Sunday, September 02, 2007

We must be middle aged dorks....

An outing-

DH was supposed to drive 6 hours north to DMIL's Saturday morning, but the "Sudden Impact" event Friday left us uncertain about my car's road-worthiness. This morning, he was restless and wanted something to do. "I wanna go somewhere," he said.


This doesn't happen often. I flew out to my Road Warrior and got the state tourism book. We hemmed. We hawed. I took a shower and left him leafing thru the book. Finally, we settled on it-we decided to go to Floresville, drive to the old Polish settlement Panna Maria, the ghost town, a Japanese internment town. All right!


On the way outta town, DH stopped by the ATM. Of course we were behind a sllllowwww person. We saw a long line at the gas pumps, and wheeled around to the one vacant pump. Broken. Figures. Had to stop for a long freight train. I started laughing at DH then, because those things would make him absolutely bananas on any given day!


I didn't realized exactly how "out in the country" we were headed. We were on county roads. The speed limit was 35. I started to apologize for picking a dud route. "No," he said, "this is exactly what I wanted. I didn't want to spend two hours on the interstate."


We turned a corner, and saw Panna Maria. (This name confuses me. Panna cotta is a creamy gelatin dessert. Con Panna is espresso with whipped cream. How did Panna Maria translate into Virgin Mary?) We got out at the church to read the historical marker. Those poor settlers. They walked from Galveston! The sun was shining. It was absolutely still. Too still. "Doesn't this remind you of Children of the Corn?" asked DH. Absolutely, and I hustled back into the truck.


We drove on, thru Helena (not worth going to if the museum isn't open) then farther south. We drove thru Falls City, home of the Fighting Beavers (which prompted some giggling about maces being the weapon of choice), thru Karnes City (not a city, never was. More like a rail depot) and on to Kenedy. We searched and searched for the historic marker that mentions Kenedy as the site of a Japanese internment camp (Japanese men from Peru, but that's another story) but had no luck. Couldn't find it.


So we turned back toward home. I had my "see the world's largest ball of twine" moment, and demanded we eat at Pollack's Sawsage Farm, thinking that it would be good. Oddly, DH's "sawsage" looked and tasted for all the world like meatloaf in casing. His hot German style potato salad was a the saddest potato salad I have ever tasted. I had a reuben (on Texas Toast-yuck) but the kraut was really good.


We had fun. Right down to driving thru the rain. "Bet we got good rain out at the house," declared DH. "No, honey, you watch." The rain in town was pretty heavy in town, and he asked "You wanna reconsider that?" "No." As we drove to our neighborhood, it lightened, then turned into a sprinkle. As we turned up our street, I asked "So, you wanna reconsider that?" The rain turned to random drops.


Yes, I brought my knitting.


4 comments:

Joan said...

Next time you need an outing, drive up to Austin to see my sister & niece. They have a gorgeous place in Austin, wooded & on a creek. You'd also get a major kick out of my aunt/uncle but I'd never send anyone to Houston on purpose. ;-p

Glad you had fun!!!

LisaW. said...

sounds just like the kind of middleagedork trip the man and i do for fun :) glad you had a good time!

Anonymous said...

Sounds like an interesting little trip. I enjoyed your descriptions and learned a bit about Texas! Would like to know more about Japanese from Peru at Kenedy site.
Have a good day! Jamie

Enid said...

AWWW that's so cute.
It's good to get out and do some mindless driving every once in a while.

TTFN