Carpetblogger

A Night Out With Carpetblogger In Mingus, TX

We've noticed that Central Texas shares many characteristics of some of the more sophisticated areas of Pashtunistan. For example, both have substantial populations of heavily armed religious fanatics (Buckle Bunny* refuses to take us to Waco -- one in a string of outrages we've experienced lately). Also, getting a drink takes lots of effort.

As we might have mentioned in an earlier post, Eastland County is dry. Fortunately, as a habitue of Muslim countries, we already know how deal with this. For example, if you live in Islamabad, you load up at Duty Free and entertain quietly at home. If you live in Gorman, Texas, you go to Mingus.

(Here is Richard Thompson singing "Mingus Eyes" which is pretty awesome and may or may not be related to Mingus, Texas. A quick perusal of the lyrics does not rule it out!)

Mingus lies a few miles north of I-20 and has a population of 254 (buy your T-shirt here!). Its central business district is pretty much a county road lined with bars. And by bars, we mean "pressboard shacks with some Budweiser posters on the walls, a dartboard and, maybe, karaoke."

Options are many! You have your Boar's Nest, your City Lights, your R-Bar, your White House, your Mule Lip and your Sugar Bush. There may be others. We don't know. It was dark. 

The primary difference between these bars and ones you might find in Pashtunistan, if they had bars there, is that people get extremely drunk on Coors Light and rather belligerent on Friday night. We had been under the mistaken impression that the extremely drunk belligerents we saw at the Boars Nest were also armed, making us feel this was the most menacing bar in which we had ever had the pleasure of drinking Coors Light. We feel a lot better now knowing that it is illegal to bring your gun into bars.

Sadly, though, many Mingus visitors avoid the Mule Lip because some guy shot someone there last year. The newspaper story is linked here and, if you have not yet been convinced about the utility of social media, please spend a few minutes reading the comments. 

Before you head to Mingus, know that its bars can only serve beer and whatever is the new century's version of Zima. That means you stop at the liquor store and buy your own bottle before you choose your bar. May we suggest Cheryl's? The night we stopped in, Cheryl's was helmed by two 80 year-old women in matching red sweatshirts who looked like twins. They were struggling a bit with their cash register that night. We have no doubt they, too, were heavily armed.

*Buckle Bunny is the Carpetblog contributor formerly known as Red State Sibling.

Full Information Not Given

So bleak were our recent options, that when Red State Sibling suggested we come take care of her Gorman, Texas ranch while she and the Cowboy left town, we didn't LOL at the idea. "The only thing you have to do is remember to close the gates," she lied.

Sensing our hesitation, she threw in a few appealing inducements. We booked a ticket according us a three-week visit to Central Texas, the longest period of consecutive time we have spent in the US in six years. Some people go to Bali post-divorce, others go to Gorman. We hate to be a cliche.

After a quick look at Accuweather, we asked, "Can I borrow coats and boots and gloves so I don't have to carry them?"

"What will you need those for!" she asked, as if we're some sort of clueless moron with no internet.  "It's 65 degrees here! It's Texas!"

She made plans for us to ride her cutting horses and plant her acre-large organic garden. We packed hat and gloves and a coat.

Gorman greeted us with rain and mud. Rain that turned to sleet. That turned to snow. That turned to ice.

Full information not given.

Putting Carpetblogger in charge of a 100 acre rural ranch for a week is not as absurd as sounds. Our veneer of urban sophistication may suggest otherwise, but we are not without rural skills. Horses, dogs, cats, sheep and chickens are easy. Tractors are within our skill set. So are 4WD pick-ups.

Cattle are a bit foreign, a little scary, but we can deal. Hundred year old houses with a dozen guns (there are three within sight of this couch) but no locks on the doors and no landlines are disconcerting. And, can there really be parts of America where there is little or no mobile phone coverage? As it turns out, YES! This is one of them. Terrifying.

Full information not given.

About those gates. The mobius strip they've created of doors and gates that only lock from one side virtually guarantees, should we follow the instructions "remember to close the gates" diligently, we will be locked out of somewhere critical, or locked in somewhere with no mobile phone. Alternatively, we will develop OCD. "Did I lock that gate? Shut that door?" and trudge back and forth to the barn all night long in sleet and mud, doublechecking.

Full information not given.

Did we mention Eastland County is dry?

Full information not given.

Our biggest fears are these: Things will get stuck (tractors, vehicles, calves. O! Did we forget to mention it's calving season? Sometimes they get stuck and have to be pulled out. Full information not given) or things will get cold (primarily, me).

Stay tuned.

Well That Didn't Take, Did It?*

EXT: Eastland, Texas, off Interstate 20, 120 miles (200 kms) west of Dallas, 50 miles (80 kms) east of Abilene. Close enough to get the Abilene TV stations. That's excellent news for those who want to catch up on daytime Zionist Christian talk shows.

Courthouse Square: All Texas towns have one. If one needs a notary and Google offers nothing useful in response to "notaries eastland texas," it seems like a logical place to start looking. Since nearly all the store fronts on Main Street are vacant, choices are limited.

I-20 Bail Bonds and Pawn Shop. Gun shop too, but why waste space and paint pointing out the obvious?

INT: Conversation among three good ol' boys halts when white girl, wearing very un-rural black wool coat covered in hay and loafers, but driving a dirty white pick-up with three dogs in back, parks and walks in.

"Y'alls notarize things here?" [End of vernacular. Readers sigh with relief]

"Depends. Whatcha got?" asks large bearded man with tattoos standing behind counter, next to gun rack.

[First unanswered question: What don't they notarize?]

"I got a divorce here." She hands him an envelope.

"Come back to the office and sit down. I'll have a look."

White girl sits down in cluttered office. Large bearded man with tattoos thumbs through the thin pile of documents. Avoiding his occasional glances, white girl examines photos of local basketball star, most certainly large bearded man's daughter.  To unasked questions she thinks up fictional answers more believable than the dry truth laid out in the document. Istanbul, Turkey. Irreconcilable differences between the parties have resulted in the irremediable breakdown of the marriage, Portland, Oregon. Eastland, Texas. It doesn't make much sense to her, either.

White girl signs. Large bearded mans stamps with the authority of a Soviet apparatchik.

"What do I owe you for this?"

"Nothing. Good luck."

"Wow. Thanks."

Good ol' boys watch the white girl in silence as she exits the pawn shop. She gets back in the dirty white pick-up, drives dogs back to the ranch in Gorman and feeds the cattle under light snow flurries. Then, she redesigns a blog. As you do.

*Yah, I know. If you read with RSS there's no noticeable difference. But it's a brand! We don't feel like starting all over again! And, although this Central Texas posting is temporary, it's a vein too rich not to mine. There will be more, at least for the next ten days or so.