DH and the older boy have gone camping. So I took DS#2 and DD with some of her friends to dinner (We had Greek). During the general silliness that also included the advice – If you’re going to laugh soda out of your nose make sure to aim at the person who caused the laughter – One of DD’s friends turned to her and asked, “Does it panic you or comfort you to know that you’re going to grow up to be her?” While pointing at me. DD replied, “I can only hope.”

Of course I always wanted her to grow up to be a unique individual but I can live with her emulating me.

Go to Wikipedia and look up your birth day (excluding the year). List three neat facts, two births and one death in your journal, including the year.

Events
1784 – John Wesley charters the Methodist Church
1983 – The final episode of M*A*S*H is broadcast in the USA, becoming the most watched television episode in history, with 106–125 million viewers in the U.S. (estimate varies by source).
1993 – Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms agents raid the Branch Davidian compound in Waco, Texas with a warrant to arrest cult leader David Koresh. Four BATF agents and five Davidians die in the initial raid, starting a 51-day standoff.
And one closer to home…
1850 – The University of Utah opens in Salt Lake City, Utah.

Births
1939 – Tommy Tune, American dancer, choreographer, and actor
1940 – Mario Andretti, American race car driver
1942 – Brian Jones, English musician (The Rolling Stones) (d. 1969)

Deaths
1916 – Henry James, American writer (b.1843) – – The writer who wrote like a psychologist….

Just for reference, the grill is hot most Saturday nights and the standard rules apply.

The Standard Rules

1. Bring your own stuff for the grill (meat or veggies, just don’t complain when they are cooked next to each other).
2. Bring something to share with everyone (Chips, salad, dessert, single males are generally expected to bring soda).
3. If you’re drinking booze, bring your own and clean up after yourself. (and have a designated driver unless you’re donating your car to us).
4. Act like reasonable adults – – No bitching about the other people there, if you don’t like the diverse nature of our friends, you’re welcome to leave. (That goes both ways, the anti’s can’t bitch about the Mormons and the church members are not allowed to lecture on anything other than politics and smoking. Lectures on No Smoking are only to be given by those under the age of 18)
5. Control your children or just shut-up when someone controls them for you – most of us are parents and agree that all adults have the responsibility for correcting out of control behavior in juveniles especially when in imminent danger to themselves or others or when about to inflict property damage.

I have a whole bag of black jelly beans and a bag of caramel Nestle eggs…
See you when the sugar high wears off.

My uncle Jim was one of the best things to happen to my Aunt Margie. Jim used humor to break up tense situations and made everyone around him feel comfortable. He made my husband feel like he belonged to the family (although at the funeral, people kept asking if DH was part of Jim’s Addiction Recovery group). Jim loved everyone, and told them about it from the homeless man on the street to the women in diamonds at the Art Gala opening.
Just like him, his funeral was full of fun and contained an eclectic group.
The pine casket was perfect and as was stated more than once, the snow storm today was another prank Jim arranged to perfection.
Jim used to send “rubber b’s” in fun to the kids he knew on his route so it was perfect that after the flowers were placed on the casket, everyone flipped rubber bands toward it and into the vault.
My son says he will miss the fighting they did over their names everytime they met.
(The ending compromise was one got the nickname and one got the full name).

A great obituary for a funny man

I married an artist. The end result is that vacations are usually comprised of drive to the middle of nowhere, turn left, and continue for 50 miles. Thank goodness this one had a Needlework store! Ely Creations had Feather Fairy as a display model in the window and Winter Queen inside the shop. The shop has a huge selection of Week’s Dye Works and they had Stranded by the Sea which I had heard about but never seen before. Being the only decent hobby shop for miles, they had a bit of everything: beading, quilting, cross-stitch, canvas work (real and plastic canvas), knitting, and crochet. I was able to get one of the Nickel Quilt books from my wish list and I got 2 of the Stranded by the Sea colors.

The best place to stay in Ely is The Prospector Hotel and Casino (although the city council member who runs Copper Queen would disagree). The place has a child friendly pool and a free exercise room. There are clean rooms, plenty of parking and most everything is marked Holiday Inn. Just don’t plan on eating there (see the Ugly section).

Speaking of food, I can enthusiastically recommend three restaurants in Ely: La Fiesta, Orient Express and R&P BBQ Express. La Fiesta was recommended by the Nevada Tourism Bureau in Wendover, NV. They didn’t have the new location though. La Fiesta is no longer on the McGill Highway, they are now on the Great Basin Highway but the food and service are still excellent. Every waiter was concerned about our drinks, chips, salsa and the pickled veggies served with the salsa. The food servings were huge compared to the prices charged.
Orient Express was picked due to expediency, they were the only place we found on Main Street open at 8:30 on Friday night that allowed children. (Okay, so we didn’t go to the coffee shop at the Hotel Nevada which is open 24/7 according to the waitress at the Prospector Café who told us to go somewhere else to eat). The sign was old and read Ent Express (this engendered a comment on how many weeks it would take for service). The service was quick, friendly, and they gave us take-away silverware with our boxed leftovers since as travelers, we probably didn’t have any.
R&P BBQ Express is located next to the Steptoe Valley Inn. We had the pulled BBQ pork sandwiches and the Beef Kabobs. I have received smaller steaks for more than the $6.95 that the Beef Kabob cost. Along with the Kabob, there are 2 sides and bread. It was probably one of the biggest meals I saw all trip and one of the least expensive.

