By the way, it
was a short-lived thing, Larry’s being in insulated overalls in 75° weather (I
was mistaken about the coveralls; they were only overalls).
He soon had the wiring fixed well enough
that we could proceed... and Tuesday morning while I curled my hair and
packed our bags, he found where those wires were
broken to one of the trailer brakes, and had it ready to splice into new wiring
as soon as we could stop and get some at an automotive shop. So, because of that little snafu, we didn’t
leave Midland, Texas, nearly as soon as we’d hoped to. The overalls were fine, that
morning: it was only 31°!
Larry is always optimistic (“This
won’t take long!”) and he generally knows exactly how to do whatever needs to
be done. As Lydia once said when she was
just two years old, sitting calmly in her little car seat while Larry put yet another
new engine belt in our pickup as we sat stranded atop McDonald Pass in
Montana, “My Daddy can fix anything.”
And he just about can.
A friend, upon hearing this story,
remarked, “When I was little, I thought my dad
could fix anything, too. Later I learned
it was just creative use of duct tape.”
haha
The Woodspring Suites motel
where we stayed didn’t offer breakfast, but that was okay, because we had a
leftover pancake from iHop (Larry had that with several packets of jelly I had
absconded with from the previous motel, along with some yogurt) and half of a
sweet potato with butter and brown sugar from Cracker Barrel (I had that). Larry didn’t think a sweet potato made a very
good breakfast at all, not being fond of them; but I love sweet potatoes, and
thought it was a fine and dandy breakfast.
I got a note from my friend
Sue, from whom we would be purchasing the Bernina Artista 730: “I’m getting so antsy to meet you guys
today!!!
“Here’s something to think about. I don’t know which way you will be going when
you leave Galveston, but you are welcome to leave the truck and trailer here
while you explore Galveston. It might be
hard to navigate the streets and parking in Galveston.
“Be safe out there! Rain has arrived again along with temps
dropping back into the 40’s and 50’s. It’s
currently around 65° here.”
“We do plan to leave the trailer and
Dodge... somewhere,” I replied. “It all depends on what route we’ll
take to head for home. Larry has been
looking at lists of parts he will need to repair the truck. If he finds
some at a good price and they’re not too far out of the way, we’ll pick
them up before we turn north.
“Good grief, I don’t think you want a flatbed
trailer and a ker-smooshed truck sitting at your house!
Aaaiiiiyiiiyiiieee, that would take the value of your entire neighborhood down
by a quarter mill. Eh? 🤣”
We would want a safe place for it, of course;
we saw cars near Odessa that had evidently had mechanical mishaps of one sort
or another, parked on the shoulders of the roads – and they’d been stripped
clean of tires and wheels, headlights, taillights, sideview mirrors, and more!
Larry got the proper wiring at Lowe’s, and
put it on the trailer. He’d done a temporary fix the previous evening,
but one trailer wheel didn’t have brakes. He told me it would be fine (he
always thinks everything will be fine), but I know that if there’s ever
a scary driving situation, particular with dumb drivers (we’re never the
‘dumb drivers’; it’s always ze uzzer guy who’s ze ‘dumb driver’), whether or
not one’s rig is in good repair might make the difference in whether or not one
can avoid an accident.
Soon Larry climbed in the pickup, started it
---- and off we went, 334 miles east across Texas.
We came upon a large pickup
truck loaded with long boxes going slowly (that is, the pickup was going
slowly) (well, actually, the boxes were going slowly, too; but only because
they were on the back of the pickup), hazard lights on, and we had to putter
along behind him for a while until we got a chance to pass him.
Larry’s explanation: “He’s hauling light bulbs.” (That’s his standard explanation anytime
anyone is traveling slowly, or with hazard lights on for some unfathomable
reason.)
Early that afternoon, we
stopped at a convenience store where they had fresh pulled-pork BBQ sandwiches
on their warmers, sending out tantalizing aromas. I don’t particularly like barbecue flavors,
but I have to admit, those sandwiches smelled good, probably because that half
a sweet potato I had for breakfast had done worn off. But... I don’t eat sandwiches in the early
afternoon! That’s a surefire recipe for
weight gain, for me. I thought
maybe, just maybe, I could weasel a bite from Larry; that would be good enough. I got myself a bottle of orange juice and
called it good.
Back out at the pickup,
Larry opened his sack to get out his sandwich – and there were two in
there. The lady had given us
two – and charged us for them, too.
Larry didn’t mind; he could
easily scarf down both.
I saved him from himself and
ate a third of one. I’m noble that way.
There were a lot of RV parks
in that area of Texas; many of them are for transient workers, as there were oil
wells everywhere, and new ones are being put in at a fast rate.
Another observation about a significant
part of the country we drove through: the
garbage alongside the highways is atrocious.
Not only did we see plastic bags, Styrofoam and cardboard and plastic
cups, and other smallish bits and chunks of flotsam, we also saw a grand plenty
of old couches and chairs, worn-out tires, and even a stove with most of its
innards missing. Ugh.
There were smokestacks here
and there with flames shooting out of them.
I typed into Google, “Why are flames shooting out of smokestacks—” and
Mr. Google pompously finished my sentence, “—in Texas.” And here’s the answer:
That flame one sees burning
at the top of a refinery’s pipe stack is an important, safe, and regulated part
of the refining process. Although the
visual of a flickering flame is eye-catching, there is no need for alarm. Flaring is a crucial, environmentally sound
part of converting oil into gasoline and other products.
