Columnist Kate Maddox: Fingering bids for Darva’s ring

Kate Maddox

Sunday, July 16, 2000 | 10:22 a.m.

Kate Maddox's column appears Sundays, Tuesdays and Fridays. Reach her at kmaddox@lasvegassun.com.

Tainted though it may be, Darva Conger's 3.37-carat "engagement" ring has hit the auction circuit. The monstrous sparkler, a one-of-a-kind design by local jeweler Michael E. Minden, was put up for sale on the buybidwin.com website on July 8. Opening bids were around the $1,000 mark and as of Friday afternoon, the in-the-lead price was $19,502.50. The retail cost of the ring is $35,000.

One of the bids on the site was put in by a fellow named Rick Rockwell. Whether or not this joker is the real deal, his $16,997.50 bid was quickly upped by the next wannabe owner. Rockwell, who has been surprisingly silent(ish) these days, most likely still has in his possession the $1,000 platinum wedding band that he received from Fox and Minden's jewelry store for the "Multimillionaire" wedding. A call to Rockwell went unreturned, but he's still media-friendly enough to have kept his original cell number from February, when the whole show shebang went down. Thanks, Rick.

The auction is still on through 10 tonight. Representatives from buybidwin.com are hoping bids exceed the retail cost of the ring. All proceeds from the sale will go to the United Cerebral Palsy Foundation in Conger's name. Her brother passed away from the disease.

Next up: Her other grand prize, a 2000 Isuzu Trooper, will hit the auction block next week, also on buybidwin. Valued at 35 grand, the truck is expected to draw somewhere in the neighborhood of 30 grand.

Minden, who is in "talks" with Conger's camp about joining her name with his ring design, still plans to make both cubic zirconia and diamond replicas of the infamous ring.

For those of you interested in watching the Crazy Girls picket the Nellis Cab Co. for taking their advertisements off the backsides of their cabs, you only need hold your breath for a little while longer. The girls, who are still fuming about the injustice, are plotting a full-scale assault. The picketing will, of course, be done in costume -- you know, those little things they wear in the show.

Until then, however, three of the Crazy Girls will be participating in a segment for Fox Sports' "Goin' Deep" this weekend. The show will focus on the ever-important role of the ring girl in boxing and wrestling matches, and whether it's a very, ahem, PC practice. The Crazy Girls frequently moonlight whenever major bouts come to town. Obviously they will be defending their right to bear cards in bikinis. The show is scheduled to air later this summer.

OK, let's answer Friday's Aladdin Theatre trivia question: Neil Diamond was the opening act back in 1976. Diamond gave five shows in three days, playing to capacity crowds.

Checking the vanity-meter, if you think you look anything like country beauty Faith Hill, drop your mirror and run -- don't walk -- to the Wal-Mart on East Tropicana Avenue later this month. On July 29 possible Faiths will have the opportunity to show off their likenesses and win two tickets to her concert, with hubby Tim McGraw, at the Mandalay Bay Events Center later that night. Also thrown into the mix, look-alikes will have the opportunity to be professionally made over by Cover Girl make-up artists -- the cosmetics company that Hill hawks in commercials.

Riviera employees were so up in arms about rumors of a Steve Wynn buyout earlier this week that bosses there had to circulate a memo insisting the gossip was just plain old, well, gossip. Lots of old-timer workers in some of the more retro hotels on the north end of the Strip have been nervous about the Wynn rumors these days. All fear the DI treatment.