Nobody Walks Anymore...

It may have been the anxiety I got from the conversation I had with Alec, but I never went to sleep last night. I stayed up the whole night, just dilly-dollying. By the time I actually got sleepy, it was about 5 A.M., but I knew I was going to the Farmer's Market with Vanessa at 8 A.M. and figured it wasn't worth going to bed for three hours, as I'd probably end up more tired if I did. So once 7:00 A.M. hit, I quickly got dressed and freshened up, grabbed my notebook, sunglasses and purse and headed out the door.

I had put on flip flops, since I wanted to be comfortable, figuring I'd be walking most of the day. For some reason my brain won't ever think to put on tennis shoes. Must be a defect... But I went about, crunching through the grass, it being about 40 or 50 degrees, and also dewey, my feet and nose were freezing! I walked over to the bus stop in front of McDonald's on Central, texting Vanessa. I stood there for about 15 minutes, listening to the Dave Matthew's Band, watching my breath come out and the scenic sunrise coming over H.E.B. And the bus came. I also texted Matthew to pass time, and I waited for Vanessa to reply.

I took the bus to the downtown terminal, and started walking and texting at 12th street to 6th. As I was walking, Vanessa told me she was getting closer, which was great, because I was starting to worry that maybe she slept in! When I reached 6th, I looked up and down, and wasn't really sure which way Harrison was. I had looked it up last night on Yahoo! Maps, to figure out which direction I should go, and it looked like it was more towards the area closest to the border, so I took the down route. As I was walking Vanessa asked if she could meet up with me, and said she was going to start heading down to wherever I was. I let her know that I wasn't sure if I was going the right direction, but that I felt like I wasn't, since I was nearing the end od 6th and not seeing a Harrison sign anywhere. I turned around and started heading in the opposite direction. Eventually, I saw Vanessa across the street, we reached out to each other, as the cars passed by, and we eventually joined, and walked together, in the RIGHT direction. As we walked, she told me how she had woke up kind of late (which kind of worked in timing with me having to walk my way over).

We eventually arrived to the Farmer's Market, which just so happens to be right next to the Brownsville MFA. I could have taken another bus and not had to walk as much, but it was all okay, walking is good, and I actually enjoyed it. :) They were still kind of setting up, when we got there, so we stood there for a minute, walked up the ways a little bit, just to make a quick browse, and tried to collect where we'd like to start. As we walked, I saw Adrian walking around. I didn't get to say hi, but there was a band setting up at the far end, where we came in, and it was actually Adrian and his family's band. It turned out to basically be the same show from Galeria 409 a few nights ago, which was cool because I didn't get to see the last act. :]

The first place we checked out, was a booth that sold different kinds of pepper and fruit jams. I thought this was actually very interesting because I'd never heard of Jalepeno or Habinero jams. This scragly old lady, who was kind of frantic and unorganized (and also one of Vanessa's old science teachers) was explaining to the gathered people when she makes certain varieties of jams, which were which, the samples she had, etc. We stood there for awhile, wanting to try a sample, waiting for the small crowd of people to wane down. She seemed a bit scatter brained, so I just let Vanessa pick which she wanted to sample. I really wanted to try the habinero jam, but we got a papaya with a hint of habinero and a smidgen of cream cheese. She gave me a little wooden spoon (and not Vanessa, how rude) and we sampled it. It tasted like straight papaya with the faintest bit of sting from the habinero. It taste weird by itself. I'm sure it would've tasted better on toast or something, but with the cheese it kind of made more sense. So we went to the next booth, which had various pots you could buy, to start growing your own various types of lettuce and herbs. We went around sniffing the herbs, and checking out the produce, and moved onto the next booth, which was serving fruit cocktails. I had been DYING for some mango and watermelon, and they had it in the same bowl. :) (Though Vanessa had to convince me, that that was indeed mango.) We bought a somewhat heavy bowl for $2.50, grabbed a little pot of chili powder, and continued to browse. All of the produce seemed to be extremely huge. Humongoid grapefruits, lettuce and cabbage heads, carrots, herb plants, etc.

