On last night's episode everyone left cushy Beverly Hills for the fuzzy thrills of Las Vegas, that town fueled by money and sweaty desire. It's a glitzy place, but it's a sad place too. And last night was no exception.

Oh heavens! Isn't everyone on this show so sad? Well, OK, I'd guess that Lisa Vanderpump is doing OK in the happiness department. She's just obliviously rich and has so many slaves that one of them spends all her time standing in Lisa's closet, waiting for someone to come and try on clothes. That is pretty rich! Once you've got a closet slave, you are basically Lucius Malfoy rich. (Word of warning, Lisa: Don't give the closet slave a piece of clothing!) Plus Lisa's husband is basically just a fun, scruffy British terrier come to life, so who's gonna complain about that. Lisa's a product of the Fine Factory, she's doing fine.

EVERYONE ELSE? Hooftie. Let's see. Is Camille the worst person on the show? She just might be! She is pretty, pretttyyyyyy wretched. Never before in the history of Real Housewives, seriously, has there been a contestant (they're basically contestants, aren't they? eventually one wins) who is so blatant about the fact that she's on a television show for the sole purpose of bragging. Last week she did the little smirk about all of "her" properties, and this week it was this dopey winking and face-sharting about her sexy tennis slave Nick. Ughhh. Remember when they were playing tennis at the beginning of the episode and he was like "Do you think we have enough balls?" and Camille was trying to be all fun and sexy and said "Do you have somewhere to put all those balls?" And it was, duh, trying to be innuendo-y, but like... what does that mean? That Nick has more than the regular two testicles and that he's, what, going to put them all inside Camille's mouth or vagina? Was that the implication? That's the thing about when these goose-brain Housewives try to do the sexual innuendo game. It always comes off so awkward. "Oh look, the dogs out there chewing on sticks. I could probably chew on a stick...." "Uh. You want to chew on my penis?" "I.... Um. Stickkkk..." It's just so embarrassing and gross and stupid. Badly done, Camille. Extremely badly done. Also, I know about editing and all that, so maybe they were playing tennis for longer than a hot second, but why the hell was Camille so out of breath? She's a reasonably young fifty-seven-year-old woman! She should not be so out of breath. But she was, and it was annoying. And she purred more about Kelsey, and it was annoying. And Nick is what one might call a "cockfinger", and it was annoying. Everything about Camille is wretchedly annoying. And sad! And sad too. More about the sad later.

Another sad creature is the Maloof. The Maloof is hidden behind walls of makeup and hair and opulent marble, but you can still see a little bit of her dark light pulsing through a crack or two in the overly buffed veneer. The Maloof lives in an enormous mansion and her only company there is her husband. And her husband is... Well, her husband has a plastic surgeried lower lip that is so plastic surgeried that he can't eat or drink or smile properly. It's just a useless, ever-shiny (eyyughhh) appendage hanging off of his face. So if that was the thing, the only other thing, that was stalking around your enormous pile of marble and echo, then I think you'd be pretty sad too. So what the Maloof does to forget about the sadness is invite people on opulent trips to go visit things she owns. First it was to go see the Sacranmenty Kingses, a cute little basketed-ball squadron. And last night it was to go to Las Vegas where the Maloof owns the Palms Casino & Fucktel, a quaint little joint that's not even on the Strip. It's a real classy place, what with its "Hugh Hefner Sky Villa" and all. So yeah, she invited all these ditzy dopes to Las Vegas for the weekend so the show could have an episode. These are the things that the Maloof, all hood-lidded and purple, does to cover up her husband-related miseryterror.

Everyone was so excited for the trip! Lisa organized a pre-trip luncheon so everyone could get to know each other and hopefully insult each other a little bit before they were stuck is Lars Veegums together. It went swimmingly. Camille showed up with that strange "I just blew someone" look on her face and started complaining about how her kid is sick with a stomach flu and Kelsey is nowhere to be found so thank god she has her four nannies. And it wasn't some "Ohhh you" stupid Housewife move. I think Camille said it for the express purpose of bragging about her four nannies! Camille! No! No! You do not do that. You do not brag about your four nannies! You mention them like it's no big deal and everyone playing along at home laughs at you and we all feel a little bit of catharsis, a bit comfier in our own ruined lives. Stop doing the game this way, Camille. Because it is the wrong way. So that was a dumb thing that happened at Lisa's lunchtime Lisa Luncheon, and the other dumb/sad thing was that Kim showed up and was herself. Kim! Oh lawdy, she is just the living saddest. That poor woman is going to, like, disappear in the woods near Klamath Falls one day and though they'll never find her, everyone will nod their heads, because they know, and say "Yeah... terrible thing, that. Terrible, sad thing." Kim showed up to lunch talking about some date she was going on and everyone chuckled at her and her evil sister Kyle was like "Let me pick the guys," in her loud stupid donkey-horse moan. "Because your track record is baaaad." And Kim just sort of went puddle-eyed and slack-mouthed and you felt so sad for her, so sad that her life is just this series of injurious moments, little scratches and dings and dents and scrapes that eventually add up, when you step back and really look, you can see that they make a whole mural or map of sadness and hurt. Little damaging lunchtime moments like this — her sister, on camera, braying about all the man mistakes Kim has made. How mean. How typical. How totally Kim.

