.

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Welcome to Fabulous Las Vegas: Advice from a Former Las Vegan to the Valley’s Newest
David Himmel David Himmel David Himmel David Himmel

Welcome to Fabulous Las Vegas: Advice from a Former Las Vegan to the Valley’s Newest

At the time of this writing, my friend and former Chicago-based poet, model, and musician, Dana Jerman is residing in her new home in Las Vegas, Nevada. Her husband, co-editor of Literate Ape, longtime storyteller mainstay, and man with a complicated relationship with his feet, Don Hall is just three days out from loading up the last vestiges of their Chicago life — forty years between the two of them — into his Prius to make the drive west and begin a new adventure in a part of America Joseph Smith once referred to as a “great place to do anal with child brides and legally take money from the Jews.”

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Buying Whores for Chuck Berry and a Threat from Jerry Lee Lewis
David Himmel, Fiction, Literate Ape Press David Himmel David Himmel, Fiction, Literate Ape Press David Himmel

Buying Whores for Chuck Berry and a Threat from Jerry Lee Lewis

“You work for the radio station?” he asked again.

“Yes, sir, Mr. Lewis. I’m Dr. Dave Maxwell. What can I help you with?” Little Richard walked past us, and he,  too, looked frail and worn down. The Killer glared at him as he passed. The Innovator didn’t seem to notice. Jerry Lee turned his gaze back at me, his eyes smaller now, his face taut with rage.

“Can you do me a favor, boy?”

“Of course.” 

“Don’t let that niggah touch my pianah.” He and his two men went on their way.

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Las Vegas Stinks... of Possibility
Don Hall Don Hall Don Hall Don Hall

Las Vegas Stinks... of Possibility

One of the most asked questions I’ve been fielding lately in this new pursuit for a home in the Mojave is “Why Vegas?” proffered in the same way one would ask you why I was wearing that gold sequined tube top to church or why I got that Joey Laurence neck tattoo.

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Too Close for Comfort... Inn
Contributing Writer Contributing Writer

Too Close for Comfort... Inn

Six months into the relationship, Dan proposed something that forever changed the course of their relationship.

He invited her to Las Vegas.

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Bad Day
David Himmel David Himmel David Himmel David Himmel

Bad Day

I wrote this under distress.

The day began to my wife waking me up in my hotel room before sunrise. I thought someone had died. They had.

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