Valentine's Day

Mancakes

Every year a group of Clear Lake Shores men, through the auspices of the Civic Club, treats the community to "mancakes," a breakfast of pancakes, bacon, sausage, OJ, coffee, and even mimosas, available for the paltry price of $5. Tom helped this year.

I don't know this woman, but was taken by her look.

Thai Food

Our Valentine's Day dinner was one we cooked together, a relatively simple one consisting of Spicy (though not as spicy as we would have liked, but only because we were too moderate with our addition of red curry paste -- we'll use more next time) Thai Chicken soup and mango-bean sprout salad. It was a great meal, topped off by Tom with a slice of lemon meringue pie. At this rate (two in nearly forty years of marriage), there may not be another one, so I hope he makes this one last, as he's sworn to.

Mardi Gras

Fat Tuesday is actually not until next Tuesday, the 17th, but, in the tradition of the great Carnival/Mardi Gras sites, this area claims large swaths of the month to celebrate. Galveston has big parades, balls, and general festivities over the course of a couple of weeks, and its smaller neighbors to the north follow suit.

Last weekend was our time to celebrate, starting with the

Carty Gras Parade

As with several other events, no official sponsor exists for this annual Clear Lake Shores golf cart parade, but the civic club does the scant coordination that it requires. Though we didn't participate in the parade, we did invite Arlene and Jim to come sit on our porch, eat boiled shrimp, and view the fun with us, and at the last minute I was asked to be one of the judges. Though the responsibility sat heavily on my shoulders, the beads flung to us (bribery?) sat lightly. It was thoroughly enjoyable.

 Our neighbor, Kinsey, and his people, Teresa and Kurt; they won second place.

 Thanks for the photo, Arlene.

Yacht Gras

And neighboring Kemah chose the same day to sponsor their annual Yachty Gras parade. Bob and Sara, having spent the afternoon scouting out the area for a possible future home, stopped by for some of that boiled shrimp and then a golf cart ride over to the boardwalk, where we enjoyed the parade with the throngs.

 Loved this VW bus-boat.

We were dressed warmly, mostly for the golf cart ride over. Though we travel at maybe 11 mph, it's enough to create a breeze that can be a bit brrry.

Thanks for the photos, Bob.

Heather's Birthday

Heather, having celebrated her 21st birthday at a beach house in Galveston -- what a great way to spend that important day! -- stopped by on her way home. It was fun seeing her, glowing in her happiness and her approval of the house (though [unlike us] she misses our old house in Baytown), and meeting her boyfriend, Joseph. We shared a king cake and wished her well as she continues her journey to adulthood.

As evidenced by the photo, the weather had warmed considerably, with the temperature having reached 80 degrees earlier that day. And this evening was perfect.

Happy birthday, Heather!

Clear Lake Shores Children's Library

One of the charming little institutions here (and, given the size of the city, all its institutions are little) is the children's library, one small room in size, ungoverned by an attendant of any kind. The kids know that, at any time, they can walk in, browse, and borrow as many books as they would like. With no time limit on keeping the books, no fine system, indeed no supervision of any kind, one might think that the place would either be a mess or empty, but such is not the case. A couple of volunteers (like me) spend a little time each week re-shelving and organizing, and the rest simply takes care of itself. Perhaps it helps that the library is in the same building as the police station and city hall, but mostly I believe that it is simply that it is part of what is, essentially, a very small town in which most everybody knows everybody. More Mayberry, and what a delight.

I totally enjoy the limited time I spend here, especially the time I spend re-organizing. A nice outlet for the librarian part of me. I loved both Children's Literature classes I took, both as an undergrad and as a grad student, as well as the "kiddie lit" classes that I taught years later at Lamar U. and then Lee College, and it pleases me to simply see and hold some of those familiar books. I even found here a Betsy, Tacy, and Tib volume, bringing back happy memories from my childhood in Portland. How I loved to read as a child, and how lucky I was to have a mother who encouraged that love.

It's Been a While

I know that, due to my negligence, I'm losing my few regular readers, so I'm going to try to get back to being a more regular presence here. After a busy January, our social schedule is tapering off this month, leaving more time for reflection and writing. And time and opportunity to get our bodies back into fighting shape, I might add. Our weekly weigh-in this morning was disappointing, though not unexpected, since we have basically let ourselves go for the last couple of months. Time to take back control. We are people, not slugs!



Ah, but they are cute . . . .










Chili Cookoff

In no other neighborhood where we've lived have people held a community-wide birthday party for whomever decides to come, and coupled it with a chili cookoff. "Bring a pot of chili," they announced, "and whatever you want to drink, and some tip money for the band, and come on," so we did. Tom got Elizabeth's long-distance help on a good Texas chili recipe, and we made some outstanding chili, first concocting our own chili paste and rendering beef fat from a brisket that Tom cut up to use as the chili meat. It was excellent, as was Karen and Ray's entry, which they also made from scratch with the chili paste and all. Neither won the contest, which is fine, except that the one that did win was rather, in our opinion, pedestrian, with what appeared to be Rotel tomatoes thrown in and the regular old ground meat. Sour grapes, perhaps?

       Yes, I am having fun with Google images today.

Anyway, the event was great fun, and we got to meet some more folks and get in a good visit with Karen and Ray and enjoy the really good music.

                                                                Lots of chili entries

 Lots of dancing, mostly by women of a certain age (like me)

 Allen won the prize for the fourth year in a row. He's happy about it.

33rd Annual! 

Other Events

No photos of these, but I do want to mention them:

1. Tina organized a birthday lunch out for me, and I chose the Outrigger, one of my favorite local joints, the site of my favorite fish tacos and a great place to sit outside and watch the boats go by in the channel. 

2. And that evening, Tom and I went to Star Cinema Grill to drink, eat pizza, and watch American Sniper. Yes, we liked it. As to the controversy over it? I like what the New Yorker had to say about it: it's an anti-war film, and it's a pro-war film. Not simple. 

3. Super Bowl party at Debbie and Randy's: very fun and festive, despite the disappointing outcome. But what a great game, and what a great group of people! (I tried my hand at homemade pretzels for the party, and that was great fun. But something went amiss, as they have a slightly off, bitter aftertaste. I bet Elizabeth will know what that's all about.)

4. We're checking off our list of folks that we want to see this winter, some of whom we hadn't seen, literally, for years. We've had dinner with the Parkers and the Krells in the last couple of weeks, and we spent an afternoon in Sabine Pass with Art and Barb, and had Larry's curry at his and Courtney's beautifully-redecorated place. Great in each case to catch up with one another's busy, though largely retired, lives.

5. We finally replaced Gerrilynn's barbecue cooker with one that Pat had seen in east Houston. It feels good to get that off our backs, and Gerri seems happy with it. I don't think I've mentioned on the blog what happened: We were returning the pit to her one evening, months ago, when a tire blew out. Being fairly close to her house (and being naifs, I suppose), we left it, hurried to her place, and came back with Pat and a trailer, only to find that sucker gone, gone, gone. Hearts fell, but they have been lifted now that we found a good one that didn't set us back thousands of dollars. And we will never borrow this one!

And if you see this pit (Note the distinctive handle - it's a drill bit.), call the Baytown police, to whom we reported the theft (They called it a loss, not a theft --semantics.).

Enough for now. Wish us well as we become culinary ascetics for the next few weeks.