VEISHA

Morro Bay CA (Low 49 Sunny High 62)

We went to the Hearst Castle yesterday but won't have a blog entry on that today as Bob has almost 200 photos to go through but stay tuned. To tease you here is a photo of Morro Rock that we can see from our campsite

and here is a photo of Hearst Castle from the Visitors Center.

These events took place while we were in a dead zone but we still wanted to comment on them. This is a departure from our usual blogging only about travel and food and full-time rv'ng, we hope that is OK. If not you can close this blog entry and wait for our next exciting entry.

Bob graduated from Iowa State University in 1979 with a BS in Mechanical Engineering. VEISHA is an annual celebration, the largest student run festival in the nation. The name of the festival is an acronym for the colleges of the university that existed when the festival was founded in 1922: Veterinary Medicine, Engineering, Industrial Science, Home Economics, Agriculture.

The celebration features an annual parade and many open-house demonstrations of the university facilities and departments. Campus organizations exhibit products, technologies, and hold fund raisers for various charity groups. In addition, VEISHEA brings speakers, lecturers, and entertainers to Iowa State, and throughout its over eight decade history it has hosted such distinguished guests as Bob Hope, John Wayne, Presidents Harry Truman, Ronald Reagan, and Lyndon Johnson, and performers Diana Ross, Billy Joel, Sonny and Cher, the Goo Goo Dolls and The Black Eyed Peas.

The annual celebration was rocked once again earlier this year with riots and also once again its very existence is being threatened. There were also riots in previous years, so bad in 2004 that for the first time ever VEISHA was not held in 2005. There was a lot of drinking during VEISHA during Bob's day, in fact Bob cannot remember an entire VEISHA from Friday afternoon to Monday morning when he woke up, but never the riots.

Bob learned personal responsibility at Iowa State, he has to admit he got there kicking and screaming though. Like others he drank a lot during college, and a lot is an understatement. He was a drunk, an obnoxious drunk, a very mean drunk. But this also taught another lesson, that responsibility extends not only to yourself and your friends but also everyone. Bob had friends that stuck with him even though he was a drunken jerk and made sure he or others did not start the drunken riots that have happened since we left. We learned how to place a drunk on his side so he wouldn't drown in his own puke and checked on him regularly. There was always calmer heads in the drunken confrontations. We never had a riot during our time. Somehow what was passed on to us as frosh and we passed on later has been lost.

We know personal responsibility is not "in" these days but it should be. Also extending that personal responsibility to your friends and neighbors should also be in. Bob is alive today because he was turned on his side a time or two and removed from volatile situations by his friends who until now he doesn't think that he has adequately thanked. So thanks Boog, Stretch, Glocko, Turk, Mike, Dave, Doug, Marty, Scott, Garrie, Tony, Mark, Gary, Wayne, Jody, Linda and all the others that literally saved his life and taught him a lesson he did not realize until later. Hopefully the kids at Iowa State will use this riot and the peril to VEISHA as a similar learning moment.

Bob quit drinking in 1981 because he didn't like who he became when he drank, both those events he could remember and those he can't, but mostly because he got tired of waking up driving 65 mph down the road :-)

Till next time,

Bob and Jo