Yup. Totally copped that title from an Oscar-winning movie. But considering the S & F audience, I doubt more than 20% of our readership has ever seen it. And since it’s the film that forever lets Nic Cage say “I’m an Oscar caliber actor”, I feel like it still owes the world an awful lot.  And it’s still the hardest thing I’ve ever had to write.

Anyway, if you couldn’t guess from the cryptic title, my time in Las Vegas has come to an end. I moved here in January from Boston to take a job at the University of Nevada in Las Vegas, a job I had been waiting to get for over eighteen months. When I left my last job in this field, I did so with the intent of staying afloat until this one came open so I’d have a reason to move here, and that was exactly what I did.

Unfortunately, I had to start here on only a six-month contract while the state legislature jury-rigged the budgets to try and combat a massive financial shortfall and unemployment numbers reaching above 11% statewide. It seems the Higher Education system of Nevada is “overfunded”, leading the Governor of the state (not exactly the most popular Governor in the country) to propose a 36.5% across-the-board budget cut for all higher ed institutions. UNLV is the biggest in the state, and stood to take the biggest hit.

Even though a much smaller number was eventually bargained – something in the 12-15% range of budget cuts depending on which school you look at – it still wasn’t enough to save my ass. Being the new guy on the books, as well as earning a pretty decent salary, my job was the easiest to cut. (There may have been other, less scrupulous reasons but I’m not about to start lobbing accusations without proof). Rather than renew my contract with the 25% salary bump that was *wink wink* promised when I was offered the position in October, I was cut from the books in favor of two other employees with smaller salaries and less than 20% of my experience in a highly specialized field. Such is life.

I’ve known this was coming for a little over a month now. My contract ends on June 30^th (though I’ll be leaving earlier, as I am required to use my remaining vacation days before leaving), and when I didn’t hear anything about a renewal by the end of April I started getting a little anxious. After getting the bad news at the beginning of May, I started frantically searching for another job in this area. You see, when I left my last job in Pittsburgh, I couldn’t get out of the city fast enough (sorry Johnny). Pittsburgh isn’t exactly my kind of town, something I learned soon after moving there. But Las Vegas – I’ve been looking for a reason to move here since I graduated college in 2003. I lucked out on getting an astounding house and a great group of people as my roommates and friends, something I haven’t really had since college. I passed on multiple jobs while I was waiting for this one. I finally got my chance to live here, and it was over in six months.

It seems that nobody’s hiring in Southern Nevada in any of the fields I can work in – Medical Simulation, my profession since ’04, is ridiculously specialized and still a very small field nationwide. Computer Support – “Dave the IT fix anything guy” as I call it – is a wide open field, but with so many people able to fix computer hardware and software these days I can no longer walk into a job and write my own salary, meaning I’ll actually make more collecting unemployment than if I was working full time. Photography, audio/video editing and graphic design are all fields that I’m more than qualified to work in, but they all require a portfolio of work to display if you want any job above internship levels; I haven’t done anything that I can use in a portfolio since college. And writing doesn’t pay the bills – just ask, well, almost any blogger on the Instawebs.

So, I have to leave. I certainly don’t want to, but I don’t really get to make that choice. I would love to go back to playing cards full time, something I did (with little success) for ten months between my last two jobs to help cover the bills. But – ironic as this may sound – I can’t even begin to consider that a realistic option while living in Las Vegas. When you can live at home and mooch off your family’s house and food for a year without paying much rent, well then gambling for a living is a viable option. When you’re 2500 miles away paying rent, utilities, car, phone and food bills, things start to add up. Have one bad night at the tables (which, with my style of play, is usually a really bad night), suddenly you’re a month behind and putting the rent on a credit card at 19% interest.

I’m not writing this city off. There are only two places in the country I want to live – Vegas and Boston, in some order or another. I’ve got no desire to move to another random city just to take a job, and I already know that if I did, I’d probably leave within a year. I know people here, I know people in Boston, and that’s it. I’ve been something of a professional nomad for most of my life – the longest consecutive period I’ve ever held a full-time job was two years, ten months. When this move is done, I think I am too. I’ll settle down, find something – anything – that will pay the bills, and I’ll make the transition to a normal, boring life.

As for this return trip – well, I’m going to enjoy it. When I moved to Pittsburgh, it was a one day drive. When I moved home, I couldn’t go fast enough and even left during a blizzard just to get the hell out of the city. Coming here to Las Vegas I had to meet a deadline for a hotel stay and the start of my contract, so I blew through sixteen states going across the country without taking any real time to enjoy it. This time, I’m going to take my time going back to Boston and soak in some of what it has to offer.

I’ll be blogging the trip with late-night updates (hopefully with accompanying photos) from each stop along the way whenever I get into a hotel room. Rather than retracing the line I took when I moved out here, I’ll be taking a couple of detours to catch some baseball games. I’ve always wanted to do the typical guy trip, seeing all the ballparks or football stadiums in the country. I’ve done a nice job so far, reaching five Major League Parks (Fenway, Old Yankee Stadium, PNC in Pittsburgh, Wrigley and Miller Park in Milwaukee), and on this trip I’m looking to add a few more to the list.

When the trip begins, the Rockies are hosting the Pirates. Bonus – new ballpark in Coors Field, and I get to cheer against Pittsburgh (I’m starting to think I have an unhealthy dislike for that city, even if I supported the Penguins in the Stanley Cup Finals). After Denver, I’m hoping to take in one of the first two games of the Championship Round in the College World Series in Omaha. Once I finish with Nebraska, I’m heading back to Milwaukee to see Miller Park for the second time – yes, it’s a duplicate. But I got to go to Milwaukee with some friends last summer for a random day-trip and had a helluva time indulging my love of beer, brats and burgers, so I’m looking forward to doing it again. Plus, Bernie Brewer nearly killed me at the beer stand during the game, jumping up on the counter and almost taking me out in the process. We’ve got a score to settle.

After the heart attack I’m expecting to suffer in my time in Milwaukee, I head to Detroit for some interleague ball with the Cubs. Without a rooting interest in the game, I’m much more likely to just enjoy the park and hope for some type of Zambrano meltdown. And finally, I’m wrapping up my odyssey with Nationals Park in Washington DC, to see the Red Sox play on the road – something I’ve never actually done. I don’t think I need to elaborate on which team I’ll be supporting.

Once I get back to Boston, I’ll be reevaluating a lot of things, not the least of which is how the hell I’m going to make a living from here on out. It’s time to step back and take a realistic look at what I’m doing, both right and wrong, and make some changes. Don’t worry – you’ll still get to follow my below average gambling advice here on S & F. I’m not planning to go anywhere anytime soon. But everything else I do on a regular basis might have to change.

So if you’re in one of the areas I’m passing through, come on out and grab a beer and a burger. There’s plenty of good seats available at each of the games – cheap ones, too! I’m absolutely looking forward to the trip, having the time to sit in my car and just let my mind run wild, reflect on a lot of things, and then get ready for the next step. If you’re a part of the Sparty & Friends’ Facebook group, you’ll see my profile in there – I’ll hopefully be able to take plenty of photos of the countryside, even if they’re just cell phone shots of scenery whipping past my car window at ninety miles an hour.

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