So that stunk, but it also kinda stunk good. We also got to spend more time with sorrow-laden Taylor and her cruel nerdlinger of a husband. Russell. Could he have any other name than Russell? That he is named Russell is about as perfect as the Maloof being named the Maloof. It just works so perfectly. Russell. With his thin smear of black duckling feather hair and the volleyball gut he hides with dumbly hanging dress shirts. Lisa made a funny about him, saying that Taylor calls him a strapping Texas cowboy and then he walks in, just Russell, just shy-but-mean dumpy Russell. And she laughed. And we laughed. And somewhere up in dreary heaven, the saints sighed and changed the channel. And poor Taylor. She went to the doctor one day and ordered "the Julia Roberts" and walked out with the Eric Roberts. Which is unfortunate. Also unfortunate is the fact that Taylor her husband's suitcase for him and then he ungratefully tells her that he has to go on business during their vacation weekend and Taylor's poor face falls as much as it can fall these days and somewhere Alexis from Orange County stands up and says "Heed my call, sister!" Because they are very similar. Seems to be a very California thing, these miserable trophy wives. These broke husbands. Are you sensing the sad theme here? It's really all the show's about.

So anywits! They go to Las Vegas. They get in a limo then a plane then another limo and there they are, roaring across the desert like Rommel on weekend furlough, headed toward the dark and mysterious Palms. Once there, the Maloof bragged about how she doesn't like to brag ("It's not my style," says the woman to a reality show producer who is interviewing her for the reality show she auditioned for and agreed to be on) and she showed them her brilliant brainchild: A basketball suite. Yeah, like because the Maloofs own basketball, and also suites, so basketball suite. A natural fit. It's a hotel suite with a basketball court in it and various things that made Taylor feel like she was "in a rap video." Pretty soon she'd be at a rap concert, because the girls were going to Jay Z! No one likes Jay Z quite like rich, white, fiftysomething women. That's for darn tootin'. But yeah, the suite was ridiculous and then all the wives went to go check into their own fancy rooms. Russell said something lewd and horrible about "hitting the minibar and getting naked" which made all of us die. And, oh heavens, Kim went to her hotel room, all alone, so empty, and did a sad Sofia Coppola look-out-the-window shot, the sharp orange sun a hard, vanishing blot on the horizon, her heart playing cello music. It was beautiful and artsy and awful. Kim, put down the mic pack and walk away. Get outta there! This will only make you sadder. It is not an effective video personal ad, trust me. It's gonna backfire. (I wish the TV would, just one time, respond to me when I talk to it.)

Um. Oh, so they all went to dinner and the Maloof's husband told this bizarre story about the Maloof not being able to cook well and it made no sense and then Kyle's husband was like "I love youuuuuuuuuuuuu smookiboobs" and Kim was so devastated that she didn't have some awful husband to say things about her in the weird, dark private dinner room. And I can understand that. I mean, after she expressed her sadness, Camille told the lovely story of her first appointment date with Kelsey and then Russell made a "joke" that he had his lawyer call Taylor's lawyer and then he "joked" about how the prenup was written before they even met and "ha ha" I say to those "jokes". But then they told another story about Taylor seeing the strapping Russell across a restaurant and wanting to be with him, and everyone was just so blatantly rude about that. "WAIT, WHAT??? Are you sure it wasn't the other way around? WHAT? HONK FART RATTLE???" Good social skills, guys.

Then it was turtle time! And when Camille does Turtle Time, it is horrrrrrrifyyyying. Mostly because she dances like someone a third of her age (25) but also because the Maloof's husband reeeeallly liked her sex-dancing, and he even put a five dollar bill down her pants at one point. Excellent! I was hoping to vomit out my entire body last night! I'm so skinny without all those organs and stuff. Really appreciate it, Maloof's husband. Thanks for that. So yeah, dancing happened and everyone made terrific assholes of themselves (including Russell! who dances like someone who is recovering from a mildly serious jungle gym accident!) and the next day they went to relax their dancing muscles by the swimmings pool. This was an opportunity for Camille to flirt with all the gross, ugly husbands and do tequila shots and tell us thrilling tales about her robo-boobs. The Maloof's husband's face just about fell off (more) while she told her beautiful tale. I swear to most holy Mithras, if the Maloof's husband and Camille have a sex affair, I will marry this show in a place where such things are legal (international waters?). Because that storyline would be so repulsive that it couldn't help but also be incredibly beautiful. Please, Bravo. Please just this one time.

