Army reunions

One of the great pleasures in life is taking your parents to your father's army reunions. Men who served in World War 2 like to get together with other veterans and chew the fat and drink alcohol. When men get to a certain age, however, they need to be driven to such places by, ideally, their children. For children asked to take part in such expeditions there are advantages and disadvantages. The advantages are

• It's a cheap trip. Gas, lodgings, food are paid for by dear old dad.
• You get to hear what a character your father was and if you are lucky, told stories your mother didn't hear.
• You get helpful driving instructions and are pinpointed various interesting sites to be viewed from the highway.
• You get to go to places like Jimmy Carter's fireworks and tobacco stands so everybody can go to the bathroom and you can buy souvenirs which you can hoist on your friends as Christmas presents.
• Once you are there, you get to go to a bar with the other kids of the veterans. One year they had it in New Orleans and I got to march in the Halloween parade. I wore my shirt backwards as a make shift costume.

The disadvantages are

• You get helpful driving instructions and are pinpointed various interesting sites to be viewed from the highway.
• You get told to get off at the wrong exit.
• You get to drive for miles in driving rain.
• You listen to a lot of country and western on the radio. No rock and roll allowed in Dad's car.
• You have to find parking places real close to the places you want to go.

I had the added advantage of driving my mother to her nursing school reunion. We all said the pledge of allegiance. I know everybody had to bring a gift. My mother brought an African violet plant.

Still, it's a good way to spend time with aging parents. You do remember those times after they are gone.

Editor's note: I couldn't find a link to it on the Internet but in the early 1990's there was a Jimmy Carter's stand in Georgia. It was not run by the ex president but a guy who's real name was Jimmy Carter. Anyone having pictures of this place can let me know in a comment.

the Hard Rock Park

I always have had a sense of guilt about the Hard Rock Café. As a baby-boomer who remembers when Chevy Chase hosted Saturday Night Live, my life should have revolved around visiting Hard Rock Café’s. I like to travel and have been to Amsterdam, Vancouver, Tokyo, London and Lisbon and never visited the Hard Rock Café’s in any of these places. I always felt that as a hip baby boomer I had an obligation when I arrived in a town to find out where the Hard Rock Café was and buy hundreds of dollars of t-shirts there. Souvenirs that I could then display on my wall and give as Christmas presents. It is one of my moral failings.

I’m not surprised that the Hard Rock Amusement Park in Myrtle Beach failed. For a town to have a successful Hard Rock establishment it needs a certain cache of edginess. I don’t believe Myrtle Beach ever had that. I used to bring my parents there for Army reunions. Nice town. Nice beach. Nice bars if you like drinks served out of airline bottles.

But I don’t see David Bowie or Lou Reed playing golf or going on a Ferris wheel in Myrtle Beach. My father and his army buddies yes but not David Byrne or Amy Winehouse. And that, along with the bad economy, was the essential problem with the venture.