Robert Lindsay had a big smile showing through his beard Saturday morning after filling up at the Carson City Host Lions Club benefit brunch at the Carson City Senior Citizen's Center.
"I'm here for lunch weekdays, but this Saturday breakfast only comes once a year," said Lindsay, 82, of Carson City. "Today, a woman paid to have the bus pick me up and take me back home. I had eggs, bacon, sausage and fruit and pretty soon my ride will be back here."
The Host Lions have put on the brunch every spring for 11 years to benefit the Meals on Wheels program, which takes meals daily to the home-bound. Ray Masayko, co-chairman of the brunch with Sam Ito, said the Community Transportation Program helped with bringing seniors to the brunch.
But the breakfasters weren't just the center's regular patrons.
Noreen Humphreys of Carson City said she's not a regular at the center, but came to the breakfast because she likes to support local programs like Meals on Wheels. Humphreys puts some action behind her beliefs - she volunteers as a docent at the Nevada State Museum.
Humphreys got a bonus at the brunch. She won one of the raffle prizes baked by senior gift shop volunteers, a German chocolate cake with chocolate frosting. "And I'm a chocolate lover!" she said.
Les Groth, who was giving away the raffle goodies, must have had the right touch. He awarded a lattice-topped apple pie to fellow Lion Ken Neubert, who is not only a pie lover but a pie baker at home.
"I found out which of the ladies baked it and told her I'd call her up with a review," joked Neubert. He said the brunch was his first at the senior center, but his wife, Jan, is a volunteer there.
Caroline Johnson of Carson City, a program assistant at the center, used the brunch as an opportunity to have someone else cook for her four fellas. She brought along sons Zachery, 6; Cody, 9, and Tyler, 8 and husband Mark for a meal that none of them had to clean up after.
Since the Lions began holding the brunches in 1990, the Dayton Silver Squares square dance club has provided the entertainment. This time, 18 dancers were more than enough to form two squares as Jim Marwin called the steps.
Silver Squares president Eileen Craven of Silver Springs said the group has dances every Thursday 7-9:30 p.m. in the Dayton High School multipurpose room, with all dancers welcome for just $2.50 a head. Flyers announcing the next square dance lessons will be out soon, she said.
Masayko said people were lined up at the center's door well before the brunch started at 9 a.m. Heading up the line was Lindsay.
Lindsay, who is missing his right arm and gets about in a wheel chair these days, recalled how he used to deliver the Nevada Appeal in northern Carson City a few years back.
"I had a little electric cart I'd do my route in. I'd rolled one paper up in my left hand, then hold it under my chin while I snapped the rubber band on," he said. "When I'd get up to where they put those two-story apartments on Imperial, I'd stand up in that car and toss 'em on up on the balconies."