Memorial Day

Glen Rose, Texas

Weather: low 67 degrees, high 96 degrees, clear skies

Today is an important day as we remember the sacrifices that have been made for our nation by the people who have served in the armed forces. The next time we vote (or not), or go wherever we want when we want, or complain about our government, and enjoy all the other freedoms we have, we should remember the people who make it possible for us. And remember most of all the ones who made the ultimate sacrifice.



This was a slow day for us, but that didn't mean we didn't do anything. Carolyn wanted to go through our closet, and by the time we were finished, a number of clothing articles had been removed and gotten rid of. I have no idea why we still had those things. It's like I said a couple of days ago, maybe we'll have a lean and mean RV in about five years.

Glen Rose draws a lot of tourists to see the living history that is present here. The area around the courthouse is one of the most scenic we have seen. In the past few years, Glen Rose has added to the list of things to draw tourists by developing the Paluxy Heritage Park, where some of the older buildings from the early days of the county have been restored. A good example is the first permanent dwelling that was built here in the 1870s.



This is one of the first schoolhouses that were built in Glen Rose. It was built in 1903, and was typical of the one room schools that were found in little towns back in that time.



Another attraction that Glen Rose has in the summer is Big Rock Park, where there is a swimming area. There were a lot of people using the swimming hole today. Looks cool.



And finally, here's a picture of some roses that I saw at Paluxy Heritage Park.



More later, be safe.

Today's Town - Buffalo, New York: The Queen City Of The Great Lakes

Not all who wander are lost.

New Bar-B-Que Restaurant

Glen Rose, Texas

Weather: low 72 degrees, high 95 degrees, partly cloudy, scattered showers

Since I've been diagnosed with my respiratory problem, Carolyn has been trying to slow me down as much as she can. I understand why she does it, and I appreciate what she does to remind me that I need to take care of myself. However, sometimes the enforced inactivity gets to me, and I suspect it gets to her. So, today I stood it as long as I could, and then did something about it. About 1500 hours, I suggested to her that we needed to go see what's going on in Hico, the little town where everybody's somebody, and Billy The Kid spent the last years of his life.

Very little has changed in Hico, but I didn't expect to see much change. This is one of those little Texas towns that tries to use what they have to draw tourists, as well as provide a little shopping area for the surrounding ranches and farms. This mural that faces the main drag through town probably gives as good an idea of what the town is about as anything.



When we left Hico, we drove over to Stephenville. It was late in the afternoon, and we hadn't eaten lunch. We decided to try Hard 8 Pit Bar-B-Que, since it was always busy every time we passed there. I have to say it was a different experience. If I had known what it was, I might not have been able to get Carolyn to go, but when we were finished, she was making plans for the next visit.

The way this restaurant operates is that before you go inside, you pass by the cooking pits where you tell the guy cooking the meat what you want. Each of us picked the half chicken, which was actually too much food. The chicken was taken off the fire and plopped on to a serving tray covered with a piece of butcher paper. Carolyn wanted to know where the plates were. There were no plates, but they did provide silverware. At that point, I was expecting Carolyn to say she was ready to go. But, she didn't, so we went inside to the seating area, where we picked up our eating utensils, cole slaw, potato salad, and french fries. Then I got us some dill pickles, onions, and jalapeno peppers. At the table, we had some sauce along with ketchup and loaf bread. Then, we got a hand full of paper towels and dug in. Eventually, I realized that Carolyn wasn't squeamish about how we were eating. She was actually enjoying the food and the atmosphere. I would never have guessed it.

A word about the jalapeno peppers. They were as hot as any I have ever eaten, and by the time we finished, I had worked up a pretty good sweat. That should give an idea how hot they were. Oh, another thing they provide is a pot of pinto beans that you can eat all you want of. I didn't try them, but they looked good. Maybe next time.

As I said, Carolyn is already planning what she will get the next time we go to Hard 8. Maybe I can use this experience to get her to try some other places.

More later, be safe.

Today's Town - New York, New York: Babylon

Not all who wander are lost.

Positive Results

Glen Rose, Texas

Weather: low 72 degrees, high 93 degrees, clear skies

Last night, I had the best night of sleep that I've gotten in a few weeks. As I mentioned earlier in the blog, I'm being treated for a respiratory problem that has been plaguing me for several months. The nature of the problem is such that I have been having problems breathing at night, or while doing just about anything of a physical nature during the day. As a result, I have cut back on my walking and just about all work around the RV. My doctor is treating me for the problem, and I think I may finally be seeing some positive results. The last couple of days have been the best I've had in a while. I hope this positive trend continues.

