Mal has to get used to this

Over the past couple of weeks, Mal has headed back into James's office or our room to tell James something... only to find that James isn't home.

Today, on the way home from meeting a friend, Mal said, "Since we didn't watch that program last night, we should watch it as soon as we get home, if Dad's awake. 

I had to remind him that his dad IS awake and is, in fact, at work.

It's an interesting situation. Mal is 11, and for the past six years of his life (minus about a month), James has either worked from home or not worked at all. 

That's more than half of Mal's life!

Another thing is that James is often absolutely exhausted when he gets here, and at night, like yesterday, he's ready to go to bed as soon as he's eaten dinner. 

One of the traditions that James and Mal have had over the past few years is that at around 10 PM, Mal will go into James's office to announce that he's "ready to talk." (I'm usually well into my night's sleep by then.)

James will go into Mal's room, and they'll catch up for 10 minutes or half an hour or whatever it takes. 

I think this is beautiful. It's something James is going to try to make sure happens whenever he can, even if it's less than when he didn't have anywhere to be.

On the way home from Temple yesterday, we stopped in at The Home Depot because I needed to pick something up (nope, we don't get an employee discount; they don't have one). 

While I ran in, Mal hung out in the garden center with James for a few minutes.

You might notice that James is standing upright without crutches! He was limping around, but able to work without crutches. He took them, and he used them to walk into the store, go to the break room, and just get around in general. But he could hobble out of the little garden center hut to scan stuff, so that's a good sign!

Honing in on the New Normal

If it is still 2021 when you are reading this, then I apologize. It's not really for you. It's for posterity.

Greetings, reader of the future! I hope we managed to reverse the climate change trend toward hotter, colder, stormier, drought-ier (yes, I saw that word used in a legitimate news article) weather for you guys. 

Hey, speaking of that...

A couple of days ago, the CDC announced that fully vaccinated (against Covid-19) people could refrain from wearing masks even indoors in most situations. Yay! James got his second shot two days ago, so is still a couple of weeks out from maximum immunity, but D and I are both considered "fully" and I look forward to ditching the masks!

I know a lot of people aren't. They want to keep wearing them, either for a while, until some benchmark they've chosen is reached; or seasonally, say to avoid the flu, which was barely a blip on the radar this past year, as we were distanced and masked.

Covid brought a lot of divisions to the forefront, in some really disconcerting ways.

The first is related a bit to masks. There are people, including most of the folks who were in my social circles a decade ago, who believed mask mandates to be compliance drills by the government, the first step onto a slippery slope to-- ??? Wearing burkhas? Never talking to anyone outside of the home? Closing all businesses to force the populace to be dependent on the government for income? To seize all guns? 

Most of the safety measures and protocol and solutions to the pandemic were seen by some as a great government conspiracy. The vaccines supposedly make you sterile. Or have something that inserts a tracker into your body so the government can see where you are at all times (even though you do that voluntarily with your smart phone, so...). Or will kill everyone who got one within the next decade (if this blog goes dark, you'll know why!). 

The initial "lock-downs" -- which weren't, by the way, as essential travel was never prohibited and we could go to the grocery store and get take-out if restaurants chose to stay open -- were seen as an overreach if not intended to destroy our economy, then doing it carelessly anyway.

Not allowing people to go to others' homes at first was seen as some kind of "divide and conquer" mess, I guess. I don't claim to understand the way people think.

A lot of people who felt all public safety measures were some kind of infringement on their personal rights point to inconsistent messaging. Yes, the CDC initially said masks didn't help; then they said that they absolutely DO help and people should wear them. Yes, that is inconsistent. But a couple of things were at play that helped me give grace to the folks in charge: 1) This was a NOVEL coronavirus and not much was known about it. 2) There wasn't enough personal protection equipment for the medical professionals, and they didn't want a run on what there was. This was smart thinking, the way people hoarded toilet paper and pasta and flour. 

It devolved into a political thing: If you were a Democrat, you wore masks and stayed home and lived in "fear." If you were a Republican, you enjoyed your freedom and did whatever the hell you wanted, and that's what this country is about, after all; plus, there's only a small chance you'll die, so why be such a pansy? There are exceptions. I know right-leaning people (and am related to people) who took trying not to catch or spread the virus seriously. And I know left-leaning people who are quite skeptical of the rapidly-developed vaccine and won't get it.

Another thing that the virus laid bare was the economic fault lines in our society, many of which run along racial lines. 

James has a job that he was able to do from home, and his company stable enough to weather the initial decline in business without having to cut salaries, so we were able to continue our lives without much economic instability.

But many jobs couldn't be done from home, like employees of grocers and restaurants, and in the medical profession. So they had some really no-win choices to make: go to work and risk infection, or don't work and don't get paid and probably get fired. Some people didn't have a choice: their employer couldn't afford to pay them and had to let them go. Some people didn't have childcare for their kids who were suddenly not in school, and had to wing it.

