Dear Mr. Ramirez,

I enjoyed your article on making prickly pear jelly. My parents and I have harvested this wonderful fruit and made jelly for years. One improvement we have made to the process over the years is to use a hand-held propane or Mapp gas torch to very quickly go over the pear to burn off the invisible but devilishly painful stickers. This burns the stickers off so quickly it hardly even warms the fruit, but it makes all the difference in enjoying the jelly-making experience.
Thank you for all your wonderful information.

Dr. Rebecca Thomas
Odessa, Texas

To the Editor:

By this means I would like to express my gratitude to Henry Cuellar, former state representative, for helping to create the Tax Free Weekend for our community. This is a great opportunity for parents to save money.
My hunt for tax-free bargains began at 10:00 Saturday morning when I decided to get up and start shopping. Laredo stores were bursting with shoppers, all taking advantage of this tax-break holiday. I think people are getting so used to this holiday that they now are beginning to plan for it.
Having this tax-free weekend enables parents and college students to save money on the back to school year. Parents who have a big family are able to buy more things for their children and at the same time save while purchasing more for their needs.
By having this tax break, I was able to save over $40 that would have otherwise only been used to pay taxes. I hope that everyone was able to take the advantage of this holiday. Now those $40 will be put to good use. In today's economy this is a good incentive to stretch our budgets and spend just a little bit more. Thank you, Henry!

Sincerely,
Cynthia Y. Gutierrez

To the Editor:

My compliments to Robert Mendoza on an EXCELLENT article on the Plan de San Diego. Very well written and researched, with an excellent tone throughout. That article is quite a resource.

Chito Vela
Austin