Flare stacks are primarily
used to combust flammable gases that are released through pressure relief
valves, rather than emit these gases directly to the atmosphere. Pressure relief valves are essential safety
devices that automatically release gas to protect against the danger of
over-pressuring industrial equipment and possible equipment rupture. Pressure relief valves are required by law
through industrial design codes and standards.
Flaring also reduces
emissions that would otherwise go into the atmosphere by 98%. The process combusts and breaks down gaseous
compounds from their original state to carbon dioxide.
As we traveled southeast,
the fields and pastures and lawns changed from the golden-brown of winter
colors to the bright green of spring. Deciduous
trees were acquiring a misty green tint, and, farther south, there were
magnolias and cherry trees in blossom.
Some trees, still leafless,
showed clearly those round clumps of green in the middle of them: mistletoe.
By 2:30 p.m., we were in San Angelo, Texas, and in
another hour we were in Eden, where it was 50°. We were 157
miles from Belton, where Sue lives.
The fields were full of
calves, kids, and lambs. They peered out
at us curiously from behind their mamas, while those same mamas didn’t so much
as glance up from their grazing. They’ve
seen it all before. 😃
Our GPS jigsawed us across Texas
on narrow, bumpy roads... but I don’t think
there was much choice, really.
It sprinkled and drizzled
part of the way. We went through the
little town of Rochelle, where a bright, flashing neon sign near Main St. proclaimed,
“Buzzing with Pride!” The high school
football team is called the Hornets, and the stadium is named ‘Hornet
Pride’. But the town looks more like
they should toll the death bells for it, what with most of the old store fronts
all boarded up or the windows knocked out, one or the other.
We saw a lot of houses made
of what appeared to be stone, and perhaps some of them, such as this pretty
little house, actually were. But others
were crumbling to bits, and I wondered aloud, “What are all these ‘stone’
houses made out of, anyway? Contact
paper?”
We got to Johnny and Sue’s
house about 7:00 p.m., and very
much enjoyed meeting them. While Sue
showed me the machine and the huge collection of wonderful things she was
giving me along with it, Larry and Johnny visited, and Larry unhitched the
trailer and wrecked truck near Johnny’s boat and shed.
Two of the items in the amazing assortment are sturdy,
short-legged wooden tables that Johnny made.
One fits perfectly around the machine itself; the other fits around both
the machine and the embroidery module when it is connected to the machine. They are beautifully done – 2x4s cut in half
and glued together, sanded smooth, then stained and varnished to perfection.
We saw evidence of Johnny’s skillful wood crafting throughout
their home.
After leaving Johnny and Sue’s pretty home that night, Larry
told me some of Johnny’s stories. Imagine
how I cringed over this tale: Johnny
made a woman a set of gorgeous birch cabinets, at her request. He sanded them down beautifully, nice and
smooth and ready for the stain and varnish of the woman’s choosing.
She chose... blue
paint.
Aaarrrggghhh! Once one
paints unvarnished wood, the paint soaks into that wood forever. Johnny would’ve never, ever used birch wood,
had he known that would be the outcome.
As I’ve mentioned, we were driving an
extended cab 1996 Chevy pickup. In 1996,
Chevrolet did not make rear doors that opened on their extended cabs; in order
to access the back seat, one must fold the back of the front seat down, and
then slide the entire seat forward.
Since we were going to be gone for a week and
would be traveling through a wide variety of weather, I packed quite a few bags
of clothes, so we could layer as needed.
This meant... the pickup was nearly full already, before picking
up the Bernina with its entourage.
(And no, I did not pack ‘too much
stuff’, never mind whether or not we actually used it. I did NOT pack too much stuff, ya hear?!)
Well, Larry pulled all those bags out of the
truck in order to put the big Bernina suitcases and gear in first. Then he began packing everything back
in. After two or three packing and
repacking tries, everything was in there.
But... was there room for me?!
 |
| San Sapa, Texas |
My large camera case now had to rest at my
feet beside the door, and every time I got in from that day until the day we got
home, I had to swing my feet up and over that bag in order to seat myself. And no, the bag couldn’t sit next to the
center console, because then I would’ve had to sit crooked, which would’ve put
me in misery.
But... I coped. We need exercise on long driving trips, after
all! heh
Finally, we were ready to go. We thanked Johnny and Sue again, wished them farewell,
clambered into the pickup, and Larry turned the key.
The truck wouldn’t start.
The dome light had been on the whole time
Larry was packing, along with the power converter, and these ran the battery
down – faster than it should’ve, I thought, since the battery had been new not
so very long ago. Turns out, the battery
had lost a good percentage of its lifespan way back last October when Larry
drove it to Lincoln and the clutch went out.
He’d turned the key on in order to run lights or windows or some such
thing – and forgotten to turn it back off.
For a couple of months. It
sat forlornly awaiting its new clutch, and Larry didn’t discover the totally
flat battery until he finally had time to work on that clutch.
“No problem,” said Larry, and pulled out his
battery pack.
No go.
The battery pack was too low on juice to
start the truck, as Larry had used it several times to power the air compressor
to add air to the airbags.
So Johnny backed their SUV out of the garage
and jumped our pickup. It still took
a little while before it would start.
