Morning Walk Then Off to the Casino with Dorothy

Thursday, April 29th. Scottsdale
Evie and I went for a walk this morning, and basically took a circular route behind the house, following the canal, heading up the Via Linda, crossing over to the other side of the canal, walking back along it, through scrub, on the edge of the gated community, until we hit another road to their West, crossed it, and headed back along the canal to their house. It was a lovely morning, in the 60’s, sunny, a perfect morning for a walk and we both were energized by it, I think. It’s a frequently used path, for joggers, walkers, even bicyclist, though it could be quite bumpy. The canal brings water from the mountains to Phoenix and it’s quite full, clear, and moves with energy. It makes you want to dive in it, though there are signs all over to keep anything out of it, whether people, trash, or fishing. The nicest thing about the walk is the backdrop of the mountains, green now in spring, but soon to turn brown in the hot of summer. They create a lovely view as we walk below them, and looking out the window of the house, they create a pleasing view, mostly now of green, a brief slice of the top of houses from the gated community, but mostly bushes, some tree tops, then the mountains.
We then went off to Frye’s, a humongous electronic and everything store about 21 miles away from Dad’s. It is a Best Buy, only three or four times a big, with everything imaginable. We shopped for about a half hour, looking at stuff Dad wanted, then we had a coffee, before heading back to the house.

After lunch, we went off with Dorothy, to a casino just up the road, which turned out to be about 20 miles away. It was packed with retirees, lots of Mexicans and native Americans, or so it seemed, and I really wondered about why/how in good conscience all these people could be gambling away their savings. I am increasingly getting curmudgeonly about this, about people wasting money, either at Costco or gambling, and though they may be able to afford it, it still bothers me thinking that they are wasting away money they need to survive. Who knows.

For dinner, we went to Chumpies, and we walked away stuffed, with corn beef sandwiches, onion rings, matso ball soup, and fries, of course. It was delicious but I never felt so stuffed, though not so stuffed that I didn’t’ pick up a napoleon and chocolate mousse cake for our late night snack. We ended up shopping at a store called Sprouts, a cross between Tradre Joes and Whole Foods. It was really a neat store, good bargains and great produce, making it worth while to go.

We watched The Good Wife, some b-ball and went to bed.