Giggling in Bed

My Uncle V and Aunt S shared with us an interesting part of their marriage.

They told us about their grown daughter visiting them. The next morning she stated, "You two are still giggling at night!" It seems that they have been doing this their whole marriage. (They were married just two months before we were.)

They elaborated to say that they share the funny things that happened that day; what the kids did, what happened at work, or a joke that they had heard that day, etc.

Uncle V said that there was a problem with this though. While they were still working, S had heard a joke at work that she wanted to share with him. So, after they had gone to bed she started to tell it to him. Before delivering the pounch line she paused. He anxiously waited for the punch line but the pause got longer. He then realized that she had fallen asleep. Unfortunately, the next morning she couldn't remember the joke. He said that he is still waiting for the punch line.

I thought that this was a good idea for a happy marriage. All to often, we don't look at the positive and fun things in our lives and our marriages. What a good idea, to have a good giggle with your spouse before falling asleep.

Other Cultures and Places

Sometimes it is hard to know where to start. This is one of those times. Over a time of two days, I have to say that I have had a first hand experience that has soften my heart and given me a new outlook on some peoples' lives.

My only living uncle and his wife are snow birds in Yuma. They took us across the border into Los Algodones. They have been there a number of times. It was my first time to go south of the border.

The thing that first got my attention was the people calling for your attention to check out the things they had for sale. Some were quite humorous. "Come and buy something you don't need." "Looking is free." "Come take a look at my junk." What really seemed strange to me were the people outside dental offices and places to get your eyes check and glasses encouraging you to come in. We did end up getting B's glasses on the second trip there.

As we walked around the blocks, the side walks were covered with stalls with coverings over them and things hanging from above. If the stall was part of the store, most of the time you couldn't tell the difference from the 'stall' to when the store began; they just flowed out onto the sidewalk. This is an example of what it was like. This was the stall where we did buy two cloths. I wanted to get a picture of the lady who had it along with her things but she didn't want to be in the picture.
There was an isle down the middle to go through. These are some table cloths along with a few other things too. Those are hats with tails or braids. Several places had table cloths. Some were plane lace, some had some coloring on the lace, and some were colored woven cloths.

There was lots of jewelery most of which was silver, leather goods, blankets,pottery, copper works, clothing, etc. Embroidered dresses that I had seen in San Antonio for well over one hundred dollars were starting out at forty dollars.

My Aunt had told us not to take the asking price as they would come down. As a rule you could talk them down by two fifths of their asking price and sometimes half if they had an outside stall. Those indoors were a lot firmer on their prices. When we were going to leave, towards the end of the first day, one of the ladies kept trying to sell us a table cloth and got down as low as seven dollars when she had started out at thirty.

We saw few middle aged men. Those we did see seemed to be shop owners. Most of the people selling things were women. It was not unusual to see their preschool age child or children off to the side quietly entertaining themselves. It they were under two there was a grandma with them, usually sitting on the sidewalk with her legs curled up under her, and holding out a woven cup sized basket for donations. She might have a small wrapped candy to give out in return. We saw a number of these women who looked like they were probably in their forties or fifties. I'm assuming they didn't know English as I heard only one of them speak and that was just thank you. Some of the mothers we saw looked like they were in their late teens.

Something that impressed me was the artistic skills of some of these people. We saw one man with a spool of silver wire that he was holding on his arm. He would twist and crimp it as he unwound it, making a beautiful pin with a name on it. It was amazing how uniform the letters were. Another was making bracelets with names on them. He had a strip about 3/4 inch wide that had threads lying parallel to the strip. He would wrap another color around the strip, moving the parallel threads to make the letters. He worked so quickly, I never could quite figure out how he was doing it. The wrapping thread also looked braided when he was finished.

When we were killing time waiting for B's glasses, we stopped and talked to some of the people. They weren't as busy the second time we were there. We went into a shop that had many wool rugs and wall hangings. The man wasn't a lot taller than me and he looked to be in his early twenties. He told us he was from Oaxaca, Mexico. He showed us some pictures of his home and the process of making the rugs. They raised the sheep and he had a picture of his grandmother carding the wool. There were pictures of them dying the wool in pots over an open fire after it had been spun. The loom was set up outside. He showed a picture of what looked like a stone basin where he "washed his face every morning." The area appeared to have a lot of foliage. He had a picture of a prickly pear cactus and said that they use it for one of the red colors. For a richer red they use pomegranates. If we had a place to use it, we would have bought one of his smaller rugs.