But we waited while it charged, and pretty soon, Voilá! We were up and running again.
But... there was one more small problem: the emergency brakes don’t work on that
pickup, and Larry needed to put away his battery pack and a block of wood under
one wheel. And the truck is a manual
shift, so someone needed to hold the brake pedal down while he did these things,
as the driveway was on enough of a slope that the pickup would roll.
I hopped out, scurried around to the driver’s
side, climbed in while Larry stood at the side, one leg inside the cab holding
the brake pedal down, and then wiggled my foot onto the pedal whilst he wiggled
his foot off the pedal. He
trotted around putting things away, then returned to the cab and we repeated
the previous operation, in reverse – only this time it was more tricky, since I
couldn’t stand outside the truck and stick one leg inside to hold the brake.
But, with a bit of
finagling, and with the pickup only rolling a few inches and nobody getting run
over, we got ’er done.
I hurried back around to my
side, remarking to Johnny and Sue, who stood by sympathetically (I think)
watching the show, “I’m sure there’s a better way.”
They laughed. (They’d probably been trying to keep from it
for several minutes.)
We drove to Rockdale and stayed at a Days Inn motel. Several
times, in booking through Expedia.com, we have wound up with rooms at a
discount, even up to half price.
It
was a lovely room, but basketball players obviously helped design it, as they
had the previous-night’s room. The sinks were so high, I had to stand on
my tiptoes to wash my face!
I’ve decided Larry has
nighttime klepileptopsymania. This is a
combination of epilepsy and kleptomania, and exhibits with the supposedly-sleeping
culprit suddenly kicking violently, then jerking all the covers away from his
hapless bedmate.
The bedmate doesn’t take
these things lying down, I’ll have you know.
She fights back.
“If medical doctors don’t
know there is such a thing as klepileptopsymania,” I told him the next
morning, “It’s just ’cuz they’ve never watched you sleep!”
Wednesday morning when we went to the
breakfast nook in the motel, we could hear several children talking and playing
in the adjoining meeting room. We soon
realized that they were one of the managers’ children, as he was keeping a
close eye on them as he worked nearby.
I looked up from my waffle to see an adorable
little black boy peeking out the meeting-room door at me. I grinned at him. His eyes grew wide,
and then he grinned back. When he peeped out again, I gave him a little wave.
A few minutes later, he came sneaking out, crept up behind me as I was getting
myself a glass of juice, and gave me a hug.
I said, “Hi!” and patted his head, all full
of soft little curls.
So that’s one good friend I made with
nothing but a grin and a wave, and I don’t even know his name, and probably
will never, ever see him again.
A couple of hours later, as we were driving
southward, we passed a little place out in the boonies, and on the garage door
of the small building at the back, someone had painted “SHOP”. I think we should grab some paint and a wide
brush and paint “HOUSE” on the front of the other building, don’t you
agree? People clearly need to know.
There was a light rain falling, and it was
48°.
Two good things about this:
1)
It was more restful
on the eyes, and
2)
I could edit photos
on my laptop without the sun glaring on the screen.
Two bad things about this:
1)
It was spoiling my
pictures, and how would we see across the Gulf?!, and
2)
It was turning my
hair-sprayed hair into a motorcycle helmet (which might turn out to be a good
thing, should I bump my head on anything, or should a pickpocket try clubbing
me: I could just headbutt him.)
As we drove, I thought often and fondly about all
that Bernina Stuff back behind the seat.
This Artista 730 has a nice big color screen... and it will even accept
my embroidery cards. I’ll be able to
design things on my computer, and then transfer them to the machine. I can use the fancy buttonhole CD Hannah gave
me! There are larger embroidery hoops, and designs
will save much quicker. I can ‘type’
things out, instead of going along punching o.n.e...l.e.t.t.e.r...a.t...a...t.i.m.e.
We kept seeing billboards for Cracker Barrel
announcing, “30 meals for less than $8.99!”
I said, “All of them, for less than
$8.99?! How does anyone eat that
much?!”
Look at this:
the azaleas were blooming!
That afternoon, I discovered a picture of Larry’s
wrecked pickup sitting on his trailer – on my very own Quilt Talk group! Sue had posted it, taking the picture from her
front porch. She wrote, “Here is the smashed truck and trailer making friends with
Johnny’s boat on this rainy day.” 😄
Since a few people have been confused about this truck,
here’s the story again: Larry purchased
the wrecked pickup for $6,500 online. He
will rebuild it. It’s a 2017, and was
still worth $45,000 when its previous owners crashed it. The company from which we bought it purchased
it before it was given a salvage title, so it still has a clear title, which is
always a good thing. We’re hauling the
truck on one of Larry’s flatbed trailers.
2:00 p.m. found us in Cypress, a northwest suburb
of Houston. We would be traveling
through Houston and several more of its suburbs (it has about 15) for another 1
½ hours to get to Galveston. Houston has
a population of 2.313 million (according to
the 2017 census) – and the Greater Houston area with all her suburbs has
a population of 7 million people.
Wow. The entire state of Nebraska only has a
population of 1.929 million, and the greater percentage of those are in Lincoln
and Omaha.
The rain nearly stopped, and we were hopeful that the sky
would clear, but it wasn’t 15 minutes before it was raining like anything again. I wondered how those motorcycles ahead of us
liked it.
