28 Nov 2018
Asia in Sandstone Amarillo College Museum
Some sculptures exhibited are behind glass, others are open to visitors to peer at closely, peek at the small shadows in the creases of the faces. Some of the work is utilitarian, made to ornament balustrades and pillars. Other works stood in temples before kneeling worshipers and burning incense. Antiquity never quite leaves […]
27 Nov 2018
Gallery of Asian Art Amarillo College, Amarillo
The Amarillo College Museum has several floors and this Friday, after Thanksgiving, Alan, Cousin Jim and Scott ,visit both floors. On the second floor, one of the museum’s permanent exhibits features sculptures carved from sandstone dating from the 1st century in Thailand, Cambodia, and India.The sculptures have been donated to the college by […]
26 Nov 2018
Turkey Time A Day of Thanks, 2018
Pots and pans are on the stove, the table has been set for three, a Butterball Turkey browns in the oven. It took four hours for this bird to cook and slicing it up on the kitchen counter means dinner is close. Alan, Sherrie, and I have Thanksgiving this year at Alan’s. At […]
24 Nov 2018
The Bench Sunrise Palo Duro Canyon, Texas
Palo Duro canyon isn’t far from Amarillo. If you head east from Amarillo you hit the Texas Palo Duro State Park where you can drive down into the canyon and access its visitor center and exhibits. On road cuts in the canyon below Alan’s home we look for Indian arrow points lost in […]
24 Dec 2017
Cloud Patterns At the Ranch
Most people call these ” clouds ” and stop. A few go further and describe them as ” beautiful clouds,” or, if a scientist, ” atmospheric conflagrations. ” My aunt called them ” buttermilk ” clouds when she was hunched in a bird blind shooting photographs of eagles nesting in the top branches […]
23 Dec 2017
Up a Creek Currie Ranch
The creek is in better shape today than fifty years ago. Then, creek banks were crowded with brush. Now, you can stand on the bank and easily cast your tackle. There are still cat tails in the creek but they are controlled by a local wildlife biologist for a monthly stipend. Fifty years […]
21 Dec 2017
Golf in a Cow Pasture Chasing Par
River Falls has a make believe golf course in a cow pasture not far from the Texas Palo Duro Canyon. This area has been transformed from grazing to ranchettes. With an airport, five acre lots, utilities and roads, the development attracts people with money who want to get away from big city life. […]
20 Dec 2017
Horsing Around Alan's cookie jar
In the 1950’s, Patsy Cline was the premier country western singer. Her lyrics mirrored those of today; broken relationships, falling in and out of love, working for a living, heartaches and headaches. She was talked up in the tabloids, wore clothes as far removed from the range as a cowgirl could get, sang […]
05 Feb 2016
Caesar’s Sweet Roll Sweet roll Supreme
This sweet roll is pure Texas. Tired of omelets, biscuits and gravy, toast, waffles, steaks with eggs over easy, diners can always opt for a non-politically correct sweet roll breakfast that Lyle Lovett would feature in his kind of songs. This roll fills a plate instead of a saucer. It would go […]
04 Feb 2016
It’s Five o’Clock somewhere Pier 19 at 7:00 a.m.