The jobs we suddenly glorified have been historically pooh-poohed as jobs that people who don't have a "good education" do, an almost morality tale about the dangers of failing to pursue higher education. Yet we expected these folks to happily show up, deal with people who were angry about mask mandates, put in all of their hours, expose themselves to the exhalations of hundreds of people every day, and often take public transit there and back.

The death rate of people who identify as Latinae was much higher than the death rate of white people. Black folks also died at a higher rate than whites. In addition to jobs, my guess is that things that played into this are: population density in households and neighborhoods, reliance on public transit and carpooling, and lack of access to medical care (from lack of insurance, fear of attracting the attention of authorities/ICE, and a general and understandable skepticism of the medical industry), in addition to living either in urban areas where the healthcare systems were overwhelmed, or in rural areas where there are no longer hospitals.

In addition to the 8 million people who slipped into poverty between May and October 2020, there was a huge toll on healthcare professionals. Some were laid off when hospitals stopped doing elective procedures; others were reassigned to jobs outside of their expertise. Many were run ragged, and had to choose between taking care of patients and seeing their families. I have two friends who rented hotel rooms for weeks at a time so as not to bring home something to their kids and partners.

The stimulus payments lifted fully half of the children in poverty in the US out, so that's pretty exciting. The eviction moratoriums are just ending, so I hope both landlords and tenants are able to pull through this time okay. I understand that it's easy to assume all landlords are rich corporations, but they are not. And many have been financially hit by the fact that their tenants have not had to pay rent, and federal or state help is slow in coming.

In short: deadly disease aside, it's been a mess. It's showed a lot of weaknesses, including in our communities.

Homeschoolers, especially, seem to lean more toward the "masks and gathering limits are an affront to my personal autonomy." I have a friend (who's not a homeschooler, but kind of the same mentality) who moved to another city where they weren't enforcing the statewide mandate, because she wanted her kids to have "a normal childhood."

I can only make decisions for myself and my family, but I think it's okay to teach your kids how to pivot during a trying circumstance, how to pitch in for the health of all, and that sometimes, things just aren't "normal." How can you build resiliency if you never encounter this kind of thing?

Anyway, we're a long way from "normal," but at least there's a light at the end of the tunnel now. I'd really hoped that a global pandemic might lead to more understanding and cooperation, but that just seems not to be super possible, on a large scale. In fact, I might be tempted to be more discouraged if the freeze hadn't happened, and we hadn't had some neighbors step up in a huge way. I think maybe the smaller communities are where the magic happens. And that part is nice.

COVID hits home

On Friday afternoon, January 15, Mal and I decided to drive up to Temple to visit Nana and Pappy and spend the night. We stopped about 15 minutes outside of town for Mal to use the very nice Bell County Safety Rest Stop, at which time I messaged Nana that we were almost there.

When we arrived, Nana and Pappy were watching Chance while Ken and Sarah, who had just had lunch with my parents, were helping Hannah pack up her stuff to move out of the apartment of doom. Nana asked me, "Did you see my text?" Since I'd been driving, I had not.

Unbeknownst to Ken and Sarah, TJ had been exposed to COVID from a manager at work, and they'd called all of the employees in for rapid testing. He was positive.

We were in the house for maybe six minutes before I'd booked a hotel and we turned right around and left. Chance was having enough fun that he didn't really care, though Mal was pretty upset at first. Once he realized we'd be overnighting in a hotel, though. Malcolm perked right up.

He'd just gotten a new (to him) skateboard and was pleased to experiment.

Over the next week, several people started showing symptoms, and in end end, Hannah, Sarah, Kenzie's boyfriend, Mom (Nana) and Dad (Pappy) all tested positive for COVID. My dad hasn't had any symptoms; Sarah's have mimicked cedar fever except that she lost her sense of taste and smell; Tian probably got it but hasn't been tested, and same for Chance. Mom has had a cough, chapped lips, sore throat, cough, fatigue, chills, and some loss of taste and smell.

Last night, my dad took my mom to the hospital for tests, just because her oxygen had been in the low 90s for the most part, and she was just so tired. They were there for about 5 hours, then she was released.

It looks like my family is largely experiencing the mild version of this virus that will likely have killed half a million Americans by the end of the month. We're fortunate.

Mal and I seem to have gotten out in time; neither of us has had any symptoms whatsoever.

It looks like we might be plateauing on COVID as a country, but we're on what I would call a very high butte at this time. The vaccine has been in circulation for a few weeks, but distribution and administration is not the well-oiled machine of our ideals. Still, there seems to be a light at the end of the tunnel, even if that end is still months away.

