Vanabout 2019 Day 2: Albuquerque

Vanabouts, and Walkabouts before them, are all about relearning the lessons of the past. 

Most of today I was working at the nice little RV park in Childress.  This place is a delight. For a mere $15 you get water and power and a beautiful little park to stay in. So beautiful is this park, for “lunch” I took Zoe for a walk around the little lake in the little park. Many many pictures were taken.

“But Steve”, you’re wondering, “where are these pictures?”

Well, I found out the next day, I had failed to put a memory card in my camera. So some great pictures of this delightful little park and, more importantly, some nice arty pictures taken at Cadillac Ranch will never see the light of day since the light of those pictures were not saved.  So this is the extent of my Cadillac Ranch pictures.

Firsts

• Use of my big ass battery to power the microwave to warm up my dinner.
• Oh, and this:

Vanabout 2019 Day 1: Childress

Well that didn’t go well.
I woke up at 5am. 5 motherforking AM!! To start my 6 week Vanabout that just about circumnavigates the US of A. Sorry Florida.
But as I was rolling into a rest area 30 minutes outside Wichita Falls to call into a couple of meetings, I made a terrible revelation. I left my new big honking battery back at the house.
This guy:

This is a vital element of this Vanabout, so after my meetings I had to turn around and go back home. After four hours of driving, I was back were I started, on my couch.
I left shortly after my workday was over and got to experience both morning and evening Dallas rush hour traffic. Bur for my efforts I got this at Opa’s Schnitzel Haus:



And this

Firsts!
This Vanabout will mark a number of firsts. So, I will try to acknowledge each time a first occurs every day.

• The first day of the Vanabout (Duh)
• The first time I took a conference call at a rest area.

Canyons 2016: Palo Duro Canyon

The Canyons 2016: Caprock Canyon

It could certainly be included in my crimes against nature and humanity that in my nearly half century of living in the great state of Texas, I have never visited the beautiful canyons residing in our panhandle.  “We have canyons?”, you ask. 

Yes.  And while many may have heard of Palo Duro Canyon, the smaller, closer and way more beautiful Caprock Canyon was the real star of this quick road trip.

Freedom of Speech Infiltrates Texas

Congratulations to the Jester King Brewery for beating back the Jackbooted Thugs known as TABC by now being abled to call their beers “beer” and their ales “ale”.

 

 

 

 

 

 

As of result of yesterday’s ruling, beer in Texas may now be labeled as “beer” and ale may now be labeled as “ale”, regardless of alcohol content. Breweries and distributors are also no longer prohibited from independently telling consumers where their products may be purchased, or from communicating truthful and accurate information about their alcohol content. That means Jester King will now be able to add a “Where to Buy” section to our website, as will all other breweries selling beer in Texas.

“In a remarkable (though logically dubious) demonstration of circular reasoning” Judge Sparks writes in his ruling, “TABC attempts to defend the constitutional legitimacy of the Code through an appeal to the statutory authority of the Code itself.” Referring to the required use of the terms “beer”, “ale”, and “malt liquor”, he writes “TABC’s argument, combined with artful legislative drafting, could be used to justify any restrictions on commercial speech. For instance, Texas would likely face no (legal) obstacle if it wished to pass a law defining the word ‘milk’ to mean ‘a nocturnal flying mammal that eats insects and employs echolocation.’ Under TABC’s logic, Texas would then be authorized to prohibit use of the word ‘milk’ by producers of a certain liquid dairy product, but also to require Austin promoters to advertise the famous annual ‘Milk Festival’ on the Congress Avenue Bridge.’”

I still can’t get an Oregon winery to ship to me and breweries still can’t sell their wares at their breweries (unlike Texas wineries and every other state’s breweries).  So more work needs to be done to rid ourselves of these tea-totalling despots.

Read the whole article here.

The Best TV Show You’re Not Watching Because It’s So Good You Should Be Watching

The Day Tripper with Chet Garner

Watch the full episode. See more The Daytripper.

If you love Texas and finding great small town out of the way eats, this is the show for you.  Think of it as a hipper Texas Country Reporter.  It can be cheesy at times.  But I never finish an episode without thinking, “I want to go to there.”

The embedded episode is one of my favorite, Lockhart and all the great BBQ therein.

You can watch it from their website here or Saturday mornings on KERA.

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Texas State Fair Entices Area Blogger

Three words: Chicken Fried Bacon.

How could I not go????

Where are all the Dairy Queens?

My trip to Carl's Jr. was really only a portion of a larger trip through north Texas. I decided to take the Xterra out to the country and do some drivin. On my trip, I noticed a few things. First, Frisco damn near goes all the way to Oklahoma. I remember when I first moved back to Dallas and Frisco was nothing but farmland and whore houses. Ahh sweet memories.

Second, what has happened to the Texas tradition of a DQ in even the smallest of towns? I drove up Preston Rd all the way to Sherman and saw only 1 Dairy Queen building and it had clearly been vacant for a couple of decades. Instead, it seems, every town has a Sonic. So I guess Sonic is the new Dairy Queen. Still, how can you really grow up in a small Texas town without a single Dilly Bar under your belt??