2017 Challenges

This season, we are only going to two away games, so I was really looking forward to our trip to Baltimore.  The day of our departure arrived with fog and overcast.  As Thurston started loading the RV, the rain started.  When he pulled up in front of the Coach's Sand Crane Sanctuary, the skies opened further.  That was Tuesday.  We drove through the rain for Tuesday night, all day Wednesday, and part of Thursday.  The weather made it a dark, dreary, treacherous and exhausting drive, and really wore Thurston out.  He bravely did all the driving, keeping us safe on the road.

The RV and towed Jeep weren't going to make it any easier for Thurston.  First, the emergency brake was accidentally left on in the Jeep.  That caused the RV to react sluggishly - ya think? - but, in a scary incident, left the RV unable to climb a hill, and, wheels spinning, perilously start sliding back down.  Coach jumped, that is slowly and carefully climbed out, went back to the Jeep, and fixed the brake problem.  All set.  Here we go.  Uhhh - now what?

Once Coach was out of the rain and back in the nice warm RV, Thurston started driving.  But when he checked the rear camera while making the second turn, he didn't see anything.  That was a problem, because he should have seen the running lights and  turn signal of the Jeep.  The Jeep was there at least, but dark.  Circling back to the Crane Sanctuary, the Coach again ventured into the rain to check the power connection to the Jeep and test the lights.  Thurston, we have a problem.  Thurston came back and tried another cable, but nothing doing, we had no lights.  So, we decided to turn on the running lights, draining the Jeep battery, so at least it would not be unlit in the dark rainy night on the road.  Both wet from the rain, we returned to the RV and were finally on our way at about 7PM.  Driving through the rain for the next two days ...

So here we are outside of Baltimore on Friday morning.  It's still overcast.  I'm hoping we see the sun soon.

Having gotten in to the campground kinda early in the afternoon Thursday, we set up quickly, and even got the satellite working so we could watch Thursday Night Football, Eagles vs Panthers.  Thurston found an interesting Jamaiican restaurant, Unforgettable Flavors, and we ventured out.  The restaurant is hidden in an apartment complex, in the basement level of one of the buildings, next to a small convenience store.  Definitely a mom and pop operation, it had 5 tables and one of the friendliest staffs you can imagine.  We decided to order different combination dinners so we could try as many dishes as possible.  All were really, really good.  As island music played, we feasted on beef and chicken patties baked into tender crusts, braised oxtails, brown chicken stew, rasta pasta with chicken and shrimp, fried plantains, mac and cheese, spinach prepared like collard greens and curried cabbage.  The curried cabbage was amazing.  The oxtails were delicious.  The chicken was superb - everything was good.  We also got a pineapple juice and ginger drink that was refreshing and yummy.  They gave us samples of their chicken soup and beef soup which were both excellent.  I was so glad we found this place.  Great find, Thurston!

Tampa in the rear view mirror. Giants here we come.

We woke up this morning in a gray haze.  Unfortunately it turned out to be fog and not a bad dream that the Bears had played perhaps the worst game I have ever seen them play.  If you think about it, I don’t know that there were two passes all day that went where they absolutely should have.    When you add in the seemingly absolute lack of coverage of anyone that has a TE in the position title, it would seem that our Bears are on a swift slide to a good draft pick.  I am thinking QB? 

There were a few bright spots.  1. The weather was really nice for the game.  2. Because it was Eastern time and after Daylight savings time the sun had gone far enough so our seats were in the shadow of the upper stands.  So there was no bright sun or glare.  3. We can be absolutely certain that Jay is not going to work his way back to being QB for the Bears next year.

The Tampa stadium is a nice stadium.  Not the finest by any means, but it is easy to get to, there is plenty of close up parking available and the signage is great.  The club in the stadium is nice.  It has lots of seating, visiting cheerleaders, live bands for entertainment, free water dispensers with lemon and ice, and reasonable prices.   The food selections were fairly standard, but the pricing was great.  A soda was $4 or $6 with unlimited refills in a souvenir cup.   A burger with fries, and outstanding topping bar with everything from bacon, cheese, grilled onions and mushrooms to the standards of lettuce, tomato,  onion and pretty much anything else you might want on a burger.  The price - $10.  I think that is about ½ what they would charge at Soldier Field.