I have been absolutely baffled in the past couple of months about the way some people are conducting their lives.

I have a friend who has basically not wanted her kids to wear masks at all this whole past year. She got a job in a nearby town and was happy to move because "They are just living their lives as if the virus doesn't exist." She was planning Halloween costumes and excited about "regular" trick-or-treating because "I just want my kids to have a normal childhood."

While I understand the impulse, in a way, this is NOT a "normal" time. We're living through it together. There are teaching opportunities all around.

We had a GREAT Halloween, even though it wasn't "regular."

Our city usually has trunk-or-treating, but instead had a drive-in movie and gave each person a goodie bag of movie snacks.

Whereas a "normal" holiday might have melted into Mal's memories, this was SPECIAL. He'll remember it.

Then when actual Halloween rolled around, we went to my parents' house and handed out candy to trick-or-treaters using remote control cars for distancing.

Kids loved it, parents loved it. Mal was a little frustrated that he couldn't keep up with demand, but ended up having a good time.

We've had several "not normal" little road trips this past year, where we went places we could sight-see outdoors, get take-out for consumption in parks, and just enjoy a change of scenery.

"Normal" would be nice, but I don't think that sugar-coating reality is great for your kids. Even Mal's birthday, which was NUTS, was fun. We rented a bounce-house and he had one friend (and any siblings) over every day for 3 days, and then his cousins came one day. 

Although Mal's certainly bought into the "2020 sucks!" stuff he's seen online, I don't think he'll look back on this past year as particularly terrible. McDonald's PlayPlace is probably what he misses most. We can't pretend away that it's just not open and available right now. But we CAN find alternatives, and I think we've done a pretty good job.

Then one of the rare times that an unschooling board slipped into "politics" (it was actually a question about chicken pox, which led to a discussion of vaccines, which led to a discussion about COVID), one lady responded: "It seems to be all a compliance drill. I haven't seen a pandemic at all. Less annual deaths than years past. No flu anymore. Seems like a mild flu replacement hyped up by the government and media and to what end I have no idea. We'll see." Uh. When I pointed out to her that "not seeing" a pandemic is hurtful to people who have dealt with it, lost family members, etc. she responded with this: "[W]e clearly have different perspectives. I don't think anyone's suffering should be the responsibility of others. I see health, healing, pain and suffering as each individual's personal journey through growth or stagnation. I believe there is covid and Corona viruses. I have seen the effects and know people effected. I see it as a cold or flu that can cause autoimmune attacking effects that cause blood clots to form and lack of cellular oxygen absorption. Did you know that Corona viruses have been around for several years and they were considered a cold or flu before event 201 when bill and melinda fence foundation decided its time to change our world and practiced and prepared for this current situation that changed the status of the prior/ past Corona virus to be a mass hysteria hype to give people a fear based motivation to do what they dictate? I choose a different path. I was simply offering an alternate perspective above. No harm done. No need for you to tell me what to believe. You do you and I'll do me. Let's agree to disagree. Blessings and peace to you!"

When I forwarded this to my best Vegas friend, my brief commentary included so many expletives that she thought my phone had been hacked! But, really... I can't even begin to go into all of the levels of wrong in her missive. And I can't imagine living a life in which you don't feel some responsibility to alleviate the suffering of others, if it's within your power to do so. I'm just flummoxed by this outlook. Clearly.

We're not the folks who have literally stayed in their homes since March (there are those people, and I sympathize with them, especially if they are or live with vulnerable people). When the weather is nice, James goes out to breakfast on Sunday morning and eats on the restaurant's patio. We've eaten at places like Mandola's and Lucy's and Hat Creek Burgers, where they have outdoor dining and a playground. Mal and I go to the lake multiple times a month. We've even started going back to Urban Air, as they seem to be doing a great job with their COVID protocols. 

He's seriously the only child on this entire playscape.

As I mentioned, we've gone on a few adventures. We've gone to non-essential stores like Hobby Lobby or Bricks and Minifigs. We're cautious but not scared. We're living our lives in the balance between safety and joy. 

I understand that other people have different risk tolerances than I do, but was still shocked this weekend to see that the community theater in which I was involved has had a couple of shows this season already and is planning two more, then a big musical in June. They do seem to require masks in the audience, and are spacing seating. They also offer streaming tickets to folks who aren't comfortable with being in the theater. But the actors aren't distanced or wearing masks! And I know many of the actors; they have families! 

It might be a geopolitical thing: where I live now is more liberal, and therefore more serious about public health with regards to COVID. I was going to say that maybe they're not having the same virus load we are, but just compared their positive tests to population and it's very similar. In fact, on January 22, their new cases were .06% of their county's population, whereas here, our new cases are .056%. 

