Gruene Hall

So, what’s happening in Flatonia, TX? Not very much it seems … but I’ll come back to that later.

"NO ONE CAN BEAT OUR MEAT"

Gruene (pronounced “Green”) has been “gently resisting change since 1872”. Gruene Hall (http://www.gruenehall.com/) is the oldest dance hall in Texas – and when I say “dance”, I don’t mean line-dancing (despite popular opinion elsewhere, I haven’t seen anywhere round here where they do that – it’s “swing” dancing, which is much more couple-oriented). Having said that, I’m not sure too much actual dancing goes on these days – it’s more of a venue for country music. George Strait (and if you don’t know who he is, it says more about the lack of diversity in your musical eclecticism than it does about one of country music’s biggest stars) got his start there with the Ace in the Hole band, and numerous other great artists have performed on that stage. If you remember the movie “Michael”, with John Travolta starring as a “fallen angel”, you might recognize the dance hall scene as having been shot there.

Gruene is about 4 hours drive south of Dallas, and this weekend corresponded with “Market Days” – the third weekend every month they host craft and food stalls – so it seemed like a good time to make the trip. Starting straight after breakfast, I drove all the way there without stopping (although on the way through Austin, I followed an interesting truck – the picture is not of the best quality because it was taken through the windscreen at 75mph – I didn’t dare get any closer!), checked into my hotel, and went in search of food.

Rudy's menu

I found Rudy’s – a convenience store/gas station/bar-b-q place. Their motto, on all the employees t-shirts, is “I didn’t claw my way to the top of the food chain … to eat vegetables”. Bar-b-q places are typically very basic, and Rudy’s was no exception: plastic tablecloths, plastic cutlery, simple menu, beer or iced tea, a meal ordered at the counter and eaten on the table on a piece of (supplied) wax paper rather than a plate, and “your mom ain’t here, so clean up after yourself”. I ordered a half-pound of brisket, potato salad and pinto beans, and was more than happy.

Gruene itself was more crowded than I would have liked – as the Eagles have already said: “Call someplace Paradise, kiss it goodbye”. For one thing, it is in the heart of a popular watersports area, so that there is plenty of boating, fishing, swimming and tubing in the Guadalupe or Gruene rivers, as well as surrounding lakes. Almost every convenience store advertises “Beer, Ice, Bait”, and the roads are clogged with participants. If you’re a Brit, you may think of Texas as mostly desert, but this is very far from the truth. Certainly West Texas has a harsher landscape, but most of the rest, except during very dry summer months, can be quite verdant.

Gruene Hall ...

... and the men's room!

I checked out Gruene Hall during the afternoon, when it’s just a regular bar with live music. It has unfinished floor boards, which don’t seem well-suited to a dance floor. There is no air conditioning, but ceiling fans circulate what air there is (yesterday was over 100ºF (38ºC)), and the “windows” have no glass, but rather are screened with fine mesh reinforced with chicken wire, and are battened with wooden boards that can be raised/lowered in hot weather. The roof is corrugated tin, and swathes of foam filled sacking hang from it, presumably to improve the acoustics. Old signs, probably for advertisers long since disappeared, line the walls: the White Comb barber shop, Blue Bonnet Cleaners & Tailors (“we deliver”), Ed Moeller’s Café, and the Purity Bakery. I’m not sure they serve anything except beer – if they do, they probably look at you funny when you ask for it. And it’s not in glasses either: you drink out of the bottle, and when you’re done, you put the empty bottle back into an empty case. Periodically they replace full (of empty bottles) cases with empty ones, take the full ones to recycling (or trash – who knows?) and the circle is complete.

In the evening, the “doors” opened at 8pm, the support band (the Sidehill Gougers, whose lead singer I thought looked incredibly like Lara in real life, though not so much in online photos at http://www.sidehillgougers.com/) started at 9pm, and the main act (Stoney La Rue – no, I haven’t heard of him either) at 10:30pm. The support band were great. The place filled up with people getting steadily more drunk, and who seemed to think it was a better idea to shout loudly enough that they could hold some sort of conversation with the person next to them than to go outside, where they could converse normally. I’d say that it was just me getting old and intolerant, but I think I’ve always been the same – either listen to the music, or go somewhere else and stop interrupting (these are not exactly the same words that were running through my mind, of course). I left before Stoney La Rue came on – the Sidehill Gougers were good enough for me.

Flatonia - the offices of the Flatonia Argus are on the right

Flatonia? Ah, yes … Flatonia. Flatonia is a DQ/DG town (Dairy Queen, Dollar General and a gas station) that doesn’t seem to have a lot going for it. But it does have a local newspaper: the Flatonia Argus. I picked up a copy of Volume 132, number 33 – August 17^th, 2006 from the gas station for 50c, so I’m pretty well up on the significant events in the town this week. The usual masthead, in addition to the name, has Old and New Testament verses for this week. Haley Alexis was born on July 31^st, daughter of Heather Taranowski; the grandparents and great-grandparents are given credit, but there is no mention of a father. But well done, Dr. Ann Trevino, who delivered her. The Two Sisters Café serves “good old-fashioned hamburgers, homemade stew, chili, soup & gumbo”, and, under the classifieds, is looking for “mature help”. For lunch on Wednesday, the local schoolchildren have “Chili Cheese Dogs, Oven Fries, Carrot Sticks with dip, Fruit Cup” – I suppose the carrot sticks are a start, but I think I know what will finish up in the bins out back. Kassi is wished a “Happy Belated 6^th Birthday” by her family (is the fact that the family missed her birthday something they would want to go public with?). 83 year old Ernest Hensel fell off his tractor while hauling a bale of hay, and the back tyres ran over his legs (no! – stop laughing, this could be serious). A “two story (sic) farm house with large living room, 3 bedrooms, 2 full baths, extra room that could be a 4^th bedroom, family sized eat-in kitchen with tons of cabinets, pool, 1 car garage, pool (sic – I think there’s only one), brick bar-b-que” is for sale for $65,000. The 2005 Fair Queen, Beth Johnson, will be relinquishing her title to one of the 2006 hopefuls – there are photos, and, without wishing to be harsh, I think most of them have been entered by their mothers. Certainly, the representative of the Optimist Club has earned her membership. If you want to shop at the nearby Brookshire Brothers supermarket, boneless rump roast is on sale at $1.99 (£1.04) per pound, a six-pack of Corona will cost you $6.49 (£3.42), a 12oz can of Spam is $1.97 (£1.03), and three 12pk Diet Pepsi’s are $10 (£5.26).

And that’s all the news from Flatonia!