Chapter 3

So I gave them the sad story of Lone Star Steel and the workless steelworkers, but I left out most of the nasty parts about me and the wives of some of my union brothers.

They ooed and awed in most of the right places, and then laughed about me winning the big TV and trading it to the fat gal for the 22. They said they'd spent an hour or so poking around at the same sale.

"We didn't hang around for the drawing though, we bought a couple of tickets, but we wanted to get on down here," George said.

"Just as well you didn't wait. There wasn't a ticket number called out that didn't have someone to claim the prize," I said.

"That's my usual luck, I guess it ain't changed lately," George said.

After chewing the fat with George and Jane a few minutes more, I walked to the entrance and on inside Wal-Mart to do some shopping. I didn't really need anything, but I thought I'd be polite since they had free parking.

Damned if I didn't spy a real deal right off the bat. They had Ranch Style Beans on sale for two bits a can, with a limit of ten cases per customer. Right next to my favorite beans, they had Wolf Brand Chili without beans for seventy-five cents a can - the limit was five cases per customer on the chili. This flashing blue light special was my favorite recipe, two cans of beans to one can of chili.

No way in hell did I need ten cases of beans and five cases of chili, but they were so cheap I just couldn't stand it. I filled up my buggy and had to get another one, then I filled it up half way. I parked the full one near the front of the store, where the door greeter told me to, and set off to finish filling the other one.

When I passed the cornmeal, I saw they had the old fashioned twenty-five pound cloth bags and it started me thinking about my new cornbread molds, so I grabbed a sack, along with two large cans of baking soda and four boxes of salt. Later I picked up a couple of gallons of milk and five pounds of bacon. I had to get out of there.

On a trip down by the sporting goods isle and then back, I saw something I'd never seen in a Wal-Mart before. This one was selling Zodiac inflatable boats. After a few minutes I figured out it was because of the lakes, rivers, and creeks in the area, but no Zodiac for me, thank you.

After a trip through the checkout line, the door greeter said she'd be glad to watch my stuff while I pulled up to load it. Even I wasn't dumb enough to try pushing two carts all the way to the far side of that humongous parking lot to my truck and camper.

I walked out, got my truck and trailer, and then came up and parked in the no parking zone just like I was supposed to. After loading my stuff I went back and got my same parking spot beside George and Jane. I now had beans and chili stacked everywhere in my tiny kitchen.

I barely had room to heat up a mix of two cans of beans and one of chili, but I got it done and had one of my favorite suppers, washing it down with a Lone Star Long Neck. I finished my evening by cleaning up my kitchen and then I hit the hay.

Right after sunrise the next morning I was up and shaking the dust of Wal-Mart. I found a nice little café with room to park my truck and trailer and went inside to pig out. They had the best biscuits I'd had in a long time and while I stuffed them in I was sorry I hadn't seen any twenty-five pound bags of self-rising flour in Wal-Mart the night before. I kept asking myself why I'd jumped onto the big quantity bandwagon lately, but I never answered.

I finally made it to the Big Thicket's Information Station and roamed it for about half an hour. There were all sorts of passes you could buy, for one day or one week or whatnot. The year round deal wasn't much higher and so I went for it.

I found a camper parking lot place just outside of the main entrance, on land that wasn't officially part of the preserve, and I settled in there, unhooking and leveling my trailer and breaking out my grill. Shit, I hadn't bought any charcoal.

A sack in my truck had about three pounds left and it was enough to cook one steak, I like 'em pretty rare anyway. Before going to bed that night I spent about an hour reading all the pamphlets I'd picked up in the welcome center.

The next day, over in Silsbee in the Wal-Mart there, I picked up four big bags of charcoal and a case of lighter fluid. Of course I didn't need so much lighter fluid, but it was handier to have it in the box. I also picked up more steaks in the grocery part. I knew damned well you could never have too many steaks around.

After I put all of it in my truck I spent the rest of the day driving around looking, and occasionally walking a few of the trails. I worked on the Turkey Creek Unit all day, and all the next one too.

Striking out for the Beech Creek Unit the next day, I liked it even better once I took a look around. Maybe because I wasn't at the central part anymore and there were less people.

They had a few little cookers up on short poles and I dragged out my tent, airbed, and sleeping bag and camped out that night instead of driving back to my trailer. I'd left my new charcoal supply in the trailer, but I scratched up enough squaw wood to heat up a can of chili and some beans, and everything seemed to taste even better cooked on an open fire.

After taking down my tent and deflating my air bed I drove out for breakfast to a little café I'd seen close by. It was in the same building with a gas station and a little store too, and I bought a big bag of charcoal to keep in the truck and then filled up with gas.

I spent all day at this unit, but drove back to my trailer that night. The next morning, I was off to take a look at the Neches River and after an hour or so I knew I was fucked on the Zodiac deal. Resistance was futile, it didn't keep me from trying to resist, but I was a goner and I knew I'd be boating before long.

By noon, me and my truck were headed to the Silsbee Wal-Mart to see if they had the Zodiac boats too. I hadn't even looked when I went to that one the first time.

Lo and behold they had more. I didn't buy the smallest two-person model, but took the next size up, the one they said could carry three. Not even trying to resist an outboard, I picked up a two-horse model that was four-cycle so I wouldn't have to mix oil with the gas.

After that, and barely finding enough space to cram it all in my camper shell, I left Wal-Mart in search of a local sporting goods place. I had to have a couple of rods and reels, but more importantly, I would need plenty of lures, hooks, line, and the like and I knew I couldn't count on one swinging dick in Wal-Mart who would be able to help me get the right stuff.

I hadn't been fishing in years, but I remembered how, basically. Still, I also knew advice from someone who fished around here would be worth any extra I might have to pay for the equipment at their place.

Not two miles from Wal-Mart I found Sam's Bait and Tackle. For three hundred and twenty-six buck Sam fixed me right up. I left with two rods and reels, miles of line, a huge tackle box, and hundreds of hooks and lures. From artificial worms to Tiny Torpedoes, I was ready for fishing.

Sam even sold me a hundred feet of trotline and a fifty-foot, two-inch-mesh net. He assured me the net was not legal in any part of the United States. He also pointed out I would need some real paddles to use in my Zodiac.

"You won't be able to paddle a damned place with those cheap shit aluminum poles with plastic wide parts they call paddles," he said, nearly snarling it, "and you'd be worse off than fucked if that's all you had to whack a gator in the head with when one comes out to see if yer fit ta eat. And I sure hope you didn't buy one of their chicken shit battery powered air pumps expecting it to blow up that rubber boat."