One man had pine needle baskets that he had made. He was in the process of making what was to become a wall hanging. He asked us if we thought people would buy something like that. The pine needles were about six inches long. He had calluses on his thumb from stripping off the base after they had been soaked. While we were talking to him he showed us how he made them. His baskets were very pretty with some open areas, some areas with braiding, some areas a slight green cast to the needles. Other areas had circle inserts. He said the green was from using younger needles. He also had a hat that he had made and said took him a week to make. We asked what he could get for it. He said he asks forty dollars but is lucky to get twenty for it.

We saw one of the artists when we first entered with my aunt and uncle. He had done some work for them. They would bring him cookies, so he remembered them as the cookie couple. He did all of his work with spray paint, paper, and plastic bags. My uncle said that when they first met him he didn't use a mask and was inhaling the fumes. They told him to use a respirator mask to protect himself, which he now does. At first he was the only one doing this but has taught about three others now who were also there.

He does the glass on lanterns, cream cans, saw blades, TV satellite dishes, mail boxes, etc. We watched him paint a satellite dish in twenty three minutes. He started by spraying the top half with several layers of different colors. Next he picked up some heavy paper with a jagged edge and used it to diffuse the paint as he sprayed on some white to make some clouds. Then he put some plastic over the edge of a stick and made the trunks of pine trees in the distance, pulling the color up from beneath other layers. He bunched some plastic and made the tree branches. At times he would spray some colors onto a piece of paper, take the plastic bag that he had bunched and twisted in half, dab it into the colors, and make rocks, bushes, or whatever. He would put his finger in white and streak it for the water or use a piece of paper with a little white on it to make the water falls or reflection. The water spray he did like the clouds. It was something to watch.

Here he is at work on the one we saw him do and the finished product.

These people are trying to make a living at a legal business. They are willing to put in the time and work and yet they get little for their time. Yes, maybe it doesn't cost as much to live there, but they aren't getting much for their living. After speaking with some of these people we really wanted to buy something just to help them out. Maybe if we didn't dicker so much and paid more for their goods, more would be able to make a living there and not be trying to enter our country illegally or work at an illegal job. And yet, with all their difficulties, we found them to be happy. They are willing to joke with you, tease and be teased, and just enjoy life.

Old Buildings And Other Things

One of our stops was in the old town of El Paso. We did a walking tour of some of the old buildings in the down town area. There were two building that impressed us.

The first was a hotel that is still in use. It is still a grand place, and was when it was built. It has a very beautiful stained glass dome in it.
The other building was the down town post office, also still in use. It also has a dome and the old original boxes lining the walls. The boxes are much more ornate than the plain ones of today. However, what impressed us the most was the floor tiles. Here are examples of two of them.
This one looks as if it is on a wall, but in order to get the lighting right we had to take a picture of it upside down and then flip it over.

There were about eight of these on the floor. (Samples of old postage stamps for those of you too young to remember single digit postage stamps.)

As we were driving across Texas and into the western part of the state, the land became much dryer. I wonder how they raise cattle there, (and there are cattle that we saw,) with such scarcity of grass and water. I also found interesting the few ranch house that we saw. They seem to be small, low to the ground homes. This one was close to where we stayed one night. The road into it is also very typical to what we saw.

Sometimes in life, a turn in what you are doing presents something special that you would have otherwise missed. An example of this, that I will always remember, happened many years ago one morning while I was skiing. I had just started down the hill when I fell and ended up looking back up the hill. I saw the beauty of the sun lighting up snow that a gentle breeze had just blown out of a tree. It was a scene well worth the fall.

We had a similar experience shortly after we crossed into Arizona.

We had looked for a place to spend the weekend that would honor our Pass Port America and that was close to a church. We found one at the small town of Clifton. It was about seven miles out of our way, but what the heck. We had been traveling down route 70.

We had been climbing prior to turning off to head to the town. Then we started climbing more. This area is covered with flat land with hills or mountains popping up out of no where. (Look at the above picture to see what I mean.) We were starting into one of these mountains. Before we reached the town, we noticed huge tailing piles stretching for miles. We wondered, what kind of mine was this?

We reached the town not too far up in the mountains, laid out beside a river in the base of a canyon. We learned that they were open pit mining copper and gold. They had also found diamonds but had cemented off that area. Right now they figure the gold will last thirty years and the copper one hundred years. However there is talk of increasing the copper mining which would then last fifty years.

The canyon divides with the trailer park up one draw and the old town and mine up the other. Since we had some daylight left and we were told that we could drive up and look down into the mine, we decided to check it out.

This was just one of the pits. There were several. At one time we had a pit on each side of the road, route 191. If they expand this to increase production, the opened surface will become the largest in the world. At this spot the elevation was 5520 feet. We continued on up the road and eventually ran out of the mine area and into the winding mountain road. Oh, there was some snow up there in the shade on the north side of the hills.

