Corned beef and ?????? Let me think.

Here in Southwest Texas, we have encountered the same thing we have encountered in every area of the country except Loogootee, Indiana.  

Farm land is being sold to developers to throw up another unnecessary strip mall. This 9 acres of cabbage is being dangled in front of developers who can’t seem to realize that we don’t need another place to shop but we do need cabbage, especially on New year’s and St. Patrick’s day. 

The same thing is going on in Homestead, Florida; Athens, Georgia and Pittsburgh, Pa .

When all the cabbage growing places are gone, what will we do? We certainly can’t eat a Home Depot or  a Victoria’s Secret. 

Blue? Who’s blue?

A british researcher has tabbed January 21st as the most depressing day of the year.

His theory is  that a combination of winter weather, Christmas bills and broken New Year’s promises all combine to make folks really feel bad about themselves. 

Not me. I’m going back to bed.

looks like guts.

The RV park where we are staying has parking for 850 units, 98 percent of which are permanently parked and tied down.  I would say most of the residents are from Iowa, Kansas and Minnesota.  It is a huge place and there is always something going on to occupy the folks who live here during the winter. 

I got an idea the other night why some folks need to be occupied. Thursday night is a soup night where volunteers cook up six or seven kinds of soup and serve it for 1.50 for the first bowl and free after that until it’s all gone. Just bring your own bowl, crackers, drink and spoon. 

We went by the recreation hall at 3:15 in the afternoon, over an hour before the serving time of 4:30. There were at least 50 people already there sitting down in front of incredibly neatly arranged bowls and spoons, patiently waiting for 4:30.  Either the soup was outstanding or else these people didn’t have anything else to do.  I couldn’t sit still that long if I ws offered ten dollars.

I felt bad for them but I’m sure there are elderly people all over the country with nothing to do. 

At least 500 people showed up to eat and we were crammed in there elbow to elbow. There was a huge vat of bean soup that looked good but I passed on it afraid of what might happen should the beans cause their normal reaction to my innards while I was stuffed into a spot at a table with a bunch of innocent people.

As we stood in line to get our soup, We passed by several tables full of people who already had theirs and were digging in like they hadn’t eaten in days. An inordinate number of folks wearing name tags that identified them as being from Minnesota were crushing up crackers into their soup, causing Susie to gag.

“It looks like guts.” She said. Susie really hates the sight of mushy crackers floating in a semi solid mixture. 

“Can I try it?” I asked.

“I’ll break your fingers if you do.” 

I guess I’m doomed to never know why people, especially Minnesotans, crush their crackers in their soup.   

Traveling is getting expensive.

We arrived at our destination in Alamo, Texas  last Monday after 1525 miles of driving. Thanks to a 30 mile an hour headwind that fronted us until we turned right in Jackson, Mississippi, we used 155 gallons of diesel fuel and spent $513.00 dollars for that.   The most expensive was 3.53 just outside of Evansville and the cheapest (?????) was 3.15 which we bought when we got here. 

We are currently holed up in a Mobile home/ RV park for two weeks until our digs at the wildlife refuge aqre vacated by the crew who has been here since November.

It’s not all depressing. Now that we’re here, our expenses will only be for food and entertainment, barring any unforeseen problems.

A little extra bonus.

Camping in Texas state parks is a bargain compared to Indiana. We stopped at Goliad State Historical Park north of Rockport Texas and spent two nights with full hookups for 15 dollars a night. The park was the former Mission Espiritu Santo on the Texas piece of the Spanish El Camino Real trail.

While we were there, a group of players from Our Lady of Guadalupe Catholic Church in San Antonio came down from San Antonio to present a musical play in Spanish. The play is called ‘Los Pastores’ and has been around since the 16th century. It was brought to Mexico by the Franciscan Fathers in order to teach the Indians the story of Christmas. 

shepherds

I didn’t understand much of what was going on but there was a confrontation between St. Michael and Lucifer who was trying to talk him out of the Christ child. 

 

The play was very colorful. Too bad I didn’t understand the language. 

The Park is also responsible for the Presidio La Bahia just down the road from the Mission. This fort figured prominently in the battle for Texas Independence. 

There is also a monument here to the command of James Fannin and his men who were supposed to help out at the Alamo. They surrendered to a Mexican General who promised them safety. Instead Santa Ana, a commander about as evil as they come,  ordered them executed alongside the San Antonio river . Roughly 400 men were shot. A memorial was erected about fifty years ago. 

The memorial contains the names of all the men who died. I thought this custom originated with the Vietnam memorial. Shows what I know.

Incidentally, there were no Grindstaff’s killed.  

Subtlety, thy name is Susie

I headed for the campground office this morning to check the mail and I asked Susie if she wanted me to pick up a newspaper.

“Yes, I do.” she said.

“Do you know where’s there’s any change; maybe three quarters?” I asked innocently enough.

“Yes sir.” I’ve got a whole bunch in this drawer. It falls out of your pockets when you get ready for bed and just throw your clothes on the floor.”   

It probably doesn’t help any but….

We’ve been in Texas for a few days now and I can tell you this just from observations.

If the people in Indianapolis are feeling bad about the Colts, let me tell you, the people in Dallas are reeling from the Cowboys loss. Also, the fans in Indy don’t have to be mad at Peyton for going off to Mexico with Jessica Simpson before the big game.

I think that the meaningless game(s) at the end of the season and the week’s layoff affected both teams negatively.   

Uh, what did you say the name was?

Leaving Mississippi. we crossed the river into louisiana and almost immediately ran into a ferocious storm. We tried to drive out of it but the rain and wind only got worse. We finally pulled over when we saw a really dark cloud up ahead coming at us. We turned the radio on only to hear that klaxon like piercing sound that announces bad weather.

“A tornado has been spotted moving northeast. If you’re in Claiborne county and in a trailer, get out NOW.”  I had no idea where we were but I was sure hoping it wasn’t Claiborne county.

That’s one of the hazards of travel. I’m gonna invent some way to let travelers know when they’re in the path of a tornado. 

Antebellum homes.

I’ve  seen the term ‘antebellum’ used before, usually in books about the deep south. I had no idea what antebellum meant but I assumed the homes would be nice. We drove around Natchez looking at the homes advertised as ”antebellum’ that were open for touring. The admission prices were all to steep for our budget so we contented ourselves with looking at the outside. Still no idea what antebellum meant.  

When we stopped at a hardware store to get some Glue for one of Susie’s projects, she asked the owner of the store what it meant to describe houses as antebellum.

“It means they’re old.” he said.

“Okay.”

“It also means it costs a lot to heat one of ‘em and a helluva lot more to cool one.”

“You own one, huh?” I said.

“Yep.”  

Vicksburg Cemetery.

The cemetery adjacent to the Civil War battlefield contains nearly 17,000 Union Soldiers, almost 13,000 of which are unidentified. I don’t believe they were all killed at this battle but the number of unknown soldiers is staggering. I suppose dog tags had not yet been thought of. 

Maybe someday, some sort of DNA project can identify some of them.