The biggest difference you notice from Soldier Field is how far away you are from the action.  Where at Soldier Field every tier is built on top of the lower tier.  In Tampa it just keeps going back and each level is behind the one before in on smooth set of tiers.  So big plus for SF.  Much better design.

We have left the wonderful Tampa Bay area and headed up to Colonial Williamsburg on the way to the Giants game.  You know how they say humility is good for the soul.  Well being a Bears fan in an away stadium is an exercise in extreme humility this year. 

After a couple of days enjoying the past we will dash up to the Liberty Harbor campground.  Now calling this a campground is being very, very generous.  It consists of a parking lot with electric posts.  Oh and lines on the ground so you know where to park.  But it does have the advantage of being just across the bridge from New York City, not far from the airports and fairly close to the stadium.  So that is where I stay when I visit New York in an RV.

I am of somewhat mixed feelings when it comes to the game.  I want the Bears to play well, but given that they have no shot at the playoffs, I don’t want them to blow their draft pick.  So maybe just a close game that they manage to lose at the last minute.  That might be best.

So far the journey has been truly epic.  I have been able to cross and recross the country east to west and north to south.  I have seen many places and enjoyed not just the locations I arrive at, but the journey to get there.  So let me close this by saying no matter what we Follow the Bears

GO BEARS.  – hey and wasn’t it great that at least the Packers and Vikings lost too.  Can we be looking at Detroit finally winning the division?

Back in the Saddle - Tampa Bay Eve

So we are back in the saddle again.   After a disastrous couple of games in Texas with an even worse game at home sandwiched between the coach and I were about ready to throw in the towel.  But an ok game against the lions followed by a reasonable game in Indianapolis and a win back at home against the Vikings have rejuvenated our adventuring spirit and given hope that perhaps our Bears will play well enough to be worth watching again.   So after a long bye week  spent trying to find some magic at either Disney World or Universal’s Harry Potter place we find ourselves in Tampa Florida awaiting yet another of our road games.

Tampa will make the 20^th stadium that we have visited (21 if you include Soldier Field) and after next week at the Giants we will have seen the Bears play 21 of the 31 opponents.   Actually if you include seeing them in London I will be able to claim seeing them play opponents in 23 stadiums.

We went out tonight in search of the Tampa signature dish, which depending on who you talk to is either the Cuban sandwich, just about any seafood dish, or smoked mullet.  We settled for just about every seafood dish.  Tomorrow I hope to get the smoked mullet.   We went to a Peruvian seafood restaurant and I think everyone had a good time.   After the meal we did our traditional pre-game trip to the stadium to get the lay of the land.

For this trip we have along with the Coach, my brother and a couple of nephews as well as some friends.  Tomorrow we will represent the true and loyal Bears fans and shout as loudly as possible.  Tomorrow we shall have victory!!!  Well to be honest I would settle for a really good game. 

A couple of side notes. 

1.  For those of you who are Harry Potter fans and have not had the opportunity to visit Universal’s Diagon Alley you are missing a fantastic experience.   I was far less enchanted with Hogsmead at Island of Adventure, but Diagon Alley is an experience not to be missed.

2. Epcot holds an annual International Food and Wine festival.   If you love long lines, fairly pretentious people and long lines, I strongly recommend you attend.  If on the other hand these do not have the appeal to you that apparently they did to the people attending the festival, stay away!!

3. If you ever get the chance to camp next door to a Lion Safari park I strongly recommend you take it.  There is something surreal about sitting at your camp and listening to a Lion roar.  It was quite the experience and I am glad the Coach and I were able to do so while on our sojourn to Tampa.

Not to turn this to politics - never gonna happen, but I did happen to see an incredibly funny post today.  

BREAKING NEWS:  Chicago Cubs are being forced to give up their World Series Title.

Cleveland Indians fans have rioted across the country in protest of the 2016 World Series.  Despite knowing the rules of the game prior to playing, they were unhappy they lost and demanded the outcome to be changed.  They could be heard chanting #NotOurWorldSeriesChampion all across America.

Even though the Cubs won 4 games and the Indians only won 3,  since both teams scored 27 total runs throughout all 7 games, they are being declared co-world champions.

