
Last Sunday, the gentleman friend and I were headed to Pioche, Nevada for a look at several of the parks nearby Pioche.
I was prepared for a hot trip with four bottles of frozen water and a long dampened towel around my neck. (The gentleman’s car air conditioner isn’t as mighty as might be required in our 105 degree weather.). At any rate, once we got on the highway, I was cool as a cucumber. Then we heard a rumbling sound made by the gentleman’s car. “Is something wrong?” I asked. “Yep,” he answered, as he pulled off the highway onto a gravel area.
Turns out one of the back tires on his car sort of exploded on the hot highway. The gentleman let me feel the lug nuts he was handling; I didn’t feel them for long — blazing hot. Fortunately, the gentleman is somehow heat resistant and secured the spare tire quickly.
But to continue to Pioche on one spare…and another back tire the same age as the one that exploded? We thought better of it; returned to Las Vegas and went to Walmart where the gentleman made an appointment to have two new tires put on the back wheels. (The tire people were very busy with other exploded tires, he said.) We agreed to meet Tuesday morning at Galleria Mall for one of our walks.

Photo by Diane Taylor
I was about 15 minutes early for the mall date.
And then–just as I was stepping up over a curb near the mall entrance I tripped and fell–oh shit! A bunch of folks in the area saw the old girl stumble and shouted “Are you. all right?” Having assessed the situation, I said I was, but I needed to sit a while and gather my wits. One young woman then offered to help me up and I took her offer. I had fallen on my right knee, but it worked fine. I headed for a chair inside the entrance and continued to get those wits calmed down. The gentleman arrived and we ended up doing our walk with no problems. Later the knee swelled a bit and was sore, but not bad. I had planned to go to the nail salon after the walk. I hesitated a bit…seeing as how I was “injured”–but then decided to proceed. The options: Sit home and watch the stock market continue to plunge downward or–have some nice young folks pamper my feet and hands.
A young man named Steven did my pedicure — so gentle he was, I wanted to adopt him. Then a gal named Michelle did the manicure. Michelle had three-quarters of her right arm decorated with an intricate tattoo of a woman, a wolf and some other stuff — quite nice. I asked her how long the tattoo took and she said on two different days. seven hours each day. Wow. She asked if I had any tattoos and of course, the answer was no. I wanted to shout, “IN MY DAY only the bad guys had tattoos!” But here was an attractive young lady, wearing a mask, but with great-looking false eyelashes, and with that tattoo–times have changed.
Sitting next to me at the salon was a gal having a manicure. Her left hand was in blue nail polish. Her right hand was in red nail polish and she was asking for the addition of thin white stripes on her right hand and tiny stars on her left hand. I asked the young woman what she did for a living and she said she was a greeter at the VA hospital “and the veterans will get a kick out of this (meaning the nails).” I’ll be…
I wear the same color nail polish all the time. I have the polish identification number on a card in my wallet that I have laminated because I dare not want to erase the special number on the card. I get compliments on my nail polish–not so much because it is unusual – no stars or stripes — but I think because I am rather mature. Folks who want to say something nice can only think of remarking on the nail polish. “I like your nail polish,” they say. I smile and say “thank you”.
Tuesday night in bed, I had some sharp pains in my knee…pains I didn’t like at all. Wednesday, I met friends for breakfast (a date I couldn’t miss). I then spent the rest of the day trying to get a comfortable place in my lounge chair. But Wednesday night, miracle…no sharp pains. Thursday morning my gentleman friend and I again walked the mall and had a good time talking with members of the Las Vegas Garden Railroad Society. The non-profit group had set up a massive model railroad display at the mall, and it was great. Yep, all’s well.
Happy July 4th everybody.
You’ve had some interesting adventures this week. Sure hope the knee behaves itself,
Good thing you are a seasoned Taylor and can tolerate falling.
At some later date will you attempt to go to Pioche? Perhaps not in such hot weather. As for the nail polish, does it dry quicker in the Vegas heat? And, hope you knee heals quickly and completely. Thanks for the variety of info in this article!