My church hasn't met in almost a year. I guarantee that we won't until all people have had a chance to be vaccinated. We don't go to movies. We have eaten inside of a restaurant twice since the pandemic started, and it was early on. Now that the growing percentage of cases are from a more contagious strain? We'll just take it easy until we can get our jabs.

Seeing that people have been back in church since the spring, that their kids are in school, and that life is pretty much proceeding as per usual for so many is something around which I simply cannot wrap my head. 

We're so close. I don't want anyone else dying (or developing permanent tissue damage, or long-term symptoms).

It's the Most Weirdiest Time of This Year

I have started to blog about ten times since I wrote almost a month ago. Kind of a lot is going on, and I have many thoughts about many things, obviously, but also I have quite infrequent moments of sit-and-write focusing that are available to me, plus I'm trying to finish two very good and very historically-detailed books that I don't know why I started concurrently... but there you have it.

We are continuing to be affected only in terms of convenience and normalcy by the coronavirus. My grandma has had to quarantine a couple of times since moving to a nursing home; my grand-nephew's dad was hospitalized and released with COVID; and my cousin, her husband, my aunt, and my uncle all tested positive after Thanksgiving. To my knowledge, everyone is on the mend, so that's good news.

My immediate family traveled over Thanksgiving, but did the same thing on the road as we do at home: masks when briefly inside public areas, and otherwise outdoors or only with our "pod." We drove to Port Aransas, eating common meals outside and each family renting a separate condo. It was a nice getaway.

I know people pooh-pooh "the third coast" as not having "real" beaches, but, man, it works for me.

Since we've been back, we've been taking advantage of outdoor Christmas stuff, such as our city's drive-through Christmas-tree lighting and the Wildflower Center's Luminations. We have tickets for Mozart's Christmas show and the Trail of Lights in Austin (it's drive-through this year, too). 

The other day, I got a little wistful when I saw a red Fiat 500 driving into the McDonald's parking lot... I was thinking, "That could be us, from the past, when we used to just go hang out at McD's so Mal could play and we could enjoy unlimited sodas." We're getting out to parks and meeting friends at places like that, but it'll be nice to get back to some indoor blowing-off-of-steam at some point in the nebulous future. Right now, Mal's regressed to his younger days' "nighttime crazies." He used to get SO active and engage in potentially injurious behavior late at night. He stopped for more than a year, but is back to it. I look forward to being able to pack him up in the car and take him to an indoor playground again. Here's hoping 2021 moves us toward that, sooner rather than later...

Treading the Pandemic

For posterity's sake, I'm going to note that two different vaccines have been announced within the past week as having been 90-95% effective, and that it's entirely possible that, by this time next year, we'll be back to "normal." Then again, an asteroid that's hiding behind the sun could also hit Earth, so who really knows.

Mal's stomach stuff continues to be a thing we have to stay on top of. It's looking like about 1 generous tablespoon of Miralax is a good dose for him, and we still have to wrangle him to the restroom or he just... doesn't go. Hopefully the maturity/behavioral part of this will be on his plate soon enough. Between the hour a day James and/or I spend with him camped out in the bathroom, the twice a day we have to cajole him to let us brush his teeth (actually, he does okay at night; it's the early daytime brushing that he resists, for some reason), and keeping track of time to remind him to get a snack around 9 PM so that we're not dealing with making macaroni and cheese at 10:15 at night... it's a lot. But he's happy and pretty healthy, so that's a good thing.

We've been spending a lot of time outside lately. It's one of the two really beautiful times of the year in Austin, so we're trying to take advantage of it.

Construction on the houses in our immediate area is finally wrapping up, and I think we'll get a break in the heavy machinery and its assorted noise pollution soon. We can't actually see any of the building from the house right now, but there's one house going up behind our back lot that seemed to have a lot of trouble breaking up rock to put in the septic tank last week.

I've been really thinking about environmental waste and harm a lot lately. I'd decided somewhat recently to only buy sustainable/natural clothing, but then realized we were talking $70 for a casual shirt and $175 for a pair of shoes. So I instead committed to buying second-hand clothes whenever possible, then finding more environmentally-friendly alternatives where it's not possible. In fact, except for the Sonic underpants in that top picture, everything Mal has on in the photos above is either from Kid 2 Kid or a hand-me-down from one of his friends. And we'll pass them along when we're done. 

As countries move to zero-net carbon policies, I'm hoping our own nation will soon follow suit. Along with that, I hope builders (like the ones I mentioned above) will find better options than cement slabs. It's bad for drainage (even though our town has a maximum 40% impervious cover ordinance) and making it is bad for the environment. Plus, it traps heat.

James has been looking at building a work shed and found an alternative based on French drains and gravel fill, I believe. I'm on an alternative housing committee for our town and am hoping that eventually, we can move the whole city to zoning ordinances that would favor more environmentally-friendly alternatives in house-building. 

