Blogs from Beaumont, Texas, United States, North America - page 5

The second part of my weekend was spent traversing the little ranch roads north of Beaumont, TX. There are limited forest areas in Texas and they are mostly concentrated in east Texas. These are called the “Piney Woods.” Since I am desperately missing my Redwoods, Sequoias, and Ponderosa Pines, I figured this little side trip would be good for my mental health. I needed to experience the forest (if only on a small scale) to get me though the next 10 months before I will be in Yellowstone National Park again. The first area we came upon is called the Big Thicket National Preserve. We drove through a small area of the preserve and parked at the trailhead for the Kirby nature trail. I headed off into the woods and something struck me immediately: I could ... read more

Actually, it's not a hurricane. It's a mid-level tropical storm. It sprang up rather quickly and right on our coasts! That surprised and worries all of us here on the coast of Texas and Louisiana. Last summer, our (my) area was surprised with Humberto that did not do what the forecasters expected when everyone here went to bed and sleep. Well, Humberto had his own agenda, changed route straight for our area and slammed into us. I had gone to bed as well, only my little bed at the time was in the Yucatan. I had just gone through Huracan Dean (Spanish spelling) who thankfully missed the upper Yucatan but scared the devil out of me. Now I'm in my little casa in southeast Texas. I don't like storms. Currently the storm is hugging the Louisiana ... read more

I got in too big of a hurry and forgot that Maurine had taken pictures on her cell when we were at Paul's. Keep in mind that these are the dead soldiers on the platter after the fact! Her pictures of Mr. Paul were better than the ones that I took. ... read more

Hello and I've missed everyone. I do get your messages sent through this blog, so keep sending them and I will continue to respond. As you know, I came back to the states and took a very long vacation. It was not quite as much fun to be work-idle in southeast Texas as it was in the Yucatan, but I still enjoyed every minute of it! I have been back in the work environment now for two months and love my job. I'm in the Sabine Pass, Texas area and the view is not quite Merida or Progreso, but what the heck! I'm on a small but intense project working in governmental wetlands and literally officing in them too! We have had no indoor plumbing to date, but expect to very soon. Wildlife abounds and we ... read more

Hello, All ! I haven't forgotten y'all, but have been busy. I'm writing more recipe related articles and have/will be adding them to a website of Associated Content rather than here. The reason being that I doubt all of you will want my old fashioned recipes and the memories surrounding them. If you care to see those articles, they are at http://www.associatedcontent.com/user/96569/patt_barrington.html At least I think that's the correct site to find them. In a little bit I will catch you up on my 'doings' around southeast Texas. We did have our Mardi Gras flavored Birthday Babies' Bash at Alibi's last week. We all had a good time. I will post pictures soon of that. Johnny took some incriminating pics of a particular (funny, but totally innocent) portion of our night. Beads and masks were on ... read more