Safety and rest stop#1.

Ok, we are a little bored after 6 hours of driving. We are at 813. There were some history plaques at the rest stop, so I skimmed them. I have been to the site of the embassy of the Republic of Texas in London,  so I knew Texas had briefly been an independent nation. But I know nothing about it. In a 10 minute stretch break I gathered that it was originally part of the new country of Mexico, which wanted to stop the flow of immigrants into Mexico from the US as well as the flow of slaves into Mexico. Irony, from today's perspective. Then there was a random small incident that resulted in a battle that ended with an independent Texas  for 9 years,  concluding with annexation into the US. I am struck by how contingent many facts of history turn out to be. Texas could as easily have been Mexican as American. Some things are inevitable and would have happened one way or another.  Other things could hardly have happened, and yet they did,  and have such far reaching implications. ...