It was a hazy Saturday afternoon. Gray methane clouds threatened to sprinkle acid rain on the strip. Perfect May weather to explore the nadir of western civilization during one of its hyped-up pre-fabricated holidays. C’mon, everybody, gather around, it’s time to celebrate an illiterate woman abuser’s surgical skill of bashing another human being’s skull.

And boy, did the people gather. I was one of them. It was a festive scene with mariachi bands, scantily-clad women with more stretch marks than sense, flocks of douche bros swigging cosmos spiked with Red Bull, escorts with hypnotic eyes that demanded immediate acquiescence, and a pair of Argentine lepers that kept trying to high-five strangers. Even a lice-ridden minister joined the fun, and railed against the evils of alcohol. I almost pissed on his leg ‘til I noticed a bicycle cop keeping a close eye on me. He didn’t know that the water bottles I held were filled with blanco tequila. I came to the strip to be a fly on the wall, not in the ointment. So I left the minister alone. I promised to not be on my weirdest behavior and that included urinating on men of the cloth. So I crashed a wedding instead. Why not? I had time to spare, and plus, everyone had on tie-dye tuxes and reeked of skunk. Perfect.

I was given a potent hash brownie by the best man from Duluth, and promptly passed out in a Bally’s ballroom. When I came to everyone had left, except for an elderly couple making out underneath a half-eaten wedding cake. Frosting was smeared all over their genitalia, causing me to try and pluck out my eyeballs. Luckily, I was wearing glasses. Day had made way for fight night; so I hurried out towards the MGM Grand, swigging one of the tequila water bottles dry.

There were plenty of fisticuffs outside the ring that night by inebriated macho tourists. I was provoked a few times, but too drunk to care. I’ve learned that if you’re gonna get drunk in public, get sloppy drunk instead of angry drunk. It’s always better to be the fool waking up in your own bed instead of the tough guy waking in a cell surrounded by tougher guys. That’s why now I only wear Pumas or Converse sneakers on the Strip because all bets are off if someone scuffs my Jordans.

I brought my cheap brass knuckles just in case, but sold them for fifty bucks to a bunch of angry Filipinos who had beef with Jamie Foxx’s entourage. It seems the Foxx crew were luring foreign women into their Bellagio penthouse suite for a night of pill popping and watersports. R Kelly was there also, chaperoning a high school field trip from Chi-town. I glanced into his suite and saw cupcakes laced with LSD, drop cloths, dirty diapers, and WD-40 for squeaky braces. All the while the movie Space Jam played on a continuous loop. Steve Wynn even stopped by for a few sloppy seconds.

It was a terrible scene, but not as bad as the reality of Mayweather being paid enough money in one night to fund a few thousand school teacher salaries for an entire year. That sort of reality has the potential to doom an entire society. We now live in a country where rapists are rewarded with the #1 pick in the NFL draft, and boxing brutes scrounge up enough hype to rival the Super Bowl. All is forgiven. Nothing means anything. And we don’t care because we like it this way. The crossroads are in our rearview, and so is our country’s tattered sanity.

All that matters now is how much money we make. Buy ‘til you die. Don’t look back, don’t look ahead. Counting cash is all that counts. Age ain’t nothin’ but a number, but it’s the only real number that counts (unless you’re R Kelly). And most people spend it spending. End up doing nothing, but rooting for nothing. Searching for self-worth in a circus society that values sports over schools, dollars over doing the right thing. And when money trumps everything else, then that’s when a country loses its soul.

We are decadent dunces, out of things to say or do, so we watch. The fight itself is hardly worth mentioning. Mayweather spends his time on the outskirts of the ring buzzing like a mosquito and stinging like a flea. This sort of drab boxing is what a nation of suckers deserves.

It’s a strange cruel dumb world when an Idiot Man walks into the ring followed by Burger King and Bieber. Then brags about the millions he makes for playing patty cakes when so many people are struggling around the country to make ends meet. This sort of reality is really none at all, and only leads to anarchy. And when I see Mayweather smile, I say so be it. Loot, plunder, and leave rich people asunder. When the poor people are done in Baltimore, I’ll Google-Map Mayweather’s mansion for them. It’s all the same, just a different game. Death, distraction into factions, then divide the fractions for the most profit. It sounds like a complicated algorithm of societal control, but it’s really not. Just feed the masses spectacle to keep them occupied, and then promote racial bigotry to keep them torn. We are united in name only, but all share the same psychosis. Ding, Ding, let freedom ring…