We came to this booth, where there wasn't much out, but there were a couple of coolers. This tall, somewhat older gentleman enthusiastically came up to us, explaining and showing us everything he had. He seemed to be really excited about his Dikon sprouts. I told him I'd never heard of them, and he started explaining what they tasted like and let me try a sample. It kind of tasted like radish and cabbage mixed together. He was so energetic, I almost wanted to buy something just for that, but I didn't know where the rest of the day would take us, and didn't want them to get smooshed or limp from being in my bag all day. We also visited a baked goods stand (which had banana nut bread!!) and which we said we'd come back to once we made the rounds, as well as a honey stand (I preferred the wildflower honey, Vanessa liked the orange grove honey). After we had visited all the booths, we sat down off to a corner, sharing a bench with a few old men (our whole day seemed to lead to benches), to eat our fruit cocktails. We sat there talking and listening to the music (oddly it was ABBA, which seemed really out of place), I was taking pictures of random people's butts because I'm easily amused with stupid things. Vanessa told me to look at this older man, who was dressed like he was from the 50's (I thought he looked like he was from the 30's though lol), so I turned to look, and as soon as I did, he made eye contact with me, and started walking over to us. I looked back at my fruit bowl, and at Vanessa, trying to avoid whatever he was going to tell us. But it turns out, he just wanted to let us know that the MFA was free from 8-12 (he actually told us after 12), and that there would be free coffee and muffins. He handed us a little paper and went about his way. The old guy sitting next to us seemed interested in readin the paper, so I asked him if he wanted it, and he went ahead and took it, both of us agreeing that free muffins and art sounded great. :) We finished our fruit, and got up to find something else to do.

We tried to think of what we could do to pass time until 12:00 P.M., so Vanessa suggested we head to Ringold Park. We walked over into the old main entrance, near Cummings. There had been this peacock blue colored park that had been under construction for a long time, so when Vanessa pointed it out, I immediately thought it still was under construction, so that's what I said, hah! She asked if we could check it out anyway, and I kind of love her for doing so, because I had a silly, past-due mess o' fun. We ended up going throughout the tiny little new park, trying out all the new "gym", since we literally had the entire park to ourselves. There was this wind surfing looking thing, that spinned around when you stood up on it, that I fell in love with. I could've span around all afternoon, but then it'd get repetitive and yeah.... There was also an umbrella shaped thing, that was a little harder to ride, but still. We climbed all over, crossed the "stone" bridge, climbed the "rock wall", played with the whizzy wheel and speaker. We played with the "instruments" that were set up like a street band. Vanessa looked through the telescope and slid the slide like she was in a Barney audition. Before we moved on, I rode that wind sail thing like six more times, good times, good times...

We made our way on the little path, leading up to the stairs that put us back on the road, and walked over, past the pavillion, and towards the pirate ship portion of the park. I sat on the swings and watched Vanessa attempt the various monkey bars, until she rejoined me. Then we tried another set of monkey bars together and realized it wasn't as easy as it used to be. But then again, I have a very vivid memory of giving up in the middle of a tall one and fell to my near death on my back. Oh yes, childhood memories, liveth it up. After we realized how god awful hard it was to trek the monkey bars as adults, we looked around for other things to do. I noticed some kittens playing near the pirate ship and tried to get close to them to capture their cuteness on digital file, but they kept getting scared and running off. Vanessa went to go down the big swirly slide, but realized it smelled like pee, while I persued another cat.

Since I couldn't capture the kitties, I noticed a duck and went after it instead. As I tip-toed near it, Vanessa decided to get sexy since we were the only ones around, besides the dude on the gator. ;D And hey, he wouldn't tell....

