steer, deer, and....

So my husband had to travel to Texas and last minute, he says, hey wanna go? Last minute as in, the kids' bedtime is in 8 hours,dog boarding is an hour away and closes in 5 hours, and the need shots first, and oh we need a rental car because what noise did ours just make, and the kids' mobile video system just broke and we need dinner and the laundry is dirty and omg breathe. We rather uneventfully leave and traverse a good portion of the desert southwest, and lay our heads to rest in El Paso, Texas at mearly midnight. I barely sleep, hyped up from the drive, plus my usual insomnia and an unfound fear I'm going to get shot because are those huge ball park type lights within ball throwing distance the border with beyond super deadly Ciuidad Juarez? Yes! Anyways...I wake after maybe two hours sleep, put my son's shoes on backwards, my moby on backwards, and my throat is on fire from all the dust storms. Yee haw. Welcome to El Paso, where I feel like I'm hungover and in Vegas. Really, it reminds me of Vegas minus you know, Vegas...slot machines and stuff. To quote the guy we met in the elevator, supernatural. We trek across Texas, prettier than I would expect (but pretty doesn't come to mind) and even more sparsely populated than expected. We encounter a border patrol stop, and unlike California where they show signs of illegal families running across the freeway lanes cause umm..that's probably realistic (I've never even had to slow in the patrol crossing) here they mean business, everyone stops and their car gets a once around by a dog who, I must giggle, excitedly snifffed the rear of every car. Too many hours later we end up in Fredericksburg, its like shangrila, like a step back into a 1950s quaint downtown with a main street and clean, quaint brick buildings...meets...Germamy...meets the Portlandia show. There are bier hauses all around. It really had that quaint main street americana feeling. Outside of it, Texas Hill Country abounds. I get far too excited over horses and cows, sheep, goats, ostriches, peach orchards and omg is that a wildflower farm? Full of....bluebonnets, my favorite flower? And look, a herd of wild deer. And a deer processing shack (no bambis were harmed in the herd I saw). And wait? Tuscany of Texas? Wineries! Art galleries! Grass Fed beef, quaint cafes, fresh peach pies, farmers markets, deer hunting stores, and mansions on acreage. Seriously where else on earth can you sipfine wine, eat an organic burger, browse an art gallery, hunt and gut a deer, and pick wildflowers all in one block? This place is awesome! And housing and food and gas and everything is chesper! I'm convinced there's a catch. After midnighg the gremlin come out. Or zombies.no,zombies with pet gremlims.