Exploring the Floodplain

Gary and Leah warned us about the shower. We heard stored about how previous guests messed up the valves and ended up spraying water into the mirror across the room. I was apprehensive about turning it on when I stumbled into the bathroom at 6:30 the next morning, but it wasn't that complicated.

Amanda got up at 7, and we went out on a walk through the building site just down the hill below the house. The ravine where all the building was happening was a floodplain with a community park containing a pool owned by the HOA. The developers left a narrow band of wild space along the dry creek bed and a few uncut trees to separate subdivisions.

The builders (which seemed to mostly be Mexican) started working at 6am and were swarming over all the build sites. The new subdivision didn't have much traffic but when we reached the feeder road on the other side, we discovered there was no crosswalk (because why would anyone walk anywhere in Texas?), so we backtracked and climbed down into a gully and shuffled through the low culvert to the other side.

Just beyond the trees marking the separating line between the community park and next subdivision which was still just an earthworks project, there was a single, disconnected sidewalk. We followed this until we spotted scissor tailed flycatchers in the field beyond.

There wasn't much to see or anywhere to go, cursed as we were by manual locomotion, so we followed the ravine back, walking through the waist high wet grass, and took pictures of the mourning doves, swallows, jays, sparrows, and purple martins.

We got back a little after 9 and Joy and Leah went out to get kalachis for breakfast while Gary stayed behind to use his inhaler.

On the way back to Denton we stopped for lunch at Schlotzsky's. I was curious to experience everything Texas had to offer and Joy recommended I get an 'original' with jalapeno chips, and three cups of unsweetened mango passion-fruit tea. The tea gave me a caffeine high. Southern sweet tea was common at every place we ate, but I thought it was way too sugary to drink.

Shortly before the trip, Joy and Joann's uncle died, and they decided to drive up to Iowa to attend his funeral and see their distant family. Joy needed some dress shoes, so we stopped in Denton on the way back to look for something suitable. While she was in the clothing store, Amanda and I checked out a cool second-hand craft store where I bought a packet of palette knives for $3.50. I threatened to buy a cowboy shirt with pearl buttons, but it didn't have a price, so I assumed it would be too expensive for a joke.

There was an ace hardware store at the end of the strip mall and I went in looking for safety razors, but they didn't sell them, so I braved the dollar store instead. They had a plastic safety razor with blades and a small bottle of shaving gel for $1.25. I gave the cashier $5 and she gave me $2.29 in coins as change.

Back at Aunt Joann's, the weather was hot (80F), the wind had died down, and I was finally able to change into a t-shirt and shorts to relax. We'd planned for warm weather, not icy gales and tornado warnings.

Mike made a salad with shredded chicken, boiled eggs, and plenty of dressing, and Joann made banana bread.

Joy suggested we play a few rounds of crazy chef, after which I made some modifications to the instructions. I stayed up past midnight, unable to sleep after three cups of mango tea.

Just before bed, I discovered my home SMTP server was broken, so I set up a ticket with email provider.