Speaking of which, the meeting has just started (still waiting for everyone to join the Zoom), so I'm out. Have a good week!

A Dreamy Sign of the Times

My "nightmare" last night shows the dystopian times in which we live: I was waiting in a VERY long line at See's Candy and realized that I wasn't wearing a mask. I'd been in line quite a while and was almost to the front. I looked around and realized that literally no one else was wearing a mask, either, which both made me feel a little better that I could finish my transaction, and also worse because I didn't want them to assume that I'm one of those people who doesn't care about public health and safety. Then a customer coughed right in the face of the cashier, who immediately disappeared and another employee took her place. Mal was somewhere in the store reading a book, too. I don't remember whether he had a mask or not.

Roots in the Time of the Pandemic

It's official: James put in paperwork to work from home for the foreseeable future. Of course, the question then is (as VRBO's ad campaign so poignantly puts it) when you can work/school from anywhere, why not make it somewhere you want to be?

First, we LOVE our home. We love the yard and the location. We dig the neighborhood, and the trade-offs for increased construction/density is a more diverse demographic of neighbors. When we first moved in, it was largely older white folks and now there are families of all stripes and a bit of melanin. So that's good. 

What we do not love is the heat. Pretty much four months of unmitigated heat, often paired with humidity... not Florida humidity, and not even Houston humidity, but still pretty damp grossness. And we know D is going to move away ASAP, but with the pandemic, who knows when that will be? Still, it'd be nice to be somewhat close by to... wherever that is.

We looked at Temple, where my parents live, because housing is so much more affordable there. We also looked at Wilmington, Delaware, because it's cooler than here and not likely to have a natural disaster, which is a plus. We'd just rent if we went there.

The thought of getting our house ready to sell and move is overwhelming, though, and we've put so much into it that we wouldn't get it all back out. 

But as I was thinking about it this weekend, I realized something: I've agreed to be on 3 committees that require my presence here, and I really hate to bail on that. So I guess we're hanging out for a while.

Relaxing Close

It's 7 AM and I'm sitting out on our (muggy) patio, as I have every morning since we got here. It's so nice; a lot like having a verandah on a cruise, but less noisy. I mean, the ocean and the wind can get pretty loud when you're speeding through at 12 knots. Here, instead, it's pretty still this early. Still enough that I can hear "Born in the USA" playing on the speakers in the pool/water park area.

Yesterday, Mal finally did get to swim and go around the lazy river a few more times.

He did not see his friend again, and was extremely sad about that the first half of the day. He played with other kids later, but told me, "I don't love them as much as I loved her."

We met the Shetland ponies, walked down by the river (James hadn't seen it yet), hung out in the room, realized that the general store serves pizza at night so Mal was able to eat something besides the snacks we brought and chicken nuggets, and ended the day on the lawn watching "Scoob."

Here at the resort, they keep alpacas, longhorns, Shetland horses, and goats (which we should get to see today); on-site, we've seen raccoons, frogs, and an armadillo (not me, darn it; but James did); and then across the river, we saw the happiest-looking cattle I've ever seen. They have a shaded, forested hillside, and can wade down into the water to cool off and drink. California might advertise happy cows, but I think these babies have them beat.

Today we were going to go to McKinney Falls State Park, but since this is Texas, it's heating back up. It's been warm enough, with highs in the mid- to high-80s. Today it's supposed to be in the mid-90s. And the falls have NO shade. And they're likely not really "falls" at the moment, either. Plus, we have some amazing Shiner Bock queso left over from James's dinner last night that we want to get into our fridge posthaste. It should take us just about an hour to drive across Austin to get there. And, surprisingly, our largest ice pack hasn't thawed all the way, even though the refrigerator stopped working and got up to 60 degrees for a few hours before they switched it out!

Typically, I plan pretty packed vacations. But this time, 1) COVID and 2) I've learned that doesn't work for these guys with whom I'm traveling. So I've taken advantage of the downtime and the amenities to do laundry twice. The only clothes I'll need to wash when we get home are our swimsuits and what we wore yesterday.

Have a great weekend, friends and family!

Wimberley and Beyond

Yesterday was full and fun. Once we got up, we went straight to a playground. Mal had been disappointed because the park where we considered eating in Blanco (and moved to the courthouse because of the mosquitoes) was just a walk-and-contemplate park) didn't have one. Morrow Park is buried behind the old entrance to Jacob's Well, and we had to drive over some gravel roads to get there, but Mal ended up meeting a few kids and having a great time. 

Since we were in the area, we went to Jacob's Well, also. Not familiar with the new setup, we made the mistake of parking in Lot A. Pro-tip: Lot C is a lot closer to the well, see? The walk wasn't long, but it was across a mostly-unshaded prairie, which I thought was lovely but Mal thought was hot and purposefully knee-hurty. We made it to the well, but he was unimpressed. He thought it would be a wishing well. Unfortunately, it was only a 140-foot cavern under pristine water. Bummer.