So, I followed the quack around for awhile, trying to get closer and closer, so I could get a real tight closeup of its bubbly, blistery face. It was letting me get closer than the cats, and I saw squatting down, to his level, so I wouldn't fully intimidate him. He was walking away a little bit, so I started throwing those wood flakes around, to confuse him into thinking they were maybe bread crumbs. He gave in a little bit, but he didn't come up to me, to my face. Eventually, I got close enough, to get some kind of detail, I would've liked to get a complete tight shot of just his eye and the red bubbly mess on his face. Oh, well, they're not going anywhere, maybe next time.

I went to hang back out with Vanessa, who was leaning on the pirate ship's dock. She told me the kitties from earlier were hanging out underneath, so I bent down, and tried to crab walk towards them, while they were playing, but they kept checking me out. So I decided to lay down on the floor, and start crawling. I guess they're used to pouncing, so they ran off further underneath the dock. The other cat was chilled out and napping in the warmth of the sun, it being a somewhat cool day and all. The other two kittens were hiding in the shadows of the dock, cuddled together and watching my moves. I asked Vanessa to walk towards them, so they would get more in the view of the other cat, through my camera's eye. They got close enough, even though I was hoping to run them out into the sun too. I kept trying to creep closer, but I couldn't get more than 5 ft away before they'd start getting twitchy, so I just made do. I tried to take a good shot, until little kids arrived and began to run towards the pirate ship. I got up and dusted myself off, so we could figure out something else to do.

We still had a good amount of time before 12:00 PM, so we walked down the hill to the little plaza area with the fountain. I kind of wanted to sit there and put my feet in, but the edge was wet and the water was freezing. We talked about maybe going to the zoo, if the prices were reasonable. It wasn't too hot or cold out, and the sun wasn't really a nuisance, so it would be a really good day to go, and neither of us had gone in a really long time. My batteries had died while we were at the park, so I told her I'd like to go to the Dollar Store to get some more, if we were really going to go. So we took sidewalk by the resaca to the exit we came through, and started walking past the zoo, up to Palm Blvd.

While walking, I remembered that the house that was selling the surfboard was on the way, so I was looking out for it. I've really always wanted to learn how to sruf, and it looked like a board I could get for cheap and use for practice, once my sister came down. When we got to the house, we stopped to look at it, and probably about 5 seconds later, a white care pulled up to the house. A guy came out and asked us to please buy it, he'd take anything. I half-jokingly threw a $2 bid out and he laughed and said at least $25, which still isn't bad. I told him I'd have to come back since we were walking around town and didn't want to carry it around with me. Then he started getting kind of creepy and asked us where we were walking to. I looked at Vanessa, because I wasn't sure if I should say or not, and she said the museum. We awkwardly ended the conversation, and continued walking towards the Dollar Store.

As we were walking down Palm, another awkward moment happened, thanks again to me. I swear to god, I'm like the weirdo magnet. There was this building, that always seemed kind of cool to me, that had a sign up that said "FOR SALE". Ever since last Thanksgiving, I've been daydreaming about buying a building closer to downtown, like a silly broke person I am, so I asked Vanessa if we could take a look at it. So we walked over to it, and I started looking inside the windows, but I couldn't see much. So I went to another window, and there was this fancy little cat, with a fancy little collar, meowing at us, like he wanted our attention. I went back to the other area and tried to look in again. As we were peeking, this old man walks out and asks us if he can help us, in Spanish. I looked at Vanessa because I wasn't entirely sure what he had said, then he said it again in English. I explained that we were just poking inside to take a look, since it had a "FOR SALE" sign on it. He just stood there, expecting more explanation. I assumed we looked too young to be caring about buildings for sale, so we just said thank you and walked off, because he wasn't really wanting to hear us, as much as he wanted us off his property.

We went inside the Dollar Store, and I asked to use their bathroom. They should probably be more careful with who they let in there, it was this empty warehouse looking place, with no one inside, with all their merchandise just laying around. Their bathroom was super filthy though, so I just skipped that idea and met Vanessa in the Seasonal aisle. We poked around at the Valentine's stuff, she got some sweet tarts she wanted to buy, and I got my batteries (which were a $1 more than they would've been if I had just waited and got them at home. Sue me I'm cheap! lol) and we walked back towards the park.


