more of the journey

Lola and I left my mom in Houston on Thursday and headed for Dallas. One of my favorite things along our road trip through the south was observing the unique town names. Some of my favorites were Grosse Tete, LA (it means big head...get your mind out of the gutter), Cut and Shoot, TX, and Westward Ho, TX. Well, my trip to Dallas didn't leave me with any memorable signs, but I did pass a restaurant with a particularly interesting flashing sign announcing that they had "beaver bites" and they were "made to order". I also passed the "Texas State Prison Museum" which looked like an actuve prison from the freeway and left me particularly perplexed.

We arrived in Dallas to stay with my uncle Mike for the night. He lives in a very nice area of downtown Dallas (can't remember what it's called). I enjoyed walking Lola around the neighborhood and there were lots of other dog walkers out there too.

I love mexican food so Mike and Kyle wanted to take me out for Mexican (ok so maybe it was my idea). Mike asked if I wanted more gourmet mexican or authentic and I said authentic. We got in the car and were driving around. He was pointing out various things as we drove. We got to one section and he said "this is the ghetto" and I said ok. Then we stopped. I thought we were going through the ghetto apparently that was our destination! He said "you said you wanted authentic". It actually wasn't that bad of an area (at least during the daylight). The restaurant was nice inside and we had great authentic texan mexican food! After that we drove all around downtown dallas and through the rich area where bush just bought a house (not to his actual house area). It was a whirlwind tour of Dallas but it seems like a cool city and I'd love to go back and spend some time there someday.

Later we watched Inkheart. I'm familiar with the young adult books that inspired the movie, because of my students, but it never seemed like something I'd like much. The previews for the movie and the beginning of the movie didn't convince me otherwise, but then I got sucked in and I actually enjoyed the movie. The concept behind it is interesting.

The next morning lola and I headed out. Back on the road again, with our ultimate destination being Columbus, I decided Memphis would be a good stopping point for the night. Nashville would have been better distancewise, but I went there last year. First, though, I wanted to go to Little Rock, Arkansas. When I was student teaching I read the book Warriors Don't Cry with my 8th graders. It's an autobiography written by one of the Little Rock Nine (the nine black students chosen to integrate Little Rock's schools single-handedly). Since reading the book, I've always wanted to visit the schoolsite. Little Rock Central High School is huge, even by today's standards. Visiting it made many of the moments in the book more vivid. Next we went to the Capitol building (which is also huge and beautiful) and walked around the grounds. We visited the memorial statues for the Little Rock Nine and I got a picture of Lola climbing the capitol steps.

Off again, we headed for Tennessee. Crossing over the bridge to Memphis there's a welcome center with statues of various famous Memphis musicians like BB King and Elvis. We stopped in there and then walked along the riverwalk. We drove through downtown Memphis, checked out the famous Bealle street area, and finally settled in our hotel.