Jack Sheehan on how the passing of time accelerates at a pace we can’t fathom

Sunday, May 7, 2006 | 9:09 a.m.

About once a week our 7-year-old daughter, Lily, climbs into bed between her mother and me and whispers in my ear.

"Daddy, I'm scared," she'll say.

Lily has learned through trial and error that this is an effective method of staying in our bed until she conks out.

I always ask her what she is afraid of, and the answer can range from "elevators" to "a strange noise" to "a really weird bug flying over my bed."

The elevator phobia stems from two summers ago in Montana when she and her brother J.P. got stuck for a few moments in a stalled elevator going from the first to the second floor of a condo unit.

She asked me the other night if there's anything that scares old people (that would be me), and it got me thinking. Before I knew it my list was much longer than hers, but I elected not to share it with her. We're trying to keep our kids' lives as anxiety-free as we can for at least a few more years, knowing they'll have a truckload of issues to worry about once they hit adolescence.

Other than the personal stuff like crow's feet, and feeling for the first five minutes of every morning that I engaged in a truck-pull the previous night, and suffering short-term memory loss - which is becoming so pronounced that the other day I had to tell a friend's message machine that when he called me back he would have to check the readout because I couldn't remember the phone number we've had for 10 years - here's a short list of stuff that worries me, all connected to life in Las Vegas.

In addition to destroying hundreds of thousands of lives, meth usage has greatly accelerated the rate of auto theft in Las Vegas to where it's the fastest growing crime in our city. We know about this firsthand, having had our car stolen out of our driveway three years ago by a meth freak who drove it only six miles before crashing it and abandoning it. He had replaced a CD of Celine Dion in our disk player with one from that role model Marilyn Manson. Nice ...

When, I wonder, was the last time the Bellagio with its dancing waters and the Venetian with its faux canal, were issued a fine for water wasting? Next time that water cop comes to our house at 3 a.m. looking for a droplet of dew on our faucet handles, he'd better beware. I have trick-rigged a battalion of water balloons to blast him. (The water used in these projectiles is bottled, by the way, for those keeping score at home.)

(Although my kids are starting to read the newspaper these days, they don't get the full version. I have to screen out the X-rated news reports and oral sex references first. I know, I know ... I'm the guy who wrote a book called "Skin City." But they aren't allowed to read that until they're eligible to collect Social Security.)

If we've learned anything from these recent trials, it is to examine every aspect of a candidate's background and ethics before giving him or her our vote. From now on, I'm voting only for candidates who make Bruce Woodbury and Rory Reid look like reprobates.

And trust me, I'm not the most boring guy in my peer group. I have good friends who are far more boring than I, and they know who they are. The dumbing-down of America that is occurring through these idiotic shows bewilders me. Anyone who truly understands Las Vegas knows that we are one of the brightest, edgiest, ahead-of-the-curve cities on the planet. It's not by pure accident that we've maintained the most robust and aggressive economy in the nation. But I guess a television show that portrayed that element of our town wouldn't dazzle the Nielsen ratings folks.

While weeks and months seemed to inch by like a hung-over snail when I was a kid, now that I'm on the down slope of middle age, the years go by like months. I recognize that we can't stop time and the inevitable and merciless process of aging, but I'd sure as hell do it if I could.