This week, it was off to the brown shores of Corpus Christi. Yippie-skip; or, as I like to say, my-whole-life (I don't know what it means, but it just feels right).
Maybe you remember, maybe you don't, but I truly dislike tropical places. Call it a flaw in my DNA if you wish, but I'm just too pale and easily bothered by heat and sand to enjoy going to a sunny, hot/humid, and, yes, sandy place. Regardless of the guaranteed unpleasantness, we packed up and shipped out anyway.
Some highlights and memorable snippets from the trip, I hear you asking for?
Really?
Well, that's how I imagine this scenario theoretically playing out, at any rate.
Just nod and smile.
Reginald Kitty is not amused.
Highlights first? I thought you'd never ask.
* Two beautiful early morning walks on the Riverwalk in San Antonio. Everything was practically deserted, and serenely quiet for a big city. You'll see a lot of those pictures in the slideshow later. Yes, there's a slideshow.
* We made it down to Rockport to see the Fulton Mansion, which was an interesting experience (again, wait 'til you hit the slideshow). We were on the tour with a bunch of morons who couldn't get the grasp of "the only original furniture in the home are these two mirrors, and a desk", and, therefore, kept asking if every-little-thing was original. Um, no. Read the brochure, please and thank you.
* Also in Rockport (or thereabouts, I guess), we made a stop by one of the oldest trees in the nation, aptly called "The Big Tree" (I think it's the briny air). It was so far out of the way, you almost expected the banjos to start playing.
We were afraid we'd never been seen again; of course, that fear was probably greatly exaggerated by the fact that I was whistling this the entire time.
While there, I solidified the fact that I am the Squirrel Whisperer. Don't worry, you'll see pictures.
* Half-Price Books. How do they always manage to get my money? How? I don't understand it. They didn't even have the books I'm looking for, yet I spent money. It's some kind of law that if I spot cheap books, I will bring them home.
If my house doesn't end up looking like that of C.S. Lewis, I'll be incredibly surprised.
* This was hanging up in our hotel room. Can anybody tell me what a Fisher Man Caret is?
Fisher man? OK. Caret? Yeah-huh. But why?
* The biggest story of the entire trip! I saved it until the end!
The first full day into our tropical adventure, I noticed a tiny-widdle ant crawl out of our air conditioner vent. I thought nothing of it, gave into my pathetic bleeding heart, and ignored it. The next day, I saw a few ants crawl out of the vents, and move along the dashboard. Speaking up, we folk from the high and dry Panhandle thought nothing of a few little ants. When we got in the car the day after, around half-way to Rockport, it was teeming with those damn tiny-widdle ants, mixed with a combination of whispy, willowy spiders. We had to pull of in the small town of Portland (oh, why couldn't it have been Oregon?) to fumigate our vehicle. True story. We were fighting those ants all the way home. Fortunately, they are no longer living, but we keep getting plastered with carcasses when we turn on our air conditioner. And that's why I officially hate tropical places.
All in all, this trip was pretty fun -- even in spite of those little ants.
Those bitches will DOMINATE you.
Was it more fun than the jury duty I had to miss to go on it? I'm still not sure about that (jury duty, yes; tropical places, no).
Picture time?
OH BOY!
Oh, by the way, I've got a question for you, dear reader.
You see, I -- being so brilliant -- just discovered the "Stats" tab on Blogger. I decided to give mine a look, since I love to do that kind of thing (hate math, love statistics; something just isn't right about that). Imagine my surprise when I saw this amazing little graph.
The question, dear reader, is why in hell did my views go up exponentially during the quietest month this URL has experienced in its history? Is this just irony, or are you folks trying to tell me something?
Also, this is the moment I just realized that all of this twaddle I rattle off truly does get read somewhere, by someone. Just like me, you're sitting there with the blaring artificial light of a fancy plasma screen smacking you in the face. Maybe you're scrolling with interest, or even doing some kind of blog research of your own. I'll be buggered if I know. I always just figured that a blog like mine would get lost in the shuffle, which afforded me some slight bit of comfort in the false security that strange eyes would not peruse these pages.
Yes, Simon. I was wrong.
Any road, to try and make a long point short, if you're reading this right now (which, obviously, you are), big thanks for popping in!
Have a Paul to welcome you.
