SPRING BREAK - SOUTH PADRE ISLAND

This post has nothing to do with food.  It has only to do with my state of total shock because I've never been ON South Padre Island during "Texas Week" of Spring Break.  The first year we lived down here we went to Arizona to see the hubby and go to the Grand Canyon.  The next year, I had pneumonia and didn't leave the house except to go to the doctor...I mean nurse practitioner (we don't often have doctors)... in Port Isabel.  This year, I needed to make deliveries of baked goods to Paragraphs on the North end of the island and attend two of their events...I must have looked like a yayhoo with my mouth gaping open.  I left Paragraphs at 5:35 and it took me until 6:00 to get to the bridge (less than 2 miles I estimate).  I saw more young people with less clothing than I've ever seen except during my wild teen-age days at Hippie Hollow on Lake Travis in the 1970s....back in those days thongs were what we called flip flops and we just went topless sunbathed with our tops off (laying on our stomachs of course)...nothing was shoved up the crack of our behinees.  (I can see my adult children going "NOOOO Mom, I do not want to know that kind of stuff about you!!!)

I can't believe these "children" "teen-agers" "young adults" would walk down Padre Blvd barefoot <ouch>, in bikinis (and that is a stretch to call some of them bikinis...several barely-there-thongs), carrying or dragging ice chests, boys and girls stacked and packed in the back of pick up trucks, mardi gras beads hanging around everyone's necks, flags flying from the truck beds and SUV windows.  I was next to a truck that was toting quite the extravagant beer bong...it looked like an octopus.  Boys were whooping and hollering and blowing these loud horns that sounded like conch shells...whoa.  I needed ibuprofen (OK - another sign of aging).  They were headed north...and I think they were pouring out of Coca Cola Beach at Isla Grand.  WOW...what an experience.  If you don't believe me - check out the live web cams courtesy of South Padre Live Cams.  Right now, as I type this, all is quiet...but check in around 2 or 3 in the afternoon.  Holy smokes!

It normally takes me slightly less than 20 minutes from my door on the mainland to Paragraphs book store.  Today it took me nearly an hour...you had to drive really slow because some crazy kid would dash out in front of you...people were gawking...dudes were posing...honking at girls...oh my!!!  That was nothing compared to the trip home though...as described above.

I am officially old.  Thank you very much.  I even had my camera...but was afraid to drive and take photos for fear of crashing into the person in front of me...or being considered a pervert.

That said...only one girl appeared sloppy drunk as she nearly dashed into traffic and was restrained by her friends...mostly they all looked happy and, well, like Spring Breakers...and I only saw two ambulances...and about 25 police/constable/sheriff/DPS cars swarming the island and Port Isabel...and two wrecks...both totally avoidable.  Whew...glad to be safely home.  And to think...I have to go back there on Wednesday.  Wonder if I'll see Snoop Dogg or his posse hanging out?  Hell, probably not :-)  I'm embarrassed to say I watched his reality t.v. show for awhile when I lived in Austin.  I'd stop and couldn't look away...kind of like those wrecks I saw today.  They are really setting up quite the stage for this event...whew...Spring Break at SPI...like everything in Texas...it's bigger and badder!

OK - that's my blog post for today.  I'm in old lady culture shock.  Sheesh, I'm not even that old...but that entire episode made me feel ancient.

Ciao for now!