(Well, the motorcycles were probably neither this way nor that way about
it. It’s the riders who
were likely feeling a bit like swamp creatures.)
A
great part of the city seemed to consist of oil wells, derricks, refineries,
oil tanks, and manufacturing facilities for the production of each of the
abovementioned entities.
“You’d definitely want to call Digger’s
Hotline if you were digging around here,” remarked Larry, watching a backhoe
deftly working its way between a row of red flags.
The majority of my shots in Houston, I think,
are of multiple layers of bridges going every which way.
I did get a few really lousy photos of the
Houston skyline. Distance, weather, bad
roads, and a bouncy pickup were all conspiring against me. But here it is.
We stopped at a convenience store and got
cartons of green grapes, purple grapes, and fresh pineapple. I opened the carton of red grapes. The lid was tight, and when it finally popped
off, grapes shot around all over the place, making Larry laugh at me. (I did manage to capture them all,
wipe them off, and put them back into the container.)
Larry ate green grapes, then put the lid back
on. I ate purple grapes, then put the
lid back on, having quite a bit of difficulty on account of it being such a
tight fit. As soon as the lid was in
place, Larry announced that he wanted some.
“Why’d you wait ’til I closed it to say so?!”
I griped, prying the lid off again.
And once again, grapes shot around everywhere. Larry laughed all the harder.
The grapes were good (dirt from the floor
notwithstanding), and the pineapple was totally scrumptious.
A little while later, we went over a bridge, and
there, off to the left, was... ... ... the Gulf of Mexico!
We drove southwest on Galveston Island to
Jamaica Beach, San Luis Beach, and took the Bluewater Highway Bridge over San
Luis Pass, with Chocolate Bay on the north and the Gulf of Mexico on the south. We were surprised to discover that it’s a
toll bridge, and cost $2.00 each way. It
was much too far to go around, at that hour of the evening, so we just
paid the tab.
Finding a lane leading to a public-access beach,
we turned that way. It was cold and
windy, but we put on coats and hats and walked to the water’s edge to watch the
big waves cresting and frothing up onto the sand. There were several kinds of sandpipers, along
with brown pelicans, terns, and seagulls.
This is a laughing gull. He
doesn’t find anything humorous at the moment.
Upon reaching Surfside Beach, where the road
turns inland, we made an about-face and headed back, driving right on the beach
itself for some distance.
The houses on pilings truly amazed us. Some were unbelievably high, higher than
those we saw along the Florida, Alabama, Mississippi, and Louisiana coasts back
in 2013. Many were gorgeous mansions,
and a large percentage were new, built since Hurricane Ike devastated the
island in September of 2008.
We took our things into our room at the
Beachcomber Inn at Galveston, right across the street from the Gulf. The
waters were turbulent, and breakers came curling and crashing onto the
shore. Very satisfactory.
Then off we went to find something good to
eat. I was determined to find an
excellent seafood restaurant, because there were a couple of dishes I particularly
wanted to try. I hunted around online,
and chose the restaurant: Landry’s
Seafood House.
I had crawfish bread with ‘crawfish tails, mozzarella,
Louisiana spices, tomatoes, and garlic’, along with crab and shrimp gumbo, made
with ‘dirty rice’. Larry had a plate
with a variety of seafood, vegetables, and dirty rice. What I’d really wanted to try was crawfish,
but the crawfish bread was the closest I could find on the menu.
We’d no sooner given our waiter our order,
than I spotted one of those stand-up menus in a little wooden frame at the
other end of our table, advertising crawfish!
Rats. No, crawfish.
When the waiter returned, I told him this
tale, saying I’d never had crawfish before, and asked if I could have just one
(as opposed to the whole plateful). He
took my request to the kitchen – and soon returned, bearing a pretty little saucer
with not one, but two little red crawfish, boiled and spiced to
perfection. He even told us exactly how
to twist them apart and eat the tail meat (which is the only part of
crawfish one eats). They didn’t even
charge us for this ‘delicacy’; they sent it out ‘compliments of the kitchen’. 😊😋
We cracked open our crawfish and gave them a
try. Tasty. A lot of work to go to for one small bite,
though, should one happen to be starved.
The rest of the food was really good,
too. I took most of the crawfish bread
back to the motel in a little Styrofoam box.
Restaurants serve such large portions!
I can’t eat that much.
Thursday, we did some exploring around
Galveston. It was still rainy, windy,
and cold.
The old houses in Galveston’s Strand Historic
District are something to see. Too bad
the day was so dark and gloomy! – many of my pictures were no good.
Below is a once-stately mansion that’s in sorry
shape; sad that it’s been left to deteriorate like that.
We would’ve liked to have seen Moody Gardens
and the Aquarium, but decided it was too expensive.
We went into Murdoch’s big souvenir store (the photos of Larry and me were taken on their deck),
and got a small wooden and canvas boat to give Johnny as a thank-you for
storing our trailer and wrecked pickup at his house for a couple of days.
Then Larry headed northeast on the Seawall
Boulevard without really knowing where he was heading at all, as he is oft wont to
do, and we wound up at the East End Lagoon Nature Preserve, looking out into
the Inner Bar Channel with the Gulf beyond, where were anchored many big ships.
