Month: November 2025

Palestine, TX

Downtown Palestine, TX


 
Leg 2 on the way to Hammond for Turkey Day.

Today’s drive was a lot prettier than yesterday and a little shorter. If your route happened to go through the middle of downtown Palestine, you’d see a lot of this because, as most larger Texas towns have done, there is a thriving section of national chain stores all along the bypass. All that is left in town are around a dozen churches, a half dozen “antique” stores, and a couple restaurants. There is the required large wall-sized mural with the town name with an uplifting saying to go with several art pieces.

We went downtown, hence the art piece photos above, to eat dinner at the Home Grill Steakhouse, and I can definitely recommend it for a good meal from its extensive menu.

Sweetwater, TX


 
Leg 1 on the way to Hammond for Turkey Day.

We didn’t stop except for a brief moment in Brownfield, TX, for a snack and a gas-up. Our original plan was to visit the National WASP Museum, but they close at 5:00pm, and we didn’t get to town until after 3:00. I figured we’d be in town around 2:00pm, but I forgot about losing an hour going to Central Time from Mountain Time. We can’t do it on the way back because they’ll be closed on the day we come this way. We’ll reschedule for a different trip.

I didn’t take the picture of the day until we stopped here in Sweetwater. I remember when Donna and I passed through in 2023, there was a big wind turbine blade right around the corner from the museum. Sally and I drove over after dinner at a place the desk clerk recommended. It is a regional chain called Skeet’s Texas Grill, and the food was excellent: chicken quesadilla for her and fish tacos for me.

Now That’s Italian 2

Fall New Mexico Skies

Tonight was dinner out; Santa Fe Sally and I met with Kevin and Beth (last seen in Las Vegas) to go for some Italian. The place used to be an indeterminate fast food place that has been converted into a nice sit-down place called Piccolino. It had a drive-thru that they still used. You ordered online, they gave an approximate time to arrive, you parked in the lot, and they then texted you to get in the drive-thru lane to pick it up.

I had the Lasagna Bolloco (chicken, green chile, provolone, mozzarella, and alfredo sauce), and it was fantastic. Even though it was more than enough food, Sally and I split a canoli for dessert, as both Beth and Kevin ordered desserts of their own. I don’t think I’ve had Italian food this good since stumbling onto Zanzos in Clarksville, GA, back in 2003.

I was kidding some above, as Aiken, SC, did have an excellent Italian place called Olive Oils that we would eat at every couple of months until it folded its tents…

There’s Something You Don’t See Every Day

telepoem booth

When I first noticed this in the lobby area of the Chavez Center while waiting for Santa Fe Sally to finish up her workout, I thought maybe it was an actual phone booth, but then I noticed that the word “phone” was misspelled as “poem.” Was it a joke? Or was that telepoem Spanish? I looked it up on the WWW, and lo and behold, it is a repurposed phone that has been converted into a jukebox-like device that lets you dial a number formatted like a phone number, and you get to hear a poem and have the old-school telephone experience.

Find one nearby on their website: http://www.telepoembooth.com/locations.html

Neue Scheibenwischerblätter

Yesterday I bought some new windshield wipers for the GTI. I checked for the sizes needed, and while we were at Walmart to pick up the Cerakote Headlight Renewal Kit for Sally’s 2002 RAV4, I grabbed the ones I needed for the VW. What I should have done first was see what kind of connection to the arms it was, but I didn’t, and when we got back and went to put the new ones on, the connection from blade to arm was something I’d never seen before.

This morning we took another trip to Walmart to return the wrong ones and stopped on the way back home at the local VW place to snag the right ones. While I was there, I also had them sell me a rear window wiper blade as well. The total for the three OEM blades at the dealer was just right around three times the cost of the $35 that they cost at Wally World.

Monday Catch Up

Monday Morning Mural


 
I missed a day yesterday, both here and on Instagram. It was a long and boring drive from Tucson to Santa Fe, except for a brief few miles on I-10 near the AZ-NM border where a large rocky formation popped out of the ground. I took one lone photo in the town of Hatch, NM, when we passed through, but it was not worthy. And I so wanted that to be the lead because it reminded me of driving through Vidalia, GA, because both are home to two vegetables that have become almost name brands.

Today was spent running errands, getting new wipers for the GTI, and grocery shopping for the week. Going to the gym to stretch out those stiff “sitting in the car” muscles. And, working around the house, with yard work for her and inside stuff from my “job” jar.

Planes, Planes, & More Planes

Fraternal Twins—Douglas WB-66D Destroyer/Douglas YEA-3A Skywarrior


 
The Pima Air & Space Museum is a must-see if you are anywhere within 200 miles of the place. There are 358 aircraft between 4 different hangars and the outside area. It opens at 9:00am, and Sally and I were waiting at the doors. We returned back to the VRBO at 2:00pm, meaning we spent nearly 5 hours there. Because we ate lunch there, which wasn’t that great, that’s 4.5 hours of looking at everything from one-person helicopters to a 787 Boeing Dreamliner.

First we took a 45-minute tram ride of the outdoors area, followed by slowly wandering the 4 hangars, gawking at aircraft at human level and more that hung from the ceiling. There are also plenty of displays intermeshed in between, displaying important items from the aircraft, along with gobs of historical uniforms, etc. Sensory overload!

One of those hangers was a separate museum (included with admission) entirely dedicated to the 390th Bomb Group, which flew B-17 Flying Fortresses in WWII. It houses an immaculately restored example of the aircraft. This is the plane I have wanted to see up close after reading the book, A Higher Call that I picked up in McMinnville way back in April at the Evergreen Aviation Museum.

When I said yesterday that there would be lots of photos, I took 20 or so; here are 5 of them. The top image is kind of my favorite because of the one on the right; it is a YEA-3A that is a precursor to the aircraft I flew while in the Navy, an EA-3B. The one on the left is the Air Force’s version of the plane, an RB-66. It has different engines to go with the slightly different cockpit configuration. Below, from left to right, are the B-17 Flying Fortress, a diorama of a B-17 bombing run, a B-36 (the largest piston-powered bomber ever built), and my second Super Guppy in a month.