Santa Claus is Coming to Town

You better watch out
You better not cry
Better not pout
I'm telling you why
Santa Claus is coming to town
He's making a list
And checking it twice;
Gonna find out Who's naughty and nice
Santa Claus is coming to town
He sees you when you're sleeping
He knows when you're awake
He knows if you've been bad or good
So be good for goodness sake!
O! You better watch out!
You better not cry
Better not pout
I'm telling you why
Santa Claus is coming to town
Santa Claus is coming to town

Oh wait, I think I got that wrong….Billy Bob is coming to town :D

He was at Judge Roy Bean’s place yesterday http://billybobsplace.blogspot.com/2011/11/where-i-at.html since Langtry is a stones throw to Del Rio,  I bet he is already sipping a cup in beautiful San Pedro Campgrounds on Lake Amistad.

I will have to go pay him a visit once he gets settled down and has caught a couple fish (so he will be in a good mood)….shhhh don’t tell him I said that or Santa Claus is NOT going to come visit YOU.

Good thing is the biggest internet provider in the US does not have a cell tower in Del Rio, Texas so he can not read anything I write until he leaves town and can finally catch a signal about 100 miles from here la,la,la,la…hey that’s kind of a catchy tune!!

Nothing new on this front, except doing more laundry. watering all of mother’s trees and plants, and finally washing the cars.  By washing cars I mean using a hose with a spray nozzle to rinse of the dust. Don’t by any stretch of the imagination think I actually washed them with soap and water and scrubbed the tires and carefully detailed the inside, that is too much work.  I wonder if Billy Bob’s mentality is catching?

Was reading Shoeless Joe’s blog http://travlinwithjohn.blogspot.com/2011/11/i-ran-out.html   and from the comments I found that there are other people  besides myself that don’t much care to do laundry so a light went on, hey I’m open to barter. I will do your laundry if you mow my lawn…any takers?  Will throw in mesquite wood, just bring your chainsaw and cut your own.

Good night.  May you all have Terlingua Dreams.

Beautiful Tuesday

These past two days I have been busy doing laundry, a chore I have really never liked to do until I had to take up doing yard work.  In comparison doing laundry is a breeze.  Speaking of breezes the strong winds of days past are long gone.  While it has been a little cold in the morning, the sun has been abundant and the temperatures perked right up by mid morning.

Can you believe we still have mosquitoes?  I do not know how they did not freeze to death on Sunday night.  They are alive and well and have an affinity for my blood.

Drove into town to pick up the mail from the P.O. Box, went to the bank, and picked up a couple of items at HEB.  I was pleasantly surprised that there were hardly any people out and about.  Took advantage of that and decided to buy stamps as there were only two people in line and I know in December this place will be very busy.

While I don’t get to go online daily, on those days that I can, I am going to be changing the header picture to show some of the shots that I took this year at the Chili Cook-off.

Have a good night and may you all have Terlingua Dreams.

A Drive Through the Back Roads

My mom lives outside the city limits of Del Rio on the southern edge of Val Verde County.  Lately we have seen a lot of county trucks drive by the house loaded with asphalt so we wanted to know what streets they were paving.

We looked and looked but found nothing paved.  It had been like ten years or so since I had not taken our main road that eventually comes to a dead end at the gates of a private ranch.  It was a nice drive and the skies looked menacing but with the strong winds the hope of showers were literally…gone with the wind.  Even though I cannot complain we did get a little rain last night.

Saw this horse with pretty eyes and soon a pregnant mare joined him as not to be left out of the picture.

We then took a drive along Vega Verde Road it is a road that borders the Rio Grande for  a few miles until again it dead ends into a private ranch.  Across is Mexico and the majority of that land is owned by a very wealthy Mexican family…the Ramon’s of Ciudad Acuna, Coahuila.

