Was in Archer City the other day with the next of kin and two grandkids (the girl, about to be 7 and the boy, about to be 5.)
Archer City, for those of you not up on your film trivia, is the town where "The Last Picture Show" and "Texasville" were filmed and was in fact the town that the movies were about. But the big reason we went was that there is an enormous bookstore there. (http://www.bookedupac.com)
Larry McMurtry (the guy who wrote "Last Picture Show," as well as "Lonesome Dove" and "Terms of Endearment" and a buttload of other stuff) lives there and has (literally) four entire buildings scattered around the downtown area which are full of books you won't find anywhere else; first editions, out of print and autographed editions, broadsheets, galleys -- it's an unusual place, and the coolest place in Texas (or about anywhere else) for a book junkie.
I wanted everything, as usual, but got nothing, as usual. The Next of Kin scored an Andrew Wyeth sketchbook volume showing his prep work and studies, and the grandkids got a book of classic Disney drawings, which they are presently arguing over.
After wandering around through enormous vast areas of books shelved 10-12 feet high, we finally decided to feed the grandkids, and walked to the only cafe in town.
It can be generally described as West Texas chic, which is to say it would have been pretty rustic in 1968, but the food's good and the locals seem to tolerate outsiders reasonably well.
The burgers arrived in due course, and we lit into them. For drinks, the kids got root beer.
They informed me that their parents wouldn't allow them to drink Cokes or root beer because they had way too much sugar. I told them it was ok when they were with grampa, because grampa knew they could have sugar till it came out in crystals on their skin.
The granddaughter looked at her arm when I said that, hunting for precipitating sugar. Finally she looked up and saw me grinning at her.
"Grampa, that's not real," she announced.
"Well," I conceded, "I might have made it up. "
The meal proceeded, and she shortly held her arm up. White crystals were on her skin. "Grampa!" she exclaimed, "You were right!"
I laughed and told her that the crystals were salt that she'd accidentally got on her arm after salting her fries. She licked experimentally and said, "No, it's sugar coming from my skin."
No way -- I grabbed her arm and took a lick. Ugh. Salt. I made a face and she smiled.
"I might have made it up," she said.
Smart ass.
In Our Next Episode: I find a real computer and edit this post.
That kid takes after her grampa.
ReplyDeleteBTW, that photo of long rows of books is pure pr0n for this girl. Thanks ever!
I think I'm in love with that kid.
ReplyDeleteI can see getting nothing in that bookstore with other people ... way too overwhelming. I'd have to come back alone and just "be" for a while.
ReplyDeleteCute kid story. :)
Keera & Gekko: Yeah, and I've got five of them from 15 down to 18 months and another on the way, and ALL of them (except the "on the way" one) have that sophisticated deadpan sense of humor that just shocks the crap out of me and cracks me up now and again when they run it up. I can't image where they use it in their own age groups. Or maybe my sense of humor is a lot more juvenile than I thought. Either way...
ReplyDeleteKeera: Book pr0n - you gotta see the place for the full effect - but if you check their "contact" page (http://www.bookedupac.com/id5.html) there are a couple of more pix that give a bit more of a view (click to enlarge). Worst business website ever. But, as with everything else in Archer City, it just seems to keep on keeping on.
Paula: I first went to the place on a whim when I was out riding my bike. You can see the entire town in roughly 45 minutes, and that includes a 30 minute lunch and stops to get lots of pictures of movie landmarks.
But then I wandered into the bookstore.
Of the four buildings, I found ONE that had any employees in it at all, which were a 30-something woman and her young daughter, and librarian-looking type older woman, and a cat, who apparently actually runs the place.
All the other buildings scattered around town were quiet, and completely unattended, with notes thumbtacked and taped about that told you if you found anything you wanted and couldn't find an employee, to just bring it to Building #1 (across the main square) to buy it.
I didn't leave again till closing time when they finally found me back in the stacks still leathered up and covered in road grit, and told me I had to get out so they could close. Rode home in the dark with one $10.00 purchase...totally worth it.
Oh, I love bookstores like that - getting lost in them except you're not lost, not at all: You are constantly finding and being found.
ReplyDeleteThanks for the link! My keyboard's wet now.
Looks like the bookstore I found in Jackson a few months ago (old mining town). Took a bunch of very similar pictures. Unf. can't say a blog post will come along. (There's just too much material to blog more than a fraction of life.)
ReplyDeleteThere's just too much material to blog more than a fraction of life.
ReplyDeleteYup. But I had a correspondent tell me that this particular story sounded familiar, and asked whether I'd told it before.
Short answer: No, it only happened day before yesterday. May have been thinking of when I Twittered the first time I went in to Archer City on a whim during a bike ride. Don't recall it all, but probably mentioned the bookstore, since that's pretty much what's there.
But it got me thinking - I wonder if anyone actually bothers to re-post blog entries? Your quote above pretty much summarizes the problem with that.
'Course, on the other hand, I've been putting shit up on the internet since Christ was a just a kid - so I figure the odds are that sooner or later, some story or some style or some opinion will be re-upchucked, if it hasn't already.
Maybe I'm gonna be that raggedy ol' fart in everyone's family who tells the same stuff over and over again every time he can get someone to listen to him.
Great. Something else to look forward to.
Tell us the story about the nun, Bill Palmer and the Mother Superior again, Uncle Dust! Tell us! Tell us!
ReplyDelete(liking it cuz it's got a lizard innit)
Hah. You got played by your granddaughter.
ReplyDelete