I love to read. I think I always have. My memory doesn’t stretch back far enough to recall a time when good books weren’t a part of my life. Our home was filled with them. My parents were readers, so maybe I learned the art of reading by osmosis? If not, then certainly by example. As a toddler, I became a precocious reader. By the time I was four, I was reading a fair amount on my own.
Boulder City has a great vision statement. It’s located on the front page of our website: “The City of Boulder City is committed to preserving its status as a small town, with a small-town charm, historical heritage and unique identity, while proactively addressing our needs and enhancing our quality of life.”
OK. So I had originally intended to write about a totally different subject this month. But a glance at the calendar and the death of one of my teen heroes means I am gonna write about Halloween. Kinda. Sorta.
When I sat down to use the word processing program Word, I was accosted by my computer which wanted me to use “Copilot.” I don’t need copilot to compose what many humans have, until recently, been capable of creating, a column in the newspaper. I enjoy crafting my words from my soul, which is consciousness. I’m sure you have a soul too! Hopefully, that doesn’t spook you!
Nov. 7 will mark a year since the ribbon cutting of the St. Jude’s Ranch for Children Healing Center and shortly after, the opening of the since renamed school, Amy Ayoub Academy of Hope.
I hope you are among the lucky ones who are quarantined at home with someone you love. I can’t imagine the feelings of loneliness that would come with being truly self-isolated.
The newspaper or news website you are reading is in trouble. Like many other businesses, the COVID-19 crisis has eliminated most of its revenue but not its expenses, delivering a body blow to a business model that was already under pressure. But it continues to publish, providing your community with timely, accurate information about the crisis.
Like most of you, I am missing time spent in the great outdoors.
As I write this commentary, the majority of businesses other than grocery and hardware stores, gas stations and convenience stores are shuttered. I realize that this pandemic is serious and will likely cause many to suffer the illness and many will die from it. However, I don’t believe it is necessary to shut down the entire U.S. economy.
As we stay home for Nevada, we are renewing interest in old hobbies, taking up new ones and devoting time to things we never seemed to have enough time for before. We are exercising. We are cleaning. We are doing home-improvement projects. And we are cooking.
To say I’ve always been anxious to get things done is an understatement. It probably started when I was about 10 years old and began working in my grandmother’s grocery store. I had to be quick when it came to waiting on customers, bagging groceries, taking their money, making change and waiting on the next customer.
Although the resort-hotels of my company, Las Vegas Sands, are shuttered, I’m paying every one of our nearly 10,000 employees as though they were still working. We’re even working to make up for lost tips. I hope to do that right up until the time that we can reopen our businesses.
In the 1970s, I listened as a lecturer explained that in police work it seemed as though 20 percent of the population hated the police no matter how well they performed, 20 percent loved them no matter how poorly they did and the remaining 60 percent stayed on the fence to gather facts before reacting. I realized how true that is the older I got.
We need our better selves now as we deal with the COVID-19 virus. The response from our community has been overwhelmingly supportive of the efforts to fight this disease and protect our families, friends, co-workers and neighbors. I am not surprised that we are rising to this challenge as this community has always shown our strength when challenges arose. I am deeply appreciative of these efforts in this situation.
The most important part of what happens in a city council meeting is not always the vote. Sometimes it is something that seems minor at the time. This week, as the council finally voted unanimously to tighten up Boulder City’s notoriously lax leash law, the important part came long before any discussion about the actual law.
There are a couple of things that unite most Nevadans: how people often mispronounce that state’s name and for those who have been around a while, their dislike of the Duke men’s basketball team.
Parents of student athletes playing on Boulder City High School’s football team received a note last Thursday morning from BCHS Principal Amy Wagner informing them that the team’s head coach would be “unavailable” for that night’s playoff game.
It’s a case of making something positive come out of a tragedy.
