![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
dolariNo post for Friday, for on Friday, nothing happened. I was surrounded by family who were just ITCHING to grab me for any reason. By not giving them a reason, I was allowed to be alone for a while. Same thing happened today. I did nothing. Watched Adult Swim, and a few episodes of Cowboy Bebop. I like Ed. A lot.
Saturday, though, I went on a trip, although it started out rather badly.
I woke up, took a shower and left left left the house ASAP. I had to get away from THEM. The ones who feed on me like Pichus in a filthy tank. Once I managed to get out, I scrounged up all my money and FINALLY! FINALLY! got the Chinese food I had been craving for forever and a day. Sure it was cheap $5 Chinese and not the groovy $10 buffet I'd wanted, but at least I got it.
Took off kinda late for Atascosa County, and I was really worried about having sunlight for the trip. By 4PM,it already seemed to be getting near sundown. What made matters worse, was getting across town - the freeway into Atascosa was closed for repairs, and I wasted an hour going five miles around all the barricades to get back on the freeway. But once there, I took off like a dart for Atascosa County, a county right near San Antonio that I'd really never explored.
My first town I visited was Paso de last Garzas. I didn't really stop there, since I'd visited many times before, but you can't even SEE the pass thanks to the state building an new bridge bypassing the pass (which is good), but then giving the right of way to the property owners who locked it up tight (which is bad). The original town site can't be viewed anymore, dammit. Paso De La Garza's is also where my great grandparents are from, and the nearby Ruiz cemetery (one of the most densely "populated" cemeteries I've ever seen) and the really hard to get to Hernandez cemeteries have a lot of my extended family.
Big paragraph on a place I just passed through, ain't' it?
Next stop on the list was Somerset, just on the county border. It's become a nice large town. I remember when it was nothing...now it's becoming a fair sized town. Still no Dairy Queen though, which is more important than a City Hall when declaring yourself a town in Texas. Had an arcade, too! Most impressed.
I continued onto Bexar, although, I didn't know that's what it was called until I looked it up on MapQuest. I saw the cemetery there, but in my rush to get to Rossville before the sun disappeared on me, I skipped it. I passed Old Somerset, another town I'd never heard of until looking up Somerset on the Handbook of Texas Online. :) Been there, before ,though. The Old Rock church was a REALLY REALLY cool place to visit. Nice cemetery, and beautiful church. I knew there was a reason why Somerset Road went THROUGH Somerset and kept going. :)
As I drove down FM 476, I remembered why I don't like driving through Atascosa County. My grandmother lives just on the other side of the county, and it smells. Really. There's a lot of oil fields down that way, and you can really smell the methane or natural gas or whatever it is. Ugly ugly smell, but I got flashbacks seeing those oil well grasshoppers pumping. I hadn't seen them doing that since the late 70s. Another thing about Atascosa County,and most of Texas South of San Antonio is that it's just not very picturesque. It's all flat coastal lands with mesquites all around you, or large oaks. Without hills, you can't see over the trees, and so it's all very very boring.
I finally hit Rossville, and had plenty of light yet. I went down a road where the cemetery was SUPPOSED to be, but after a mile or two, I realized not only was I on the wrong road, the wrong road was taking me to a place that sold Avon. In the middle of nowhere. Mary KAy and Avon really ARE everywhere, I guess. Even down solitary sand roads miles from civilization. I need to take a picture of the sign I found later, pointing you down this tiny road in the middle of nowhere for Avon products.
I finally got the right road and stopped at the cemetery. My great grandfather is buried here, along with my grand-uncle. IT's a very very beautiful cemetery, and has your standard headstones...but...you can tell that there was (and is) a very very very heavy traditional Catholic Mexican population in the area (As if Rossville has a population at all) because many of the headstones are homemade, with the Virgen de la Guadalupe on them. Some are very sweet, and show a lot of love put into them. One of the headstones for an infant who died days after birth said in Spanish "From my arms into the arms of the Lord," carved into a solitary cement cross with a stick while the cement was wet.
