There I am, teaching my cousin’s boyfriend, Malcolm, that it is okay to drink the less-manly blended strawberry margarita… as long as you get the extra-macho grande-sized ones. Yup, I am still posting pictures taken on the first of the three days we spent with our relatives, when we took them to historic Old Town San Diego.

There they all are… in the Wells Fargo bank museum. Cousin Lynne is on the left, talking to her mom, cousin Dot. Malcolm is admiring the stagecoach.

As long as they are learning about California history, you might as well too. San Diego is one of the oldest settled parts of the United States… by which I mean it was stolen from the Native Americans a long time ago… by the Spanish… before we stole it from them…

No, Dot, I swear we didn’t steal that coach from the Queen and repaint it…

Hey look… the oldest jail cell in California… that looks like it would be fun when the temperature climbs above 100 degrees…

There is a very nice mural of the first settlement. And this shows an important thing that is hard to explain to visitors to Southern California. San Diego and Los Angeles are located in the desert. I know, you see palm trees and beaches and lawns and parks full of greenery and all kinds of tropical flowers and trees everywhere. But that right there is what it used to look like. Dry. Brown. And then, millions of people moved here… and planted billions of plants… and none of it is sustainable… except for the fact that, because there are more people in this end of the state, so they just voted to build an aqueduct and steal water from the Bay Area and Northern California… which is annoying to me particularly, because I am  Bay Area boy, born and raised, but now I am living in San Diego… and I do like to have a yard and take pictures of flowers… and drink enough water to stay alive…

Another important lesson… never buy tin products that aren’t fancy… This shop was actually very nice, with lots of tin artwork done by real artists… I think I have some pictures that might show up later later.

That just seems so… specific…

So yeah… there is the historic Colorado house, where you could, in the old days, take care of your banking needs…

And there is the old Johnson house… where you could take care of your Johnson needs… oh man… I crack me up… I took those pictures just for that joke… (If you don’t know, Johnson is American slang for… uh… man-parts)…

Old Town San Diego is a little confusing. There are building left from the original Spanish settlement, when San Diego was mostly huge haciendas… (ranches)… and other buildings from after we stole this part of California. And it is sort of a tourist trap. But it is fun and educational, and full of good food and and nice shops, and you really can learn about history.