Former Miss Douglas County Carina Whitcomb will be on television on Tuesday night as a contestant in a new reality television show produced by Ryan Seacrest called "Momma's Boys."
Carina graduated from Douglas High in 2004, which is when she won the Miss Douglas County title. She also took the Miss Reno/Sparks title in 2005 as a freshman at the University of Nevada, Reno. She was a first-runner up for Miss Nevada USA in 2007.
A former Minden resident, she described herself as being from a small town just outside of Lake Tahoe.
"I'm thankful I grew up in such a beautiful place, and am still best friends with the girls I went to school with."
A speech communications major at Nevada, she plans on getting her degree next fall and moving to Los Angeles where she will pursue a career in entertainment hosting.
The show is a new dating series centering on three mothers, who are seeking the perfect women for their sons. It airs 10 p.m. Tuesday on NBC.
Carina is the daughter of Dorrine Nelson of Minden.
Minden resident Eleanor O'Connor's son James built a 1-inch scale model of the original Carson City Railway Depot for the Nevada State Museum that was featured in Miniature Collector magazine.
James lives in Carson City.
He suggested to curator Bob Nylen that a model of the city's Federal Mint Building, which now houses the Nevada State Museum, would be better than the drawings the museum had.
Bob asked him for a sampling of his work, perhaps a model of the Carson City Depot, and was surprised nine months later when he received an 11-foot long miniature of the yellow building.
Jim built the model in his mom's garage.
The museum doesn't have room for the model, according to the article in the November 2008 edition of the magazine, but it may go on display at a visitors center somewhere.
I got a note from Pleasantview resident Wendell Jenness about the tortoise story while I was on vacation.
Wendell's owned two tortoises named Alcedo and Isabela for about seven years. Last year his cats trained them to use the cat door to get into the house.
He sent me a photo of Isabella climbing into the house, in which the tortoise looks like a World War I tank climbing out of a trench.