The cemetery also had one of the cutest sites I'd seen in a long time. A grove of big heavy oaks in a circle, surrounding a very young oak tree. Very small, maybe no more that 20 years old, but it looked like parents guarding their child. Very picturesque. My kingdom for a working camera.
One of the more creepy things, though, is the way cemeteries are maintained around here. In Atascosa county, the soil is REALLY REALLY sandy. You can literally grab a hand full from the ground and feel it crumble as soon as you touch it. TO get around the graves simply washing away in the rain, they mound up sand on top of the graves. It gives you a feeling of the bodies being buried JUST above ground, and a hand grabbing you as you walk by. Also, the sand is not very sturdy, and there were a good number of "Holes" that I dared not look into.
From Rossville, the sun was finally VERY VERY VERY low, so I Decided to just drive through the rest of the towns, instead of stopping. I hit Poteet, butI couldn't find the giant Strawberry Statue in front of City Hall. I couldn't find City Hall for that matter. Poteet is a very badly laid out city, and I never DID find downtown. Thankfully, Poteet is only about an hour and a half away. I can go back easily to find the statue. Maybe when the Poteet Strawberry fest kicks in - them's good berries.
Not finding the statue better not happen on my trip to Crystal city. The only reason to drive the three hours it takes to get there is the giant statue to Popeye on the City Hall lawn. No really, it's a big statue of Popeye. :)
After driving a bit, I found Old Pearsall Road, the road out of Pleasanton to Pearsall. The road, though, on my maps, just dies a few short miles out of Pleasanton. So I followed it. Right up to where my map said the road ended. It kept going. Being a complete and total nutbunnie, I drove on and on and on and on and on...the road got more and more...primitive till I came to a gate. Right down the middle of this gate was a property line...so something USED to go through there...time to look up satellite imagery to find out where the old road used to go. YEah, I'm a road geek, why do you ask?
By this time, though, it was just dark, so I decided to go home. Towns I passed by but didn't look around in were: Jourdanton, Pleasanton, North Pleasanton, Leming, Thelma Losoya (couldn't visit my deceased grandparents...too dark and almost out of gas).
In other news, the new redesign for my main page, www.dolari.org is now up and running! WOO!
Saturday, though, I went on a trip, although it started out rather badly.
I woke up, took a shower and left left left the house ASAP. I had to get away from THEM. The ones who feed on me like Pichus in a filthy tank. Once I managed to get out, I scrounged up all my money and FINALLY! FINALLY! got the Chinese food I had been craving for forever and a day. Sure it was cheap $5 Chinese and not the groovy $10 buffet I'd wanted, but at least I got it.
Took off kinda late for Atascosa County, and I was really worried about having sunlight for the trip. By 4PM,it already seemed to be getting near sundown. What made matters worse, was getting across town - the freeway into Atascosa was closed for repairs, and I wasted an hour going five miles around all the barricades to get back on the freeway. But once there, I took off like a dart for Atascosa County, a county right near San Antonio that I'd really never explored.
My first town I visited was Paso de last Garzas. I didn't really stop there, since I'd visited many times before, but you can't even SEE the pass thanks to the state building an new bridge bypassing the pass (which is good), but then giving the right of way to the property owners who locked it up tight (which is bad). The original town site can't be viewed anymore, dammit. Paso De La Garza's is also where my great grandparents are from, and the nearby Ruiz cemetery (one of the most densely "populated" cemeteries I've ever seen) and the really hard to get to Hernandez cemeteries have a lot of my extended family.
Big paragraph on a place I just passed through, ain't' it?
Next stop on the list was Somerset, just on the county border. It's become a nice large town. I remember when it was nothing...now it's becoming a fair sized town. Still no Dairy Queen though, which is more important than a City Hall when declaring yourself a town in Texas. Had an arcade, too! Most impressed.
