Ramblings about Lost Wages—errr I mean Las Vegas

Tonight we are in Las Vegas, or as my father-in-law called it “Lost Wages.” We’ll stay here 2 nights before heading to Zion National Park. (Zion will be a quiet compared to the hustle and bustle of this sin city.) In the meantime, we are camped at a KOA located on the Las Vegas Strip. We’ve not seen any CSIs running around, but we have seen a lot of lights and people. Just driving down the Strip is a delight for the eyes. Only here can you drive by the Eiffel Tower, the Empire State Building, the Statue of Liberty, the Coliseum, a sphinx, a pyramid, a medieval castle, the Doge’s Palace, and the Brooklyn Bridge and still be on the same street. Where else can you witness a volcano erupt, then walk a block and view dancing waters and lights paint the sky? It’s all over the top and a hoot!

Times might be bad, but there are a lot of people milling around. There’s also too much traffic for the street which is under construction yet again. The buildings are whimsical, colorful and jammed together. At first glance it does not look like anything natural can exist in this urban cacophony, but after careful scrutiny, there are trees and gardens too. There’s also gambling, which I guess, is the purpose of this oasis in the desert.

Tomorrow night we are going to The Phantom at The Venetian on the Strip. Tonight we tried to drive there, in order to pick up our tickets early, but found that was easier said than done. We did not pick up our tickets, as we could not find a place to park. Tomorrow we’ll take the people mover and leave the truck parked at the campground.

It’s interesting to see how Vegas has changed over time. The first time I visited Las Vegas was when Dwight Eisenhower was running for President (my that’s a long time ago). I remember a parade and my Dad talking to Ike and all of us shaking his hand. I remember a huge neon sign that said “Howdy Partner” and waved as we drove into town. It was small town then. Howdy Partner is nowhere to be seen; being replaced by mega-screens showing live video as you crawl down the Strip. With a pirate ship, a volcano, a flying saucer, a roller coaster and thousands of hotel rooms, Vegas is not the little town it was in the 50s. I wonder how it will continue to change and grow during the next 50 years?

The Many Names of Mother

My mother passed away 11 Mothers' Days ago. I miss her with all my heart! She had Alzheimer’s Disease. No one deserves to have that horrible disease, and my mother was no exception. As she became more involved with the disease her world became smaller and smaller until it was a room in a nursing home where she could stare out a window. What she was seeing, what she was hearing, what she was thinking, what she was feeling, no one really knew. She seemed to communicate with her grandson the best. He was her delight and the feeling was mutual. He also lived closest to her and he saw her everyday in her little room that had a few family pictures and mementos harkening back to a time when she was vibrant and alive and hopeful.

As my mother’s world was diminishing to that tiny room, we noticed that she did not know her name anymore. It happened slowly. One day I said “Mom” and she turned around and asked, “Who is that?” That’s when it dawned on me that that my mother had a lot of names and in her state of confusion, she really did not know who she was. Was she living in a time warp, where her father and mother were still alive? Did she think she was now a child? Or, was she living in the “here and now” with a husband, children, grandchildren and friends? We did not know. She could not tell us!

That’s when I started to chronicle all the names my mother had been called over her lifetime. Her parents called her baby and Helen, and daughter. Her sisters called her ShaSha (a leftover from when they were girls and the youngest sister could not say “sister” and “shasha” came out). My sister and I called her Mom or Mother or Mommy. Her grandchildren called her Mommy Helen. Her husband of 59 years called her Hon or Honey. Her brother in law called her “Hel” (that is pronounced with a short “L” not Hellllll but Hel). Sometimes she was called Mrs. G, or maybe even Miss W. Her friends called her Helen. It was no wonder that she was confused. As her life passed by her she had several different identities; and now she was 81, sick with Alzheimer’s and confused. She did not know her name.

As a family we decided that we would call her by the name she seemed to recognize and that was Mommy Helen. No matter the relationship, she became “Mommy Helen.” We started doing this and the vacant stare that was on her face would show a bit of light. Was it recognition of her name? I hope it meant that she was thinking of her grandchildren and children that would cause that “smile.”

So on this Mother’s Day, I’m thinking of Mommy Helen and wishing her wonderful thoughts. I’ve been meaning to write this story for 11 years, and I’ve not been able to do it. I’m still not able to do it without shedding tears. She never heard us say good-bye to her, as she suffered a stroke that left her in a coma and three days later she slipped away to a happier place. The stroke was a blessing because Mommy Helen never wanted to be confined to a small room decorated with the trinkets of her life!

Minneapolis pictures

Take a peak at some pretty Minneapolis cityscape
Crystal Carp at the Sculpture Garden

Walking Thru the Green Houses at the Sculpture Garden

Spoonbridge and Cherry

Old Stone Arch Bridge, now for walking and biking

Guthrie Theatre with Riverside Reflection

Mighty Mississippi River

Old Flour Mill on the Mississippi

MSP and IRA

I’m at the annual International Reading Association meeting in Minneapolis, Minnesota. This morning I served as a discussion leader for a panel. Our topic was Censorship/Intellectual Freedom. If you think of this issue as 2 sides of a coin, censorship is the negative side where you are stopped from thinking and doing “things;” intellectual freedom is the positive side where you are asked to think critically about issues and events and come to your own conclusions. We had a lively discussion about the topic and that’s the purpose of such an event.

