A Trip to Downtown San Jose

The National Theatre sits on a large square in the downtown and was modeled on the Paris Opera House. The interior is magnificent and main lounge opulent as the pictures below will indicate.





The National Museum is located on a hill overlooking the central city and features historical exhibits, a lovely central courtyard, and a delightful butterfly garden.



Inside the central courtyard are a grouping of large multi-sized round stones. They date from the Pre-Columbian period and noone appears to know their significance. Do you have a guess?

I'm not quite sure why a national history museum would have a butterfly garden, but it does and it was well worth a visit.

Deep Six January with Costa Rica

We offer in the next several days a marvelous plan to deep six January. Spend it in Costa Rica!

This may not be practical for the working stiffs of the world, but for the retired it is an ideal way to avoid the practical northern terror of slipping on the ice and snow in your own front yard. Taking a tumble on a patch of ice that was only foggily apparent because of your tri-focals is embarrassing; better to strain something leaping off a zodiac to the beach or tripping on the walking root of a jungle tree. That is a badge of honor for the intrepid senior citizen.

So we offer you a summary of our mostly glorious Elderhostel to Costa Rica and Panama aboard Cruise West's intrepid little ship--the Pacific Explorer. Our journey started with a pleasant flight from Moline to San Jose via Atlanta. There was a bit of a snafu at the San Jose airport when our hotel transport was among the missing, but some frenzied negotiation with a taxi tout did manage to get us to the Casa Conde.

We were three days early for the start of our Elderhostel and intended to use the time to do some sightseeing in San Jose using the Casa Conde as our base. Other than the quixotic hot water supply and the occasional lapses of communication with the staff caused by our insufficient command of Spanish, our stay was delightful. Note we could complain that the staff didn't always seem to understand our English. But let's face it folks, that is one of the most often voiced and perhaps least justified tourist complaints in the world. Whose country is it and whose language difficulty is at the root of the problem? You do have to remember that even four year olds in foreign countries speak the native language quite well.

And let it be said that you could easily fall in love with the Casa Conde in spite of the tepid showers. As the following pictures show, it was a visual delight. The stairs were striking; the rooms were well appointed; the beds comfy, the pool gorgeous, and the food both delicious and reasonably priced. We took our every meal under the awning by the pool.

We've Been Gone!

What can one say? We escaped from the Illinois Winter by taking a trip to the tropics. It was a boyhood dream of mine to travel the world and one book, read when I was eight years old, has always been the initial crystalizer of the dream. Richard Halliburton's Book of Marvels took you on a tour of the great wonders of the ancient and modern world and I read and reread it. A copy still sits in my bookcase today. One of those wonders was the Panama Canal and most wonderful was the fact that Halliburton declared himself a ship and swam through the canal in the 1930's. At thirty-six cents his remains the cheapest ever passage through the canal. The toll for our little boat was $22,000. Our entire route took us first to San Jose, Costa Rica. From there we traveled to the coast and boarded the Pacific Explorer. The ship took us down the Pacific coast (with stops at National Parks in Costa Rica and Panama) and finally to and through the Panama Canal. In the Carribean we made short visits to Portobello and the San Blas Islands before returning to Panama City for the flight home.

There will be more coming as some of the almost 2000 photos are tweaked and downloaded, but for now we are back home and trying to get caught up.

Volume XXXV December 25, 2008

Christmas 2008

According to the great American actress Helen Hayes, “The hardest years in life are those between ten and seventy.” Wow! As of February both of us will be out of the “trouble zone.” Isn’t that reassuring? We can just sit back and watch while the current sad mess is turned over to another generation. No problem! Well, maybe still some problems, but we hope that every citizen, regardless of party, will extend wishes of success to President-Elect Obama in a job that would have been economically and politically daunting for either candidate.

While on politics how can I ignore the governor of our home state? We always say that we like our politicians to have convictions in Illinois and most of them do. The modern day solution is to sell the Senate seat openly via a TV Reality Show. Let’s hear it for “Survivor: Pay to Play,” or “The Big Race to Washington.” Governor Rod Be-gone-o-vitch will be the host. It will be a three week competition. All Chicago residents get to vote twice (once for themselves and once for their dead grandmother). Carpetbaggers will be encouraged; anyone from Joe the Plumber to J. Lo. can enter. Week one will put everyone through a Karaoke contest. Week two will have each candidate debate a federal prosecutor. And the final week will put all the survivors inside an iron cage for a Smackdown. The last person standing becomes Senator and can remain in the cage, which allows them to proceed to jail immediately without passing Go. No need for costly trials or impeachments.

But on to the year. The jokes are done and you can stop reading now with the knowledge that we have survived and wish you a Merry Christmas.

