{"id":625,"date":"2010-07-22T08:21:58","date_gmt":"2010-07-22T14:21:58","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/augerhandle.net\/blogs\/jumpingfish\/?p=625"},"modified":"2016-12-05T23:03:10","modified_gmt":"2016-12-06T05:03:10","slug":"waiting-for-the-fireworks","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/augerhandle.net\/blogs\/jumpingfish\/2010\/07\/22\/waiting-for-the-fireworks\/","title":{"rendered":"Waiting for the Fireworks"},"content":{"rendered":"

\nWe had dinner on the terrace overlooking the falls and got a seat right at the edge—something that only comes to those who are so ready to eat that they show up before the rush. And frankly, we were very ready to eat<\/em>.\n<\/p>\n

\nFrom our perch, we were able to watch the rainbows come and go depending on the whims of the mist\n<\/p>\n

\n
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\nand watch the people milling around and generally marvel at what a good time we’d had that day.\n<\/p>\n

\nWe were dog-tired. At some point, we figured we’d been on our feet for nigh on 12 hours, and there was more yet to come. But we had smiles on our faces.\n<\/p>\n

\n“I’m having a real good time<\/em>,” I told Trudy.\n<\/p>\n

\nHer eyes sparkled.\n<\/p>\n

\nOur plan for the evening was to hang out at the falls until after dark, after the colored lights on the falls, after the Wednesday fireworks. But the flaw in that plan was that we would have to take a hotel shuttle back instead of the People Mover.\n<\/p>\n

\n
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\nbecause the last People Mover leaves just as the fireworks start<\/em>. (How could they do that, we wondered to ourselves.)\n<\/p>\n

\nWhen we reconnoitered the Casino where the shuttle stops, our hearts dropped.\n<\/p>\n

\nWe had left the world of the falls behind and entered the world of the mall. It felt like a science fiction movie, where only you realize that you’re in some artificial world and everyone else is wandering around in zombie-like bliss making you wonder if it is you that is messed up. From the sunset rainbows and people walking on sidewalks and kids running around on the grass, we entered a world of piped-in music and bright lights and shiny floors and store-front facades and fake luxury and meaninglessness and …\n<\/p>\n

\nOh my, we hadn’t come here for this. We were desperate to escape<\/em>.\n<\/p>\n

\nIn the end, we gave up on the hotel shuttle bus and returned to the falls as fast as we could. Except the promenade outside the casino led nowhere but around the casino, back to entrances on the other side. There was no way to return—or rather no way without great walking distances, unless we took the tram up the bluff, which we thought we’d avoid and just do on foot. But the sidewalks went in circles and there we no obvious way back down the hill.\n<\/p>\n

\nBut of course, there was a way; it was just … out of the way, but in the end we found it: a mostly-empty sidewalk crossing over a busy street going by some deserted parking lots at the edge of the casino landscaping, where well-fertilized grass gave way to bare dirt berms and parked cars.\n<\/p>\n

\nBy the time we got back down, we were dog tired and plopped ourselves down at a People Mover stop and told ourselves that we didn’t really have to watch the fireworks, after all.\n<\/p>\n

\nBut you know, this isn’t what I sat down to tell you about. I wanted to tell you about the fireworks, because in the end we did see them, but I see that I have written too much, and so I’ll continue my story later. Tune in then.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

We had dinner on the terrace overlooking the falls and got a seat right at the edge—something that only comes to those who are so ready to eat that they show up before the rush. And frankly, we were very ready to eat. From our perch, we were able to watch the rainbows come and […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[42,41],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/augerhandle.net\/blogs\/jumpingfish\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/625"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/augerhandle.net\/blogs\/jumpingfish\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/augerhandle.net\/blogs\/jumpingfish\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/augerhandle.net\/blogs\/jumpingfish\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/augerhandle.net\/blogs\/jumpingfish\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=625"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/augerhandle.net\/blogs\/jumpingfish\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/625\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4476,"href":"https:\/\/augerhandle.net\/blogs\/jumpingfish\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/625\/revisions\/4476"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/augerhandle.net\/blogs\/jumpingfish\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=625"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/augerhandle.net\/blogs\/jumpingfish\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=625"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/augerhandle.net\/blogs\/jumpingfish\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=625"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}