Vegas Rules

"There's just no quiet in Vegas." - Barry Manilow

Last February at my dear friend Colleen's birthday party, a group of women decided in a fanciful conversation that it would be fun to take a trip to Las Vegas - no kids, no partners.  I am writing this blog on the plane, headed home from a very fun, but very exhausting trip with four delightful women.  Though there was a time when we thought we would be a larger group, it ended up being Colleen, her sister Jocelyn, sister-in-law Christine, dearest childhood friend Janine and me.  We five range in age from 37 to 57, Christine being the former and I the latter.  Christine is an oncologist, Janine a neo-natal nurse, Colleen an accountant, Jocelyn a business woman and I, of course, an HR consultant.  Janine lives in Ottawa.  Christine lives in Vancouver.  At first blush, it would seem that we do not share much in common, but we are women and women somehow always seem to find the commonalities in our lives.  To start, we are all mothers and though our children range in age from four to twenty-two, we all love them and worry about them.  We never ran out of conversation.  We laughed a lot.  Shopped a lot.  Ate a lot.  And considering none of us is much of a drinker - drank a lot.  We shared clothes, and makeup and stories.  We spent an afternoon at Macy's making Janine over from head to toe in the earnest hope that at the end of the day, she would see what a beautiful woman she is.  Cristine bought Loubitan shoes, giving me a great vicarious thrill.  Colleen bought a beautiful dress to wear at her partner's Christmas party.  We all wish we could be there to see his reaction when she emerges in that dress.  We all treated ourselves to a new outfit or two and we all shopped for our kids.

What we didn't do much of, was sleep.  We started our days in the early morning and ended them in the early morning.  We went to a couple of shows and shared a couple of great dinners.  We gambled a little, sat at the pool a little, and talked, and talked, and talked.  The fanciful notion of another long weekend together next year arose in our conversation.  Another four days in Vegas would be great by me.