March (Part 2): Our trip to Paris... (Paris, Texas, that is)

On March 29th we just decided to head out driving and exploring.  Lane was the navigator and didn't tell me our destination.  Just where to turn.  She wanted to see some of the Texas country outside of the built-up Dallas-Fort Worth area.  So we headed north-east and wound up in Paris, Texas.  A very small town.  By the time we arrived we were definitely ready for lunch, so Lane found us this place.

Scholl Brothers Bar-B-Que in Paris, Texas

From the outside it may not look like much, but like so many places like this, if you get past the outside appearance and go inside and try the food you find it is most excellent.  The food here was fabulous.

My Bar-B-Que was served up right on the paper tray liner.
Lane's brisket was in a Styrofoam bowl.  It was still great food.

We Southerners always appreciate a restaurant serving sweet tea,

We saw these metal horses when we stopped for gas.
They are made from scrap pieces of roofing metal.

Passing through a uniquely decorated small Texas town.

Some flat North Texas

Lane had never actually seen an operational oil well.
We saw quite a few this day.

It was a great day trip.  Just a House-Boy and his Travel Nurse exploring Texas.

"You can't explore it if you haven't ever been there."

Brian Hallman

March (Part 1): Two Zoos

We were almost two full months into this adventure by the first of March.  We were finally learning our way around this huge place, and starting to explore more.  On March 1st, Lane and I spent the day at the Dallas Zoo. 

We had a nice day checking out all the sights and animals.

The obligatory elephant picture.

                 

I think this was Lane's favorite picture of the day.
We were really close to this guy.  No camera zoom here.

Then on March 15th we got to see a different kind of Dallas zoo. A people zoo.

They have developed a tradition here of having a really big Saint Patrick's Day parade.  It runs down Greenville Avenue, which is just the next block over from our apartment.

This is taken from the entrance to our parking lot.
As you can see, by now the flowers had already been blooming.

Lane loves flower pictures.

Traditional sights you may expect to see in any parade...

...as well as some less traditional.

As I understand it, they let anyone and everyone in.
Even part-time storm troopers.

And who knew -
Elvis has been hanging out all this time on Greenville Avenue.

Brian H., if you ever read this blog, I took this picture just for you.
It speaks for itself.

More House-boy and his traveling nurse adventures to follow.

"You can't explore it if you haven't ever been there."

Brian Hallman

The Kennedy Memorial and Down Town Dallas

On January 26th Lane and I headed into downtown Dallas to sight see and explore.  One place we really wanted to visit was Dealey Plaza, the site of the assassination of President John F. Kennedy on November 22, 1963.  I was just four years old at the time, but have vague memories of the funeral on our old black and white TV.

Dealey Plaza is in the Historic West End of downtown Dallas.  In 1993 the Dealey Plaza Historic District was named a National Historic Landmark to preserve Dealey Plaza, street rights-of-way, and buildings and structures by the plaza visible from the assassination site, that have been identified as witness locations or as possible assassin locations.

This is looking back along the path of the assassin's bullets toward the Texas School Book Depository building from which Lee Harvey Oswald fired.  It is the building on the left.  The exact window is second floor down from the top, far right window.











This is a view looking at where the bullets struck, as seen from where the famous Zapruder film was shot.  The person in the extreme right foreground is standing where Zapruder stood.

This is a view looking across the street where the bullets struck and looking at the grassy knoll area.  This is where many  eyewitness were standing as well as where Zapruder stood.  The area to the left is the area from where conspiracy theorist believe a second shooter fired. You can see a white "X" in the middle lane of the street, right in front of the three people.  This is the approximate location of Kennedy when the last shot struck.

Then we went into the Sixth Floor Museum at Dealey Plaza.  Inside they have recreations of the sniper's nest Oswald fired from, as well as the spot where they found the rifle.  Both these areas are best guess recreations based on a few photographs taken at the time.  I don't think the police were real big on properly securing and documenting the crime scene back then.

This is a picture taken from the window right next to the one from which Oswald fired.  You can't actually get to the exact window because it is isolated as part of the exhibit.

One thing that really struck me was how much closer everything is in reality as opposed to the way it looks in photographs.  I grew up believing it was this unimaginably huge distance between where Oswald fired and Kennedy was struck. But when I actually stood there the distance did not seem that great at all.

Inside the Museum are very large (composite) pictures of John Kennedy and Jackie Kennedy.  I say they are composite pictures because the big picture you see is actually made up of many thousands of very tiny pictures.  The pictures are like pixels.   The John Kennedy picture is made from thousands of tiny Jackie Kennedy pictures, and vice verse.

This picture is an extreme close up of the John Kennedy picture above it.  You can see the many Jackie pictures of various shadings.








Later in the day we walked around more of the West End and downtown to just explore and see the beautiful sights.

Sky scrapers as a back drop to the upper end of Dealey Plaza.