There is a heavy presence of Border Patrol in the area and they just looked at us going 5 mph in a 30 mph zone, as we were taking in the scenery.  My family owns a lot here but our lot along with few other adjoining ones is heavy covered in carrizo from 30 plus years of neglect, so we have no idea  exactly which one it is.  Heck you cannot even see the river from the road anymore.

This might be our lot, who knows?

This would be what our lot would look like from the road if the carrizo were not blocking it.

Who says El Alamo is located in San Antonio?

We have an Alamo right here in Del Rio, Texas

All in all it was a nice leisurely afternoon drive.  Right now the winds are very strong out of the north and we are supposed to have a freeze tonight.  Turned on the heater a few minutes ago and plan on keeping it on all night.

Good night and may you all have Terlingua Dreams.

Thanksgiving 2011

I have never in my life gone to the grocery store on Thanksgiving day but since I was going to prepare my first turkey dinner wanted to do it right and decided to go to HEB to pick up crescent rolls and egg nog.

Was surprised at the number of people there at 1:00 p.m. considering they were closing the store at 2:00 p.m.  Some had cart fulls of stuff while others I suspect dinner guests had beer, wine, pies and flower arrangements in their carts.

As you can see I survived cooking my first Thanksgiving turkey and did not kill my mom or myself in the process.  Hope everyone had a wonderful day as well.

Is everyone ready to go take advantage of Black Friday deals at midnight?  I must admit that I only went once and that was like eleven years ago when the offers began at 6:00 a.m. at Wal-Mart.  Not being a morning person I showed up at 8:00 a.m. and by that time the TV/VCR I wanted was long gone.

The one thing I miss about Houston is the wide variety of stores all within ten minutes drive of my house.  Here in Del Rio the only big retail store is Super Wal-Mart.  I am a fan of Target and now that stores open up at midnight and me being a night owl I think I would go there and to Academy.  But alas the nearest Target and Academy are in San Antonio a whole three hours away.

Would like to welcome WeArePennyandCJ as followers.  Thank you for reading my blog.

Good night.  May you all have Terlingua Dreams..

Monday November 21, 2011

The day started out a little dreary and I almost believed the weatherman when he said today would be cloudy and rainy.  Should of known better, the sun came out and it was a beautiful and warm day.

We still have tons of mosquitoes and the worst part is that they are in the house.  I do not know how to get rid of them.  Does anyone know of a homemade remedy?  I cannot spray any chemicals because of mother’s allergies.

The day after I got back from Terlingua I started dad’s old car, and you guessed it…it does not want to start.  I take that back it has a new battery, it turns but it does not want to catch no matter how much I floor the accelerator.  Oh well, it will just have to wait until next year when I can find another mechanic.  It is shame since it was running so well but it does have to be started everyday or at least every other day.

Decided to brave the crowds and go to HEB (our only grocery store besides Super Wal-Mart) and try to pick up a couple of groceries to hold us over to next week.  Totally slipped my mind that today was a Mexican holiday so everyone was there shopping for turkeys. Turkeys are very expensive in Mexico and both HEB and Wal-Mart know this and advertise heavily in the mexican media to lure the mexican shoppers  during pre-Thanksgiving sales when they are on special here. They buy them for the traditional Christmas as well as New Year’s dinner.

The majority of people that  "know me" from the blogging world are aware that my culinary skills are non-existent.  If it does not come out of a can or a fast food joint, well then it is obviously not going to be served at my house.  But since I am at my mom’s house she does the cooking ( I know it’s shameful) so I decided to buy a small turkey this year and see how it goes.  YES, I am actually going to prepare it myself.  I may end up in the emergency room but at least I gave it a swirl :-)

Good night and may you all have Terlingua Dreams.

Slowing Stewing

This past week I have not been in a blogging mood.  Not because I have nothing to blog about but because I am highly pissed off, but the problem is that I am not sure WHOM I am pissed off at.

