My brother and his wife (retirees living in Mexico and prone to wander the earth on a moment's notice) had come in the night before and we had gone out to eat dinner at one of our favorite vegetarian Indian restaurants (Udipi), then had come home and chatted for a while. The next morning, we went to breakfast at a local(?) chain called Bagelstein's, where I wolfed down a eggs with site-made corned-beef hash, along with lots of other accompaniments. My brother went for the lox and bagels, with onions and capers and cream cheese. The women-folk ordered less extreme stuff. After we went back to our house, my brother and his spouse quickly pulled their stuff together to leave, planning to stop by a bank on the way out of town to wire money to pay for a 1995 Mercedes convertible he had just bought in an online auction. This is about his third online car purchase and, based on his experiences, I'm interested in having him look for good deals for me. The car he bought has very, very low miles and is in terrific shape.
Back to the matter at hand. Our restaurant favorites tend to be simple, unpretentious, very basic places. It wasn't the stress of "looking the part" in a fine-dining establishment that gave my wife pause about going to work. It was most certainly something else. She was just ready to play hooky. And, it seems, so was I. So, we quickly decided to call the office, inform them that we would not be in until late in the afternoon, if at all, and jumped in the car with the objective of driving to Wichita Falls, about 140 miles northwest of us, to see their new butterfy convervatory. So, off we went, exhilarated at the fact that we were spontaneously taking Friday off from work. Just shy of 2:00 pm, we decided we should eat so we drifted about and found a little Mexican restaurant (El Paisa), where we had a nice lunch of salsas, chips, chile relleno, enchildas, and such (between the two of us). After lunch, we wandered about downtown and were enchanted by the following sign, advertising adoptions of wild horses and burros (click on the photo to see it full size to be able to read the sign):
We opted not to adopt a wild horse or burro. Instead, we drove off in search of butterflies. It didn't take long to find Riverbend Nature Center in Lucy Park, the site of the new Ruby N. Priddy Butterfly Conservatory. The building is essentially a huge metal frame with glass walls. Unfortunately for the conservatory, the staff was less-than-enthusiastic and fundamentally unhelpful. The one visible staff member noticed us walk in and, with no sense of urgency, put down her watering bucket, shuffled over to us, and told us we needed to pay $5 each to enter. She then walked away, leaving us to our own devices. We wandered around, reading signs describing the geography and biology of the area and saw quite a few butterflies. It wasn't overwhelming, but interesting. All in all, I'd say $5 per person was about $4 per person more than the experience was worth, but I'm glad we did it anyway. Here are a few photos of butterflies I was able to capture while we were there:
2 comments:
Nice lepidopteric photos! I was watching a nature show the other day with my mother about black bears in Montana, and saw a segment on azure butterflies landing where bears had peed; they stick their proboscuses down into the soil and retrieve minerals from the drying bear urine. Ah, Nature!
Nice photos of the butterflies. Sounds like a perfect way to spend a day playing hooky!
Post a Comment