 

I think it's a lot prettier and more impactful from the lower level, but, again, the layout was different than when I went when I was expecting Malcolm, and we weren't pressing our luck to do anything other than get there and leave.

I'd had left-over pizza for breakfast so wasn't hungry yet, but we went by Shamrock Tacos (which is inside a Shamrock gas station) for James, and then went to Cypress Creek Nature Preserve so he could eat them. They had a little playground! And it was right across from Monster Treats, which serves Amy's Ice Cream. So we did.

On the way back for an afternoon regrouping (it really was getting toasty out), we went to Pioneer Town. Kitschy little western movie set. 

Much-needed rest over, we ventured back out as the sun was getting ready to set. First, we visited EmilyAnne Theater. It's closed, obviously, but has a series of gardens, including an interactive music area that Mal loved.

Then we went basically across the highway to Old Baldy. It's a hill you reach by ascending 213 steps. There are encouraging painted rocks along the way, and I'd tried to prepare Malcolm for the adventure. He did great! He even had energy to spare once we got to the top!

We hung out enjoying the panoramic Hill Country views for a while before descending. Then we went back to the cabin to finish up the pizza.

This morning, we packed up and made our way northeast. We got breakfast at Sugar Shack Bakery (James had the Sunrise Hash and I had a terrific chicken salad sandwich), and ate it near the playground at Blue Hole Regional Park. Mal made some more friends and played for an hour or so. Then we drove over to look at Blue Hole. It's so still and pretty when no one's swimming in it.

Later, I'd pulled over to get a picture of a giant slice of pie in Kyle, when Mal noticed "a REAL wishing well!" So apparently, this is what he thinks a wishing well looks like.

Yeah. A fountain. I won't tell him if you won't.

Then, man, was this the highlight of our trip? We saw... THE WORLDS LARGEST SHOVEL.

It's made from items that were in a landfill. And, really, what can you possibly see that might top the World's Largest Shovel?

How about a fairly large pecan-loving squirrel wearing a COVID safety mask? Ser kurt.

And, at long last, we arrived at our final destination: Hyatt Lost Pines Resort. It's a very nice hotel, and has lots to do. Since we got here at 3, we've relaxed in the room, gone swimming, ridden on the lazy river, Mal made a friend on the "beach" at that pool entry, we locked ourselves out of our room by exiting through the patio and not remembering that I had the safety lock engaged on the actual room door, had an AMAZING dinner, and roasted s'mores while listening to a guy playing campfire songs on his guitar. Mal made more friends at the fire pit, and we're supposed to meet them at the alpaca feeding tomorrow.

 

 

Now, I'm super tired and my computer is about to die! Night!

"You're in Trump Country"

We drove around a lot yesterday. About 150 miles, give or take. But we didn't get very far, as you can see from this map:

During that drive, we learned two things: 1) Ranchers overwhelmingly seem to support Donald Trump for reelection. I've never seen so many signs, flags, giant banners, etc. Admittedly, I don't often drive through miles of ranches, either. For every sprawling hill country pasture with a Biden/Harris sign adorning the fence, we saw 50 or more for Trump. Also, a popular sign in Johnson City said, "Vote Republican to preserve your freedom!" I'd love to interview the Biden supporters, see if they know their neighbors and whether it's difficult to be the lone blue in a sea of red. Also, I'd love to ask the "freedom" people what and whose freedoms they mean.

However, the more important thing we learned was: 2) THEY ARE BUTTERFLIES, not moths. Oh, man, the slaughter was worse driving around yesterday. I took a picture of our grill, which I won't share here because it's really brutal in a kind of beautiful way. One of the first items on our agenda today is to find a car wash; we also drove over some fresh tar so the undercarriage is likely a mess, as well. (According to Mal, our first order of business is finding a playground.)

Let me tell you about our adventures yesterday, in words only because the internet where we are is super slow. Like downstream is about .37 mbps. So there's no chance of uploading pictures until we get somewhere less... country. In fact, where we're staying is on a property literally called "A Country Place," which has a selection of differently-sized cabins. We're in The Woodshed, which is adorable and more spacious than it looked online. You can see it here.

We left the Exotic Zoo Resort after a last swing on the playground, and having emptied our last bits of food for the animals. They'd just been fed their official meal, which looks like sawdust, but were happy to leave the troughs to come get treats from us. One llama exhaled a mouthful of his feed into James's window, then promptly threatened to spit after consuming a few bites of the pellets we gave him. Also, a camel tried to eat my windshield wiper. Which we really need to work because, as I mentioned, suicidal butterflies.

