Las Vegas Weekly

June 20, 2012 · 10:10 AM

Backing down and regretting it

By Rick Lax

An encounter with an escalator repairman at Mandalay Bay. What would Weezer do?

It’s my girlfriend’s younger brother’s 17th birthday. I’m taking them to see Weezer at the Mandalay pool. We park in the garage and walk towards the escalators. The down one is in repair.

It’s not too crowded in the garage and the escalators aren’t very long, so I propose to the group running down the up escalator. This is where the escalator repairman chimes in:

“I wouldn’t do that if I were you.”

He didn’t say we weren’t allowed; he was offering an opinion. So I ask my girlfriend what she thinks, and she considers it.

“You’d be a fool to do it,” the repairman ads, unprompted.

“Well,” I tell him, “I’ve done it before, and lived to tell the tale. And I don’t feel that I’m a fool, so…”

I swear to God, this was what he interrupted me to say: “Well, you look like one.”

Under most circumstances, I would have taken a pic of the guy with my camera phone, taken down his name, and reported him to MGM management. (I’ve done things like this before.) But because I’d just met my girlfriend’s bro and because I didn’t want him thinking I just go around looking for fights, I let it slide.

I’ve regretted my decision ever since.

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