By the time we got back, we still had about 40 minutes to kill, so we decided to sit on one of the benches by the resaca and have a chat. We sat around, watching the ducks swimming, trying to warm ourselves because it was getting chillier. We talked a lot about friendships; mostly the friends we've made through Lopez (most of which we have in common) and how we missed hanging out with them, how much they've changed. They are all great memories, and I miss them too. I wish I was closer to a lot of them, so we could could hang out more and make new memories. I'm also anxious to make either more local friends, or just get out of here, and make friends there. Things are defintely at a slower pace, and I miss being adventurous! Its understandable that people grow apart and change and its always nice to reflect on good times spent. :) When it was 10 minutes until noon, we got up and made our way to the museum.


We walked passed the zoo to check the prices out. They seem to have gone up since I last went about $2, so they're now $9 a pop. We decided that was a little too pricey to walk around and stare at sleepy animals, so we said we'd figure out something else to do, once we had our fun at the museum. When we walked in, the lady at the front desk asked us if we were here for a visit. That was kind of a duh question, but she went on to add that the museum was free from 8 A.M. - 12 P.M. (you know, the times when they gave free coffee and muffins. Doh!) I guess the older gentleman, in the suit, misinformed us. Or maybe we were just distracted. Maybe we should've kept the flier. Hah! We went inside, as to not look like we were using the museum for free snacks, and checked out the art. It was actually the same exhibit from our last visit, which i guess was okay and kind of expected. We noticed that there were a few people from the Farmer's Market sitting around in the cafe area, drinking coffee, but we didn't check to see if there was anything (even though I really wanted too!), and took the oppurtunity to take a second, uncluttered glance around.

The only part of the museum I didn't see last time, was the Children's section, so I decided to take a quick walk in there. I checked out a few of the children's art, hanging on the wall, of random things like trees, flowers and owls. I saw some art supplies lying around on one the tables, (half) jokingly implying that I wanted to steal them. Vanessa let me know she was going to the Pedro Reynosa exhibit. So I took a small circle around the room, which ended up working out for the initial reason we went there anyway. I found a small tray of cookies stacked underneath a napkin and snagged a handful. I went to go join Vanessa in the next room, sneakingly eating my stolen cookies and offering one to her. She asked me to save it for her, and I said uhhh, it's kind of weird to carry a cookie around, especially in a place I'm not supposed to be having it. So she took it and put it in her sweater's pocket. Vanessa is so silly. :P We checked out the Pedro Reynosa painting again, commenting on how we both didn't really think they were all that. He does have some decent techniques for someone just starting out, but they look almost childish and they lacked realistic depth-perception on most of them. We sat on the bench and talked a little more, and thought about what we could do next.

We ended up leaving the museum, shortly after we'd arrived, standing around outside, still trying to figure out what to do. About this time, my lack of sleep was really starting to catch up with me, so I suggested we get some grub. I figured a little caloric intake might wake me up a bit. She asked where I wanted to go, and I said Whataburger. So we waited at the bus stop in front of the zoo, for a long while. Our conversation was kind of silly, probably because when I'm sleepy my brain cells start making me say ridiculous things. We people watched and talked about the good ol' days in Mr.Elm's and how weird it was that he and Willie would hang out at Chapa's. Eventually the bus came and we hopped on.

Vanessa was concerned about having to pay $2 for such little traveling. Hey, I understand, I like to save a buck as much as the next person. Since we were going to the downtown terminal, I told her that sometimes bus drivers will let you go on the same bus, if you wanted to continue riding the same route, without having to cough up the extra dollar. I told her, while everyone was getting off, just to sit tight, and he'd tell you it was okay, since that's how it went about the few times I did that. So as we approached the bus terminal, we waited for everyone to get off. It looked like one guy was going to stay, so it wouldn't be so awkward. But he got off too. Vanessa thought it would just be best to approach the bus driver and ask, so they had a conversation in Spanish and then she motioned me to get off. I asked what he had said, and she informed me that we were getting our extra ride for free, but that we needed to get off because he was taking his lunch and another driver was taking over, but he said he'd give the other bus driver the heads up. We waited around for the bus doors to open, hopped back on, and headed to Whataburger.

