One of the best kept local secrets about coffee is Nuevo Laredo's Bola de Oro, where six bucks gets you a kilo of stout Mexican coffee, whole bean or ground to your specs. The shop, a decades- old fixture on the downtown business-scape, is located behind the Mercado on the corner on the way to the Fruteria Gonzalez.
Long lines of fellow travelers notwithstanding, the chore of paperwork completion for road travel into Mexico has for some time now no longer been a nightmare. It has become a rather easy process if you have your own documents in order. There are immigration employees walking the floor to answer questions about forms and in which line to stand. The MC has found that a one-year vehicular permiso, though seemingly costly, saves plenty of time for travel into the interior.
We sure appreciated the ease with which a defective broken axe was replaced at Lowe's, no questions asked. The MC found excellent advice in the plumbing department and quick service on key duplication.
Is it just the MC's imagination or are some long lines at local grocery stores being exacerbated by slot machine winners redeeming their winnings in $5 increments for grocery purchases? What a sad footnote to already paltry and slow moving service at nearly every grocery store in town, most of which are owned by the same chain that has yet to put customer service on its priority list.
If you have not yet, do take advantage of the close-out savings on floor models at Metex, which is undergoing remodeling and other storewide changes.
Despite the Christmas rush, good service at Joe Brand remained a constant
Way to go, Best Buy, for that excellent, expeditious routing of Christmas traffic that made things so much easier for shoppers.
Dinner at the Hamilton Café was exquisite, really well-prepared and very prettily presented and tasty, but leaving there smelling like an ashtray wasn't the MC's idea of a night out on the town, and what a shame because it is a neat setting for conversation.
Chavarria's Plumbing took care of a long-distance out of the city plumbing dilemma in the blink of an eye, basically fixing the bad plumbing practices of another contractor.
Grande Ford in San Antonio offers excellent light truck service, and there's always a follow-up call to ask if the customer got the service expected.