Let me explain, September came and went so fast I totally LOST that month between my two trips to Houston and being ill.  October faired no better with my income tax woes and getting ready for the chili cook-off.  Now here it is November with only ten days left before tumultuous December descends on us.

Upon my return from Terlingua I sat down and opened a lot of correspondence that I felt could wait until I got back.  How WRONG I was!!!  Or maybe how right because if I had opened it sooner I think it would have definitively RUINED my trip.

What the heck happened in September that could of caused my 401-K to look like a 101-K ???  I remember a few days of ups and downs in the stock market but then I thought it recuperated?  I am middle class working gal that is temporarily retired so I can take care of my elderly mother and I certainly cannot take a 13 percent loss in my portfolio.

I do not like the uncertainty of the stock market but the government leaves me NO CHOICE, my hard earned money has to be with an accredited financial institution or brokerage firm until I am of retirement age to begin withdrawals and at this pace I am not going to have anything to withdraw.

At this time of my life I cannot be in an aggressive investment strategy that is why I am so shocked at how much I lost in September.  Which leads me to another question, how much do you trust your financial advisor?  Are there other Bernie Madoff’s out there?  Do you all understand your monthly statements or is it like a maze?  I think they make them confusing on purpose.

Thus you can see I am quite angry but I don’t know if I should be angry with myself, my financial advisor, the stock market or WHOM?  I have always been a saver and I think I manage what little money I have quite well so this is really eating up at me and has for the past couple of days.

I will be calling my financial advisor tomorrow but is that going to bring back what I have lost? NO.  Is he trying to swindle me?  Who knows.

For the people who moved their 401-k plans from your former employer to a brokerage firm are you happy with them?  Would you recommend them? What advice can you offer me?

I don’t think I will be having Terlingua Dreams tonight…more like WALL STREET NIGHTMARES…grrrr!!!!

Tent Shower

Got a nice e-mail from a reader asking me to elaborate more about my tent shower, as they had never heard of one before.

They come in all sizes, my first one was pop up one 4 x 4 that I purchased from Cabela’s this is not the one but it resembles it in many aspects http://www.cabelas.com/catalog/product.jsp?productId=746435&destination=%2Fcatalog%2Fproduct.jsp%3FproductId%3D735058%26type%3Dproduct&WTz_l=YMAL%3BIK-516873

I have never been able to fold it no matter how many times I have watched the video.  It really did not matter as I had Terlita and there was plenty of room in the van to accommodate it.  Here is a picture back from the 2007 Cook-off and I used it along with my Zodi water heater.

I bought another one at Wal-Mart in 2008 that was a little more compact but it was only 3.5 x 3.5 and got skinnier on the way up.  I still have it but I don’t much care for it.

Last year I purchased a 4 x 4 shower so I could have a little more room to put a chair in there (so I could sit down and shave my legs) that is the one that got trashed this year.  I also purchased it at Wal-Mart for around $39.00 and in my opinion worth every penny.

The shower has mesh on three sides to let the water out and in the center there is room to hang your solar shower bag but I can’t really lift that much weight without assistance so I prefer to heat my water in clear gallon milk jugs and then pour it in my garden hose sprayer.  It also has a back window that you can zip and unzip to let it air out and dry quicker but it is hot enough in Terlingua that you don’t really need to do that.

This is what was left of my shower

I also take this opportunity to thank Terry for signing on as a follower.

Chili Cook-Off 2011

Did you think I had run off with a tall, dark and handsome cowboy?  Sure wish I had :D   

Well folks one thing about the cook-off is that you make plans and hope to accomplish this or that but it very seldom happens because something always sidetracks you.  So if you ever attend don’t really plan on following a schedule, remember you are on Terlingua time.

Got to the cook-off a little after 6:30 p.m. on Sunday, October 30^th was planning on setting up my tent but things got in the way and ended up partying and catching up with friends until 3:30 a.m.

