We spent last Friday wandering around downtown San Antonio and ended up eating American style Italian food twice.  For lunch, we went to a place that offered free wine with the meal.  We didn’t actually choose the restaurant for that reason.  Actually, we went in there because we were looking at the menu and the proprietor or someone else came out and welcomed us inside.

This cockroach died in a foyer at the Menger Hotel…

The photo to the left shows the paper hats some of the teens were wearing.

I had some pretty good lasagna at that place and a glass of cheap merlot, which was nice because I had just been visited by Aunt Flow and wine is usually helpful in soothing the savage beast.  Bill had some sort of a pasta dish with feta cheese.  After we ate, we went out of the restaurant and were immediately accosted by a scraggly looking street person.  He asked Bill if we needed a guide.  Bill and I have learned not to engage folks that we don’t want to have to disengage from later, so we ignored him.

The guy got very upset and said something along the lines of, “Oh, so you’re just gonna ignore me?  You’re just a fucking white nigger!”

We just kept walking and didn’t react or respond to the guy’s very offensive and racist comment.  Obviously, a reaction was what he wanted from us, otherwise he wouldn’t have dropped the n word.  Maybe what I should have done was whirl around and take his photo, then call 911.  On the other hand, who wants to waste time with someone like that?

On the same street is a glass art gallery called Gallery Vetro!.  I noticed that the gallery was selling a couple of pieces by Stanislaw Borowski.  If you read my post on Polish artists, you have seen photos of Borowski’s art that I purchased at the factory in Bolaslaweic, Poland.  Gallery Vetro! had the gonzo in a different color selling for $900, $600 more than I paid for it at the factory.  They didn’t have the two other pieces I have, but I think it might be time to consider raising our insurance.

Anyway, we went into the gallery and I ended up purchasing new jewelry.  We talked to the proprietor who gave us some interesting insights into San Antonio’s street people and social welfare system.  Apparently, San Antonio has some very progressive programs for people who need help.  The proprietor also told us that after Hurricane Katrina struck in 2005, San Antonio inherited a lot of street folks from New Orleans who are a “different breed” and are a lot more street wise than local street people are.  Wow.

Bill looks in the window as I notice the glass sculpture.  See the yellow gonzo on the right?  I have a blue one just like it.  

This is the jewelry I purchased.  It’s really gorgeous on.  The blue brings out my eyes.  ETA:  I lost one of the earrings.  🙁

I happened to notice this overpriced water right after I tried on my new bling.

I took some photos of the Alamo, though we didn’t go in.  We visited the Alamo last time we were in San Antonio.  I also took shots of the outside of Schilo’s Deli and a Mexican restaurant.

At an Irish pub…    

During the afternoon, we stopped by an Irish pub on the Riverwalk and killed time with a few beers.  Then a little later, we had dinner at an Italian place because I was craving pizza.  We ended up taking it back to the hotel with us, but I didn’t finish it because we had no fridge and I wasn’t wanting to tempt fate.