Four Food Trucks! or CHI'LANTRO Restaurants Rule Austin!

First off, I am sorry for not writing last night about the four food trucks and my excuse is that I worked late, over at The Cabin and was just too tired when I got back home.

It is 7:00 in the evening and Tony and I just returned home, after spending several hours working over, at the property. We hung up the curtains I made, stained over 40 more 1'x4's, hung pictures up, then took them down and then re-hung the pictures until they were perfect.

Continued from Monday night...Four Food Trucks!

When Tony, Hope & Jae arrived, at the property, the first thing we did was give Hope & Jae a tour of our beautiful property and they instantly fell in love with our beautiful, 1977 Land Yacht (Airstream) too. And by the time we had shown them the "enchanted forest," area, then the super-cool, two-story, red barn, the three Madrone trees, which Chet told me are considered by Native Americans to be sacred spirit trees—we invited them to come into The Cabin.

When they first walked inside, The Cabin, their jaws dropped, to the floor and I thought it was because they were really impressed with our cabin makeover, but I was wrong.

Hope was smiling, but she had her hands covering her mouth and the look on Jae's face was like he had just seen a ghost or something. So I said, "What? What is it?" And then they broke out laughing and pointed to my barefoot, half-man mannequin, that was leaning up against the wall, near the front door. Then Tony and I started laughing, too.

Then we all got a cold beer and while we showed them, The Cabin, I explained about buying the mannequin, at the garage sale and why it was wearing a pair of my old, 501 Levis. And they thought it was hilarious instead of weird.

Well, I talked too much as usual, as we sat around catching up with Hope's latest news and our news, in the big room, and when I finally realized I was doing most of the talking, I paused, and then asked, "So Jae, what do you do, in Austin?"

"He owns five restaurants," Hope sweetly bragged on her super-nice boyfriend. "And he also has four food trucks. Jae's CHI'LANTRO restaurants/food trucks. It is Korean BBQ inspired and it fuses Korean & Mexican flavors and.... "

"Omg!" I said. "I love food trucks so much! And I've always wanted to have one. Especially after watching that great Jon Favreau movie, Chef. It is one of my all-time favorite movies...."

Then once again I realized I was talking non-stop, so I asked them to please tell us more about Jae's restaurants, because I definitely wanted to blog about it. And by the time they were finished telling us about Jae's restaurants all I could think of was us making a fast trip, up to Austin and going with Cindy, Ronnie & Nita, to go eat at one of Jae's five CHI'LANTRO restaurants or four food trucks.

Tone and I had a wonderful time visiting with Hope & Jae and before dark-thirty they adios-ed us, because they wanted to get back to the Trail's End Guest House, in Kerrville, where they were spending the night. "Because we love the Trail's End Guest House and that is where we always stay when we come to the Kerrville area," Hope said.

"We love the Trail's End Guest House, too," I said. "Many years ago, our good friends David & Desiree, who own the popular place, adopted one of our wild hogs from us. We named that sweet, wild hog David Beckham, because he chased soccer balls, but Desiree and David ended up re-naming him, Wilbur and they told us that Beckham/Wilbur was very popular with their guests. Unfortunately, Beckham died a few years ago...."

Tony and I came home after Hope & Jae left and the first thing I did after giving Roy a pill for his arthritis was Google CHI'LANTRO restaurants & food trucks and I was even more impressed after reading that they are the highest rated event caterers, in Austin. Anyway, I hope y'all will check out our friend's popular Austin restaurants & food trucks and get back to me, because we can't wait to eat Jae's food. And here is the business card that Jae gave to me before they left. And please note that I put his business card, in my back pocket, so it sort of got crinkled up a little bit.

Y'all have a great night and keep on laughing!

What A Funny Pig He Is!

Today has been great. This morning after I walked eight miles with Sansone, Tone came inside to tell me that he had a surprise for me and that I needed to come outside to see who was here, so I followed him to the dog pens. When I saw our great volunteer, Matt Bradbury in the pen feeding Hank and Nellybelle I said, "OMG, Matt! It is great to see you! And we have really missed you..."

I visited with Matt as he fed Dusty, then Moe Bandy, Randy Travis & Mandy, then I introduced him to Callie aka Rita Coolidge and he fell in love with her. After he fed her we stayed in her pen as he played with her. Then we went into Ruth Buzzi's and Chuck's pen so he could feed them and then I followed him into Rocky's and Lucy's pen so he could feed them. After he fed Annie Oakley and then Jill we crossed the road and went to the pen that Tone was cleaning and that's when I saw Meghann feeding Ashley Judd and Ludy!

"Hi, Meghann! Thank you for coming out! I didn't know that you were here! It is so great to see you..." I half-hollered. A few minutes later after all of the dogs had been fed and their pens had been cleaned we went into Outer Space and had a great visit and caught up with our friends / volunteers news. Before they left after handshakes and hugs T. and I thanked them for coming out we told them not to be strangers and they promised us that they wouldn't.