OK, moving on. Um, they had dinner before Jay Z and everyone made fun of Russell for going on his business trip, and that was awkward and stupid. And then, gaspss!, Camille's tennis slave Nick showed up by surprise! Haha, everyone laughed! And made jokes like "Are you Kelsey?", because that's how adults joke about adultery. "He's really hot, huh?" Camille basically said, in front of Nick, and TV cameras, and all manner of other things. The Maloof's husband seemed really jealous, which is too bad for him. Someone else who was clearly jealous was Taylor, who decided that she would make her own attempt to be sexy by seductively eating cotton candy. And, yeah, sure, oohhhh nothing is sexier than cotton candy. "Hey baby," you can say as you shove the wispy strands into your mouth, pink sticky stuff coating your lips and cheeks, thin strands of candy blowing in the breeze. Way to do it, Taylor. Kyle's husband seemed oddly turned on, but he was the only one.

Then it was time for rap! Good old rap music. Everyone danced like prize idiots during the rap show. It was hilarious that Bravo couldn't play the actual audio so they played weird lyricless bass-thumping music that was supposed to simulate rap. It was like all the wordless "rock songs" they played on Saved by the Bell, you know in episodes where there was a dance or something. So that was great in its own sad way, and then it was time for post-show drinkz. No one had fun at the drinks. Well, that's not entirely true, but Camille left early by herself (to go see what Nick was doing with all of his many, many balls probably) and then Russell was standing all stupid and weird in a corner by himself while Taylor had fun with the girlies. Eventually enough was enough and Russell came over and basically told her it was time to leave. Just like that. Yay marriage. Protect the sanctity of that shit!

At the very end of the episode, back in BH, we found out that Kyle and Camille had gotten into some kind of spat. Basically Kyle had insinuated to Camille that no one cares about her, they just care about her famous husband, Frasier from Frasier. That's all anyone wants to think or talk about when they are with Camille. Because who isn't completely obsessed with Kelsey Grammer these days? Little boys have posters of him up on their walls and want to be just like him when they grow up. Little girls write his name on their book covers. It's Kelsey Grammer's world, we're just living in it. No celebrity is hotter these days than Kelsey Grammer. Thus, Kyle was completely right about how people feel about Camille. All they want is to use her to get to their hero-god, Hank from Hank. Man, I wish we could have seen the fight, but we didn't. So we'll just have to imagine it.

We'll have to imagine, too, the moment when Taylor spotted Russell from across a crowded room and Cupid's arrow pierced her heart and a new passion was born.

We'll have to imagine that Lisa Vanderpump must let some things faze her. I guess we're going to see just such a thing next week. It will be a bit jarring, I suspect.

We'll have to imagine what the Maloof might have said to her husband about all his eggy ogling that weekend, if she chastised him or shut him out and ignored him, or if she just took his gummy face in her hands and kissed him right square on the lip-muscles and said "You're mine. You are a subsidiary of Maloof Productions. Ya dig?" And the Maloof's husband maybe nodded his lip and sputtered out an affirmative response and that was that. Just how we maloof in these Maloofy times.

And we'll have to imagine a time when Kim was happy. When anyone on this show was happy. When we, dear readers, were ourselves happy. Some dewy yesteryear, some newly ancient time, a wanly remembered place. For Kim it was maybe those child star years. Or, more likely, the thrilling few years after, when she knew she was free, that she could make herself into a whole different person. She could move to Greece! She could live on a boat in the Indian Ocean! She didn't have to be Disney's girl or anyone else's. She could be her own girl, in possession of herself. Those are happy days, when Independence, all youthful ideas of it, hasn't yet been replaced, conquered, dethroned by Loneliness. I wonder if that's what Kim was looking at that evening, from the casino window. Some flash out there in the cooling dead desert. A brief memory of a moment when. She had been happy once and it wasn't so hard. You just did it like breathing. Happy in, happy out. Happy in, happy out. And maybe she could do it again. Maybe it could be that simple. Maybe she could almost get there, feel strong and whole in herself...

But then of course in the literal world, it was time for dinner, or a concert, or a night of fitful dancing, and besides the sun was gone now, hidden behind some brown dirt mountain, so change would have to wait. Oh well. How sad.