Texas Sunset

It's remarkably similar to other sunsets and sunrises I've captured, but this one happened in the Rio Grande Valley of deep south Texas, last night.

Visual Overload

Immediately after crossing the border, tourists visiting Nuevo Progreso in the state of Tamaulipas, Mexico are bombarded with vendors hawking their services and wares.

At a glance in this photo you can see a stand bearing men's belts.  Right next to the belts is a large sign advertising the prices of dental surgery. Above that, part of an electric sign advertising contact lenses.

On the left side of the photo is a stand with windshield screens, really bad wall art and another stand full of garish women's purses.The high density of vendors, stalls, booths, sales reps and tourists makes navigating the sidewalk difficult. Sometimes you just have to stand and wait for foot traffic to clear.

In the middle of the photo a pharmacist rep meets and greets a dentist rep. They are apparently good friends. The two tourists in the photo have just spurned them. It's interesting to note the ways both tourists and sellers segregate themselves from the other.

Everywhere in town there are pharmacist and dentist reps carrying brochures and folders with which to accost every tourist, regardless of whether they will listen. Every seller, from taco vendor to boot polisher, jeweler, pharmacist and dentist has "good prices," "almost free." It's fun and exciting – the first time. After that it quickly becomes annoying.

Break Time

Children take a break from their chore of selling Chiclets on the streets of Nuevo Progreso, a border town in the state of Tamaulipas, Mexico.

Minimalism in Harlingen

Pear Street Fog

The weather channel's web site reported fog in Harlingen with visibility near zero. Our Photography & Tour Group had planned a day-trip to that very city on this day.

Fortunately, by the time we arrived the fog had burned off to the point where visibility was similar to our own neighborhood.

Restored

A couple from Little Rock had recently finished restoring this 1950s vintage travel trailer. Their first trip was to Sleepy Valley Resort in the Rio Grande Valley of south Texas.

They stayed about two weeks, visiting cousins on the street behind them. During their stay they enjoyed this single sunny, warm, comfortable day. For the rest of the two weeks, the weather was cold, raining, wet, muddy and miserable. Everyone in the park stayed inside where it was warm and dry, so we didn't get a chance to say much more than, "Hello, what a beautiful trailer, where are you from, how long will you stay?

They left on a cold dreary Wednesday morning when we weren't home. They seemed to be nice people.

What a horrible time to break-in such an exquisitely restored and decorated travel trailer.

The Event

Late in the pitch dark night, much too early one morning when the sun was high in the afternoon sky, ever so slowly it happened quite suddenly. 

There was no sound when, loudly, it came crashing down upon them. No one expected it, but it was just as they had predicted. 

What had happened was entirely beyond description and yet everyone had a mental picture of it on the tip of their tongue. 

The smell of it rang in their ears. 

The entire crowd was speechless, the nattering endless. For hours on end the blathering lasted but a moment. 

And then, in the calm of turmoil, it was the village idiot who quietly projected (in a manner that everyone in sight could hear), "while this event, which lasted but a split second, could go on forever, there is no time like the present for a nicely chilled cocktail."

Working Man's Technology

Our Lady of Guadalupe – Mission, Texas

 Our Lady of Guadalupe Catholic Church was established in 1899 as Our Lady of the Mission. It was renamed in 1927 when the church was rebuilt after a disastrous fire.

 Windows in the choir loft.

 Major renovations, completed in November, 2013 included new wings on either side of the sanctuary.

Light from clerestory windows reflect a beautiful soft light from the arched ceiling to an expansive sanctuary attended by worshipers every day of the week.

Light Painting

 Painting with a penlight thanks to our friend Ruth Blackmon who suggested we try this as a group.

 These are my best attempts with water drops on a CD