Skip to main content

Snow falls in Texas, too

Well, I know all my neighbours to the east are heartily sick of snow already, but snow in Texas is about as common as cowboy boots in London, so you're just going to have to grit your teeth and listen to me rave about it for five minutes. If it makes you feel better you can always do the "12 inches? That's nothing! Bunch of wusses!" routine. We always enjoy mocking the locals when it rains and the news stations send reporters out to stand there damply telling us how wet it is. But significant snowfall is outside of our comfort zone, too, so we're happily staying off work and panic-buying cat litter or whatever it is you're supposed to do.

So, yes, the photos. It was very wet snow, so venturing out was a rather splashy business enlivened by occasional plunges into ankle-deep liquid slush. Nevertheless, I sloshed my way down W 7th St, determined to extract maximum enjoyment from the situation. This guy didn't look too impressed.


The snow stuck to the trees something chronic, and many of them couldn't cope. They looked very sad and droopy.


Most local businesses were underpopulated, and the staff had nothing better to do than play in the snow. I liked the use of maraschino cherries outside one bar.


In normal life, these are sun loungers. Today they are snow loungers.

The Methodist church over the road looked like a Victorian Christmas card. It just needed a robin in the foreground but I couldn't find one to pose for me.

The apartment complex boasts a hot tub among its amenities, and the combination of hot water and cold snow was irresistible. Tiptoeing through icy slush in flipflops and a swimming costume was a test of the will, but once we got there it was great. We weren't the only ones with the idea; a few others had set up an ipod (carefully sheltered by a chair) so we relaxed in the warmth and music, with snowflakes settling on our heads. Goodbye Texas, hello Iceland!

Comments

Anonymous said…
Fab. The Rix's have had snow in N Carolina too.

the Gulfstream is still working over here and keeping us relatively warm.

Hope that you guys enjoyed it.

David G

Popular posts from this blog

Mr White Watson of Bakewell

Once upon a time, back in 1795 or so, lived a man who was always asking questions.  The kind of questions like, "Why is glass transparent?" or "Why do fruit trees grow better in that place than in this place?" or "What does the earth look like underneath the surface?"  This last question was one that he was particularly interested in, and he went so far as to work out what the rock layers looked like where he lived, and draw little pictures of them.  Now he was a marble sculptor by trade (as well as fossil hunter, mineral seller, and a few other things) so he thought it would be even better to make his little pictures in stone.  That way he could represent the layers using the actual rocks they were composed of.  Over the course of his lifetime he made almost 100 of these tablets, as he called them. Then he died.  And no one else was quite as interested in all those rocks and minerals as he was.  His collection was sold off, bit by bit, and the table...

Growing things

For those of you who are interested in my attempts at balcony gardening, I thought I'd update you a little. For those who aren't, don't skip this post. You may find something else of interest. Apart from the ever-present herbs, tomatoes and cayenne peppers are on the go this year. The peppers are really on the go - we went away for a week and came back to find them twice the size as when we left. Now they're producing fruit which is growing at a similarly rapid rate, though none has ripened to red yet. I realised I should have given you some kind of scale, so I just went out and measured. They're about 22 cm long, or 8 1/2 inches for you non-metric types. I may have to find out how to dry peppers if they all ripen at once. A couple of tomato plants are looking pretty healthy and beginning to flower. A few died; one, apparently, by being eaten whole by a bird, a trouble I've never had before. I had two seedlings left so used those as replacements, b...

Portway: Down to the Derwent and back up again

I've never been to Holbrook before. It's a small village on a hill, just south of Belper, and I instantly like it. Look at the view! And interesting buildings too. I leave my car to enjoy the scenery and head down Stony Lane. Good thing I didn't bring a vehicle for this bit - there are several signs warning me that This Is Not A Road. I pass a few farms and the back of Holbrook School for Autism and come out on Port Way, just where I left it last time . A short distance up the road is St Michael's Church, which has a semi-circular window, a secret tunnel, and a sprawling graveyard. The church is closed today. I'm now back in the centre of Holbrook. I take a left on Mellors Lane and soon leave the houses behind. There's a good playground. I still find myself rating play equipment, even though my boys are far too old for it now! I cross a couple of fields, then the ground starts to slope downhill, with a fantastic view across the Derwent Valley. There's a squa...