I still go for my morning walks, but they take longer than they used to. For instance, I used to do 12 minute miles. Now, I'm lucky to do an 18 minute mile. That's okay, at least I can still do that. I have hopes that I'll be back to something approaching my former pace in time.

We have an external hard drive that we use to back up our computer about once a week. The hard drive crashed on us, but we finally managed to get it running long enough to put all the data on the computer hard drive. Then, we bought another external hard drive to use for our backups. Today, I took the old external hard drive apart and destroyed it with a hammer. One more piece of junk gotten rid of.

While I was getting rid of the old hard drive, I went through some other computer stuff that we no longer have a use for. Several items were found that I got rid of. Another five years of this RV life and getting rid of stuff, and we may have everything pared down to a lean and mean RV.

Anyone who keeps up with the blog probably notices that we like flowers of all kinds. It doesn't matter whether they're in someone's yard, in a park, or wildflowers in a ditch along the road. We find them everywhere we go, and are always looking for them. Here's one I found today. According to our reference, this is a basket flower. Note the bee at the top of the flower.



This next flower with the purple color is named a Horse Mint.



More later, be safe.

Today's Town - Pigeon Forge, Tennessee: Years Of Forging Progress

Not all who wander are lost.

Happy Birthday, Carolyn

Glen Rose, Texas

Weather: low 72 degrees, high 93 degrees, clear skies

Today is Carolyn's birthday, as she turns xx years old (you don't really think I'm going to publish how old she is, do you?). I tried to make the day special for her, so flowers were the first gift for the day. She likes Alstromerias, so I got her a bouquet of those that also included yellow carnations and purple daisies.



The birthday celebration included a trip to Granbury as we looked for a steam cleaner named The Shark. Carolyn has been wanting one ever since she saw them advertised on television. With the respiratory problems that I've been having, she was looking even harder so she could steam clean the chairs, couch, and several other things. We stopped at Home Depot for something else that they didn't have. However, imagine her surprise when I found The Shark, and bought one.

The next stop was at the RV parts store, where we needed to look for a different fan blade for our stove hood exhaust fan. The old blade was so flexible that it was inefficient at pulling exhaust fumes away from the stove. Success again, as they had just what we were looking for. One thing they didn't have was a water pressure regulator, which I've been looking for. That's okay, since I found a place on the Internet that I can order it from.

A birthday can't be celebrated properly unless you eat out, so we stopped at Chili's for a very good meal. The Chili's in Granbury is probably our favorite for that chain. We've tried some in other places that were forgettable, but this one is okay.

Carolyn said she had a very good birthday. I hope so, and I'm looking forward to her being around for many more. We still have a lot of exploring to do.

The traffic in Granbury was terrible. I don't think it's because of the upcoming holiday. School is out for the summer here, but even that doesn't seem to be causing all the traffic. It appears to us that the economy is booming, so that's probably what's causing all the activity. Now, if the rest of the country could catch up with Texas, we'd be doing fine.

Here's another Texas wildflower. This is a Scarlet Gilia. At least that's what our reference book says. It's about 100 feet from the RV.



More later, be safe.

Today's Town - Comfort, Texas: Haven In The Hills

Not all who wander are lost.

Funtime RV Closed

Glen Rose, Texas

Weather: low 65 degrees, high 91 degrees, clears skies

The bee swarm that I took a picture of during yesterday's walk was gone this morning. I guess they had places to go and things to do. Like find a new home, I mean hive. The cooler weather yesterday morning was what probably caused them to stop until it warmed up later in the day. Anyway, I'm glad I saw them in the tree, versus coming at me.

We had some shopping we needed to do this morning, so we drove to Cleburne, which has just about everything we needed. The first stop was at HEB, where I picked up a couple of things that we like from them. Then, we drove to Lowe's, looking for a water pressure regulator for the RV. Lowe's didn't have what I was looking for, so we drove to the Fun Time RV dealership. I had read on an RV discussion page that Fun Time was closed down by their floor plan company, but I was hoping that their parts store might still be open. No luck on that, as the entire property has been closed down. Only a couple of older RVs are there, plus a few people working on what looks like finishing up the shut down. It's too bad the place was shut down, since they had one of the better RV parts stores in the area. Also, I imagine they had 30-40 people working there. I wonder what those folks are doing now?

