Greg and I finally (finally, finally!) visited San Antonio. I had become embarrassed by our ignorance as people from the north were constantly asking us about this city. Yes, we’ve lived in Texas for a year and a half, and yes, we live just 80 miles from San Antonio, and yes, we have a San Antonio guidebook sitting in our family room, but NO, we haven’t been there.

We started our tour with a visit to the Riverwalk and then strolled over to El Mercado, a section of town known for its Mexican markets. I became skeptical as we walked toward El Mercado. We saw few people on the street. We passed a Goodwill, an immunization clinic, and a pawn shop — signs of a less-than-thriving community.

And then we reached the two-block El Mercado square. We stepped into a different country. Vendors hawked sombreros, candy, and art. Mariachi bands played. And many people waited in line to eat at the two restaurants in the area. We stopped outside La Margarita and debated our chances of getting a table within the next half hour. I watched one woman after another approach the hostess and speak to her in Spanish. We were losing precious minutes, falling farther down the waiting list. I started to wonder if the hostess spoke English. I turned to Greg with a look of panic.

“Are we allowed to speak in English?” I asked.

“Yes,” Greg said, as though my question were ridiculous. “The sign is in English,” he said, pointing to the restaurant sign.

I thought maybe I should speak to the woman in Spanish. I certainly know enough Spanish to get a table for two at a restaurant, but my accent is bad. I didn’t want to speak my halting Spanish in front of this crowd and see their pitying smiles. I worked up my nerve and approached the hostess.

“Hi,” I said.

“Hi,” she said curtly.

I requested a table for two, and seconds later we were escorted inside.

As we ate lunch, I felt like people were looking at Greg and I. They knew we didn’t belong. They probably laughed at us, asking for our water in English. We were the immigrants here.

We’re still not sure whether we visited San Antonio yesterday or took a wrong turn and ended up in Mexico.

Greg went grocery shopping yesterday because he had the day off, and when I arrived home I found the receipt sitting on the counter with an arrow drawn next to one of the items.
“Greg, why did you draw this arrow here?” I asked.
“They charged me for diced tomatoes, and I didn’t buy any diced tomatoes,” Greg said indignantly.
Our grocery store is really good about reimbursing us when they make an error. I guess Greg planned to take the receipt with him to the grocery store on some future trip and demand that they give him 72 cents.
Let me pause here to say that Greg doesn’t bat an eye at dropping thousands of dollars on technology. Or vacations. He will leave five-dollar bills lying around the house because he doesn’t want to carry “change.” But Greg will be damned if some grocery store is going to charge him 72 CENTS! 72 WHOLE CENTS! for tomatoes he did not buy.
As I drove my route for Meals on Wheels today, I heard a clunk coming from the back of the car. I stopped and popped the trunk. And I think you know what a found.
I’m just glad we hadn’t already asked for our 72 cents back.

It began last night while I was walking down our street with Abe. A strange black and white dog who had been sitting unleashed in the middle of a lawn came up to us to say hi. Abe, as he does with all bigger dogs, started barking ferociously. Fearing for Abe’s foolish life, I took him home. I walked back to check on the dog and saw that he had moved down a couple yards. I called to him and he came over to me. There were no tags on his salmon-colored collar, so I leashed him up and took him home.

He stayed in the back yard while I started knocking on some neighbors’ doors. No luck there.

When I got home, Abe started barking at me, “Hey, you left that dog in the back. He’s big and will either steal our woman or eat us and then steal our woman. Get rid of him.” Winston just glared at me and gave a growl lower than I have ever heard. I told them it would be alright. They didn’t believe me.

I decided to name the new dog Philip, because, of the half dozen names I tried, that’s the name he responded to best.

The temperature outside that night was going to drop to a Texas-rare 26 degrees. Philip would have to be inside, but Abe and Winston wouldn’t have that, so he spent the night in our garage, displacing the Low Rider onto our driveway.

Sarah, who had been at her monthly bunco night, came home confused as to why her Camry was outside. When I told her of our guest, she was both excited and annoyed. Dogs are always fun to have around, but there has been a lot going on in our house the last few days, and adding another occupant wasn’t going to help things.

Philip made it through the night without any problems. This morning I took him for a walk, posted a few flyers around the neighborhood, and worked from home for the first half of the day. His owner called this afternoon. It turned out that Philip lived pretty close to us. His owner told me that he was a bit of an escape artist and had already chewed his way through three gates and broken down a couple doors. He asked if we wanted to keep him. I politely declined and he said he would fetch him from our back yard.

Operation Find Owner Of Dog was successful.

Philip, the dog, on his recent holiday.