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las vegas, that misunderstood desert jewel

@Sebastian Blair2/14/2026blog

so i woke up to a ceiling fan spinning like it was trying to escape the heat. the room smelled like old carpet and lukewarm pizza. weather’s been a thing lately. i just checked and it’s that weird desert chill where you feel both hot and allergic at the same time. humidity’s at 25%, which is basically the atmosphere trying to nod off. if you get bored, the strip’s neon glow is just a few exits east. i heard that the local dive bar serves green chili fries but the waitress is a retired shark who judges your life choices through a kaleidoscope lens. something a local warned me about.





there was this one moment where i saw a group of teenagers trying to film a ‘viral’ video at a abandoned tumbleweed lot. they were screaming into a camera so loud that a vulture flew off. it was surreal. i almost joined them but realized my phone had died. classic.




"don’t trust the reviews. they’re all written by people who’ve never actually been there."


i took a photo of a faded sign that read ‘welcome to boulder city’ and posted it on that unsplash thing. it turned out to be a triple threat. the first image was of a blue and white stadium under blue sky during daytime. honestly, it looked like a simulator arcade. the second one showed green trees on a mountain during daytime. which made sense because boulder city is… well, a mountain town with a weird marketing budget. the third was a man in a neon trench coat trying to sell counterfeitured snacks. yelp lovers’ trap, maybe.



i saw a couple having a fight over a smoothie at a gas station. the man was yelling about ‘sugar content’ while the woman held a straw like it was a sword. i walked away slowly. neighbors here are either late-night concert goers or people who think ‘cozy’ means ‘air conditioned panic room.’ some told me that the nearby desert hike has more snakes than you can shake a stick at. which is probably true. i’d pay to see that logic in action.



webmd said heat stroke is bad. i say if you’re 15% comfortable and 85% sweating, you’re doing it right. also, the air quality’s kind of an existential crisis. pollution’s like a bloc of cheese grater humming outside yours. on the plus side, the stars are so bright you can see constellations that aren’t in your astrology app.



i linked to a tripadvisor page for a random diner. the average rating was 3.2 but 75% of reviews were from people who mentioned ‘dramatic exit.’ yelp had photos of a chef juggling knives while wearing a squirrel costume. that’s not a thing. i added a link to a local forum where someone asked if the desert is actually haunted. the answer was no, but the thread had 12 pages of people sharing ghost sightings. tourist weirdness, i guess.



i tried making a meme about the weather but it just came out as pixels. maybe that’s the point. life in 15.44c feels like a bad dream you can’t wake up from. or maybe it’s the hypothalamus. neighbor concerns? if you’re driving through, the gas prices are like a sadist’s math problem. 4.99 for regular, 6.66 for ethically sourced fossil fuel. don’t ask.



i recommend avoiding the area after 10pm. too many people trying to reenact steve jobs’ suicide at the surrendering convenience store. instead, hit the boardwalk. it’s where the weirdest tourists go. i saw a guy in a full burqa trying to do yoga. he looked like he was auditioning for a commercial about inner peace. booked.



links to think about: tripadvisor las vegas reviews, yelp boulder city highlights, urban legend forums. also, that unsplash page where the stadium photo is. it’s weirdly viral. the vulture story’s probably going viral too. who knows.



ps. the boy next door? he’s a conspiracy theorist who claims the wifi is run by aliens. he sets up a hotspot in his backyard and charges $5 for 3g. i haven’t confirmed this but the story checks out in my head. chaotic? absolutely. are you sure this is a neighborhood? probably not. but it’s our chaos now.



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About the author: Sebastian Blair

Writing with intent and a dash of humor.

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