Late this afternoon I received the nicest e-mail from D&D from their B&B and it really made my day. David and Desiree Farrar are our good friends and kindred spirits who own and operate the coolest bed & breakfast in Texas— the Trail's End Guest House in Kerrville. And they are the wonderful people who adopted Beckham, our soccer playing wild hog. Here is what they wrote:

"Nancy,

Finished your book last night. It was a great peak into "a day in the life"; what every reality show should aspire to portray. I hated for it to end, hopefully the next one will be out sooner than later. We read a few sections to Wilber/Beckham and showed him all the pictures. Though excited for you and the Ranch, he was a tad miffed. When we inquired as to why, he told us there was not a single porcine image. Horses, cows, dogs, cats and even (shudder) humans. We explained to him it must have been due to a decision in the edit process. "Even Mercedes McCambridge, a fantastic Academy Award winning actress, had her part in Giant edited down from one hour to less than 15 minutes actual screen time." After two cans of diet orange pop and 4 homemade cookies he got over it. What a funny pig he is.

Our best to you and Tony,

D&D"

Desiree and David, thank y'all for the kind words about my book. We will see y'all Thursday night when Sandy and Jon Wolfmueller, Kinky and Marcie and Tone and I come out for dinner. I can't wait!

Y'all have a great evening! 

I Sorta Saw The Light, Again!

Tony had a great birthday, thanks to all of y'all's happy birthday wishes—thank you! He loved it!

Yesterday, Buttermilk took Tone and me to Kerrville, so I could treat him to lunch for his birthday, and then take him on a shopping spree at WalMart, to buy as many fishing lures as one hundred dollars could buy.

T. wanted to eat at Billy Genes for two reasons. They have good food, and they are real close to Wally World. Just as we pulled into the restaurant's parking lot, Buttermilk's air conditoning system stopped running.

A few minutes later, as Tony and I sipped our ice(d) teas, while trying to decide what we wanted to eat, the weirdest thing happened!

A tall, distinguished gray haired man walked into Billy Genes with a couple of friends. "Tone, don't look now, but Jesus just walked in," I whispered. Then I started laughing. Tony immediately turned his head to look, and then he started laughing, too!

The man, was dressed in white, wearing a red shawl, draped across his chest, and over his shoulders—and hippy sandals! He had long, white, wavy hair, and he sported a handlebar mustache. I thought Jesus was pretty good looking for his age, but I didn't tell Tony, because he was dealing with turning fifty-five, and trying to behave like a senior citizen would.

"Nance, I promise you, that is not Jesus," Tone said. "He's just a Roman emperor visiting Kerrville." Then our friendly waitress appeared at our booth, acting like it was no big deal that Jesus was here to eat one of their famous chicken fried steaks. We gave her our order, while Jesus went over and sat down at a table, with two of his flock.

I really wanted it to be Jesus, because I had a few questions that I wanted to ask him, but Tone was right—the gentleman wasn't Jesus. I knew this, because I've never seen a picture of Jesus with a handlebar mustache. Then a couple walked into the establishment and said, "We're here to meet with the vacation Bible school party. We're running late." Tony and I laughed.

As Tony and I discussed the Roman Empire, our good friends and dog walking volunteers, Jan and Todd, entered the restaurant! We waved at them, and invited them to join us for Tone's birthday lunch!

The four of us had much to talk about. Last week, they had gone to New Orleans, but they had to turn right around and come back—because their dishwasher had caught on fire, and if not for their good friend—their house would have burned down! They told us that they are still staying at a hotel, and hopefully can move back into their house in a couple of days. Then we talked about the dogs at the rescue ranch, etc. as we ate our meals. When we were nearly finished eating, Todd's eyes got big and he quit eating. The Roman emperor walked past our table, on his way to the men's room.

"I thought that I'd seen everything," Todd remarked. The four of us started laughing!

"We did, too," I said. "He's here with some vacation Bible school people. I thought he was Jesus!"

Before leaving, after paying our checks, I told Jan and Todd about Buttermilk's air conditioning system quitting on us. I asked them if they had their camera with them, so they could take a picture of Tony pounding on the cylinder with our rock tool. Unfortunately, they didn't. After handshakes and hugs we said our goodbyes and left the restaurant.

After Tony had rocked out with Buttermilk, he slammed the hood down, and got into the Explorer. "Nance, It is too hot outside. Let's go home. I'll get my fishing lures later." I was fine with that.

Everything was cool for about fifteen minutes, and then the air conditioner quit, just as Will Hoover began singing, my favorite song of his, "Jesus Don't Drive No Fastback Ford!"

Y'all have a great evening!