There is another town, Morenci, close to the mine, that is stretched along the upper ridges and their sides, with a population of over one thousand.

The next day we drove on up the canyon above the RV park. This is what we found.


What a nice side trip, and to think that we might have missed it all, never guessing what lay to the north.

Missions Along the San Antonio River

There are five missions in this area. The first one built on the San Antonio River was San Antonio de Valero, now known at the Alamo, in 1718. The others are down stream from it at spaces of around three to four miles apart. Some have original stone work still standing and some have original painting still visible. Some chapels are still used. We got to see some nice nativities in the ones that are still being used.
Their chapels were small and narrow.

We came across the middle one, Jan Jose, just driving into town so we stopped in. A lot of it has been restored. It also has a small grist mill with a horizontal wall wheel. It was a small mill.

The Indians had small two room homes that formed the outer walls.
Most Missions weren't enclosed at the beginning but when the Apache Indians started invading them they walled the Missions in for defense. There were outdoor ovens and the foundations of building that were within the walls.

Next to the church was usually a convento where the missionaries lived. These formed some nice arches and were sometimes two stories.

The buildings were made of lime stone and some bricks that they made on site. They weren't meant to last forever. In time the missions were turned over to the Indians and the missionaries only took care of the church duties. Without guidance, the buildings started falling apart. At the time of the Battle of the Alamo, it was used to house military. Due to the history of them, they have been restored. During this time there was even graffiti.
We found an interesting stairs in one of the churches. The steps were cut from logs and stacked one on top of the other.


This is the front of some of the churches.The last one is of Mission Concepcion. You can see the dome that is inside the chapel. It is larger and more elegant than the others. This is the dome inside.
I also found the doors interesting. Most of them were double doors, both of which were very narrow. I also liked the work that was done on the doors themselves.I just found these next two interesting.

Unfortunately, we didn't have sun when we went to most of the missions, so the pictures weren't as interesting. However, it was interesting seeing them.

Seeing San Antonio

We arrived in San Antonio and have enjoyed some warm and sunny weather. We have taken in some of the things to see around here.

Through our exploring, we have noted some good things about this area. We have been impressed with how clean it is. There are even people out cleaning in the down town area. The roads are easy to get around on and there seems to be an adequate interstate system with many spokes going into the down town area. They have also done a great job on keeping and restoring historical areas and buildings.

One of these areas is La Villita. It was the beginning of San Antonio. It has original buildings that were built in the late 1700's. They have specialty shops, etc. in them now. It was in this area that Santa Anna lined up his cannons for the fight at the Alamo.

Another area is The Market. Years ago the local farmers and Mexicans would bring their wares here to sell. It is now Mexican shops, restaurants, music, etc.

Another historical area is the King William district. Here many old Victorian style homes, that were the homes of German merchants, have been brought back to their original glory. One man has personally bought 13 of these homes and restored them.


We were able to meet up with one of my brothers and his wife, who were here for the holidays. Since they are familiar with the area, they were our tour guides for some of it.

We went down to the River Walk. I was surprised with what I saw. I thought that it would be at street level, (it is below.) There are lots of shops and restaurants . The walk way follows the horse shoe shape of the river, which is more of a canal now. There are boats that you can ride on it. It is a very pretty part of the city even if it was very busy with people.

There are numerous bridges across it and you can come up to street level in many places. In one place there is a falls.

We came up near the Alamo and walked over to it. We did go back the next day so that we could go inside the Alamo.

The saddest part of this area is that the business stores of today are all just across the streets from the Alamo. It is too bad that there isn't some open space and not just commercial buildings. The other missions do have some space. There is a monument out front listing the names of those who gave their lives here fighting to defend it.

This is from inside; one of those large oak trees.

We went back down to the river walk and ran into Samson trying to hold up the pillars and Deli cutting his hair.

We drove out to one of the Universities and drove through their campus and all the lighted trees. It was very beautiful. It is in this area that the San Antonio river comes bubbling out of the ground as a large spring.

The following day my brother took us to the New River Walk, which is up stream from where we were. This is a nice area for joggers, bikers, and walkers. There is a lock on the river and they do bring some of the tour boats up it also. There are lots of native plants along the sides and some built in attractions, one of which makes it look like you are under ground.

They have also added falls where water enters. It is nice that the sides aren't built up with businesses but that will probably happen some day.

This is looking back towards the main part of town.

Much of the river has been straightened. The part that goes through town use to flood the town. They have done much to prevent this. First they dug a canal that joins the bottoms of the horse shoe. There are flood gates here so that the water can be shut off from going in the horse shoe. Also, upstream they have drilled underground tunnels to divert water past the down town during heavy rainfall.

We took in the Missions in this area but I will save that for the next blog.