At seven in the morning, you show yourself down several hallways into the restaurant. Giovanni or one of the girls gets a pot of coffee and a full cup to me when they see me. When the wind blows I can feel the entire pier swing its hips like a drunk hula girl. […]
04 Feb 2016
South Padre Island Sunset Tuesday, February 2nd, 2016
The sky is burning and, if it wasn’t, there would be no reason to snap this photo. Joan, Neal’s wife, and the rest of us, all stare as we all walk towards the Shrimp Haus, a South Padre Island restaurant that features shrimp, shrimp, and more shrimp – boiled, breaded, fried, cooked or […]
04 Feb 2016
Isla Blanca Park RV's welcome
Isla Blanca Park is owned and operated by Cameron County, Texas. It is at the southern tip of South Padre Island and has hundreds of full service sites for snowbirds, overnight visitors, campers. It is a destination for most, a stop on the road for some, and it is a good place to […]
04 Feb 2016
Pompano’s and Whitey’s surf fishing on South Padre
” Some days you do better in the boat and some days better on the beach, ” the fisherman in coveralls tells us as he opens his cooler and shows us his Pompanos and Whiteys, game fish in this part of the Gulf of Mexico. The bottom of his cooler has five or […]
02 Feb 2016
Prospecting On the beach at Padre
Prospecting is in your blood, or it isn’t. On a weekday, at the beach, Neal prospects, Joan knits, Scott pulls his hat down and lays back against a dune and watches kite surfers move across the water. The wind is blowing, but it is better here than in a frigid north where a […]
01 Feb 2016
Sea Turtle Rescue Center South Padre Island Drive
Sea turtles can grow to five hundred pounds and range widely over the world’s oceans. They mysteriously return to lay eggs on the same beach where they were born and man has been one of their biggest enemies since their meat is tasty, their shells can be fashioned into ornaments, their body parts […]
01 Feb 2016
Kite Surfing-Texas South Padre Island
This Padre Island surf isn’t the best but the wind here is usually strong and steady. Kite surfers combine kites and surfboards and hitch themselves to the wind for free rides, skimming the top of the surf like stones thrown across the top of a lake’s surface. Wearing wet suits, their rides today […]
30 Jan 2016
Pieces of Eight Morning walk on Padre Island beach
Early, gold hunters show up with wading boots, windbreakers, wide brimmed caps, sunglasses, their gold detectors dipped into frothy water. The sky, water, and beach run together like a tightly edited film. Everything in this landscape moves but seems to stand still. Clouds blow past, waves roll in, seagulls take flight. A raven […]
30 Jan 2016
Sandcastle Art Mermaid and Dolphin
Sand is the most common material on the beach. While we walk on it, draw initials or hearts with arrows through them, there are those who use sand to sculpt fantastic visions. Outside Pier 19 in South Padre Island there is a sand sculpture. There is sand art in front of the visitor […]
30 Jan 2016
Wash and Wax winter cleaning
Isla Blanca Park, at the south end of South Padre Island, is full of recreational vehicles that are more homes than campers. Snowbirds come down here to the tip of Texas for months, unfold carpets in front of their rigs, set up lawn chairs, bring out plants and yard ornaments, and congregate with […]
30 Jan 2016
Going to the Dogs South Padre Island beach
People love dogs. Dogs behave as we humans should behave. They are loyal, patient, love unconditionally, and show affection. Many retirees who pull their Rv’s to the Isla Blanca Park in South Padre Island, Texas do so because they don’t want to leave their dogs home with strangers or alone in a kennel […]
29 Jan 2016
Seagull Charley Morning on South Padre Island Beach
Seagull Charley doesn’t come when you call his name. Without a fish for Charley, he ain’t going anywhere and he won’t push tennis balls with his beak or do circus tricks. This morning Charley strolls the beach watching for opportunities. What he catches is his and he will share only if he has […]
29 Jan 2016
Fact and Fiction South Padre Island, Texas
South Padre Island is accessible from Texas highway 100 via the Queen Isabella Bridge that connects Port Isabel, Texas on one end and South Padre Island on the other. When you hit the beaches here you have miles and miles to walk and on most mornings men and women carry Wal- Mart plastic […]
27 Jan 2016
Monahan’s Sandhills Where are the camels?
