A Parlour for a Plague

Oh....it's open.

Here's the view on the mexican side at 6:54 pm today

Not bad at all.
The people who try to sell you stuff have to stay further back from where the last car in the middle of the bridge is. Not sure where the line is, but they stay behind it.
It's how a lot of them make a living. The whole family will be out there. So they obey the rules.

Some vendors are selling fruit drinks and other home made snacks. I've learned as a gringa to not ever drink something unless it's bottled. I don't know if it applies just a few yards over the border, but I'm not gonna risk it.

Ha! Not nearly as bad as I guess I made it out to be.

My routine if I have to stop at the Aduana (or even if I don't if I have up to date paperwork) is to stop at Exit 13 on the American side. That's 13 miles from the border. There I'll gas up, get something to eat and drink for the road, go to the bathroom, etc.

My exit in Austin is 232, so that many miles. I-35 that runs through Austin, slams right into Mexico, the zero mile.
More than 1/2 the time the wait at the Aduana isn't that bad, an hour or 2 total. If you have your paperwork in order you don't even need to stop.

You need that paperwork because about 15 miles in is a check point. You're going from the free zone to the zone where you need a visa to travel. Sometimes you're asked to show your papers, sometimes you're not. But if you're asked and you don't have them, you'll have to go back to the US.

I don't like to stop for anything in Nuevo Laredo to be honest. It's not that safe. You want to cross over in the daylight, and get on the freeway and go.
After you're on the freeway, there's modern service centers at regular intervals.
So, there's enough opportunity to pee. I just don't overindulge in beverages that day.
There's a large complex/service plaza Parador Turístico San Pedro that's almost exactly half way between Nuevo Laredo and San Miguel. So that's my scheduled pit stop to gas up again, and get a snack and pee.

Hope you’re ok Boida.

I'm not at all better. Discouraged.

I hope you start to feel better soon.

Just learned a hard cooked egg hack from TikTok, and it totally worked.

Instead of boiling just put the eggs in the oven at 350F for 27 minutes. Came out perfectly and easy to peel.

I was impressed because these were very fresh eggs, bought just today. As many of you know, if you boil a fresh egg it’s almost impossible to peel.

Just put them in an ice water bath when cooking time is done, as you would when boiling.

I lose so much time and egg when trying to peel, I buy store bought hard boiled
eggs, and they are already peeled to perfection. Works out to about $6.00 per carton, but better than losing all that egg to the process, not to mention the frustration.

we brought 6 doz eggs on our cruise. We are really going through them and its only 4 people.

Are you boiling fresh eggs?

Must be something either special about me or really wrong. I don't have any trouble smoothly peeling off the shells of my boiled eggs.

I have no idea. I shop the supermarket, not the farm.

You're special.

Why thank y..o..u...

Hey, wait a minute, I think you might be aiming to insult me!

No, I mean do you boil the eggs as soon as you buy them, or within the day?

If they're that fresh, they won't peel well.

If I wanted to make egg salad, I'd stop eating from the carton we'd open, and put that aside for 3 or 4 days. Then they weren't hard to peel.

However, these baked eggs?
They were probably laid no more than a day or 2 ago, and the shell peeled right off. That would never happen if I boiled them.

Heh. I just looked up to tell how old the egg is when bought.
It says on the carton there is a number from 1 through 365, indicating what day of the year it was packaged.

The carton I bought on 7/25 had 205 stamped on it, so July 23.

Further, I looked it up, and for an egg to peel easily, it should be at least a week to 10 days old.

That's interesting.

So that's what I've been doing wrong....

Next thing you know, they'll start charging extra for stale eggs.

I have never intended to insult you. I do think it a shame that common usage has 'special' to have such opposite meanings - at least as the word is often used.

ahhhh, rog, he's just teasing you.