March 9, 2008
The Buenger's quick trip to Corpus Christi created some weather angst. For Erin's part, hitting the south Texas coast meant that we missed the (ever so brief) snow here in the Microplex on Friday morning. It also took us directly into the face of high winds, shivery temperatures, and a nearby tornado. We were unaffected by the Nueces County tornado, but did get a full face of wind, rain, and the shivers. In fact, Davis, Erin, and I were stranded for about an hour in Betty's Cat House on Water Street in Corpus when a heavy downpour interrupted our shopping date (that's right, Betty's is a boutique with cat accoutrement, not a baudy business as you might have suspected). We had made some small purchases and were headed to the door, when I noticed that we would have to cross ankle deep water just to make it to the door. We hied it to the opposite end of the store, and even though the street it faced was not named "Water," it was inconveniently not named "Dry Land" either. With our way blocked on both ends, no car, no umbrellas, and no rain gear, we decided that we hadn't shopped at Betty's long enough. The young proprietress seemed unfazed by either our lingering or by the water rising into her shop from under the front door. She pulled a shop vac from some tucked away storeroom and vacuumed up bucket after bucket of water, until the rain finally stopped and the Buengers took their token purchases and departed.
In addition to some light shopping, we made it to the Texas State Aquarium and to the movies to see the Spiderwick Chronicles (which had opened and closed here in Bryan faster than we could get organized to see it). On the way down to the movie house, Erin and I saw something that made us both say Hmm. We passed a Methodist Church with a fifteen foot tall statue of Jesus (no that wasn't the Hmm part. Such a site is fairly routine in the city called "body of Christ"). No, what made us say Hmm virtually simultaneously was the marquee next to the statue that said, "PET BLESSING AND FREE VET CHECK, TODAY!" and there we were without Willie who needs all the blessings he can garner AND without Luke who has had many, many vet checks before, but they haven't been free or even affordable in a long time. We also made it to the Corpus Christi Museum of History and Science, where Erin not only tried out all the hands on exhibits, but she also conversed freely with clutches of historians gathered there (did I mention the reason we went to CC was to attend Walter's history convention?).
The high point of the convention for Erin, besides swimming every day, was the book exhibit, which she insisted on calling the Book Fair, like at her school. Gayla Christianson, who is the Director of Marketing for the Texas A&M University Press, had the cunning idea to tell Erin that her dad had an open account with the press, so if she saw any books that she wanted, just to tell the person at the register to put it on her dad's tab. Let me just say that Erin couldn't carry all the books she bought "without money." The Press paid Erin back a little for her patronage by sponsoring a lovely dessert reception on Thursday evening. Erin may have erased whatever profit the Press had on her purchases by consuming copious amounts of cheesecake squares and mousse cups. Thanks Mary Lenn!
We got back yesterday, just in time to washed all of Davis's clothes, have a nice family meal together, then head out the door this morning to return him part two of the semester. Tomorrow, Erin and I head out across town to do a three day mini-camp with her soccer team. There will be a little work, and I hope a lot of giggling and bonding, as we work on some team building and tactics for the upcoming Cup season. I promise I will update The Report later in the week when I have time to reflect on my wonderful son and digest the information that he may spend next fall in Budapest, Hungary studying at the Institute of mathematics there.
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