The rest of the time, I’ve spent looking at children’s literature, teaching approaches, advances in internet technology and the like. I’ve also spent some time exploring downtown Minneapolis, which is quite beautiful. The architecture contains a healthy mix ranging from post-modern to art-deco buildings. Downtown is alive and filled with people, businesses and restaurants.


Among the downtown skyscrapers is the Foshay Tower which is the 2nd tallest cement structure in the world (only a smidge shorter than the Empire State Building—which was the tallest) and it claims to be the first skyscraper in the city. I took a picture of it reflected in one of the newer taller buildings that now grace the cityscape. They say the Foshay was designed after the Washington Monument, but it has windows and a distinct art-deco bent so I think you need a good imagination to see any resemblance other than it is a plinth that is wider at the bottom than at the top.

As I walked downtown, I saw one building had an Egyptian Motif. Compare the Minnesota building with a glyph I found in Egypt. There are bas reliefs on one building reminiscent of the carvings found on temples and tombs in ancient Egypt.



The Mall of America is located in Minneapolis too. This is one HUGE MALL. Inside you can have fun in an amusement park with a roller coaster and several other rides; view sharks and turtles and other underwater denizens at the aquarium; play in LegoLand; see events happening in the different rotundas (I went to a robot competition); go to a movie; eat at a ton of restaurants; take a bus to a casino; and if you want, I guess you can shop. There are a ton of stores that just do not exist in my little hometown, so I had a grand time looking at them. I stayed till my feet started talking to me. It’s impossible to see such a mall in one swell foop (as it were).



There is a clean, light rail system that connects downtown to various parts of the city. I have ridden it twice and found it to be a good way to get from point A to point B without too much confusion. There are signs in the cars reminding folks to take care with the equipment, and people seem to follow the signs. The cars are clean; the upholstery is neat; there’s no graffiti, and I did not see any feet resting on the chairs. I was impressed. The fare was reasonable too with a 2.5 hour pass costing $1.75 for adults, and $.75 for seniors.

I’ve been pleasantly surprised by Minneapolis. I’ve liked the MSP International Airport for years, and now I have a similar feeling for the city where it lives.

844 Mark 2

Today we were trying to see the 844 with a head of steam rolling into Oroville. Trying! We missed it! Can you believe the train was on time! When we were in Roseville on Monday, the engineer said the train would NOT arrive on time. We thought we'd find the tracks south of town and follow it's progress. We saw a lot of empty track! Then, in Oroville, we saw the train.


The Roseville yard had it contained behind a fence; not so in Oroville. It's right out in the open in the train yard on Mitchell Avenue. The train will be the "kick off" event for Oroville's Fiesta Days. On Saturday, it leaves town at 8AM to snake up the Feather River. I won't be in town to see that event, but I hope Chet can do so. Keep watching this space, we might yet get a picture of the 844 with a halo of steam as she come chugging 'round the bend.

The 844

Today we saw a mechanical marvel from 1944—Union Pacific Engine #844, the last steam train in use in the United States. The train is HUGE at 454 tons, 23,000 gallon water capacity, and 6,200 gallons of No. 5 oil. According to the engineer we talked to, the train uses recycled oil from cars and other trains. I asked the delicate question of MPG and he said, he did not even want to know!

The 844 is based in Cheyenne, WY and once in awhile makes goodwill runs across the US. The train is on an anniversary run this time from Wyoming to California. In Roseville, where we saw it, the train was part of the Roseville Centennial Celebration. The next stop is Oroville, CA, then the Railroad Museum in Portola, CA. The train is scheduled to roll into Promontory Point, UT on May 10, to celebrate the 140th anniversary of the first Transcontinental Railroad. It was on that day that the last spike, The Golden Spike, was driven into the track to celebrate the joining of the eastern and western United States by rail. That was quite an accomplishment. You can follow the progress of the train by clicking here.


It’s fun to look at the behemoth. There is nothing tiny about this train. The wheels are over 6 feet tall. The water tender is enormous. The nuts and bolts are oversized too. The train is a plumbers delight with faucets and pipes and valves littering every spare inch of space. In order to keep this monster running properly it needs to be oiled and lubed every 100 miles! I have not seen the train moving, but we plan to be in Oroville when it arrives to see how well this monster moves. It’s said it can reach 70 miles per hour! That’s a lot of steam!

Spring along the Feather River

Spring in northern California is a sight to behold. Today we drove a few miles in the Feather River Canyon and enjoyed the colors of spring. The poppies were blooming along the side of the road, along with the purple lupine. While a few blossoms on the redbud were still evident, they are mostly replaced with greenery.


One of the interesting views along the highway are the two bridges at Pulga. It's rare to see a bridge go under another bridge, but that happens in the Feather River. The trains use one side of the canyon and the cars use the other, and every so often their paths cross. In fact, there are 2 sets of double bridges on the Feather River. I wonder if that happens anywhere else?