Big, massive props to DragonScribe, who gave me a crash course in Japanese artifacts and history. Everything correct in the recap is due to her; all errors were introduced by me.
We open with a shot of the south end of the Strip --
Me: Hey, look! It's our view from the suite we stayed in this weekend.
Mr. Sobell: No, it's not. Because there's the Trop.
Me: It's our view except for the Trop.
Mr. Sobell: Except we were in the Trop and --
Me: Silence!
Mr. Sobell: That's not our view --
Me: You're ruining my story.
Mr. Sobell: I'll shut up now.
Me: Too late. The moment's over.
And I would have regaled you with a story about how we decided to go to Vegas last weekend on a whim, and that whim landed us in a massive traffic jam outside Barstow for almost two hours thanks to a four-truck pileup, and by the time we finally dragged ourselves into the Tropicana's lobby at 2:30 AM Saturday, seven and a half hours after leaving from L.A. after work on Friday, we had lost our room, but then the manager gave us a complimentary upgrade to a suite, where we had a fabulous view and an in-room Jacuzzi, and I had the opportunity to sit in the Jacuzzi with a drink in hand and ponder if I was wrong to make fun of the Montecito for comping everyone. (My well-considered, if slightly tipsy answer: No. No, I was not.)
But the moment's passed. So no story for you! Direct your complaints to Mr. Sobell. He's used to dealing with mine.
But you're not here to get travel updates from me. You'd rather read about how the camera swoops around to the Bellagio and someone with an indeterminable accent declares, "People say that Lass Vegass hasnoculture. No hisstory. That we ahmulate, not create. They forget [beat] that this was once a dessssert [beat] from which thisss city [beat] wasscreated. Millionss come every week [beat] and sharetheirmoney with uss --" If, by "share," you mean "lose." "Well, tonight, we give back [beat] an exhibition of rare and valuable Japanese antiquities [beat] shown in the U.S. for the firsst time. The sseventeenth century is owned by one of the Mediterranean's most special guessts. Mr. Yuri Yamamoto. Who ssahdly cahn't be weeth us here tonahght. To hiss impeccable taste. On buhhahlf of mah hotel and the city of Lass Vegass, Ithankhim." Y'all, I only transcribe this stuff phonetically; I don't tell the actor to speak like this. The well-dressed crowd makes a polite, murmuring toast. Everyone drinks the bubbly, and then there's a big dramatic scream.
“ Fortunately, the alarms goes off. They must have detected a plot point in the vicinity. ”
We switch to a woman standing at the edge of the pool, gasping, "The cable fell! He was electrocuted! Oh my God!!" She flings herself on the nearest man in a show of horror. People mill around, the security guard checks the body floating face-down in the pool, and there's general mayhem, or at least as much mayhem as a bunch of entirely-too-sober society types can generate by shuffling around muttering, "Peas and carrots, rhubarb, rhubarb, crime scene, peas and carrots, guy floating in pool, rhubarb." The live wire crackles, and Bloviating Accent Guy ("Ask me [beat] about the Kim Delaney schooloftempo!") just stands in the middle of the crowd looking really casual for someone whose party just got blown by a fuse.
Cut to the CSIs coming in: Gil must have called Sara in on a personal day again -- a personal day she spent on Ice Station Zebra. The two of them pass Brass, whose "Watch yourself, Gil" goes totally unheeded. Gil checks out the body, which is floating in a face-down, spread-eagled position while the wire still snaps, crackles, and pops merrily. I can't believe nobody's tried to cut a circuit and take that thing out yet. Gil comments, "This is odd: arms and legs become dead weight in the water. He should have sunk to the bottom of the pool." Sara gleefully adds, "He wouldn't float until after putrefaction." Gil replies, "Nice try, Sara, but the promotion's off the table, so can the fancy talk." Oh, not really. I just figured since the writers have a big hate-on for Sara this season, why not just draw all that passive-aggressive interaction out into the open? Anyway, speaking of passive-aggressive interaction, Gil asks Sara to head toward the danger (i.e. the snapping power cable) so that he can stick a non-conducting metal pole in the pool without danger.
Sara comes over, hauling the car battery fueling the "power cable" with her. Gil looks a little appalled. Perhaps that's because Sara's hefting a car battery like it's a bag of groceries, and Gil's realized that she has super-strength, so she can snap his neck like a pretzel if she ever stops moping over The Love That Won't Be and gets good and angry instead. Anyway, now that Sara's eliminated the chance for Gil to get electrocuted, he's okay with fishing the body out of the pool, and the music does this little Psycho strings shriek as Gil lifts the head and finds out that he's cradling a CPR dummy. Brass shakes his head, and Gil shrugs, "This is not a crime scene."
Fortunately, the alarms goes off. They must have detected a plot point in the vicinity. Everyone heads inside where, sure enough, some presumably priceless sword is missing from its case. The security guard rolls his eyes expressively from behind his duct-tape cocoon. Gil raises his eyebrows and say with just a touch of asperity, "This is a crime scene!" Well, thank God for that. We'd hate to see Gil waste his time, wouldn't we?