It took me six hours to set up my camp the next day and even though my friends offered to help me, I believe in being self-reliant and I did it myself.  Above is a picture of me after a nice shower and with my Halloween clothes.

On Wednesday Nov 2^nd I was the designated driver so I could take my campmates to the Dia de los Muertos celebration.  However some were pretty partied out and it ended up just being me and my friend Toni.  She has a brand spanking new fancy truck and it was the first time in my life to drive one.  We had not gone far when we saw this huge orange haze in the horizon.  Got to the cemetery and noticed that there were hardly any people there even at this late hour.  We were not there even 10 minutes when a terrible windstorm came and we barely had enough time to run back to her truck and head back to the cook-off.

We arrived just before the dust storm hit and I was able to salvage my chairs, orange cones, solar lights and other items thanks to the help of the guy that was camping next to me or they would have blown to the next county.  He was also nice enough to take me into his trailer along with another friend of mine and her boyfriend.  From his window we watched my shower being torn apart but it was just too dangerous to try to go out and save it.

We thought the storm would pass after and hour or so but it kept on all night.  My friends decided to brave the storm and walk to a party and I decided to go to my tent and with the added weight of my fat butt make sure it would not fly off in the night.  It got cold but I had my new zero rated sleeping bag and was toasty warm.  One of the reasons I bought my tent was because it is Burningman approved, now up there they REALLY have white outs that last for hours and pack hurricane winds. Therefore I was confident I was safe or I would have gone to my car or to one of my friend’s trailers.

The next day everyone was surveying the damage and let me tell you it was considerable.  A lot of torn and twisted awnings from those high dollar motor homes as well as regular portable shades structures.  It was rather cold too, so everyone was pretty bundled up.  People looking for their shoes, boots and other items that blew away.  The majority of my friends pull trailers, toy haulers, teardrops or pop-ups.  I am the only one that still does tent camping.  Needless to say I spent it indoors going from trailer to trailer and it was something different but fun.

Saturday I was taking the trash to the dumpster when I did not see a hole and twisted my ankle.  Lucky for me I was able to grab my friend’s truck tire and did not fall on my face or skinned up my knees.  This did limit my mobility a bit and I am still suffering the consequences.

The cook-off lasts until Sunday but a fair amount of people do not want to brave the traffic and the long lines at the Border Patrol Inspection station and stay another day or two which is what I usually do.

Sunday was sitting around with my friend Debi reminiscing about the past week when I see this dog jumping off a truck and running around like he was possessed and all of a sudden it hit me “ it’s hell dog” and then a light bulb goes off and I remember that Frann has a little red truck so here I get out of my chair and hobble along shouting at the top of my lungs Frann, Denise, Hell Dog.  Of course they do not hear me but some people see me waving my arms and tell them and they come over.

We had a nice conversation at my friends Debi’s camp since she was had a shade structure and I did not, thanks Debi.  These ladies are hard working gals that really know their stuff and their skills and knowledge rival or surpass any mans.  I am sure all of you all know them but if you don’t give their blogs a look Denese’s is http://thepathtobliss.blogspot.com/ and Frann’s is http://frannbro.blogspot.com/

I want to thank them for coming back later that evening after hearing I was planning on eating a can of ravioli and they brought us some delicious fajitas.  I really appreciate it girls, I owe you one.  The next morning Denese came by so I could follow her to their place and get the grand tour.  I am sorry to say that I have no pictures as the night before I packed up my camera so I would not lose it and forgot which container it went in.  If you saw the picture of how I packed going to the cook-off you should have seen how cramped my car was coming home, as I just threw everything wherever it would fit.

When I got home Monday I took a shower, ate and went to bed.  Tuesday had to take my mother to her doctor’s appointment and I somehow ended re-injuring my ankle so was not able to unpack my car until today when I finally found my camera.  However I have not tackled the trunk that will have to wait a couple more days, as my tent weighs a ton.

May you all have Terlingua Dreams.