Flocks of terns,
laughing gulls, ring-billed gulls, great-tailed grackles, and even colorful pigeons
entertained us as Larry tossed them pieces of crackers. They were so tame
(or brazen, one or the other), they’d hover (well, the terns are the only ones
of the above-mentioned birds that can really hover very well) right outside our
vehicle window, screeching for more. What
a ruckus they made, screaming and diving to snatch crackers in midair when they
spotted one flying their way!
I looked at a map on my laptop, and discovered
where we were. Not wanting very badly to
go back through Houston, we instead decided to take the Galveston-Port Bolivar
Ferry across the Texas City Channel, a part of Galveston Bay.
It’s a component of the highway system, so it’s
free. The seagulls, terns, brown pelicans, and great-tailed grackles
follow the boats all the way, and the grackles land right on it, and on the
vehicles. They have quite pretty whistles and chatter noises, and are so
fun to watch, with their long, fan-shaped, glistening purple/indigo/black
tails. They’re similar, but quite
different from, our common grackles. Some people don’t like them, but I
really love to watch and hear them.
As we were approaching the dock on the other
side of the channel, we passed a rock jetty completely covered with both brown
and white pelicans, cormorants, and laughing gulls.
Below is the Point Bolivar Light, a historic
lighthouse in Port Bolivar, Texas, that was built in 1872. It served for 61 years before being retired
in 1933.
A little before 5:00 p.m., we got to Winnie, Texas,
a little town with a population of 3,254 in far southeast Texas. We
stopped at an O’Reilly’s Auto Parts store, and Larry bought a step for the side
of the pickup so I could get in and out easier. Too many ins and outs,
too much turning this way and that to take pictures while driving Galveston
Island, and I’d hurt a rib so badly, I could hardly get a good breath of air.
I took some Advil, and it felt a little better.
The step helped immensely.
It would’ve been a lot prettier had it been sunny
instead of rainy, but at least the clouds were in interesting layers. Still, a lot of my pictures are blurry,
because it was too dark, and the pickup was too bouncy.
We were driving through Sour Lake, Texas, a
little before 6:00 p.m., when Larry spotted a quilt shop called Quilts, Etc.
“Oh!” I exclaimed, “I’d intended to look for
a quilt shop in Galveston to get something for Sue, and totally forgot!”
Larry obligingly went around the block, and
we went in. I chose a quilt kit and
several fat quarters for Sue. I got a
ceramic coaster with a Basket of Lilies quilt block painted on it, and a couple
of fabric panels – and Larry found a panel with deer on it that he wanted. He rarely asks me to make anything for him,
so when he asks, I comply. But you’ll
have to wait your turn, dear.
Keith texted me, asking how badly wrecked the
Dodge pickup is.
“Well, I think it looks like a
heat-seeking missile hit it,” I told him, “but Daddy’s been whistling happily
ever since we picked it up.”
His response:
😂🤣
We stopped at a convenience store that
evening. I started to fill a Styrofoam
cup with coffee from one of those big Thermos pumps, when the little old man
working there came running at me full blast, waving his hands, shaking his head,
and crying, “No coppee!! NO COPPEE!!”
I smiled and nodded and put the cup
back.
Do you think those Thermoses blow up if you
press the thingy on the top when they’re empty???? 😲
Or maybe he just didn’t want me taking all
the dregs that he takes home to brew more ‘coppee’. 😛 😜
We stayed at the Baymont Inn in
College Station, Texas, that night.
Wouldn’t you know, it was sunny and nice in
Galveston Friday. 🙄😏
We headed toward Belton to pick up the pickup
(sounds sort of like ‘quilting a quilt’).
In one of the little towns we passed through,
we went bounce-jouncing around a corner lickety-split, and my very large Styrofoam
cup of coffee leaped out of the holder and committed suicide right at Larry’s
feet. Fortunately, it had had time to
cool off, so he didn’t get burned. I accused him of making it fall out on
purpose, since he’d asked why I was getting such a huge cup in the first
place. Amazingly enough, only a couple of inches of coffee spilled; 80%
of it was still in the cup. It was Texas pecan coffee, really good stuff. Gotta order some of that!
We pulled into the drive of a little church
and poured the coffee off of the rubber floor mat, then proceeded on our way.
We got to Johnny and Sue’s house about 1:30
p.m. Sue was at a quilting retreat, but
Johnny was there. We hadn’t been able to
get him on the phone, so we just drove in unannounced, and Larry went to
pounding on things with crowbars and hammers and monkey wrenches. Worked much better than doorbells and
telephones; Johnny was soon coming out to see us. 😅 (Since someone will
doubtless take me serious, I should explain that Larry wasn’t making all that
racket just to bring Johnny out; he was hitching up the trailer to the Chevy.)
People are kind of free with their terminology
around Clifton, Texas; I don’t think one smallish lump in the terrain makes a ‘mountain’,
do you? Yet a ranch we went by was
called ‘Wild Mountain Ranch’, and there was only one small hill, and nothing
wild about it. They must be wannabe
mountain dwellers, just like us.
I spotted a wide concrete drainage ditch
built into the side of a hill. I pointed
it out to Larry: “Look, there’s a
runaway ramp.”
Larry glanced at it and replied, “Uh-huh. It’s for motorcycles.” 😂
The clutch on the pickup wasn’t working just
the best (unless it’s the transmission; the matter is up for debate), so Larry
began looking for a good place to stop and work on it.
