You know you're in Texas when.....

You know you're in Texas when: 1. You stop in Junction, Texas for lunch, and going to walk your dog at the filling station, you come across a defunct car wash and under the defunct car parked in front of it, there's a squashed and dessicated Armadillo. 2. The guys in Mr. B's Steakhouse in Fort Stockton are sitting at tables surrounded by Elk heads and cow skulls hung from the walls talking about what they're going to kill next and what kind of gun they're going to use to do it. 3. The Texas flag flies over every diner 4. You get to see a giant passel of friends and relations in one fell swoop.

We arrived at Matt and Natalie's house in San Antonio yesterday. Hardly seems like a year since we went to Greece with them on their honeymoon, but there it is: Now Nicholas Alexander has joined them, a cheerful baby who poses incesssantly for the camera as if he is on a photo shoot. The yard is big and Ethan, after his days in the car, is able to range and play some fetch.

The drive through West Texas, which we were warned about, was actually very beautiful, mostly buttes and big-wide-open sky and a stunning storm gathering over the distant mountains. As one drives East on 1-10, the terrain becomes flatter, sandier, scrubbier, but 100 miles West of San Antonio, the Hill Country begins, and the buttes and bluffs return, this time covered in green. It's a long drive -- and I wouldn't want to do it often, but interesting if you've never been there and are a Flatlander unaccustomed to such big vistas.

Today we are headed back to the Hill Country to see my cousins, Connie and Terry Weirick, and their daughter Jessica and her husband, and my cousin Pete and my Aunt Nitza, who are coming over from Kerrville to see us this afternoon. It's a regular mini-reunion.

For those of you who have sent comments: I must fess up. I only had the comment settings set to receive comments from members, i.e. Dana, who also has a blog. So if I ignored your comments it was because I NEVER GOT THEM! Matt helped me figure it out today, so send those comments on. We'd love to hear from you.

PS: We think we're ready to go home after this. We miss Izzie the puppy and we miss our friends! Besides, I've got months of writing material lined up from this trip.