There is Something About Texas............

There is something about Texas that I love! I feel it whenever I cross the state line. It's big, it's friendly! Everybody waves! I learned last time we were here that years ago the state had a campgain to be friendly and they had bumper stickers that said wave at your neighbour or something similar and the practice continues.
On leaving New Boston we were riding on McCoy Blvd.......so I'm guessing since Hatfield was back in Arkansas the McCoys moved to Texas. Maybe.
I have to comment on the number of graveyards and churches there are in the last 3 states we have been riding through. They are so numerous, mainly Baptist, Methodist and Pentecostal, not too many catholic. Quite a few of the churches have cemeteries attached, which is quite commen in older communities and in Britian/Europe. The cemeteries are full of beautiful upright headstones of all shapes and sizes and flowers are abundant, though most are plastic.  There seems to be lots of available land for this practice. I guess it strikes me as soothing, much more meaningful to visit a burial location than a plaque on a wall.  We past through several towns today where the population of one I noted was 229 and the town cemetery looked like it had around 600 headstones. Enough of graveyards.....but it is interesting!
Of course this morning the coffee hunt was unsuccessful.....till we arrived in the town of Marshall. It is quite a good size town, so we drove around all the streets till we found one! Jeff doesn't like me to ask the locals if they have a specialty coffee shop as he doesn't want them to think we are hoity toity! He has a point they are pretty simple, no disrespect intended. We discovered  Central Perk, which was the name of the coffee shop Jennifer Aniston worked in, in Friends. The shop was huge and included a store that sold all kinds of treasures.....nothing I could fit on the bike. One of the downsides. Since it was almost lunch time when we discovered this place we also had food. The BEST tomato basil soup I have ever had.
After a relaxing stay at the Central Perk and a perusal of the map book we were on our way to Palestine.  The secondary highway we are on is lined with big trees on either side, there are properties  along the way, some small and not very prosperous some quite grand with big fancy gates with
interesting iron silhouettes of cowboys, horses and cattle, or simple wooden structures with the family name, or Hog Hollow ! This being Saturday we passed countless yard sales and the ever present Flea markets. Occasionally a small dirt road winding around the back of a ramshackle farm building flashes me back to the Camino, the heat of the day is the same; this time I'm glad I'm not walking.
We arrived in Palestine about 4pm and popped into the visitor bureau. The clerk was about to pack up for the day but loaded us up with a ton of booklets and was very friendly. She corrected my pronouncation of Palestine ......it is Pal-is-teen. We decamped at our hotel, did some laundry and caught up on emails. We were off to find the brew pub and music which we thought would be fun for Saturday night. We drove everywhere, it was like a ghost town! Getting hungry we spotted an Italian restaurant called Giovanni's .......parked the bike and four people coming out of the restaurant chatted to us....where you from etc. we asked if the food was good inside......they said ok but did not seem too enthused. Well, our server came and asked what we would like to drink. Us "do you have beer on tap?".......she "No" us "what do you have bottled?" She......"nothing" me "what kind of wine do you have?" She "none, you have to bring your own" we were flabbergasted ! We had water with lemon . Our server was one of the sweetest girls with a lovely soft voice. We wondered about her age and naïveté ! I said to Jeff we should ask her where the action is as we could hardly believe how quiet it was for a weekend night. Jeff asked her how long she had lived in Palestine .....she appeared to be counting and said 13 yrs.  As to the action, she said there is nothing really! We were to pay our ticket at the cash register on the way out. Here we tried again saying to  "Giovanni " we were surprised how quiet it was. He looked at us and said lots going on tonight! There was a football game at the high school and after that the town would be crazy busy.
We left, us old folks are going to bed!  It was hard work trying to have some fun.