After peering at the map on my laptop, I told
him, “There’s a nice big cemetery at the next little town.”
“That would be good,” agreed Larry. “I could pull the left front tire up on a tombstone,
and lift it just the right amount.”
We drove on, and instead went to the Hico
City Park, where there was a nice paved shelter plenty big enough to pull into.
The dandelions are already going to seed down
there, and starting on the next batch.
Here in Nebraska, the dandelions are still hibernating and shivering
from the cold.
When Larry completed the operation, we
departed with great expectations for a
Our hopes were soon dashed. The clutch grabbed just as badly as ever, and
the gears were still prone to grind and clash when trying to put it into third
gear. Larry says it’ll probably require
a new transmission. ☹ And yes, this is that pickup he took on trade
from that young man who assured him that everything was totally redone with new
parts, and there were no problems whatsoever.
Hungry, we started looking for a
restaurant. I found a review for the ‘Hashknife
on the Chisholm’ restaurant in Salesville, Texas, north of Mineral Wells: “Regularly
with a welcoming demeanor. The food is conveniently priced, regularly delicious
and clean.”
How ’bout that. They evidently hire raccoons to wash your
food before they bring it to you!
About this time, our
appetites were abated somewhat by the aromatic suggestion that yet another skunk
had met its waterloo, and we had just passed the site of the carnage. Pewweeeee!
It’s a wonder there are any skunks left in the world, as many as they
run over down there.
I found reviews on the Green
Frog Restaurant in Jacksboro, including this one: “Best frog legs I’ve ever eaten! George Straight eats here every time he’s
nearby.”
The owner’s answer: “Thanks for the kind review, but we don’t
serve frog legs.”
Hahaha
The reviewer is doubtless now
wondering, What on earth was that I ate then, anyway?!!!
There was a brilliant sundog
in the sky that evening as the sun was going down.
We ate at the Green Frog, Buffet-Style,
All You Can Eat Restaurant – and it was very good. There were no frog legs.
A mother at the next table
told one of her small sons to ‘talk nice, because God doesn’t like it when you
aren’t nice.”
I think she was trying to
impress us, because it became obvious it was something she hadn’t before told
him when he exclaimed, “Waaaaait!!!! How
would He know?!”
“Because
God is everywhere,” she told him. “He’s
all around you, and hears everything you say.”
“Oh!!! I know now!” yelled sonny triumphantly. “He’s just like Santa Claus!”
(Funny,
that was my precise thought just as she was explaining it.)
She
smiled fondly on her offspring and assured him he was exactly right. 🙄
Leaving the restaurant, we
headed on north toward Bowie, Texas. The
posted speed limit was 75 mph – but it was a two-lane road, and horribly rough. We went around a corner where another road
intersected the one we were on, and the reflectors and signs made it nearly
impossible to see where we were supposed to go.
Had we been going 75 mph, both pickups, Chevy and Dodge alike, plus the
flatbed, would’ve been out in yonder pasture.
At one junction there was a
sign informing us that to the left was the little town of Vashti, while to the
right was Bugscuffle Road. 😄
We stayed in America’s Best
Value Inn in Bowie. “It’s a nooo rooom!”
the owner told Larry with great excitement, and obvious disappointment that I
had booked online and somehow gotten a 50% discount. (No, I don’t know how I did it, either.) “You get much mo’ for you moneys!!!”
The sink in that motel room made
up for those others that were too high:
I could’ve washed my face in this one while kneeling on the floor. Don’t motel manufacturers have any common
measurements for stuff like this??
The nooo roooom consisted of
an old room with a new paint job, somewhat wild and garish, where nothing
coordinated in the slightest. One wall
was done in wide stripes of orange and bright sky blue, the stuffed chair and
curtains were in burgundy and maroon, respectively, and the bedspread and
ruffle were in mustard and rust. But
there was an adorable little old-fashioned red Frigidaire in there (though it was
lacking one handle). I want a cute little red
Frigidaire in my house!
This was supposed to be a non-smoking
room. What, then, was an ashtray
doing on the desk?! At least nothing
smelled like smoke.
It smelled like paint.
But finally, we had a motel room with a heat
lamp in the bathroom... (Why do they rarely have those things anymore?? It gets cold in there.) So I, all pleased, gathered up my
paraphernalia, went in there to have a shower, turned on the heat lamp
--------
It was the wrong kind of bulb. Didn’t even get warm to the touch.
Here’s a conundrum: In the same motel room where you have to
kneel to reach the sink, the commode is so high, one can swing one’s feet!
(Okay, sorry; that was TMI.)
The floor in that ‘nooo roooom’ was a replica
of old barn planks. Now, it’s not that I
dislike old barn planks; I actually think they are perfect in certain
settings. (Old barns, for
instance.) But somehow, well, ... it’s
just that I sorta like plushy >>clean<< carpet in
motel rooms. Sigggghhhh...
There were no USB ports in that room, though
there were a couple of ethernet ports.
Do people still use those?? Nooo
roooom indeed.
