Continuing with the “nails and mugs” series, just for fun. It’s these tiny luxuries that make life pleasant.

I got this mug at a local thrift store. I have never gambled at our local casino, but here is its web site.

The Sho-Ban tribal lands are less than an hour’s drive from my house. The Shoshone and Bannock tribes used to have a range that extended farther north, into central Idaho and Montana, as you can verify if you read the book Naya Nuki. They were moved to a smaller place, as has happened to so many tribes. Read this book for a strong argument that American Indians should be treated just like regular American citizens, not as collectivist wards of the state.

Anyway. Although I do not go to the Sho-Ban casino/hotel/event center to gamble, I have been there a number of times. Its banquet halls have hosted our local pro-life banquet for the last several years. Plus, I like to go and eat at their resto (fry bread! bison burgers!) and go to their gift shop. For my last two birthdays, I’ve asked my husband to get me a hand-beaded Sho-Ban item from the gift shop there. These things are not cheap, but boy oh boy, I love them so much. They also smell like woodsmoke when you first buy them.

Here’s a leather barrette beaded in classic Sho-Ban colors.

Apparently, people will come from out of state to play at the Sho-Ban casino. I’ve seen billboards advertising it in Utah, for example. And when my husband and I go and eat at the resto there, the servers assume we are staying at the hotel. I guess we are getting old enough to look the part.

To get from the Sho-Ban event center to our house, you can take the back roads. You can drive through the reservation, over Sage Hill, cross the Snake River, and come out on Highway 39.

It’s a little longer, but it’s prettier and gives a fresh perspective.

Rodeos also take place on the Fort Hall Reservation. I aim to attend one some day. We moved here in 2019, and by the time I realized I ought to attend a rodeo on the rez, they had been cancelled indefinitely because of you-know-what. But I think they are having them again now.