We got to Whataburger, ordered our food and sat down at a booth. We both took turns to wash our hands, and I people watched a lot. There was this older white man with two little mexican boys, who he kept getting after for touching things they weren't supposed to, being rowdy and climbing all over the walls, that I thought was entirely amusing. There was also this girl, who seemed to be standing at the drink station forever, who looked familar, and I spent almost the entire time trying to remember where I knew her from. Now that I think about it, I'm pretty sure she worked at Convergys. Waaaay late...

Eventually, our food came. I got a burger and onion rings and Vanessa got a grilled chicken salad. I had dumped my onion rings out on my tray, and I got this one that looked like a heart (force-ably). Awww, just in time for February! :P Vanessa asked for an onion ring and I ended up splitting that one with her. So I guess I have her half my heart. Awwwww, we're so lesbo. :)

When I opened up my burger, to make sure they got the order right, I noticed I had a pickle that bore a striking resemblance to Strong Sad. Seriously!! Man, its been forever since I've seen anything Homestar Runner.

While we were finishing up our food, Vanessa got a phone call from her sister. It was somewhat funny, but I think they were seriously arguing. So I played with the ketchup they had given me. I had planned to use it for eating, but it was all gross and watery. I dumped it out on the burger wrapper, and it came out in a sad face, I just added the tear from the ketchup water. I don't know what was up with my food being all emo. Hearts, Strong Sad, crying faces.... Guess it just couldn't accept that it was going to end up in my belly! >;P

I asked her if she was interested in playing pool, after we finished up eating. She was down for it, so we got our things together and started walking towards the Billiard Room. On our way there, I noticed this sign, that probably meant $8.00 menudo, but it looked like it said 'boo menudo' and that was funny to me, because I'measily amused, heh.

So we got our balls and set up towards the back. It was sort of empty, save for a few guys playing by themselves, probably because it had just opened. we played about 3 games, since we didn't want to play for more than our hour. I felt a little creeped out because there was this weird old man, who kept looking over and smiling really weirdly at our table. When we left, I asked Vanessa if she noticed, but she didn't. Oh well. We listened to the classic rock playing on the speakers (AC/DC, Guns 'N Roses, Pink Floyd) and acted silly. She asked me if this was the place we met Gabriel and whatever that other dude was with him, and I told her yes. We each won a game and ended the 3rd in the middle, since it would've gone over our hour (she would've won though). Upon exiting, she asked if we could go to the library, so we continued our trek down Central...

By the time we got to the library, I was basically wobbling around, wanting to lay down and die (sleep-wise, of course). I asked her if it was cool if I just sat in a chair, while she looked around. She went to go to the Friends Of The Library, but it turned out to be closed. So we did a little browsing, while I melted off one of the chairs by the circulation desk. I think I actually dozed off because when Vanessa came back, she poked me and asked, "Were you sleeping?" I said, "I guess so" lol She told me Mr. Simmons was there, and I did see him leaving in the weird-to-see-teachers-in gym shorts and t-shirt. She told me she would call her parents to pick her up, which I was somewhat grateful for because I didn't think I could go on doing anything else. We parted ways, in the lobby, and I waited for my mom to come, sitting on a bench next to some random old guy. When I got in the car, she asked me who I was sitting next to, I told her I don't know. She told me how I not knowing who I was seated next to was weird and suspicious. So I guess she assumed I had been hanging out with him all day. My weird, weird, mother.

When I got home, I was laying on the couch next to my mom. She was tying to talk to me about how the Farmer's Market was, because she had wanted to go. I talked a little bit, but I was so happy to be able to rest, I probably ended up falling asleep on her. I had a really fun day though, and I loved walking everywhere. We have to keep doing that. I also noticed, we accomplished nothing for our script. Which I think is funny. But I'm sure next time, we'll squeeze some more work in. :)