Another thing – a small thing, but a thing,
nonetheless: those who decide where the
trashcans should be placed in motel rooms must not have ever actually stayed
in a motel room – or if they did, they never used a trashcan. They often never put one in the bathroom,
particularly when the sink is on the outside of said bathroom. But a trashcan is needed in a
bathroom, whether there’s a sink in there or not. This room had a trashcan right beside the
front door, so that you ka-bonked into it when you walked in. It was likely put there by the trash
collector, so he wouldn’t even have to set foot inside the room whilst
collecting trash. (I moved it.)
There was a lovely, soft, duvet on the
bed-------- but it was covered with one of those nasty, horrid poly-rayon
bedspreads!!! Arrgghh, such
sacrilege. Most motel-room duvets are
covered below and above with nice sheets, and I understand that. But poly-rayon?!!! 😲😝
Yeah, I’m a Royal Penthouse Suite girl on a Dew
Drop Inn budget.
Curling my hair the next morning, I kept
thinking I was hearing Tiger snoring—until it finally dawned on me, someone on
the other side of the wall was snoring.
🤣
We ate some breakfast in the breakfast
room. It was fine, but there weren’t many
food choices. We filled our lidded
coffee mugs and went on our way. After a
few miles, I happily picked up my mug and took a sip.
!
What on earth do motels make their coffee out
of? Tar and turpentine?? Arrgghh.
Where’s some Texas Pecan coffee when you need it?!
By 11:00 a.m., we were on Rte. 81, and would stay
on it all the way to Columbus, except for a short stint on I35. Both roads are dreadfully rough. I
always worry whether or not the chains holding whatever it is we are hauling will
hold. 😬
In Marlow, Oklahoma, almost all the bottoms
of the tree trunks were painted white.
I looked it up, and found this:
The Marlow High School and Junior High Wrestling Teams are
continuing the tradition of the white-washed tree painting along
Broadway/Highway 81, North and South of Main Street.
The painted trees have become a tourist attraction and help in
creating uniqueness in our small town.
We are expanding our efforts this year and opening up the tree
painting to Marlow residents for the first time ever!
The wrestlers will be painting the trees Saturday, June 25, with
a lime mixture so that it will endure the harsh Oklahoma weather that Oklahoma
sometimes experiences. This is a community service to raise money for the Marlow
Outlaw Wrestling program. The donated funds will go toward wresting gear and
uniforms, camp fees, facility improvements, etc.
We greatly appreciate any donation that you are willing to put
forth.
Thank you again for supporting you Marlow Outlaws!
Thank you again for supporting you Marlow Outlaws!
Andy Howington
Head Wrestling Coach
Hmmm, how ’bout that.
We knew we were getting back to the north
when we started seeing ice on the lakes and ponds. But the birds are already migrating, and we
saw thousands of Sandhill cranes, Canada and snow geese, and various other
kinds of ducks and geese. It looks so funny, when there are ducks and geese on the
lakes, and sometimes they’re right next to each other, but some are swimming in
the water, while others are standing tall on the ice, just inches apart.
We ate at the Olive Garden in Salina that
evening, using a gift card from Keith and Korrine. I had calamari and
Italian chili. Imagine my surprise when
I decided to pull out my phone and inquire, “What is calamari?” – only to
discover... I was eating squid!!! Amazingly enough, I liked
it. Granted, it was breaded squid, fried crispy, and there were
two different kinds of yummy sauce, one hot, one cold, both spicy and good, to
dip it in. I think maybe I wouldn’t want
to eat boiled rubbery squid, all by itself.
😜
This oil well is located near Lubbock,
Texas. How many oil wells can you
see? How many derricks?
Would you believe, there are eleven oil wells
and at least twelve derricks? Might’ve
been able to see even more, had we not been bouncing madly down the highway
when I took the picture.
Hannah called to tell us that she’d just
opened the bag of dry cat food that came from Wal-Mart a few days ago. It was a huge, heavy bag that she could
barely drag into the house. Wal-Mart
ships such bags in large, white, heavy-duty vinyl bags. Since Hannah couldn’t lift the cat-food bag
out of the white shipping bag, she opened the top of each bag, planning to dip
out food for the cats’ bowls.
She scooped it out – and discovered... it
wasn’t cat food.
Pulling the white vinyl away from the side of
the food bag, she read, “Ol’ Roy Complete Nutrition T-Bone & Bacon Flavor Dog
Food.”
“Did I order the wrong thing?” I wondered,
and looked it up on my computer.
Nope, I’d ordered Meow Mix Original Choice
Dry Cat Food, as intended.
We stopped at the Wal-Mart in York to get a
bag of dry cat food. Upon leaving the
store, we thought to cross the highway and go to the Sapp Bros. Truck
Stop. The store exit was on a steep
slope, and the clutch or transmission had not improved with usage. No cars were coming, so Larry, hoping to avoid
jerking the pickup, didn’t quite come to a complete stop.
He was almost across the near lanes when he noticed
that the median was curbed. So he pulled
into the turning lane, watching for the truck stop entrance ---- and then
belatedly realized that he was indeed in a turning lane, ... ... ... for
oncoming traffic.
Fortunately, York is a smallish town,
population about 7,800; and, as it was past midnight, there were no cars in
sight.
Except for the local policeman.
Almost instantly, there were flashing red and
blue lights behind us. Siggghhhh...
Larry handed over registration, driver’s
license, and insurance card, and in his usual apologetic way explained what had
happened.
And again as usual, the patrolman was
sympathetic, gave him a warning, and then backed out of the way, leaving his
flashers on, so Larry could safely back up the few feet needed to reposition
and get back in the proper lane.
