I am: Fig Tart

A few weeks ago, Dennis and I drove up to Reno with Will (an actor in the company here) to see our friend Eric Weaver in 42nd Street at the El Dorado Casino. We had never been to Reno before. I had heard tale of this magical place from my dear friend Taylor Katai whose father lives there, but I still was not quite prepared.

Reno is a strange mirage of casinos and hotels in the middle of nothing. I hear that is what all the big cities in Nevada are like. Well, the show was great and Eric tapped his little heart out. Also, we realized part way through the show that another friend, Melinda was playing on of the leads. She was fantastic! And afterwards we found that another friend, Kristin, was the stage manager.

We hadn't had time to get dinner before we got to the show, so by the time it had ended we were famished to no end. We desperately searched through the casino to find a restaurant, which sounds easy but is no walk in the park.

Casinos are gigantic! And there are places where you feel like you are outside, but you aren't. You are in a some oversized hallway with a sky painted on the ceiling and mirrors and flashing lights enclosing in on you.

So, after stumbling around the hallways of trickery, we stumbled upon a restaurant called the Roxy.

As soon as we sat down these two sixty year old women at the next table started staring at us. If you don't already know this about me, crazy people love me. If there are a thousand people in an open field hanging out and one of them is crazy and one of them is me, that lunatic will without a doubt run directly over to me and ask me if he knows me from our time in the Japanese Interment Camp. No, sorry you loon, I've not trekked through Manzanar this lifetime, we must know each other from somewhere else. Then in his rage, he will through glitter in my face and tell me I've been a terrible wife and an even worse cat.

Dennis leaned over to ask me, "Do you know those women?

"No." I replied.

"Are you famous?"

"Not here. Not in Reno."

We went on to enjoy a lovely meal (Rosemary chicken is a dear friend to me). The two lushy old birds were finishing up their second bottle of wine when they decided to approach.

Drunk cougar number one asked us "Which dessert should I get?" whilst waving the dessert menu around like it was overcooked linguine.

"You should get whatever dessert you want to get," I retorted icily.

"Should I get the fig tart?" She obviously doesn't take hints well. At this point my sarcasm was tickling the back of my throat like acid reflux.

"I told you never to call me that."

Two can play this game, she thought.

"I'll call you whatevers I wants to, you fig tart!" The words were definitely slurring together like grapes in a wine bottle. "Fig tart! YOu're a figgg tart."

Luckily she got tired and left. And I was bestowed an extremely unexpected nickname.