Life Is What Happens To You On The Way To Do Other Things . . . .

The oddest thing happened to me the other day.

For the first thing, I've noticed that Interstate highways leading away from the Gulf Coast (I-37 from Corpus Christi TX; I-45 from Galveston TX; I-65 from Mobile AL) all have exta-wide right shoulders and little blue-and-white signs every 2 miles that read "Hurricane Evacuation Route." It's a bit weird watching the little signs leading away from the coast for 50 miles or so, but nice to knolw somebody had the foresight to think of such a contingency.

Makes sense, right? In case of impending hurricane, they use the shoulder too for added traffic capability.

The second thing? Well, last Sunday we decided to go to beautiful Corpus Christi Texas. Fabled land of Spring Break debaucheries, Sunshine, and the world's greatest coastal fishing, as well as the home of the U.S.S. Lexington -- the feared "Blue Ghost" aircraft carrier of WWII. Seems like a safe bet for a day trip, right?

Heh. Guess again.

Admission to the Lady Lex was about $21.95 per person -- substantially greater than we planned. After touring the old girl (which is in substantial need of repair, unfortunately) we drove though downtown Corpus looking for a beachside seafood joint, figuring it'd be chaper and fresher closer to the Gulf, right?

Again, Heh-heh-heh.

With apologies to any residents of the Belle of the Gulf, she's certainly seen better days. The downtown looked like a hurricane had been through there recently, although it's almost certainly been 10 years or better. Vacant lots; closed stores; and a general air of urban semi-blight prevailed. After miles of driving up and down Seaside Blvd looking for a place to eat, we eventually returned to our starting point to an old-fashoined Diner which had very good food -- but not the seafood we had our taste buds set on.

A nice day, slightly disappointing overall, but not terrible. Still, disappointing, and a bit creepy and sad.

So this past Friday (five days later, for those completists out there) I took a day off for another excursion. After a quick pit-stop at the ever-delightful Buc-ee's (see previous post) which has become my nephew David's favorite kitschy tourist trap, drove on to Houston TX and the Johnson Manned Space Center. There we saw the sights and (almost) took the tour of the Center before it started raining and abbreviated out tour.

Since we had some extra time on our hands, we decided to toodle the 27 miles down I-45 to Galveston Island and see what was out there as well. A trip unplanned; almost as an afterthought, but that road less traveled has made all the difference. We found Houston's Chinatown that we'd been looking for (for almost 3 years!) We also found a plethora of Seaside souvenir shops, bars, and cheap excellent seafood joints like we'd been searching for the previous weekend, and ate until we were stuffed. The place we found had the BEST deep-fried soft-shelled crabs I've eaten since i was stationed in Augusta Georgia 21 years ago -- just magnificent. Out waiter was a teenaged Russian emigre attending U.T.-Houston, and was both surprised and thrilled I spoke a bit of conversational Russkiy.

Imagine that.

Galveston's pretty enough and reasonably-enough-priced that we talked about maybe moving there. Oh yeah, that'd break my heart; having to live on the ocean and eat fresh seafood every day.

God Provides, indeed.

~~~JD~~~