We drove around the spinney, found the entrance
(and the correct lane from which to get into it), and pulled into Sapp Bros. in
an extremely safe and prudent fashion. 🥴😇
We got home somewhere around 2:00 a.m.
The cats are delighted to have us home. 😻😻 Just look how excited they are.
Larry managed to go to church in the morning, but my
ribs, hips, neck, shoulders, knees, and ankles were complaining much too
loudly to get up and get ready when my alarm went off. So, after making sure Larry was awake, I went
back to sleep for a couple of hours. By the
evening service, I had recovered pretty well, so I went to church.
Larry came home at noon today and got the
vinyl flooring for the laundry room cut; it was lying there ready to be glued
and rolled flat when he went back to work.
It’s been four weeks since the washer sprung a leak and created a
waterfall into the basement. I have a
lot of clothes to wash! Larry has washed
some of his work clothes at Walkers’ shop, but it’s still a mighty good thing
we have lots and lots (and lots) of clothes.
😏
This evening he painted a friend’s bumper,
and when that was done, he came home and glued the flooring down.
This afternoon, I clicked ‘Contact Us’ on
Wal-Mart’s webpage, intending to use the Chat function to tell them of the cat
food versus dog food mix-up. But... Where’s
the ‘Chat’ option? Seems to have
vanished. That’s happen before. Do all the chatters go on strike, and take the
Chat button with them as they go?
I called instead, and, as usual, talked to a
nice young woman whom I could barely understand, and who could barely
understand me. But in the end,
all was well, and she promised to send me the bag of cat food I had ordered. (If it winds up being gerbil food, it is NOT
my fault.) As for the dog food, I can
give it to someone, and there will be no charge for it.
It’s Victoria’s 23rd birthday
today. She’s our youngest. Our oldest, Keith, turned 40 two days ago. Astonishing, how that happens. I’m giving Victoria my wonderful and
much-loved Bernina 830 Record, so I need to clean out the cabinet. I have that thing filled to capacity.
Victoria has a Bernina 810 – just like the
830 Record, but without the open arm, and with a few less fancy stitches.
We got it on eBay for $100 several years
ago. I’d put it in my watch list,
knowing it was a bargain; but then thought maybe I shouldn’t spend the
money. The auction ended while Victoria
and I were at church.
Larry had stayed home, as he wasn’t feeling
well – an unusual occurrence, for him.
He was watching the church service on my laptop when an eBay
notification popped up, informing him that the auction was nearly over. There were no other bidders on it; the price
was still at $100.
He promptly bought it, never mind the fact
that he had no idea what I wanted it for.
He just saw ‘Bernina’ and ‘$100’, and thought, Buy it!!! Buy it!!! Buy it!!!
It’s worth at least $500; that was a smashing
deal. It had been used in a home ec
classroom and was very well maintained.
However, it does not have the electronic foot pedal that mine does, and
it takes off with quite a lurch every time one steps on the pedal. It’s sooo much nicer, when one has
good control of one’s foot pedal and speed!
(Granted, Victoria herself is prone to take off from anything, anywhere,
with a lurch; so you’d think it would’ve been an excellent fit. haha)
My rectangular glass earth-toned beads that I
ordered for the Atlantic Beach Path quilt arrived while I was gone, but no hexagon-shaped
Swarovski crystals have come. I suspect
they’re in the package awaiting me at the post office; the silly shipper
thought I needed to sign for them.
Aarrgghh, that’s aggravating when they do that, causing me an otherwise
needless trip to town, because they invariably come when I’m washing my
hair or otherwise unavailable.
Birds are beginning to sing their mating
songs here! There’s a joyful noise in
our trees. It’s a sunny
45° today.
Last Monday, Hannah sent me a picture of a
box that had arrived nearly ripped open; it had been put on the porch between
the house and a flowerpot, and was all ripped up. Other packages were in a different
flowerpot. Must be a different FedEx
driver (again)?
For months one of those guys brought boxes
right when I was washing my hair... so he never saw me. Then one time he
popped open the door, said “FedEx,” sat the box down without looking up,
straightened – and there I was by the table not five feet away from him.
Jumped clean outer’n his hide, he did.
Sometimes when something strange happens in
their delivery/box placement mode, it’s because there’s a different guy running
the route. Some of them don’t have enough grey mattuh in ze ol’ punkin to
make batting for a potholder. Others
just seem that way, because they’re mad at the world, and take out their
vengeance on my box.
That box that had nearly been ripped apart
contained my new Logitech wireless ergonomic keyboard. Fortunately, it was in its own box inside the
bigger one – but there was only one small scrap of brown paper in there to
supposedly ‘cushion’ it! Amazingly
enough, it works.
My old one went kaput the day we left for
Texas. I think I’d used that keyboard
with the last three laptops. I’m glad to
have one now with the small USB receiver; the receiver on the old keyboard was
an inch and a half long, and forever getting in the way of things. This one, however has a ‘sleep/hibernate/power
off’ button on the top right corner. I found
this out by accident. 😲
And now, I shall get back to quilting, yeehaw!
(Seemed appropriate, since everyone kept saying ‘y’all’ to me last week.)
,,,>^..^<,,, Sarah Lynn ,,,>^..^<,,,
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