Saturday continues.....

Really, the whole purpose to this trip to New Jersey was to see Tom's mom and her brother who was driving down from Virginia to visit her.  He is 82 and she is 89 and he drives down alone once a year. Our plan was to videotape them together trying to get them to reminisce about their childhoods.  We had been trying to reach Uncle Bill all day by phone, but our cells were in and out and we never could. Since it was getting late, we assumed he had seen what a mess NJ was and had decided not to come.  However, the storm had hit him as well in VA and he had no power, so he decided to come to NJ to get out of his mess!

Anyway, he arrived just as the sun was going down, grabbed a quick slice of pizza and cannoli and promptly declared we should go to the casinos in Atlantic City where we knew they had power. It seemed like a good idea as Tom's mom was becoming more and more agitated as she couldn't turn the lamps on and couldn't have her cup of tea so we took Marie home then headed to the city.

 Back in the day, Tom's mom and dad loved the slot machines.  They had cards to every casino and always had buffet coupons, show coupons and all kinds of bonuses from those cards.  In fact, when Joe passed away in 1997, we put his casino cards in his urn.  Eleanor's memory is fading and she really doesn't know how to play anymore and the fun of hearing a few coins clanging when you win is long gone.  Now you get a piece of paper that comes out of the machine to redeem with a cashier.  I don't know how to play the slots so I'm no help either but we put her in front of a nickel machine and she seemed happy enough.

 After a bit, we took a stroll on the boardwalk.  Eleanor loves this as well but she struggled after awhile.

 They all waxed longingly for the days of the Steel Pier and the diving horse.  Tom worked on the boardwalk back when he was teen (kind of our version of Lagoon) so has fond memories of the place.

We ducked into another casino so Eleanor could sit for a bit.  While Tom and Uncle Bill went to redeem his 56 cents in big winnings, I did some people watching while Eleanor continued pushing buttons as the money was long gone.  Suddenly a woman appeared and asked if we needed something.  Turns out Eleanor had been pushing the "help" button over and over!

After the lengthy walk back to the casino where we parked, we stopped for a small sandwich and a hot cup of tea for Tom's mom in a small cafe before taking them home.  The power was still off and she just could not understand why we were all doing things with flashlights and why she couldn't turn on her lamp to do her crossword puzzle.  We got them tucked into bed and headed back to Marie's where she too was still without power.