McAllen, II

I know, it's been over a week since my last post. I'm turning into Spearot. Really though, most anyone who reads this thing lives in Madison and they could enjoy the chicanery in real-time.

In the interest of maintaining a semblance of chronology, I want to finish up the trip to South Texas, but congrats to everyone who finally passed their prelims. Did we mention the hard part of graduate school starts now?

The purpose of the trip to McAllen was an on-going project studying Arundo donax. For those not familiar with this most fascinating of plants, it's like sugar cane, but bigger. Much bigger.

It can grow up to 30 feet high and sucks up a ridiculous amount of water. As far as I know, it can't be smoked. For agricultural regions like the Rio Grande Valley, water is a valuable resource and they want this bad mo-fu out. In it's defense, it grows so quickly that some think it will make an amazing bio-fuel.

Anyway, we started the day by driving out to a USDA lab on an old Air Force base. After getting past the dudes with guns (ok, they let us through after verifying our identity), we entered the lab.

First lesson learned: we need to spend less on war and bullshit anti-terrorism campaigns and much more on scientific research.

Our tour necessitated white lab coats and booties. I suppose this protects the labs from other organisms we might track it, but I can't be sure. Nevertheless, I learned loads about A. donax.

Second lesson learned: lunch is more interesting than most research.

Yes, lunch was had at the stockyard, where the cattle auctioned on Thursday mornings. It certainly had ambiance. And the sweetest middle-aged watiress:

Us: "What are the specials?"
Her (as fast as possible): "X, Y, Z. You ready to order now?"

Under duress, I turned to the reliable cheeseburger. This was roundly criticized and I was pushed into ordering my first chicken fried steak. They say everything is bigger in Texas. Since it appears some people live beyond 35, this so-called everything must include arteries. It definitely includes asses.

Deep fried death was followed by a meeting with another health economist at Texas-Pan American and then a stroll around Santa Ana National Wildlife Refuge. Santa Ana is really a remarkable birding ground, with species you just don't see anywhere else in the country, including this guy: Couch's Kingbird

I also saw a grooved-billed Ani and heard a bunch of other birds, but was mostly distracted by the swarming mosquitoes and deet-laced sweat pouring down my body. I eventually hacked my way back to the parking lot and we headed toward Nuevo Progresso, Mexico for dinner.

This was very exciting since it would be my first time in Mexico. Duck-butter or no duck-butter, that's a pretty big deal. In fact, I've been on 3 continents (North America, Europe, Africa) and this was the farthest south I had ever been. We parked before the bridge and then walked over the Rio Grande across the border.

It is obviously an area that caters to day-tripping American's and thus was similar to parts of Morocco I've seen. Cheeseburger was not on the menu so I again deferred to my colleagues. This resulted in frog legs and quail. The quail was tasty, but the frog legs were way too salty. Bananas Foster's flambeed table side more than made up for it, however.

Our short trip ended with a requisite stop at the duty-free liquor store. And since my driver's license still says Wisconsin, I was entitled to 4 times more booze.