When questioned, Commissioner Manfred stated, “We felt as though it was the right thing to do for the nation.  What kind of example would Major League Baseball be setting if we expected the adults who play this game, and their fans, to Gracefully accept defeat?  Instead of creating a bigger divide between the Cubs and the Indians, MLB is confident that the Cubs will gladly share their victory with the Indians”.

I hope you got as big a laugh out of that as I did.

Tomorrow is game.  The Bears are favored by most of the analysts so we have to cross our fingers and hope they have not been given the kiss of death.  Most of the team is back healthy(ish) and with luck we will see some calculated and precise passing from Jay and some outstanding defense.  I will report in tomorrow night with our impressions of the stadium and any interesting tidbits that turn up.

In the meantime – GO BEARS!!

GAME DAY Houston

I am going to write this as it happened.

Worry - what would the team do
HAPPY - they actually look like a football team
Second Half - why is it Bears coaches seem to give demotivation speeches at half time
Disappointment - they started out so good and raised my hopes only to have them dashed yet again.

We got to NRG park early.  This was in part because it was recommended that we get there early in order to get a parking space and in part due to the fact that there was no traffic and we were in our spot less than 30 minutes after we got into the car.  There were some outstanding tailgate setups there.  One group came in 5 large pickup trucks and set up by backing in to park in every other spot.  They then erected 5 popup shelters that covered the entire area in back of the trucks.  Music, smokers, bbq grills and great smells then emanated from the area for the next several hours.  They were not the most elaborate setup there by far.  But with the exception of the tailgaters we didn't see any other cars showing up for a couple of hours.  By 10:30 most of the lot we were in was still empty. 

We went into the Verizon club.  It is one of three different clubs they have at the stadium.  The club was nice, but nothing outstanding.  Good access, comfortable seats, open spaces and plenty of TVs and bars.  There was never much of a line anywhere.  Food choices were the stadium standards and also 4 specialty stands.  One was BBQ, one was tacos, one was make your own salads and the last one had Korean sloppy joes and some kind of a tater tot casserole.  The food was good.  Views from the seats were very good and they had a lot of leg room .  They provide beverage and food service by ordering from the app on your phone so there was much less getting up and letting people out than at most stadiums.   The scoreboards and video screens are large and easily seen from anywhere in the stadium.   And it was LOUD.  Even when the warmups were going on and the seats were less than 1/3 filled they were able to be extremely loud.  My one complaint was the bathrooms.  They only had two for the club and they were inadequate to handle the number of people there. 

The fans were mostly very nice as were the staff.  Everyone welcomed us to the stadium and there were only one or two people that were taunting or rude to the visiting fans.  Many people went out of their way to comment on how they thought it was a good game and how the Bears played well.  And they were not being sarcastic, just being nice.

Getting out of the stadium was incredibly easy and we were back at the RV in about 45 minutes.  The RV is about 25 miles from the stadium. 

I am not going to recap the game.  It would just be too painful.  But at least they stayed competitive into the fourth quarter.

Observations:
Stadium signage superb
Stadium staff incredibly friendly and helpful
Tailgate in full swing 4 hours before game time and quite elaborate
Cheerleaders - energetic
Chicago fans - present, but not abundent
Someone needs to teach White the plays - he looks totally lost out there





On to Dallas to position for the Cowboys game and then back to Chicago for the Eagles.

2016 - The journey continues HOUSTON

Well it is time for a new season and hope is blooming in our hearts.  We can assume the preseason was a fluke and we can count on all the new players to make a huge difference.  All of this is why in many ways this is the best part of the season.  We open our trip in Houston and then a quick trip back to Chicago to watch the Monday night game against the Eagles and then back to Texas to check out the Cowboys digs.


