Every few months I get in this funk where I reminisce about what it was like to be 25 and realizing for the first time that my 20’s were half over? How I was conscious of it at the time, and that’s why I made sure to savor every moment. Because by then, I had come face to face with one of life’s harshest truths: that I would never be able to wear Spandex again and that my youth was gone…behind me… a thing of the past like the soft touch of my smooth hairless teenage buttocks.

Then all of the sudden I was 27 and thinking “fuck, wait…how much is botox?”

And then before I knew it I was 31. I’d opted out of the Botox because, thanks to Jonathan, my officious-sounding-partner’s Wicked challenge for me to defy gravity I’m trying to do it naturally….only doughnuts and the occasional pizza slice are mysteriously not diet foods. Who knew?

So together we buy local organic produce from the San Francisco’s farmers’ markets and shifted our drinking from hard liquors to Pinots and Cabs, because we blindly believe it’s good for our hearts and we want to live long enough for that Smuckers birthday shout out.

Life now has a completely different smell, sound, taste, and touch. It’s a different pace, and what hindsight I do have, reveals my early 20s to have been a five-year haze of 14-hour-days on what little fuel I had after a 3a.m. Abbey WeHo flirt-fest cloaked in “vodka-crans” and Parliament cigarettes that ended with the best “sobering” chicken soft tacos from Los Tacos. A Red Bull and a few bat-shit-filled diet pills got me through longs days spent climbing the entertainment ladder just so I could burn the fat consumed the night before at the gym while flirting with guys I was too insecure to pursue… but I digress. The cycle was repeated day in and day out until all of the sudden I was shackled to adulthood by my boyfriend, the purchase of a condo, and my irritatingly popular black-Jew Labrador, Eddie. Yeah, my 20’s were fan-fucking-tastic!…but…but…they’re over.

Red Bulls have morphed into artisanal cups of leaf-designed coffee-flavored-foam that are eight bucks apiece. We pay for everything with our smartphones through Yelpface, or some shit, which is some new mash-up-app in Beta that only makes me feel older and more out of the loop, because I don’t know how to use it. My days are filled with backaches and gas, only now, I only get a few hours of productivity from my morning caffeine fix and there’s still bat-shit in it. My body is aged, deflated (or inflated in some places), and showing the side effects of gravity. Twelve hours of sleep still isn’t enough after an evening rager on the couch salivating over Andy Cohen’s dreamy Jewess-ness and gorgeous gray hair during three hours of the Housewives of New York reunion.

I try to rationalize my use of the words “umbrella policy” and “estate planning” as being responsible, but they just mean my base cost of living is climbing. But what scares me the most is the fact that just the other day I actually considered taking a water aerobics class. And that’s when drastic measures need to be taken.

That’s when you need a weekend in Vegas!

I know it sounds cheesy, but I’m telling you, there’s a reason The Hangover did so well at the box office. Millions of men and women can sympathize with this very same dilemma. Nobody wants to resign to the fact that they have a FUPA (fat upper penis/pussy area) and their pants will never sit low on their hips again.

So here’s what you do:

Go to Vegas with a group of good friends. It’s good to include at least one on the verge of germination, because they’re the best Vegas-goers behaving like the trip is their last big hurrah before diapers and diarrhea. You gamble and binge on gourmet food prepared by some of the best chefs in the world. Don’t waste your money trying to get into a nightclub, because it’s not worth it and when you dance now, your ass doesn’t touch the floor like it used to.

When you’re flying home, wherever that may be, and you’re scratching at your moisture-deprived eyes with a thick black film under your finger nails and you smell like second-hand smoke…that’s when you’ll think to yourself “I’ve still got it!”

Blue Ribbon Sushi Bar & Grill

Hamachi sashimi. For begin landlocked in Vegas, Blue Ribbon Sushi Bar & Grill sure knows how to pick the freshest fish you can find. These super thick cuts of yellowtail melted like butter and didn’t need any soy sauce of wasabi.

Dragon Roll with shrimp tempura on the inside, and eel and avocado on the outside. This is a pretty standard roll you find on most sushi menus, but it was done very well here.

Kanpachi Usuzukuri: thinly sliced amberjack with Yuzu and jalapeno pepper.

An assortment of nigiri: Madai (Japanese red snapper), Kanpachi (Amberjack), Hirame (Fluke).

Dynamite: sea scallop with wild mushroom and smelt roe. This was tasty, but I don’t think I would order it again if I had the chance. There was too much dynamite mayo sauce and it over powered the grilled mushrooms and already creamy scallops.

Smoked pork belly Kushi Yaki with pickled red onions and baby watercress.

Kobe beef appetizer. Each single bite of beef was perfectly marbled with fat evenly distributed throughout the piece of meat, which is why it falls apart when you start to chew it.

Beef marrow with sea salt, shaved bonito and teriyaki sauce. You just scoop the marrow out from the bone and slather it on a piece of crusty bread. The bread serves as a blank canvas for the marrow, which is a celebration of lipids in your mouth.

Bucket O’Wings with wasabi honey and Asian chili sauce. These were the best chicken wings I think I’ve ever had. They really hot and I think I burned my mouth a few times on the piping hot juices squirting out from within as I took each bite. The wasabi honey dipping sauce was so good I wanted to rub it all over my body like lotion.

And one of the best things I’ve ever put in my mouth was the….

Oxtail fried rice with daikon, shitake and bone marrow. They bring this bowl of fried rice to the table with a ribbon of egg omelet on top. Then they chop up the egg and mix everything together at the table and serve you. Talk about umami flavor profile! The deliciously moist torn pieces of oxtail meat hits your tongue and the creamy bone marrow coats every bite of rice. Pieces of green onions help to cut through the richness of the dish.

Grilled half chicken with bok choy, sweet potato puree drizzled with teriyaki sauce.

For kicks we ordered a side of roasted mushrooms but these were not worth it.