This Is What Happens When Bryan Makes Me Take a Vacation

I’m currently in Las Vegas.

Sorry, I should have started with a little more pizzaz…

JEN ZUG DOES VEGAS!

(If “does” is code for “reading a book in various locations within a one block square radius,” then that statement is totally accurate).

I might be the least Vegassy person I know, but I am nonetheless enjoying myself, not to mention that when I got here, I saw this guy for the first time in over a week:

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He is here on business as part of the core team at UP Global that is hosting the UP Summit. Holy cow are these people amazing! Over 500 enthusiastic, motivated, smart, and extroverted people from around the globe who are all excited about infecting the world with their startup culture.

The summit started Thursday, so after a few days of lounging around the pool, I’m excited to be learning and connecting with some great people.

Speaking of lounging around the pool…

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After arriving late afternoon on Tuesday, Bryan had a dinner meeting to attend, so I went down to the pool to read my book. All the lounge chairs around the pool were taken, but there was an entire section of empty chairs behind a red chain and I was all, Maybe that chain is just to make sure people fill up the other chairs first – like they sometimes do in church to make everyone sit toward the front – so clearly it’s okay for me to sit here now that they’re all full.

Well, apparently I entered a restricted cabana area. But a kind young security guard with a rather large walkie-talkie said that if I book a day in advance I can get this area for $100 cheaper!

Cheaper than what?? I didn’t ask, because that would have blown my cover as someone who goes to Vegas all the time.

So I apologized for not seeing the chain earlier (when I stepped over it) and moved to a chair in the non-cabana area. At that point I realized the $100-cheaper-than-something price gets you a cool mist spray from above, which the chairs in the regular area don’t have. This is an important detail, mind you, because it was 100 degrees as the sun was setting.

I totally felt like I was sitting third class on the Titanic, about to sink into heat stroke while first class guests are misted with a dewy spray.

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To prevent my nose and the part in my hair from burning in this unrelenting sun, I wanted to bring a hat to Vegas. The trouble is, I don’t have a cute sun hat, nor did I buy one before leaving.

I do that sometimes. I sabotage my intentions by doing absolutely nothing about them.

Here’s a fun experiment. Take a person who is never alone and is terrible at making decisions and drop her off at the airport alone with a backpack and a ticket to Vegas. You know what she might do? She might step into the cutest airport store ever to try on hats for wearing by the pool in her swimsuit, then become paralyzed because do you buy the practical hat you can wear with anything or the fun hat you can only wear by the pool because nothing else in your suitcase will go with orange plaid?

Keep in mind this person agonizes over the purchase of a single pair of shoes every four years or so because that one pair of shoes has to last for at least one Presidential term, be comfortable, and look equally good when worn to the grocery store or “out on the town” (do the kids still say “out on the town” or am I showing my age?) because GOD FORBID this person spend the money to buy situationally specific shoes for herself. At this point the odds are stacked against the fun hat or buying both hats because HELLO: one hat to rule them all until the next presidential election.

To be safe, this person might phone a friend, as it were, by texting pictures of both hats, and this friend might be completely unhelpful by pointing out all the wildly cute things you can wear with the orange plaid hat, causing your utilitarian, depression-era-frugal mind to explode from all the irresponsible ideas being suggested, but when faced with the possibility of what could be, you turn around and walk all the way back down Concourse C to exchange the practical hat for the fun hat, but not before trying them both on again several times, then walking out of the store with the practical hat again, the one you bought in the first place that represents all that is the opposite of dropping a woman off at an airport alone with a ticket to Vegas.

Here’s the hat I ended up with:

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My final lesson learned was the next morning – Wednesday – when went back down to the pool around 11:00.

I’d brought my sunscreen with me and began rubbing it all over my legs, arms, and chest. I’m sure applying sunscreen is a sexy experience for some demographics, but those of us with a lot of surface to cover and minor difficulty with flexibility, it probably looks a little like a giant bear trying to relieve an itch by rubbing up against a tiny tree trunk.

It was not a very flattering experience trying to get sunscreen all the way around my thigh. How else can you do this except by throwing your leg up in the air while rubbing yourself in areas that aren’t normally included in your public appearances?

(YOU’RE WELCOME FOR THE VIEW, FELLOW SUNBATHERS!)

If you know of any YouTube instructional videos on how to do this, I’d appreciate a link.

Needless to say, from that point on I applied sunscreen before I left the hotel room.

My vacation awkwardness leads me to consider two action points:

1) I need to go on vacation more often, or

2) I should never be allowed to go on vacation ever again.