Lampasas, Texas. The Name Stuck With Me.

August 5, 2009

On our recent trip to South Texas, down Highway 281, our route took us through Lampasas, which is the county seat of none other than Lampasas County. If you believe the hype that the local Chamber of Commerce distributes, “there’s always something going on in Lampasas.” We didn’t see a thing happening except down at [...]

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Al-Amir Lebanese Restaurant in Addison. I Fell For It Hookah, Line, and Sinker

July 30, 2009

Belly dancers! International music! Hookahs! We missed it all, because we arrived for the lunch buffet at Al-Amir … and that entertainment is only offered in the evenings. Doggone it! Al-Amir is a Lebanese restaurant in Addison, Texas (there is one in Dallas, too) that we found quite by accident. It was a very happy [...]

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Ominous

July 27, 2009

Changing pictures from color to monochrome seems to change their “tone” entirely. On a bright and beautiful day, my husband and I drove through the South Texas Hill Country near Luckenbach viewing these sights. They seemed cheerful in color. Once I changed the pictures to black and white, they seemed almost ominous to me. What [...]

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Raining Bats At Congress Avenue Bridge

July 25, 2009

Yesterday I showed you a picture of people lining the bridge at Congress Avenue in Austin at sunset. Those folks had gathered there to watch a colony of bats flying out to feed. That’s why we went to Austin, too — we were going batty. I have to tell you that we had a better [...]

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Vacation is Good

July 24, 2009

Ours is just a “mini-vacation” — a trip to the Capitol of the Lone Star State. We dashed down to Austin for an overnight trip to break the monotony of two weeks of working on our house and yard. Everybody needs a break from drudgery now and then so they can maintain an optimistic outlook [...]

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The Shell of A Roadside Attraction in Decatur

July 4, 2009

The rooms at the old Texas Tourist Camp are empty now; the cabins closed their doors to travelers back in the 1970s. The once bustling highway in front of it doesn’t get much traffic since the Interstate Highway was routed around the other side of town. As I walked around to take these pictures, I [...]

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Lavender’s Blue, Dilly Dilly. Lavender Ridge Farms near Gainesville, Texas

June 27, 2009

“Lavender’s blue, dilly dilly, lavender’s green, When I am king, dilly, dilly, you shall be queen. Who told you so, dilly, dilly, who told you so? ‘Twas my own heart, dilly, dilly, that told me so.” ~English folk song Actually, “lavender” is “a pale to light purple to very light or very pale violet” but [...]

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Kilgore, Texas. Boomtown, USA

June 25, 2009

Kilgore is a tiny town in east Texas that has a big history. I didn’t know that when I drove there yesterday to tell stories at the public library. In my three hour break between performances, I decided to explore “downtown” Kilgore. I was surprised at the treasures I found. At first, it didn’t look [...]

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I’m So Glad Spoons Cafe In McKinney Is In My Neck Of The Woods!

June 20, 2009

Y’all know by now that I’m a gal who likes to eat. If I find a restaurant I like, I’ll go out of my way to visit. “Spoons,” in McKinney, is one of those places. I had visited it more than a year ago during an Arts Walk night in the town. I loved it [...]

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Interlude

June 17, 2009

“The sun rose to a cloudless sky and what seemed to be an endless sea of waving grass. The prairie goes on forever as far as the eye can see. The wildflowers make it look like a floral tapestry woven with threads of yellow, white, blue, lavender and pink” ~ Nellie Morgan, 1855. Back in [...]

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A Splash Of Color On The Riverwalk

June 13, 2009

Perhaps you can see, from the name of this blog, why this particular store caught my eye. The Eclectic Art Gallery, on San Antonio’s Riverwalk, was up on street level, which meant I had to drag my tired old body up a flight of stairs from the river level. Once I spied the place I [...]

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Durty Nellie’s on the San Antonio Riverwalk

June 6, 2009

The sign looked “charming.” As my friends and I strolled the Riverwalk in San Antonio a few weeks ago, we were looking for a place to sit down and have “refreshments.” This looked like a likely spot. “Durty Nellie’s,” I said. “Isn’t that interesting. Well, I’m a good Scots-Irish lassie, so let’s stop at this [...]

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Who Was Mother Neff, And Why Does She Get A State Park?

May 30, 2009

I’ve often seen the road sign pointing to Mother Neff State Park as I drove on Interstate 35 south of Waco, Texas. Being curious, I’ve always wondered, “Who the heck is Mother Neff? Why does she get a park named for her?” I always meant to stop for a few minutes and see if I [...]

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Butterflies Flutter By In My Neck Of The Woods

May 23, 2009

I almost missed seeing this little fellow as he nestled in the leaves at Wild-Connections Butterfly Farm. This caterpillar, munching away, will shortly turn into an amazing butterfly. But, I don’t know which one he will be! I obviously didn’t take the educational tour when I visited this nature center near Austin last week — [...]

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Home Again, Home Again, Jiggety-Jig. Only The Good Friday.

May 22, 2009

This little piggy is back home again, and I couldn’t be more delighted. Now, don’t get me wrong — I enjoy taking vacations to see new places. I always anticipate the adventures and the break from routine. A “vacation,” however, is different in my mind than a “road trip,” because road trip is synonymous with [...]

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Scenes From The River Walk

May 21, 2009

One of the most lovely attractions of San Antonio, Texas is the downtown River Walk. We didn’t have much time to spend there after work yesterday (and trust me — you could spend hours there). Most of our time was spent in a pub. That’s a story for another day! I’m driving across Texas today [...]

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Gruene With Envy. My Neck Of The Woods.

May 16, 2009

After visiting Gruene, Texas several times over the years I remembered it as a bucolic, sleepy little place just slightly northwest of New Braunfels. If that means nothing to you, think, “thirty minutes north of San Antonio.” If that doesn’t tell you anything, then I need to get you to Texas, child, because your education [...]

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St. Peter’s Catholic Church in Lindsay, Texas. My Neck Of The Woods

May 9, 2009

Traveling in Texas on US Highway 82 from Paris to Lubbock you are likely to see more beef on the hoof than you will beef patties at the Dairy Queen. It’s mostly a string of small towns with a lot of rolling farmland in between. You will notice the “skyline” of the tiny hamlet of [...]

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Heritage Inn Bed and Breakfast, Denton. My Neck Of The Woods.

April 18, 2009

Not far from the Courthouse Square in Denton, Texas there is a quaint Bed and Breakfast Inn. Actually, it consists of three historic homes, side by side and surrounded by gardens, on Locust Street. The Heritage Inn is a delightful retreat — an alternative to the generic hotels you find along the highways. If Denton [...]

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Royer’s Cafe in Round Top, Texas. My Neck of the Woods.

April 11, 2009

We were cruising around in South Texas a few years back, when we found ourselves in the little town of Round Top. I told you that my neck of the woods covered all of Texas, didn’t I? Well, we were exploring and had gotten hungry, but couldn’t find a Dairy Queen on those back roads. [...]

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