On the way down to Houston the trip was fairly uneventful.  Which is really how you want a road trip to be.  Almost invariably events = problems.   Fortunately we were able to arrive down in Houston with almost no problems other than my typical Texas problem of not ever being able to find the place I am looking for on the first attempt.  This has been an ongoing source of unhappiness with me for years.  And Houston did not disappoint.   We started by having the wrong address for the RV park.  Only a little wrong, but apparently 2800 on Sam Houston Parkway E and 2800 S Sam Houston Parkway E are some 25 miles apart.  So we got to the first location and then got to drive around all of Houston to arrive at the correct address.  There we  almost were run over by a dump truck who would not let us into his lane to make the right turn into the RV park so it was go around once more to the next exit and then back on the parkway in the other direction and try again to get off.  This time we were successful by coming to almost a stop in the road until someone was willing to let us in to make the right turn.  But all was good as we were guided to our spot and directed where to stop in the very long site they provided.  Where to stop was at the front of the site.  Where the hookups for water/sewer and electric was at the back of the site.  So it was go unhitch the car and back up so our hoses would reach.  That was when the monsoon decided to roll in.  For about 5 minutes, while we were going out to disconnect the car, it rained so hard you could not see your hand in front of your face.  But what the heck it stopped soon and returned to the high 90s and 80% humidity.  People pay a lot of money to sit in a hot sauna and we were being provided one by nature for free.

We eventually got all set up and everything was good so don't anyone worry.  We will be continuing to provide our observations on the NFL cities and the games as we travel around the country.

Houston does not have a signature dish.  One local paper tried to start a campaign to vote for one, but apparently there was not enough interest in the city to generate even meaningless results.  So we were forced to improvise.  We decided it was either BBQ as with most of Texas or some kind of Tex-? dish.  So we tried what was supposed to be the best BBQ in town at Killens and we went to BBs Diner, a Houston tradition for some huge number of years, for Tex-Cajun as that seemed to be a thing here.

Killens had a line outside that stretched down the sidewalk and around the corner.  Fortunately it moved very quickly and within 20 minutes we were inside being asked what kind of meat we want.  We decided that we needed to try most of them in order to judge the food fairly.  I will start by saying Killens is some of the best BBQ I have had.  Having said that here is our judging on the food:

Beef Brisket - A, Beef Ribs - A+, Pork Ribs (unusual in Texas) A, Smoked turkey A-, Pulled pork B, Bone in Pork Belly B-, Burnt Ends B-.  The sides were about as good:  Baked Beans B, Pinto Beans B, Mac and Cheese B and Creamed Corn an A++.  Unfortunately all this food was really good because when we got to desert we were only able to eat a bit of the A+++++ Bread Pudding.  All in all it was well worth the wait and the service was at least as good as the food.

BBs was not as disreputable as its reputation led me to believe.  The food was good, but not great.  Now to be totally honest we tried one of the suburban locations not their original location downtown.  Their house dish was something called Tex-Cajun Virgin.  It is shoestring fries topped with queso, gravy and roast beef debris.  While it was a heart attack on a plate, you would at least have a big smile on your face when you died.  The Po-Boys were not quite as good.  The bread was as good as anything I have had in New Orleans, but the sauce, shrimp and debris were not quite right.  The shrimp and grits were not bad, but again I have had better.  The grilled oysters were not a hit.  We had been hoping for a repeat of our first experience with them at Crawfish and Noodles (but I am getting ahead of myself).   For a diner in Houston it was darn good though.

Our first night in Houston we tried a very highly rated restaurant called Crawfish and Noodles.  It was a Korean-Cajun fusion seafood place.   Given that billing it was either going to be really good or really really bad.    Fortunately we got luck and it was really good.   We had grilled oysters, crawfish, Korean quail, some noodle dish and stir fried blue crab.  The oysters were very good.  The Coach needed to be shown how to properly eat a crawfish and the expression on her face as she sucked the head and got a mouthful of innards and juice was priceless.  But they were good and she was willing to try another.  The quail was outstanding and the noodles, while mild, provided a great counterpoint to some of the splicer dishes.  The crab as also very good.  I would strongly recommend you check this place out if you are ever in Houston.  

During the day we explored some of the sights in Houston.  We spent a full day at the space center and it was a great experience.  We saw the original control center where they ran the flights up through the Apollo missions.  It is amazing what they were able to accomplish without the computing power we have in a phone.  We also saw some great movies and presentations as well as a talk by a four time shuttle mission commander, Brian Duffy.  We also got to see the Orion capsule and the plans for the mission to Mars.  I hope I get to see it, it looks totally amazing.  