It is Weston’s idea to go see the dunes. Passing through Midland on my way to the beach at Padre Island,Texas, I pay a visit to a nephew living in what some call ” the armpit ” of Texas. Saturday we drive to the sand hills, take off our shoes and climb dunes. […]
01 Sep 2015
Courtyard Texas Oasis
One can see joy when Bedouin travelers top a mountain of sand and wind their way down to an oasis with date trees, water, and a flat place to set up tents, unroll hand woven rugs, and build small fires in the enormous desert night. This courtyard is the same, a quiet place […]
29 Aug 2015
Water Wheel Observation Point- Palo Duro Canyon
There used to be a small stream here that meandered down the hill and went over the edge of the canyon and fell into a deep dark hole below us. The land’s owner built himself an observation platform, erected a light pole, and built a water wheel that generated electricity to power the […]
27 Aug 2015
Sandell Drive In Clarendon, Texas
Drive In movies, in the fifties, were a popular family outing and also a place where teens, borrowing the family car, could get away and explore birds and bees in the back seat of station wagons. The latest Hollywood movies were projected onto huge screens and patrons watched from their cars with sound provided […]
27 Aug 2015
Goodnight Home Snapshots
Snapshots are all I have of the inside of the Goodnight home, taking us back to the late eighteen hundreds and early 1900’s. Mr. Goodnight died just after the stock market crash of 1929 and he, at 93, was ready to move on, feeling he had lived in the best possible times, much […]
27 Aug 2015
Charles Goodnight J and A Cattle Ranch
Not far from Clarendon, Texas is the homestead and ranch headquarters of Charles Goodnight, a pioneer Texas rancher. In the mid to late 1800’s, he controlled a ranch of over a million acres, had 180 cowboys on his payroll, and was an industry by himself. He was a tough man who lived to […]
26 Aug 2015
Palo Duro Sunrise Deer Ears and a red sun
This mule deer beelines to Alan’s back yard to have dessert. There are sunflowers off Alan’s back porch and when this deer snaps one off the stem he looks like a little kid eating a piece of brightly colored candy. When I move towards a large living room window to get a better […]
25 Aug 2015
Texas Cattle morning walks
I’m back in Texas. These cattle watch me intently as I cross the road to take their group portrait. I walk slowly, stop, give them a chance to get used to my intrusion. They are congregated by a fence line and don’t really want to give up their ground. This is a small […]
16 Mar 2015
Texas Turkey’s Lunch in Palo Duro Canyon
Driving back roads through flat dry West Texas prairie, one comes upon mule deer grazing among mesquite trees. They look at you as you pass with dark intense eyes. They are always aware, can turn quick and be gone even quicker, leap over barbed wire fences like child’s play. Deer are handsome animals […]
16 Mar 2015
Fishing/Palo Duro Canyon Trout fishing in March
Palo Duro Canyon cuts through Texas like a big spoon in a tub of ice cream at a church social. We load three poles, a tackle box, frozen corn, rubber worms and salmon eggs, and navigate three locked gates to get down to the prime fishing holes. There are some good spots below […]
16 Mar 2015
Big Tex/ Canyon,Texas As big a guy as they come
In Canyon, Texas there is a relic from the fifties that overlooks the freeway that plows through town. This giant statue of a cowboy is known as “Big Tex”. He has been here as long as townspeople can remember and civic leaders have started a fundraising effort to save him from the dust […]
15 Mar 2015
Lady Buffs/ West Texas A&M Regional Championships
Buffalo’s are not small, short, slender animals. In fact, they have a reputation for hardiness, tolerance for adverse circumstances, and supported Indian’s on the Great Plains for hundreds of years. The Lady Buff”s of Texas A&M College in Canyon, Texas are slender and wiry and are playing in the Regional Championships for the NCAA […]
15 Mar 2015
Cerulean Gallery/Amarillo Show in Amarillo after lunch
Contemporary Fine Art is the calling card of this small gallery in Amarillo. It’s owners feature works of emerging local, regional and national artists in nine exhibitions a year. They offer personal consulting services and support the community by donating time and money to local causes. Open, just like their sign says they […]
15 Mar 2015
Cadillac Ranch Gift Shop/Texas Every tourist needs a memento
Just down the frontage road from the Cadillac Ranch is the Cadillac Ranch gift shop. It is before nine in the morning so it isn’t open but they have a sign out front that encourages lollygagging. This gift shop is presided over by a twenty foot tall cowboy sporting a big hat. He waves […]
15 Mar 2015
Cadillac Ranch/Texas Brainstorm
Before you reach Amarillo, following I-40, you look to the right and see a series of Cadillac’s stuck in Texas dirt in the middle of an unplowed field. In the old days the Cadillac’s used to be natural, like they came from the factory. They had huge fins, power windows, custom paint jobs, […]
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