Huckleberries: Vegas provides close encounter with Pro Bowler at the craps table

So Christa Hazel’s enjoying herself at the strip in Las Vegas for her 17th wedding anniversary last week when she notices action at the craps table.

A tall, fit man in a hoodie has drawn a crowd. He’s hitting on $1,000 chips. The Coeur d’Alene school trustee moves closer. The man looks familiar. It’s obvious that he’s an athlete. Then, there are athletes everywhere in Las Vegas.

The West Coast Conference is playing their basketball tournaments in Vegas. Christa and hubby, Joel, had planned to catch Saturday’s game between Gonzaga and Pacific. As the man in the hoodie tosses the dice, his dreadlocks spill out.

Could it be? He was now attracting gawkers who were attracting security, to keep things under control. The gambler’s smile is recognizable. Finally, Richard Sherman looks up and makes eye contact with Christa.

Yeah, that Richard Sherman. The cornerback for the Seattle Seahawks. Christa’s close enough to hug him. But, she tells Huckleberries: “I reminded myself of all the reasons why that wasn’t advisable.”

Sometimes, what happens in Vegas doesn’t stay in Vegas.

In memoriam

It was a privilege to listen to the Post Falls High Jazz Band play at Coeur d’Alene High’s Fahringer Auditorium Friday night. Jazz bands from the two Coeur d’Alene high schools joined Post Falls for the entertaining evening.

But the Post Falls performance was special. The back story, of course, involves that horrible train crash that killed 15-year-old passenger Mikelli Villasenor and injured 17-year-old driver Jacob Brockus. They were on their way to a band event when the fatal crash occurred at a dangerous crossing Feb. 7.

Jacob was in the trombone section Friday. The band played five songs.

Some in the audience didn’t connect the dots until an emotional band director Joel Sandford mentioned how tough the past month had been for the band.

He then introduced the fourth song, the one the band dedicated to Mikelli: Henry Mancini’s “The Shadow of Your Smile.”

There weren’t many dry eyes in the audience after that.

Huckleberries

Poet’s Corner: The door of life/revolves about;/she’s coming in,/I’m headed out (“New Grandchild”) – from “The Bard of Sherman Avenue: Poems by Tom Wobker” … Huckleberry Friend Bruce Twitchell spotted a woman from Vermont at the DMV Thursday with two fair-sized, black, hangman’s nooses hanging down from her waist. And he has a photo to prove it …

He may have deflated a football or two on the way to winning five Super Bowl rings, but New England QB Tom Brady is still loved at Davis Donuts in Coeur d’Alene. He was quoted on the readerboard Saturday: “If you don’t believe in yourself, why is anyone else going to believe in you” …

Bumpersticker on a brown Jeep V8 parked at EntertainMart (old Hastings) Saturday (with emblem of a pit bull): “Punish the deed, not the breed.”

Parting Shot

Sure, almost everyone is a fan of the two-state Centennial Trail now. But, early on, some residents of the Pinevilla subdivision, along the Spokane River in Post Falls, fought the trail fiercely.

Some thought Spokane thieves on bicycles would use the trail to rape, molest children and pillage their homes.

Seriously.

An item from this column on Feb. 20, 1989, from a Post Falls Unlimited luncheon, gives you an idea of the bone-headed resistance: Overheard back then: “Paying for this Centennial Trail is like a man who buys a mink stole for his wife in July so she can wear it to her bankruptcy hearing.”

Fortunately, small minds didn’t stop the progress.