Last weekend we went to Omaha. It was really nice. The drive went well, and Becca and I had a great time with Duane and his mom. Judy seemed happy to see us and meet Becca.
We left on Friday morning and drove down through Des Moines. The city name made us wonder what the history was so I looked it up.
“The history of Des Moines can be traced to 1834, when John Dougherty, an Indian Agent at Fort Leavenworth, Ks, recommended that a military post be established at the point where the Des Moines and Raccoon Rivers merge. Nine years later, May 1843, Captain James Allen and a company of dragoons from Fort Sanford arrived on the site. Captain Allen proposed to name the
garrison Fort Raccoon but was directed by the War Department to use the name Fort Des Moines. The origin of the name is uncertain, but most historians agree that the name probably initially referred to the river. Some people feel that ‘Des Moines’ is derived from the Indian word ‘moingona’ meaning
river of the mounds which referred to the burial mounds that were located near the banks of the river. Others are of the opinion that name applies to the Trappist Monks (Moines de la Trappe) who lived in huts at the mouth of the Des Moines river. French voyagers referred to the river as La Riviere des Moines.”
Anyway, we made it into Council Bluffs Iowa and East Omaha right around sundown, so it was interesting driving. I have to plug my GPS again though. It saved us quite a lot of time and it was fun being able to look down at it and see the amount of driving left. When I first got it, it was interesting to note that the time estimation wasn’t always right, but it seems as though it is getting better. Perhaps it is alive?
While in Omaha we went to a place called the “Texas Roadhouse”. It was very cool. They had a huge barrel of peanuts in the entryway to snack on while waiting to be seated. We had 40 minutes or so. The food is like an American Steak and Seafood place. The gimmick is that the wait-staff come to your table if it a special day and do a sort of line dance while you sit on a mounted saddle. We were going to get Becca on the saddle, but by the time we had the chance, we were too full and had to be rolled out!
We also went to the dog track and watched some greyhound races. Becca bet a couple dollars and was very close to winning $55. She bet on the top three coming in at 4 – 1 – 3, when it was really 1 – 3 – 4. It was pretty cool. After that we went to the casino and watched people put money in machines. I decided to play a $.50 poker machine and put in $2 and pulled out $5. So I basically made up for our losses and some. It was pretty cool.
We left on Sunday, even though we didn’t want to. I had to play hockey at 8pm and we needed a day to do laundry and the stuff that we normally do on the weekends. The drive home was uneventful.
Hockey went well. The team we played had come very close to beating some of the teams that we have lost to in the past so we were up for a tough game. They didn’t score on me until the 3rd period when I started to tire. We ended up winning 5 to 2. The first goal they scored was a three-way pass and I had no defense on the the last two players. The second was totally my fault. I lifted my stick as the guy stuffed it from behind the net…
That’s about it for now. I have to head off to work, dropping Becca off on the way.