Wednesday, October 25, 2006

Meanwhile, Back At The Ranch......

They were busy suckering tourists into paying a whole dollar for teensy tiny bottles of water, and laughing at the losers who stepped into the copious piles of animal poop lying around. That would be me. While wearing sandals. Ewwwwww.

This place is Enchanted Springs Ranch just outside San Antonio, and the first tourist trap, er I mean "attraction" we hit after leaving Butt Camp. It's supposed to be set up like a Wild West Town but we saw Indians squatting next to their teepee drinking Coke and using their BlackBerrys, and cowboys with cell phones in their gun holsters, so I'm not sure just how authentic it is. The Rotary Club put on a demonstration using their trained knights. The one in blue is a female knight atop Thor, the supposed Guiness Book Of World Record holder for being the tallest, living horse. They wanted to charge 10 dollars just to take a picture of Thor, but I snapped this when nobody was looking, and I made sure that I remained too far away for the knights to beat me with their jousting thingies. See what a good blog friend I am? I won't charge you anything to gaze wonderingly at the magnificent Thor.

All the kids got a chance to sit on Woodrow The Longhorn. You can tell by his expression that there is nothing he loves more on a 90 degree day than to have a procession of strange kids plop their butts down on his back. In the background is the cotton candy stand where they were whipping it up fresh. It was yummy and stickarific. We practically spent the next hour licking ourselves to get all the cotton candy residue off.

Us on the only free thing featured in the entire place even though we paid an exorbitant entrance fee. The covered wagon ride allowed us to meet some of our fellow ranch hands. They were weird, and asked me if my children were foster kids. WTH??!!!??? The man looked like Jed Clampett in a cowboy hat while the woman resembled a grizzled Willie Nelson with her long braids hanging down off her shoulders. That was an extraordinarily long 20 minutes.

My little cowboy wannabes all tried their hand lassoing a metal calf while mounted on this mechanical horse. I only took one picture because right after Caterpillar got down, my little Boo Boo lassoed me in the eye. I liked this kind of horse because I figured I was finally safe from walking into steaming piles of crap. That is, until, I stepped into a mound of metal shavings located directly behind the horse.

That'll teach them ornery whippersnappers to dare ask for another dollar bottle of water. My daughter, Monkey, cleverly filled her empty container from a spigot outside the saloon. The bar maid did not look kindly upon this act of cunning though. Monkey's just lucky that the gallows stage remained occupied until we left. In my opinion, the scoundrels responsible for serving camp fire grilled hot dogs wrapped up in a TORTILLA should be charged with criminal mischief. I'm sure they had hot dog buns in the Old West and didn't have to co-opt another culture to serve up their weenie creations. It's hot dog blasphemy, I tell you. Blasphemy! The other food vendor charging 8 bucks for a paper plate of stringy barbecue should be strung up for highway robbery.

9 comments:

jams o donnell said...

Hmm cowboys with mobile phones? Indians with Blackberries.. How inauthentic can you get? EVERYONE knows that the Startac was the phone of choice among the first nations!

£8 for baebeque.. An authentic bushwhacking eh??

jams o donnell said...

errr $ £8 would be geting on for fifteen of your strange notes!

Lia said...

I liked San Antonio when I was there. I don't remember this place, though.

Give people a break on the BlackBerries. Don't you understand separation anxiety? Also, how literal is "Woodrow the Longhorn"?

Rhonda Sloan said...

A hot dog in a tortilla? That's just offensive.

But here's a fun game...what would it be called? A hotdaco? :)

Chris said...

At least you don't have Chinese cowboys who say, "I likes to dlink lisskey." That would be shocking.

What's the normal rate for a paper plate of stringy barbecue anyway?

Super Happy Girl said...

Tortilla dogs? (I also vote for "hotdaco") is that like authentic Wild West food? I bet it is, so there.

Thank you for not charging us to view that picture of Thor, I could not possible afford it.

I loved the legless mechanical horse. It's so freaky looking, it almost scared me. Almost.

I want to say that if I ever wne there, it's have to be with you, otherwise it'd be no fun at all.

Emma Jo said...

hmm, sounds like the same food rustlers at the Houston Livestock Show and Rodeo...
You have the kind of kids that I want to squeeze or stare at because they are so beautiful...I mean that in a nice, motherly non-creep sort of way.

Super Happy Girl said...

"I ever wne there, it's have to be with you"...what was that about?. Sorry, I don;t talk like that IRL, really.

elasticwaistbandlady said...

jams- I'm genuinely surprised that we didn't have to pay to use the bathroom at that place!

lia- I'm always very pure in thought, and heart, in mind, and in deed, so those kind of connections never even registered with me!

rhonda-I call it "the end of civilization."

christo- At my house stringy barbecue is budget mark down cuts from the stores bargain meat bin that's been stewing in a crockpot with sauce all day. I'm a cheap floozy of a woman when it comes to comestibles christo.

No Cool Story, as my best bloggy friend forever we can go together to Enchanted Springs Ranch, so long as you agree to wear matching chaps, pink cowgirl hats, and spurs with me. Oh, and no flannel shirts. I don't want to give people the wrong idea about us. :)

emma jo-Your girls are the most photogenic of the photogenic! I'm thinking of arming myself with vacation pictures and crashing your scrapbooking soiree tonight. *WARNING* Camel toe jokes may ensue.