Old Red:  The historic  Dallas County Courthouse, built in 1892 of red sandstone and rusticated marble accents, is a historic governmental building located at 100 South Houston Street











One of the many modern sky scrapers looming over much smaller but beautifully maintained older buildings.

The Historic West End





























This was a really neat western store in the West End.  We went inside but did not stay long.  It was very, very crowded that day.

A Travel Nurse and her House-Boy at the end of a great day in downtown Dallas.  This is next to a fountain at the upper end of Dealey Plaza.













"You can't explore it if you haven't ever been there."

Brian Hallman

January 2014

White Rock Lake

One of my goals of this blog is to help us keep track of the many things we see and do while experiencing this great adventure.  We had two outings in January, despite the cold weather.

The girls keeping eyes on Lane

White Rock Lake is just a few minutes drive from our apartment.  We packed up the girls and a lunch one day and went there for a pic-nic lunch outing.  It was pretty cold but we spread out on the grass in some good sunshine so it was not too bad.  The girls had a really good time.  We did too.  I think that nature is just as beautiful in the winter as any other time of year.

The girls can't stand to be separated from Lane.

Later in the month we spent a nice day at the Dallas Arboretum.   It is on the far side of White Rock Lake from where we had our pic-nic lunch.

Again it was a little cool that day, but we did not let that spoil our fun.  I was a little hesitant to go that day because I thought that since it was the dead of winter there would not be anything worth seeing there.  Boy was I wrong.  I have long ago learned to trust Lane's judgement in such matters.

We certainly were not the only visitors that day either.

We promised ourselves we would return here again in the spring or summer to see everything when it is in full bloom.  But it still was pretty.  This was a beautiful walkway through rows of crepe myrtle.

And there was still some nice color to be seen.

A hard working, dedicated Travel Nurse with her highly trained House-Boy enjoying their first visit to the Dallas Arboretum.









More to follow...




"You can't explore it if you haven't ever been there."

Brian Hallman

Welcome to the Metroplex and The Village

Dallas is part of what they call the Metroplex. The three largest cities are Dallas, Fort Worth, and Arlington.   Research on Wikipedia shows that the Metroplex encompasses 13 counties and 64 cities/towns with more than 10,000 residents each.  The largest of these include Dallas, Fort Worth, Arlington, Plano, Irving, and Garland.  It is the largest land-locked metropolitan area in the US.  By population it is the largest metropolitan area in Texas, the largest in the South, and the fourth largest in the US.  By land area it is larger then the states of Rhode Island and Connecticut combined.                                                                                                                              

Downtown Dallas

Getting around here was a little daunting and confusing at first.  Lane and I live in Franklin, which is a really small but beautiful town in the mountains of Western North Carolina.  Years ago we lived in Raleigh and hated the traffic there.  This place makes Raleigh seem like a quaint little village by comparison.  The area of town in which we live is great though.  Loads of places to eat and shop nearby, and it is very walk-able too.  We are not far from Southern Methodist University (SMU), and there are many college kids living in the various apartment complexes within The Village.

As I mentioned earlier, one of the many HouseBoy daily duties is looking after our two darling dogs Daisy and Piper, commonly called "The girls."

Piper relaxing in her Mom's lap.

Daisy relaxing and catching some sun on our little patio.

Trees everywhere in The Village.

In addition to the obligatory potty break walks multiple times a day, I try to take them out once a day for a nice long exercise walk.  As I mentioned, our apartment here in The Hill is part of the larger complex called The Village.  There are tree lined sidewalks everywhere, and several small lakes in the center of The Village with beautiful walking/jogging paths all around the lakes.  The girls and I have several routes we take that keep us out around an hour and a half each day and cover around four miles.  They have adjusted much better that we thought they would and have become very comfortable being around all the people.  Daisy is still having a really hard time learning to accept squirrels though.  She actually seems to outright hate them.


The scenery for our walks is quite beautiful, as you can see.
The girls absolutely love their daily outings.

A fountain in one of The Village lakes.

Keeping a wary eye on some ducks.

Piper checking out the route ahead.

A HouseBoy hard at work.

A HouseBoy has to work in the snow too.

The snow covered street we use to enter our parking lot.

Of course we arrived here in the dead of winter so the grass and trees were not always so beautiful and green.  We had some cold days and some snow days.  But nothing compared to what Lane and I have seen in our years in North Carolina.

When we first arrived we immediately needed to hit the grocery store... but where.  We were unfamiliar with the area so I Goggled for nearby grocery stores.  This place called "Tom Thumb" came up.  We had never heard of it before and based on the name I figured it was something like a convenience store, but we needed bread and milk and the usual suspects so I decided what the heck.  Boy was I wrong.  It is a huge chain of large, upscale grocery stores similar to Bi-Lo and Kroger for those of you in North Carolina.  It has become our go-to place for groceries.  I even got us a Tom Thumb rewards card.  Woo Wooo.  Just like we are real Texans.

More on our big adventure to follow soon.




"You can't explore it if you haven't ever been there."

Brian Hallman