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Your Ultra Modern Living Hostess |
Providing party planning, decorating & entertainment
for Mai Tais, Martinis and Other Special Ocassions! |
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All About Cherry Capri
Autobiography
Chapter 6) VaVoom! You’re in Las Vegas!
Wouldn’t you know it? I boarded the wrong plane. Well, these were gentler days where no one looked too closely at your ticket and assumed you knew where you were going.
The flight was to Las Vegas. Figuring that everything happens for a reason, I stayed put.
I had never been to Vegas before. The Parakeet Family flirted with Sin City a few times, but could never get the booking.
I found a room for rent in the old 6th street downtown neighborhood and got a job as a cocktail waitress
the Sands Hotel. I still had a fake ID from my clubbing days on the islands and it got me a job.
Besides the hotel had seen better days since Frank and the Rat Pack haunted the hallways and cute waitresses weren’t
knocking down their doors. It was a good gig and if you flirted with both sexes, you got better tips.
All my luggage was lost being that it was on the way to L.A. and I had to wing it with the clothes on my back and
a quick trip to the local thrift stores. Those were the glory days of thrifting. I found a plethora of polyester
pant suits much like the outfit I was wrapped in those many years ago on that bamboo raft. Thus, the ladies’ leisure suit
became my “look” because I had nothing else to wear.
While working the drinks I wore colored panty hose for easy glamour. It wasn’t exactly sanctioned by the management,
but they let it slide as long as the customers kept putting coins in the slots.
Actually, did you know you can make custom colored panty hose pretty easily?
I made mine by buying white hose and then dying them with Choo Choo Cherry Funny Face.
I experimented with Kool Aide, but it just didn’t have the same results.
And remember, if you ever run your hose, you divert the negative attention to something else…
spill a drink on someone’s lap and your problem is solved!
For two years I worked the second shift at Sands and eventually moved on to the Dunes.
My fascination with Las Vegas history began as I hungrily ate up all the trivia and urban myths I could find.
I also enrolled myself in the Tropicana Beauty School.
Classes were on Mondays and Tuesdays, and Wednesday through Sunday was the casino.
With no nights off, there wasn’t much time for socializing,
but I made friends with the bartenders wherever I worked. I was fascinated with the art of mixology and I must say that Las Vegas is a pretty fun town to turn 21 in.
It was around that time that I invented the Cherry Martini. It was inspired by the famous blue martinis at the Sultan’s Table at the Dunes. This was long before designer martinis and martini bars became the rage. I had to fortify my own cherry juice as it was not a staple in most bars, but it was worth it. There’s nothing like the taste of a Cherry Martini. It’s sweet, yet bitter, like cherry cough syrup, only you can drink lots more than two tablespoonfuls at a time. Well at least I can…
The Dunes was a huge place to wander around and I loved to hang out by the door to the Dome of the Sea and watch the harpist play on the giant lilypad. And I learned about showmanship from the magic violinists who would perform with choreographed dancing around the Sultan’s Table.
I never had the nerve to be a topless showgirl, although I must admit to being intrigued by the idea. Instead I chose to enter the Miss Eviscerator beauty contest. The contest was held by the Flamingo pool in front of Bugsy’s old bungalow low rise motel rooms. I won 1st runner up, but the girl who won the contest was disqualified when they found out 'she' would have been more suited to enter the Mr. Eviscerator contest.
My first scheduled appearance as Miss Eviscerator was at the Meat Packer’s conference. I was thrilled to wear the banner and attend the conference because I used to make a lot of protein shakes in blenders back in my early days on the beach.
I got to the Las Vegas Convention center around 9AM. As I got out of the taxi, I proudly slipped my sash over my head
and settled it across the new cocktail dress I had bought just for the occasion. When I made it to the booth,
I found out I would be highlighting the E.V. series 400 Deluxe Model 2 with optional stainless accessories.
Then I couldn’t believe my eyes. An eviscerator was not a blender!!!!
As I saw the photos of the product in action and the the reality of what I was promoting dawned on me
I ran screaming out the double doors and past the conventioneers streaming in and smack dab into a bouffant blonde
with a well groomed man on her arm. The lady maintained her composure, but the guy went flat down on his right arm on the floor with me on top of him.
There was a gasp from all around and I realized I better get out of there quick. The man looked familiar, but I couldn’t place the face and I didn’t have time to think. I was so embarrassed I just sprung up right away and ran like the dickens and kept running all the way back to my little room on 6th street.
When I read the newspapers the next day, the headlines read “Heiress finance flattened by fleeing femme fatale!”
I was disqualified and my title was stripped leaving the 2nd runner up to take over my duties.
All I have left after that episode is my sash which I have kept all these years to remind me of my pledge I made that day not to eat the cute little animals ever again. Mom was right.
It was rough not having any days off and I flunked out of beauty school due to some trouble in tinting class.
My instructor and I had a disagreement about the color of my hair. I was a bit ahead of my time using bright punky red
color to enhance my already natural red hair. She thought it was outlandish while I was quite pleased with the result.
Besides, it was getting time for me to leave the Entertainment Capitol of the World anyway.
I left Vegas before they blew up the Dunes. I couldn’t bear the thought of it going and I knew that the Sands
was not far behind. It really became the catalyst for me being pro-architectural preservation.
Harkening back to my earliest days making treasures from trash, I hate to see needless destruction and
things go to waste.
And even though the Sands is long gone, it still gives me chills to see the old neon signage on the convention center
façade on Sands Street and it reminds me of those last few sunset moments of the golden era of Las Vegas.
Chapter 7) I'm Going Home
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