Mal wanted Home Town Donuts, so we stopped by there (James had a breakfast taco and kolache), then drove over to LBJ park complex. There is a state park on the south bank of the river, then a national park to the north. The state park has a living farm, operating as though it were 1917. There are a couple of cabins, one dating back to the 1850s, and then the farm is a homestead where the family started off with a modest little cabin, and then the husband built the wife a Victorian home that resembled her mother's house. They have sheep, cows, chickens, pigs, and a garden. They were cooking goulash for lunch and it smelled heavenly. In addition to the homes, there is a dormitory that the husband built for his 10 kids, and which has since been turned into a smoke house; a barn; a nice big chicken coop; a well house; and a smithy. 

Except that the homestead neighbored the Johnson ranch, that part of the park didn't have too much to do with Lyndon Johnson. However, they did have a museum with relevant displays. We didn't go inside, because Covid and masks and all of that. 

We drove over to the Johnson property, and it was massive but modest. After he became President, Johnson had an airstrip installed so he could travel to the "Texas White House" to work from there, and to host guests and dignitaries. It's still a working ranch, and we got to see quite a few cattle. It's really a lovely site, and it felt like we had it to ourselves. There is a half-sized replica of Air Force One at the airstrip. Mal was terrified that it would start up and fly into us. He enjoyed the bench swing in the trees between the house and the river, though.

Oh, hey! I got one picture to upload! Yay!

Next, we drove through Fredericksburg... I don't know if we missed the best part of town, but I've heard raves and didn't really see anything too impressive if you're not into wineries. Holy cow, there are more than 50. Also, a couple of places where they make mead, cider, and rum.

But you know what town was super cute? Ingram. After Fredericksburg, we drove through Kerrville to Ingram to see Stonehenge II. If you look at the map above, you can see how "off the path" we went to see it. It was worth the side trip, though! There are quite a few neat pieces of outdoor art in the complex, and one of the Easter Island heads is responsibly wearing a mask about the size of a queen sheet.

Ingram seems to have a bustling arts community and specialty shopping. I think it would be fun to hang out there for a couple of days.

Heading back east, we stopped at a quirky roadside attraction called "Cartoon Saloon." It was only a few miles from there to Old Tunnel State Park. It was a railroad tunnel that stopped operating in 1942. Now, thousands of bats live there and fly out at night a la Congress Street Bridge in Austin. We knew we wouldn't be there late enough to see the bats emerge, but it's free to enter the park so we stopped by, anyway.

Walking down to the tunnel, we were able to see HUNDREDS of bats already flying around like crazy at the far end of the tunnel. Also, it smelled really bad. But the view from the upper viewing area was absolutely gorgeous! It was our best view of the Hill Country so far. And we weren't even in the car, where we were having to view it though a bug-splattered windshield!

Once again, Mal was such a trooper. He complained a little bit about walking during the day, but he did it. And he was in generally good spirits. I did ply him with soda and Hershey's, but that just means I'm an adept parenting strategist, right?

We got dinner from Blanco River Pizza, and ate it at the picnic tables on the county courthouse lawn. Mal ran around the whole time, talking about and playing Minecraft. Then we came to our little Woodshed. On the way, we crossed over a one-lane "bridge" that was maybe five or six inches over a creek. It was very cool and I'm glad it hasn't rained lately!

Today, we're planning to explore Wimberley, but also taking it easy. Have a great Tuesday, folks!

Hill Country Getaway

About three years ago, my extended family started planning a trip to Hawaii, to spend a week a the beautiful beachfront bungalows where my parents took us way back in 2004. This time last year, however, we found out that the bungalows were for sale. The manager couldn't say for sure what would happen under a new owner, but the sales page for it made it clear that the historic buildings could be town down to make way for building "your personal paradise." Rather than wait until the last minute and have to scramble, we went ahead and canceled the trip.

A few months later, I planned a trip to California. We were going to do things that none of us have ever done before, like go to Disneyland, Legoland, and Huntington Beach. We were going to eat at Bob's Big Boy and Roy's Donuts. And since California is much cheaper to get to than Hawaii, we had even splurged to travel first class. Then COVID. We were very fortunate, and after barely any convincing at all, all of our money was returned to us, save a 10% service charge from the third-party reseller for Disney tickets; I didn't begrudge that at all.

SO, scaling back even more, we decided to return to the State Fair of Texas. We haven't been in two years and Mal's at the age where I think he'd really enjoy Little Hands on the Farm. But, of course, the fair got canceled. They have a drive-through food thing, but it's a minimum of three hours and I definitely do not want to sit in my car, staying in one place, for that long. Also, the Perot Museum is still closed. And we'd have to wear masks inside everywhere. The Dallas Zoo even has everyone over the age of ten wearing masks all of the time, even outside. Thus we filed Dallas away for another time.