The next day was a mishmash of the unusual sites in Houston.  We saw a storage lot filled with huge heads of the presidents (15 feet tall and taller).  We drove by an art display run by a pipe company with some really unusual sculptures.  We saw a 15' tall silver armadillo with glowing red eyes, and mirrors on its back.  And some modern junk art work called tranquility park.  We also drove by the stadium to check it out and make sure we knew where we were going on game day.  
 

Tomorrow is game day and the day after we head for Dallas to get in place for the game in two weeks.  

I would like to close with a list of three observations about Houston.

1.  It is HOT - like really really hot
2.  It is humid - like in a sauna humid
3.  They have periodic monsoon periods - with no warning and often while the sun is still shinning
4.  Their highway signage sucks

Yes I know there are four items on my list of 3.  Everyone knows that things are bigger in Texas.

Chargers Game Day - and a bit about the days after

It is Game Day and we made our way to the stadium for Monday Night Football – at 1:30 in the afternoon.  Watching football on the west coast is weird.  MNF starts at 5:30.   So with an hour or more drive to the stadium and wanting to get there early as usual we are leaving our RV at 1:30.   By the time we get to the stadium it is about 2:30 and the parking lots are starting to get a few cars.  They don’t really start to fill up until about 4:00 tonight.   Getting into the parking lot is easy.  Just follow all the other cars off the highway and into the lot.   Unfortunately we are apparently at the wrong gate.  We find this out after the person at the lot takes the part of the parking pass they are supposed to take off and scans the pass.   They tell us you can’t get there from here – you must go out of the parking lot, around the stadium and enter on the other side.   We ask how do you do that?.  There is no road that seems to go around to there.  They say “I don’t know”.  I ask how will I get back into the lot, you have taken off the part of the pass and scanned it.  They say “I don’t know”.   I say so what should I do now.  They say – well you get the picture.   Finally someone comes over and says “oh no, all you need to do is go down to the end of the row there and use the inner ring road to get to the other side of the stadium”.  So off we head down to the end of the row and there we meet another person who says “oh no, the gate to the inner ring road is locked. You can’t get there from here you need to go back to the gate and around the stadium”.   We explain as before and ask the questions as before and he says – “I don’t know”.   We thank him and decide to seek our own path.  We drive in the direction where the letters are going down.  We are looking for lot A1 and are currently in G4.  So left and in are the directions we head.  Finally we find someone who says – “Oh, the only way open into the inner ring road is down by gate K”.  At that moment the other attendant opens up the gate to the inner ring road to let someone out and into the lot we are in.  Waving our parking pass frantically we go to the gate and she lets us out.  Finally we are able to drive around and get to the location for A1 where the attendant says that we are one of the few cars that have come in to this area and she can’t understand why because usually there are a lot more.  We do not bother to enlighten her.

From lot A1 it is a quick escalator ride up to the club level and after looking around the club for a bit we head for the little bar they have there.  We get a drink (we needed one by now) and order an appetizer.  Their new carne asada natchos.   The waitress takes our order and then comes back with another server about 10 minutes later to ask where we saw carne asada natchos because they are not on their menu.  We point to the large sign on the wall announcing their new for 2015 menu items and the top one which is the natchos.  They say oh, I didn’t notice that before (this is the middle of the season and signs are everywhere around the lounge).   Without hopes for a positive outcome we await our natchos.  Needless to say they fulfilled our expectations. 

We then headed for our seats because as far as a club goes there is absolutely nothing to recommend this one.  There are no special foods or drinks, no where to sit, no special give aways or programs or anything.   They do have wait service at your seats.  But unlike several of the other parks which offer this by way of the team app.  They offer it by flagging down one of the servers who steps over and on people to get to your seat and take your order and payment and then steps over and on people to get back to the aisle and when your order arrives they step over and on….. well you get the idea.   Apparently they don’t, but you probably do.

The “Jumbotron” is mostly advertising for their various sponsors with a small video space in the center to show replays.  I am fairly certain my TV at home is larger.  Certainly relative to the distance you are from the screen it is.  Now the advertisements were interesting.  You could see them very well because they were larger than the screen.   For example the charger gals want to thank California spray tan studio and the Beaches wax studio for their support.    Lets just leave this topic and head to the game itself.

As you all already know somehow the Bears won.  The crowd was about 20% Bears fans and with about 15% empty seats that became a significant percentage of the crowd.  On our side of the field it was probably 30% Bears fans.  That is huge considering how far away San Diego is and that it was a Monday night game. 

