Derry, Northern Ireland

Derry, Northern Ireland
A book I'm working on is set in this town.

Monday, December 14, 2009

I love long walks

Especially on a cool evening where the air hints of rain and there's just enough breeze to notice. I've found there's a post office with extended hours just over two miles from where I currently live -- open till 10pm six days a week and till 8 on Sundays. It's hidden (man, is it hidden) off Jones-Maltsberger Road north of Highway 281 right by San Antonio's "International" Airport, along a stretch of two-lane blacktop that has neither curbs nor sidewalks but plenty of potholes half-filled with what my grandmother called "politician mud." In this area, tin-roofed warehouses are to the right; medium-rise office buildings and Enterprise Rent-A-Car are to the left. On the section between Loop 410 and 281, wilderness covers the right of the road; its opposite is a pleasant housing development.

To find this post office, you have to curl right at a light off J-M, by a fair-sized green sign telling you the PO's this way. You head down a one-way street (two lanes, with curbs) to a "Y" that isn't really a "Y", because the right lane HAS to go right while the left lane gives you a choice of right or left...and if you go left, you've screwed up and have to go ALL the way around, again, in this nice neverending circle they've provided for people who use logic to drive by instead of mental instability. To reach the entrance of the parking area, you have to go right in the left lane -- and take care about the oncoming traffic since all of a sudden you're at the beginning (or end, whichever) of a two-way street -- then turn left within 50 feet. Coming out's easy; that's all one way. And if ANYBODY can think of a more confusing and idiotic design for an entrance to an important business structure, I'd love to hear it.

BUT...that's beside the point. I liked the walk. Didn't like how close the cars got (this is a very busy road for being such a back-country-pathway) but I liked the long stretch of wilderness along the lower section. And I worked out another chapter in POS. In fact, it got to where it was pounding so hard at me, I had to stop at a Taco Cabana on the way home, have some queso and chips with a DP and write it out. THIS is why writers who are worth anything are NEVER without paper and pen...and is half the reason I've fallen in love with cargo pants and their side pockets; perfect for storing a note pad. And soon as I'm done here, I'm putting it into the computer.

In fact, I am done. Off to my real world.

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