The next stop was at the WalMart Mall, which is on the way out of Cleburne. We checked out their RV parts section, but there wasn't anything there that we needed. Since we needed a few groceries, we picked those items up. While we were walking through the groceries, we noticed that many items were marked down quite a bit. By the time we left, we had picked up a nice baked chicken, fresh corn on the cob, some fruit, and a few other things. Supper was good!

More later, be safe.

Today's Town - Reno, Nevada: America’s Adventure Place

Not all who wander are lost.

Bee Swarm

Glen Rose, Texas

Weather: low 65 degrees, high 93 degrees, mostly clear skies

It sure was a nice cool morning for it to warm up so much this afternoon. From 65 degrees to 93 degrees is a 28 degree difference. I walked early when it was cool, so I missed the hotter temperature later in the afternoon. Another reason for walking early was unplanned, but worked out okay. Bees are starting to swarm, and I saw this big swarm hanging in a tree just off the path I was walking on. If it hadn't been cool this morning, the bees may have been flying. Check out the size of this wad of bees. I was about 100 feet away, and used the zoom feature on the camera for this shot.



Swarming bees are quite commonplace in Texas when the weather starts warming up. Normally, they don't bother anyone. My brother Terrell and I were playing golf in Bay City several years ago when we heard a strange buzzing sound. The sound kept getting louder and louder, and we couldn't see what was causing it. We kept looking around, and suddenly one of us (I can't remember which one) said "Hit the ground". Almost immediately after hitting the ground, a large swarm flew directly over where we had been standing, and continued down the fairway. The swarm was about six feet off the ground, so if we had remained standing, we might have received some serious stings.

The bee swarm I saw today was the most exciting thing that happened. The respiratory problem I'm having kept me from sleeping very well, and it seemed like I was awake every hour or so and having to get up so I could breathe. This is not a fun time. I'm getting to the point that I dread going to bed at night because of the problems with breathing. But, I have to give the medicine that has been prescribed a chance to work. If I'm not better next week, I will probably be going to see another specialist. I'm ready to do whatever it takes to get some relief.

More later, be safe.

Today's Town - Bainbridge, Georgia: Georgia At Its Best

Not all who wander are lost.

More Doctors

Glen Rose, Texas

Weather: low 74 degrees, high 86 degrees, mostly cloudy skies, humid

I whined a little in last night's post about the injection I received in my left wrist when I saw the orthopedic doctor. I'm glad to say there will be no whining tonight, because the wrist is doing much better. It's hard to believe how quickly it started feeling better. Maybe my problems with that part of my body are finished.

I had an appointment with our family doctor this morning to see him about a respiratory problem that I have. He treated me for it last week, but the problem is persisting. When I saw him today, he changed some medicine and added another one that he thinks will make a difference. The problem is serious enough that we're going to stay here another week. If there's no improvement, the doctor will be sending me to a specialist. Remember what I said about seeing a doctor leads to seeing another doctor leads to seeing another..... Looks like my prediction is coming true.

Since we're here for another week, I went to the library and checked out some new books for us to read. The Glen Rose library is very good for the size of the town, and we make full use of it when we're in the area. We also use the Granbury library, but not as much. Think of the money we save on reading material by using the public library wherever we are.

In the past, I've written about how vicious the mosquitoes are on the gulf coast. Well, those coast mosquitoes have nothing on the mosquitoes around here. There has been a lot of rain here recently, and that means an outbreak of mosquitoes. It's surprising, because when we were lived here for 26 months, we seldom saw a mosquito. Not so now. We can't step outside without being attacked by the blood sucking little devils. I'm ready to go to the desert. Or the mountains.

When we were in Stephenville yesterday, we spent a little time looking around. Carolyn found a sewing shop that she just had to look in, so I went into town and took some pictures. Here's a picture of the Erath County Courthouse.



The courthouse was built in 1892 and restored in 1987. The architectural style is Richardsonian Romanesque. When I walked inside, a group of middle school students was being shown the foyer of the building, which consists of limestone columns going from the ground floor up to the tower.



Erath County has several dairies, and is the top dairy product producing county in the state. This sign gives an idea of how they feel about their dairies.



More later, be safe.

Today's Town - Ada, Oklahoma: City Of Pure Spring Water

Not all who wander are lost.