I tentatively scheduled a little circle, staying within an hour of where we live, and expecting that we'd just need to stay outside the whole trip. I didn't get too excited about it because... see above. But we got to go! It's been a nice couple of days so far. Except for the suicidal moths. 

Yesterday at about 11, we drove over to Marble Falls for lunch at Local Eats Craft Food truck. It was so good! Especially the parmesan sweet potato fries.

We'd talked about going to Sweet Berry's farm just to look at the fall pumpkin scenes, but Mal decided he would rather go to the local park. I was kind of glad. There's very little shade at the farm, and though the day was mild enough for Central Texas fall (high in the mid-80s), the full sun could definitely bake.

We had a really nice time at Johnson Park, then passed a classic/souped-up car festival on our way out of town. We stopped to admire those for a bit.

Then we drove on into Johnson City. There must have been a moth harvest recently. We killed so many of them with our windshield. It's disgusting. They look like leaves blowing in the wind until they explode in your line of view. Good grief.

Our next stop was the Exotic Zoo Resort. We've driven past before but never stopped. There were tons of very friendly animals! They said we could hand-feed anything except the zebras, which bite, and the "birds," which are evil ostriches and rheas. They didn't have to warn me about the birds. I've been pecked by jerk ostriches right in the camera lens.

At one point, James was hand-feeding a full-sized camel on his side, when a second camel stuck its head all the way into my window and across, in an attempt to get the food. When James looked over and laughed at the unexpected animal in his face, the camel on his side tried to take the entire bag. We learned to moderate our window levels to control for thievery. 

As we were finishing up the drive, my car beeped to warn me "transmission is hot; hit brakes." That was concerning, but quick enough, we pulled off of the trail and into... our parking lot. Because we had booked two nights at the on-site cabins!

Mal wasted no time making himself completely at home, and we have the best neighbors!

Of course, one of the first orders of business was swimming. The pool has to be around 70 degrees. It is SO frigid. Also, it's 4 feet deep and the ladder only has the top rung. I was there was no one around to laugh at me when I hoisted myself out over the side of the pool. Mal used the ladder to get out, and I actually did once, but realized it was a lot less dicey just to beach.

James and I got dinner from Bryan's on 290, all appetizers and sides because that place is EXPENSIVE. But it was so good. Mal had a ham and cheese on flatbread from Subway, his favorite.

After the sun set, Mal found a couple of girls running around who were staying in the cabin next door and who were kind enough to give him a glow stick. Then they all three had a dance party on our patio, then ran around playing zombies for an hour or so after. I got a really cute picture. With my cell phone. Which can't take night shots. Just trust me. 

Today, we hung out around the cabin for a while after we woke up (early, all of us).

We ordered breakfast from Hill Country Cupboard, and ate it at Johnson City Park. Mal ran around the whole time we were there, talking like crazy and just super full of energy. I asked him if he'd save some of that energy for Pedernales Falls State Park. He said he was already getting tired.

However, when we got to the park, he did the short .2-mile walk to the overlook just fine. In fact, he was super excited about the stone stairway that led down to the river. I reminded him that if we went down, he'd also have to come back up. AND then walk back to the car. But he was excited! So we walked to the river's edge and had a great time throwing rocks and looking for things that are in Minecraft that are also in the real world. He flagged a little on the pathway back to the car, but he hiked just under a mile! I had kind of wanted to do the half-mile trail to the Twin Falls Overlook, but didn't want to press our luck. We'll save it for next time. James and I did get out separately and go into the bird blind while Mal sat in the car drawing on the full-sized MagnaDoodle we got him for the trip.

We came back to the cabin and Mal and I jumped into the pool for a super-charged cool-down. I'd thought I wouldn't go all the way in today, but after getting so warm at the park, it actually felt... well, I went in over my shoulders today, and Mal said the first time I did it that I screamed too loud and it hurt his ears. But by the third or fourth time, I was basically numb. It was super relaxing then to sit in the sun and dry out after that. 

Tonight, we ordered dinner from West Henly Boil Shack. James got all of the Cajun stuff: étouffée and rice; shrimp boil with sausage, potatoes, and corn... I like boils, but James did say that the shrimp was spicy. I figured it might be, so I just got a patty melt and salad. It was all so delicious. Then I made my way down to the pond for sunset. My pictures... well, the pictures after the food somehow have a big old greasy finger-print in the corner. I mostly cropped it out, but they're not framed up right anymore. Still, I supposed having less-than-artistically-framed pictures is better than having patty-melt-prints all down one side, right?

See? I couldn't edit that smudge out without getting rid of Mal, and it's an adorable picture!

We played a few rounds of cards before shutting down (mentally) for the night. Tomorrow morning, it's on to our next adventure!