Ely has a wonderful walking tour of the murals painted on the buildings downtown. We didn’t get too it since we spent most of our time in the train yards. One of the really good things we discovered is that you can rent the steam or diesel engine for 2 hours and be the driver. DH wants to go back often to photograph the place so one of the women I met in the gift shop told me about the volunteer program. I bet you didn’t know that I would go nuts over the idea of spending a day locked in with archival documents? I can’t wait until DH goes back.

The award for the cleanest restrooms on this trip goes to the visitor center at Great Basin National Park! I also loved the conversations with the rangers especially since DD is thinking about Conservation Science as a major.

Mustangs running, Antelope close enough to the road for pictures, Elk, and the kids reactions to ordinary farm animals.

If my mother-in-law owned a knitting store, Knit Knook Gift Gamut in Ely is what I would picture it looking like. Remember the smell of 1970’s polyester yarn? Knit Knook has Avocado and Burnt Orange in the original wrappers but all the Sunshine Yellow is gone. The side wall in the back room has plenty of plastic knitting needles in extra large sizes and the craft section has pre-color change DMC along with DMC canvas yarn. The ‘locally made’ crafts for sale had lots of plastic canvas coasters and tissue box covers, crocheted animals, and polyester yarn slippers and ponchos. At least the proprietor who looks 80-something is keeping the local elderly women off the streets. Only one thing looked really out of place in the shop of aged stock. Nestled between the “Big Band Songbook” and “Play the hits of Patsy Cline” is the book of the piano music for a Jason Mraz album. Maybe the boy has a niche in the retiree market? I wonder if his marketing people know.

The only businesses open after 9 pm are that brothels and casinos. Yes, there are 2 brothels in Ely but one, The Sardust Ranch, is closed for remodeling.

The restaurants all have Pepsi products.

The grocery store’s collection of Easter Candy consisted of ½ a box of Cadbury Crème eggs.

The Car Wash has a defective bay but they don’t have a notice warning people about that. Luckily a local warned us before we lost too much money on it

Prospector Café and Clementine’s Bar – When a hotel advertises that they have a café open until 9 pm and that room service of pizza and burgers until 11 pm through the Clementine’s Bar, I expect them to honor that (especially when they pass out coupons at check in). I do not expect to walk to the café at 7 pm and have it roped off with a closed sign. I do not expect to find the bar dark at 9 pm with the cook sitting at a table offering to re-open the kitchen. I found out later from the desk that we should have taken Tony up on the offer and had him cook “whatever he feels like making.”

From reading the paper, the corruption on the city council in Ely is ugly. Hint for those outside of Ely wanting to do business there: the first thing to do is open a large account at the bank where the city council member works.

Things you wouldn’t believe if I told you the whole story…

Mr. Darwin broke the antique coffee table which was in the front room window, the beagle I made in Vegas was not on the bookshelf headboard (but it was still in the house), DS#2 is missing underwear. (and he apparently stole the keyboard while I was gone!)

Don’t underestimate the stupidity of Rednecks with RV’s, ATV’s and non-working vehicles.

McDonald’s in Delta UT – This debacle deserves it’s own blog on another date. Just how hard is it when there is no one else in the place to fill an order of 4 double cheeseburgers, 2 cheeseburgers, and a cheeseburger Happy Meal with no pickles, no onions, apple dippers and fruit juice?

Mom left the house and I am taking this opportunity to speak my mind about how they’re treating me. They do good things and then they take them away from me. It’s not right.

It was ok when Mom brought a new person into the house last week because this new person brought all sorts of new smells with her. The most important smells came from other big dogs, I could tell that easily. There were other smells that were foreign to me, but that’s ok because they were interesting. I was so happy because I just kept sniffing her all night long. I was a little disappointed when Mom went away to go play with some CATS in Vegas because she took the interesting smelling person with her and was gone for a few days. But she did bring the person back so I figured the person was going to stay with us. And Mom didn’t smell like any cats, but she kept saying it like it was in capital letters so it must have been important.

How could something like CATS be more important than running around after me to make sure that everything I want is being taken care of?

Hey, it doesn’t matter that much to me because she brought the interesting smelling person back and didn’t bring any felines with her. But then the interesting smelling person went away again. I wonder if she’s going to come back again. I’d like to be able to smell her regularly again. It was fun being able to smell her all night long. That and Mom forgot to move the trash can and I got to dig in that a little too.

I got really excited a little bit ago because Mom packed everything up with the family and said something about a trip. I was so sure that they were going to take me, but then they all got in the truck without me. I started to protest, loudly I might add, but they didn’t listen to me. They thought I was just howling like some common dog.

Of course I wasn’t howling. I was BAYING because you were going to leave me alone all by myself and I wanted to go on the family trip too. I am part of the family after all and here I am left behind as if I am some sort of second class citizen. Mom actually called one of her daughters from another mother to come sit with me while they left because they thought I was being a nuisance to the neighbors. They call her a “petsitter”. I’m insulted – as if I am some common pet instead of a valued family member.

I was just standing on the coffee table looking out the front window to see if the family has come back yet so that I can give them a piece of my mind about that, but there is no sign of them. They have not yet begun to see what a nuisance I can be and I do not know how long they will be gone, so I must use my time wisely. I’d better get off the coffee table before the so-called “petsitter” can get me off of the table, because I think she knows that I am not allowed to stand on it before she disappears. She keeps saying that I need to be good while she goes home for dinner.

She’s going to leave me alone in the house, after my family abandons me and she thinks I’m going to be good. She’s got another think coming. One of the boys left his room in a bit of a mess, and I am sure that I can find a pair of underwear or a sock to chew on while she is gone. And it will be ok because they will probably never miss it.

I wonder if Mom left her stitching room door open. Perhaps it is time to check that out.