P.S. D & D at the B & B—Trails End Guest House sent me Part III of Beckham's tale! I will post it tomorrow. You'll love it!

It's German!

Today has been a great day! After I fed our dogs and Lucky, I checked my e-mail, and was thrilled when I saw that I had received an e from D&D over at the Trail's End Guest House! After reading Beckham's Tale, Part II, I immediately posted it, because I loved it, and I could not wait to share it with y'all!

After breakfast, I walked four fast miles with Les, and then Hazel and I cleaned the trailer. As soon as it looked like Tony and I definitely didn't live here—Hazel went into the closet to rest. I wanted to go with her, but I had too many things to take care of—like paperwork and returning phone calls.

Around nine-forty-five, while Jim, our great dog-walking volunteer, was busy walking our dogs, my dear friend, Bob Wightman, showed up to adopt Rowdy aka Roxie, the sweet little Min Pin, that he had brought his friends, D.J. and Barbara, out to see last week! When he arrived, we went into Outer Space, so he could fill out the adoption form.

As soon as Bob had signed on the dotted line, he said, "I'm changing her name to Heidi—it's German. What do you think?"

"I love it, Bob! It's a great name for her." Bob and I visited for about twenty minutes, in the screened in porch, then we left Outer Space, to go get Heidi, so he could take her to her new forever fabulous home! While T. and Bob visited, Tone attached Heidi's dog tags onto her new, purple dog collar, that the NoMads had donated to us awhile back. Then Tony went to Heidi's pen, put her pretty collar on her, and then he handed her over to Bob. I don't know who was the happiest—Bob or Heidi! Bob couldn't wait to take her home, and she couldn't wait to get out of here! After handshakes and hugs, Bob and Heidi happily took off for home, and that really made my day!

After they had left the rescue ranch, I returned to the trailer to prepare the adoption paperwork, on Audie Murphy, Burt Lancaster, The Duke, and Hank Williams, Sr., the four black wannabe Lab puppies that we rescued a few weeks back, and Little Skeeter, the recently rescued Shih Tzu, because hopefully tomorrow—all five of them will find their forever homes!

Our good friends, and rescue ranch volunteers, Jan and Todd have volunteered, once again, to sit out front of Kerrville's favorite friendly pet store—Pet Supplies Plus tomorrow, to help find them super homes! I've got my fingers crossed!

Bob called me earlier this evening. He told me that Heidi and Blue have become best friends, and they were sleeping beside his feet, as we talked! I loved it!

I want to do a shout out to thank these great people for helping us help them! Thank you, Bob, Jim, The NoMads, Todd and Jan, and Pet Supplies Plus! We couldn't do it without y'all! We love you!

Y'all have a great evening!

Texas Sized!

This morning I walked six fast miles! I then returned some phone calls and e-mails. It was now finally—My Time! I had just begun working on my book, when the phone rang—it was Kinky. "Nance, I just found a German paperback version of 'Meanwhile Back At The Ranch,' and you have got to come over and see it! Our names are all over it and it is pretty funny."

Twenty minutes later, I was over at the Lodge. After unloading some more of Tony's organic—tomatoes, onions, jalapenos, and zucchinis onto Kinky's kitchen table, I thumbed through the German paperback, finding Tony's and my name—here and there. I love that book—it is one of my favorite Kinky books. Kinky dedicated that book to Tony and me, and when I saw the dedication written in German, it made me grin! Here is a picture of the German Paperbook and the English version.

After looking at the book, Kinky and I went outside. He wanted to show me the bloom on his Texas Five Star Hibiscus, that our friends Rick R. and Leisa, from Port A., had given to him last year. It was beautiful and Texas sized, to say the least!

Kinky and I visited while he filled his hummingbird feeders. Before leaving the Lodge, Kinky invited Tone and me to join him for lunch—with Dylan, at Luby's. I accepted the invite, because I knew it would be fun to see Dylan, and also because we needed to run some errands in Kerrville.

At one o'clock sharp, the four of us entered Luby's cafeteria. Our lunch was so much fun! Dylan told us some very interesting stories, while Kinky kept interjecting some really funny remarks. I was the last to finish my lunch, because they had me laughing so hard.

After our Luby's lunch, Tone and I went to Wolfmueller's Books. We wanted to hear all about their Fourth of July pignic at the Trails End Guest House. Sandy and Jon told us that they had a blast! They said the food was delicious, of course, and Beckham is now living the life of Riley over there—and he is putting on the pounds! That news made my day!

Our visit with Sandy and Jon was fun, and I hated for it to end, but we needed to get over to Copies Plus, to get some printing done. When we walked inside Copies Plus, Trisha greeted us with a smile! Tony and I just love her. We had a fun visit with her, while she ran off two hundred copies of a brochure for us.

Tony and I are fixin' to watch Michael's memorial service that I taped earlier today. Y'all have a great evening!