Last Day

Nothing much to do after finally cramming everything into my new and bigger bag. Stop 1 was the vintage store. Two pair of Levi's purchased. One too loose, for now stomach, and one pair for after the diet stomach. Annette purchased one more mug from the Texas Uni Co-op store.

Then we headed off to the movies, via many, many road closures and detours, to see Antman. 

Nice big comfy seats with waiter service for pizza , burger and 3 freshly baked cookies. Some of the cookie will be returning to Australia on the sleeve of my sloppy joe.

Why the sloppy joe? It's been around 1 to 5 degrees for the last few days. The day before it was 24. Very strange. For the first time ever I had our parking validated so finally we got free parking. 

A relatively stress free drive to drop off hire car, apart from missing the 2nd floor up ramp and having to leave the airport before returning to get it right.

I'm about to open the BBQ chips, just so that the loose jeans will fit me better. Austin to Dallas leaves in around 90 minutes, then I eat my peanut butter and jelly sandwich (yum yum in sarcasm font), and 2 hours later we will be in the air watching the end of Better Call Saul. 

I hope you all enjoyed the blog as much as we enjoyed doing the stuff to go in it.

Footnote.  I just found this in my bag. God Bless America. 

Bruce Day

What was the reason we came to Texas? In the planning for 7 months. Travel plans by Annette and budgeting by me. Oh, the answer is that we came to see...

Anyway, not much on the itinerary today. An antique store, where no money was spent (insert happy face here). A walk around Austin, some burgers and very good fries. The eternal search for a public toilet. The search through the vintage stores for the perfect pair of Levi's.

Back home to eat left over Franklin BBQ and it was off to the Moody Center. About a 20 minute walk just following everybody else.

As usual, the concert is a solid 3 hours that cannot be beaten by any artist anywhere. U2 went the closest in Chicago. Suzi Quatro, Alice Cooper, or maybe Jeff St John at Cronulla Workers. As Neil Young said "live music is better, bumper stickers should be issued". Promised Land has been stuck in my head. Annette votes for Wrecking Ball, but they are all spectacular. I better save up as I'm sure he will be back in Australia soon.

Somehow during the day we mysteriously found ourselves at Voodoo Doughnut. I'm not the one with gps on their phone. More calories to lose. I wonder why the jeans I tried on didn't fit. 

I did find some cd's to buy but none by Manic Hispanic. I will keep searching. 

The day in reverse. This could be tricky.

23,266 steps at bedtime

Ate a chilli donut before bed. It didn't taste like chilli.

2.5 hours at Pete's Duelling Pianos.

Ate 5 baby carrots and a peanut butter cup for dinner.

Explored some music shops.

Purchased donuts at Voodoo Donuts.

Did a really good tour of The Texas State Capitol. 

Made up a doggy bag of what we couldn't eat.

Ordered 1 pound of ribs, 1 pound of brisket, a jalepeno cheese sausage.

Lined up at Franklin BBQ for 45 minutes.

Lost our car.

Saw lots of murals.

Purchased candy and ate a pickle flavoured saltwater taffy.

Did a River Walk and cursed The Lonely Planet book for its shopping recommendations.

Parked our car in a place we would remember. 

Drove to River Walk.

Ate donuts and cakes left over from yesterday for breakfast. 

Went looking for somewhere to buy milk to have with breakfast but failed.

Walmart or bust

We left a rainy Dallas. Not too rainy but just enough to make the drive through overpasses and underpasses with no time to merge, a bit more stressful. 

Destination 1 was Waco and The Texas Sports Hall of Fame. Americans sure know how to set up their halls and this one was very good.

Now a few days ago, there was an overpriced book in Barnes and Noble. Walmart had it much cheaper so the mission on the way to Austin was to stop in every Walmart on the way. There were lots of Walmarts but not the book. 

Sometime around lunch time, the Interweb led us to a tiny old building that was supposed to be a bakery.

A picture of the almost total haul will follow. (We each demolished a frankfurt in a brioche bun before taking the pic)

$10.50 for the lot.

I was feeling the stress and tiredness of a long drive when we hit Austin City peak hour. I needed the adrenalin rush of more ridiculous merges at pace through heavy traffic. I have finally figured out that the speed limit is only recommended and everybody goes faster. 

We found our accommodation and while Annette attended to her job interview,  I went for a 2km run. Ouch. I haven't weighed myself for 2 years. The ouch tells the story. After the run I explored a bit and found 5 restaurants close by. Mi Madre's was the chosen one. Much food. Very good.

Monday.......

Our battle with parking meters was lost in Fort Worth this morning. Why do they all need apps that we can't download? The parking station was happy to relieve us of money. The City is a sad place where nothing happens. I took 3 photos. 

Then it was off 3 miles down the road to Fort Worth stockyards and free parking. Winner winner! The town had an old western feel about it. We watched the pretend cattle drive consisting of Longhorns who looked tired of doing the same thing everyday. 

Checked out the tourist shops. Failed in my attempt to find the Manic Hispanic cd that I desperately need. Made our way to an antique shop and then hit the accelerator as the Navigator decided she wanted pancakes and taking "no" was not an option. My largely improved driving skills got us there with enough minutes to spare to get a small order of the much needed pancakes.

Back to Dallas and guess where we went? A hunt. It starts with an Antique Shop. From here we drove around the venue trying to suss out parking (Editor's note: for going to a basketball game tonight). The closer to the arena, the higher the cost. We settled for 15 minutes away. We need the steps desperately. 

Back home. Pack bags. Throw frozen chips in oven. Finish off Superbowl wings and off to the game. Kyrie and Luca played. There was an actual wedding at half time and the Mavs D sucks. It was made surprisingly more enjoyable up in the 3rd tier by being able to hear the bounce of the ball and the swoosh of made shots.

Superbowl Sunday

It's a tradition to take this day off so that I can sit on my lounge at home and watch the game but this time it's not on Monday.

Day started with a drive through carless streets. That was some relief from the idiot road design.

We walked through the site of the 1936 World Fair, taking in the Art Deco buildings. For those less knowledgeable than me, Art Deco can be translated to Curvy Bits on Buildings.

We then proceeded to successfully win our battle with a parking meter and made our way to the Sixth Floor Museum. I found it to be very eerie just being at the spot that the whole thing went down (Editor's note: where Lee Harvey Oswald assassinated JFK). As Molly would say "do yourself a favour".

We then headed to the Farmers Markets to try free samples of extremely overpriced jams and chili sauce. Saying that, I did buy one of the said chili sauces as I think the sample tasted nice. I had little feeling in my mouth due to over consumption of hot stuff. 

We had lunch there and headed back to put on new lounge pants and get ready for the game. Annette went for a walk while I looked after the lounge.

(Editor's note: Texans love their murals)

I must say that a 38-35 game should have been entertaining but I'm putting it in my list of worst games ever. Perhaps it's because I hate the Chiefs.

The ads were mostly spectacular,  with the ones for you to seek out being the Breaking Bad Doritos and The Pepsi Zero Sugar with various celebrities e.g. Steve Martin.

Our Aldi Buffalo Wings and Frozen Chips were spectacular. 

Post game, and because I paid good money to stay here, and because my body needed it, I went to the gym. Two miles on the treadmill with the only break coming the 3 times the lights turned off, as they were on motion sensors. 

Did I remember it all? I'm operating on a 24 hour delay so I hope so.