Leaving the stadium was easy.  You sat in the parking lot next to your car for about and hour and a half after the game until a large part of the lot emptied and then got in the line to wait your turn to exit.  Or you got in the line right away and waited over an hour to get out of the lot.  Your choice.  We chose the former.  Being in one of the inner lots we had to wait until all the outer lots emptied before we could have a shot at getting out of the parking area.

All in all I understand why the chargers want a new stadium.  The one they have is a dump.  At the moment it ranks as the second worst stadium we have been to.

We left San Diego Tuesday heading for Dallas to see some friends.   We stopped at Phoenix “on the way” to see some of the Coaches relative’s.   More about Dallas and the rest of the journey in a future post.  But before I leave you I want to relay some of the fun we had getting to Dallas.

ON THE ROAD

California Highway 78 is an interesting road.  It runs next to, and sometimes under, the California Dunes Recreation Area.   The under is part of the fun.  Here you are barreling down the highway and suddenly half the road is buried in a couple of feet of sand.  There are no fences or barriers to try and stop the sand and the highway isn’t raised above the ground level to keep the sand from flowing freely over it.  Nope it sits level with the ground next to it and becomes one with the dunes environment.  

After a while you leave the dunes area and enter a land of brown hills, brown desert and the typical brown sage brush farm.   These areas are interspersed with occasional bright green areas where someone has decided this is a great place to grow “insert plant here” and has irrigated the fields and grown a crop.   Parts of this road go around the hills and parts seem to enjoy becoming one with the hills and remnants of the dunes.  So it does things like do a straight up climb to the top of a tall hill followed by the crest and a swoop down the backside of the hill.  Followed immediately by a climb up the next hill.  The drops and climbs were so close together that you saw places where trucks had scraped the pavement because they were longer than the space at the bottom between the two hills.  Now anyone who is a fan of rollercoasters would have thought this was great, but even they would have been a little concerned when you get to the top of some of the hills and the road abruptly makes a sharp left or right turn and there is no longer a road in front of you.   After a couple of miles of these rollercoaster like hills we see a sign that says “Dips Ahead”.  I am not kidding you.   It turns out these new dips neither climbed so high nor dropped so far, but instead were like huge overgrown speed bumps placed 20 feet apart. 

And so it goes on California Highway 78.

If you will indulge me for a moment I need to engage in a little rant about driving in Texas.   This is different from the story/rant about driving on California Highway 78.   This is just some observations and you need to keep in mind the thought that runs in my head throughout this is “Who Does That?”.  Now the other thing you need to keep  in mind is that the speed limit on most Texas Highways is 70 mph.

Lets start with what had to be a fascinating budget meeting one day.   I imagine if you were a fly on the wall the conversation went something like this:

Sir, we have a problem with some of Highway 10.

Well what is it?

Sir, the road has buckled in some places and there are potholes and when that happened apparently the low bidder we used didn’t secure the road well and it kinda twists up and down a bit.

Well how much is it going to cost to fix?

Sir, it will be about $ome large number of thousands of dollars.

Well, we don’t want to spend that – what else can we do.

Sir, we could put up a sign telling people there is a rough road ahead.

Well, how much will that cost.

Sir, only a couple of thousand.

Well, lets do that then.

So end result, you are speeding along this highway at 70 and see a sign that says rough road and all of a sudden the road drops out from under you, twists and bucks like a bronco and then is straight and smooth once again.

WHO DOES THAT?

Next we have the guardrail.  Now we have all seen guardrails up on tight turns.  They are there to guide you and provide protection in case you miss the turn so you don’t shoot off the road into never never land or a corn field, or mesquite tree or whatever.   Sometimes these guardrails get damaged when someone hits them.  In Texas they apparently don’t fix them, cause someone might just hit it again and it would just get damaged.  So what do they do?   They put up a sign which says – wait for it – Guard Rail Damaged Ahead.   Like that is going to help stop a car which is plunging off the road.   “Oh look Marvin, the guardrail is damaged up ahead.   Maybe You shouldn’t hit it.”

WHO DOES THAT?