I continued onto Bexar, although, I didn't know that's what it was called until I looked it up on MapQuest. I saw the cemetery there, but in my rush to get to Rossville before the sun disappeared on me, I skipped it. I passed Old Somerset, another town I'd never heard of until looking up Somerset on the Handbook of Texas Online. :) Been there, before ,though. The Old Rock church was a REALLY REALLY cool place to visit. Nice cemetery, and beautiful church. I knew there was a reason why Somerset Road went THROUGH Somerset and kept going. :)
As I drove down FM 476, I remembered why I don't like driving through Atascosa County. My grandmother lives just on the other side of the county, and it smells. Really. There's a lot of oil fields down that way, and you can really smell the methane or natural gas or whatever it is. Ugly ugly smell, but I got flashbacks seeing those oil well grasshoppers pumping. I hadn't seen them doing that since the late 70s. Another thing about Atascosa County,and most of Texas South of San Antonio is that it's just not very picturesque. It's all flat coastal lands with mesquites all around you, or large oaks. Without hills, you can't see over the trees, and so it's all very very boring.
I finally hit Rossville, and had plenty of light yet. I went down a road where the cemetery was SUPPOSED to be, but after a mile or two, I realized not only was I on the wrong road, the wrong road was taking me to a place that sold Avon. In the middle of nowhere. Mary KAy and Avon really ARE everywhere, I guess. Even down solitary sand roads miles from civilization. I need to take a picture of the sign I found later, pointing you down this tiny road in the middle of nowhere for Avon products.
I finally got the right road and stopped at the cemetery. My great grandfather is buried here, along with my grand-uncle. IT's a very very beautiful cemetery, and has your standard headstones...but...you can tell that there was (and is) a very very very heavy traditional Catholic Mexican population in the area (As if Rossville has a population at all) because many of the headstones are homemade, with the Virgen de la Guadalupe on them. Some are very sweet, and show a lot of love put into them. One of the headstones for an infant who died days after birth said in Spanish "From my arms into the arms of the Lord," carved into a solitary cement cross with a stick while the cement was wet.
The cemetery also had one of the cutest sites I'd seen in a long time. A grove of big heavy oaks in a circle, surrounding a very young oak tree. Very small, maybe no more that 20 years old, but it looked like parents guarding their child. Very picturesque. My kingdom for a working camera.
One of the more creepy things, though, is the way cemeteries are maintained around here. In Atascosa county, the soil is REALLY REALLY sandy. You can literally grab a hand full from the ground and feel it crumble as soon as you touch it. TO get around the graves simply washing away in the rain, they mound up sand on top of the graves. It gives you a feeling of the bodies being buried JUST above ground, and a hand grabbing you as you walk by. Also, the sand is not very sturdy, and there were a good number of "Holes" that I dared not look into.
From Rossville, the sun was finally VERY VERY VERY low, so I Decided to just drive through the rest of the towns, instead of stopping. I hit Poteet, butI couldn't find the giant Strawberry Statue in front of City Hall. I couldn't find City Hall for that matter. Poteet is a very badly laid out city, and I never DID find downtown. Thankfully, Poteet is only about an hour and a half away. I can go back easily to find the statue. Maybe when the Poteet Strawberry fest kicks in - them's good berries.
Not finding the statue better not happen on my trip to Crystal city. The only reason to drive the three hours it takes to get there is the giant statue to Popeye on the City Hall lawn. No really, it's a big statue of Popeye. :)
After driving a bit, I found Old Pearsall Road, the road out of Pleasanton to Pearsall. The road, though, on my maps, just dies a few short miles out of Pleasanton. So I followed it. Right up to where my map said the road ended. It kept going. Being a complete and total nutbunnie, I drove on and on and on and on and on...the road got more and more...primitive till I came to a gate. Right down the middle of this gate was a property line...so something USED to go through there...time to look up satellite imagery to find out where the old road used to go. YEah, I'm a road geek, why do you ask?
By this time, though, it was just dark, so I decided to go home. Towns I passed by but didn't look around in were: Jourdanton, Pleasanton, North Pleasanton, Leming, Thelma Losoya (couldn't visit my deceased grandparents...too dark and almost out of gas).
In other news, the new redesign for my main page, www.dolari.org is now up and running! WOO!