Jan continued in 2008 to supervise student teachers for Monmouth College, serve on the County Library Board, and co-supervise the AAUW Art Presenter Program. For the 35th anniversary this year they brought a children’s art exhibit and a guest storyteller named Sue Black to the Buchanan Center for the Arts. Over a thousand kids benefited from the exposure and Jan and Lila Blum received the Buchanan Center’s award for outstanding patrons of the arts in 2008. Did you ever think about the fact that the phrase “working mother” is redundant?


Jim remains on the board of the Buchanan Center for the Arts. He writes a monthly column for the Illinois Theatre Association’s newsletter and still sits on their board. His newest project is a fledgling County Historical Society. They are seeking to spruce up the town’s Pioneer Cemetery, relocate a County Historical Museum., and to exploit the community’s connections to Wyatt Earp and Ronald Reagan.


Son David continues with Honeywell in Minneapolis and stays active in music and drama criticism circles through his website www.howwastheshow.com He also “twitters” now. If that reference escapes you, don’t worry, it’s definitely a generational thing. Daughter Amy and husband Todd were not directly impacted by the flooding that destroyed much of central Cedar Rapids, Iowa last spring, but several of their friends were in the damage zone. Teaching remains recession proof so Amy continues to try to leave no child behind in spite of attempts by the government and administrators to bury all classrooms in tests and paper work. With construction work tough, Todd is spending a lot of time in landscaping and snow plowing.

The grandchildren are growing like Iowa corn. TJ turns 13 in a few days and is now taller than we are. Mikel has arrived in first grade and is doing well. Both boys have found baseball. (See the pics below.) The newest member of the family is a cute little Yorkshire terrier called Max. On a visit to our house last month, he endeared himself to grandma and grandpa by not piddling on the carpet, not yipping, and eagerly submitting to cuddling by any and all.

Travel was present but not as romantic this year. We made trips to see the kids and a number of drives to Chicago as Jim’s uncle (the last member of his dad’s family) slipped into Alzheimer’s. He passed away at the end of May. We continue to enjoy reading and playing golf and try to keep up a reasonable exercise program.

As I write this the cards and notes from many of you are arriving in the mail. They provide a reassuring and hopeful note that, in spite of difficulties, the world keeps turning. As Tom Stoppard says in the quotation that heads this blog, “--LIFE MOVES ONLY FORWARD--NEVER BACK!” F


We wish you and yours a Holiday Season with family and friends and a New Year filled with minimal pain and maximum joy and accomplishment.

All our best,
Jim and Jan De Young
Write anytime to jdeyoung@maplecity.com. And we’d love a visit.

Where will Obama take the Arts?

If only our national economy had made as much progress in 2008 as some of our arts agencies. Unfortunately, we face 2009 with a host of uncertainties as to how the new administration will deal with the nation’s problems and how the whole of the arts community will fare in the mix.

President-Elect Obama's arts platform has been received enthusiastically by most arts advocacy organizations, but it is clear that federal, state, and local governments are going to find it hard to increase spending on the arts in the face of that now officially announced major “recession.” William Ivry, the former NEA chairman who is serving as the arts point man on Obama's transition team, recently canceled a scheduled appearance on an Arts Webinar because “The Obama team” was not ready to speak on the record about the specifics of any proposals.

Undaunted, the Americans for the Arts has joined other organizations in sending an arts policy brief to the Obama transition office. It deals with everything from the NEA to the role of the arts in education, the workplace, and in life. You can read this comprehensive document by clicking here.

One bright spot is a report from the Medill School at Northwestern University that claims that major Chicago arts organizations are “holding steady in the uncertain economy.” The article discussed institutions like the Lyric Opera, Steppenwolf, the CSO, and the Art Institute. You can read more at: http://news.medill.northwestern.edu/chicago/news.aspx?id=104607

There is also some hope that Obama’s new tax policies might encourage increased charitable giving . See the following article from the Chronicle of Philanthropy: http://philanthropy.com/news/updates/index.php?id=6185

To end on a positive note here is a marvelous idea from the current mayor of London, Boris Johnson. He has proposed adding an option to the now ubiquitous OYSTER transportation cards that will give free or cheap entries to museums, theatres and sports centers for seniors and schoolchildren. It is a part of a wider strategy to boost London's cultural life. Read the full story here: http://www.thisislondon.co.uk/standard/article-23591256-details/Oyster+card+for+the+arts+in+Mayor's+culture+masterplan/article.do

Winter Arrives in Monmouth

There is just something about turkey and dressing in the midwest that seems to bring winter out of hiding. After a mild and sunny Thanksgiving, the end of the week produced that first dusting of the white stuff. Not nearly so bad as that attempt in the eighties to return the kids to college that left us stranded in a motel about fifty miles short of Grinnell, IA, but just enough to remind us that there are some chillier days ahead. And it looks like little Max (see previous entry) got his new green sweater just in time.

Gotta go now and check the gas in the old snowblower!