Next you have the signs over the road that point out which lane goes to which highway when they split.  In Texas they put the arrow on the line between the lanes.   Not in the center of the lane.   So you kinda get to guess, do they mean the left lane or the one next to it goes to that highway.  This leads to lots of last minute jockeying for lanes at 70mph. so people don’t miss their turns or don’t turn off on some road they don’t want.

WHO DOES THAT?

Last we have perhaps my favorite Texas road sign of all.  Various lanes closed ahead.   What kind of a sign is that?  What good does it do?  How does it help the driver speeding along at 70 do anything to avoid the closed lanes, help move traffic along or avoid an accident?   Why even have the sign.

WHO DOES THAT?

Last we have a feature of the drivers here in Texas.  Apparently they have mistaken a turn signal for a yellow light.  It means Drive Real Fast.   If you want to change lanes and you put on your turn signal everyone in the lane you want to turn into speeds up so you absolutely can’t get in front of them.   So in Texas the way you change lanes is you quickly turn on the turn signal as you turn the steering wheel and dart in front of someone into the next lane.

WHO DOES THAT?

I leave you as always - Go Bears.   On to the Rams.

Chargers Game Day - Tomorrow

Today is supposed to be football day.  It is Sunday, the holy day of sitting and watching the ultimate in sporting events.  A day dedicated to the body of the holy chicken wing done in the style of Buffalo and the blood of the hop done into a great beer.  From Noon on into the night we are treated to game after game and the chance to root for our beloved Bears.  But no, we play on Monday and so while we were privileged to see Green Bay fall in defeat, we had to watch it starting at 10:00 in the morning.  Something about the whole process seemed wrong.

But we were able to at least go in the afternoon in search of the fish taco.  By general agreement all the best fish tacos were to be had in food trucks.  So after noting the locations of a few of the highest rated and most recommended we set out.   The first spot we found was Mariscos el Prieto.  This is the the height of the food truck concept.  They have a person in the parking lot directing traffic and helping people in and out of spots.  They have a large table set up outside the food truck under a tent to give customers a spot to stand and eat.  They have made a deal with the cell phone shop they set up in front of to allow patrons to use the bathroom in the store.  The have a cauldron of seafood consume set up boiling away to give customers something to eat while they are waiting for their order.  And wait they do.  On a Sunday at 3:00 there was a line of people waiting to order and it took a good 10-15 minutes after you placed your order before you hear your name called out.  So was it worth the wait?  The shrimp cocktail that the Coach ordered came out first.  They have four sizes and she selected the chico.  A good thing because it came served in a 16 oz clear plastic cup and was filled with 1/3 of a pound of shrimp.  Not bad for $6.   And it tasted great.   Basically shrimp in a thin salsa.   Next came the tacos.  Between us we had three, marlin, "fish" and shrimp a la diabla.  The marlin was the best of the three.  Tasty chunks of marlin in a slightly spicy sauce with peppers.  The "fish" was the next best.  Interestingly they make their fish tacos here out with breaded fish.  The taco was quite good with slaw and a crema sauce.  Limes, pickled onions and radishes are available to be added to any of the tacos as are three kinds of sauces and salsas in bottles on the table.  The shrimp a la diabla had great shrimp, but the sauce was a bit salty and not all that spicy.   But it was still a good taco.  

Next we headed for another food truck Mariscos El Pescador.  This truck was also set up quite nicely if not up to the standard of the previous one.  They had a much larger selection of offerings however and the advantage of speaking at least some English.    They had a tv set up under their tent to show the football games.  Unfortunately their tacos were not up to the standard set by el Prieto.  The fish taco was good, but not outstanding and the octopus taco was good but nothing spectacular.  Service here was slower if possible then el Preto.  Their sauces were also a bit off and very very salty.

We did not try the other two places on our list out of the fear that we might be silly enough to order something and eat it and explode. 

So in summary - fish tacos were good.  I still prefer grilled fish tacos to breaded fish tacos, but an interesting and tasty signature dish in all events.

We then went to Qualcomm stadium.  Unfortunately they don't let you near the stadium.  All the entry gates are closed off to the lots and access roads and so we can only give you the impression that it is right off the highway.  How that will translate into ease of access and exit only tomorrow will tell.

So at this point I leave you saying - GO Bears - Green Bay Sucks!!