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Dallas or Austin?

Last night, I was sitting here thinking about which Texas city I’d like to explore over a weekend.  I am really not very familiar at all with Texas and am not sure how I like living here.  So I asked my Facebook friends if I should visit Austin or Dallas (and one person suggested Houston).  Overwhelmingly, the vote was for Austin.  Bill and I did visit Austin over the summer, but we didn’t really do anything there.  We just drove around and looked at the place… it was too hot and sultry to get out and find what makes the city so popular.

Austin is not at all far from San Antonio.  Dallas, on the other hand, is a bit of a hike.  One of my friends described Dallas as “high falutin'”… kind of a junior league sort of place.  It sounds like it doesn’t have a lot of character, yet a lot of people live there because there are jobs there and that’s where the Cowboys have a big stadium.

Bill went to high school in Houston and that’s where he met his horrible ex wife.  He says it’s a big, booming city… hot and humid in the summer.  I have never really been there, though I have driven through it as we made our way to San Antonio.  I imagine we will get there at some point, since Bill has family there… so do I, now that I think about it.

So anyway, Austin is probably more my kind of place than Dallas is.  It has many brewpubs, great restaurants, music venues, and weird people.  I can get onboard with any city with the slogan “Keep Austin Weird”.  Maybe we’ll get there soon for a much needed break from San Antonio.  I am in need of some travel so I’ll have something new to write about.

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San Antonio part 4

We spent July 6th on a road trip to Austin.  I had never been to Austin before and had heard it was a really neat place.  We got there, taking a brief detour through New Braunfels, which I had also heard was a pretty cool place.  We opted not to stop in New Braunfels, though the downtown area was pretty charming.  We also opted not to stop in Austin because it was really hot outside and the downtown area looked a little dead.

I was also feeling cranky because Aunt Flow was in full force.  Little did I know that two days after we took a driving tour of Austin, JimBoob and Michelle Duggar would be in town making speeches about “baby holocausts” and declared that any politician that wasn’t pro-life should be replaced with those who are.  They were probably in or around Austin as Bill and I drove through there.  I’m not a fan of abortion and highly doubt I would ever want or need one, but I do think it should be safe and legal.

Anyway, I managed to get a few shots of Austin from the car.  Then we stopped at Chili’s for lunch.  We would have and really should have found a better place to eat, but I really needed a bathroom and was feeling extremely crabby due to plunging blood sugar.  After fortifying myself with Southwest Egg Rolls and a Diet Coke, we were back on our way to San Antonio.  We visited my husband’s mom again and had a nice time chatting and hanging out with the cats.

Austin skyline…

Texas statehouse

Margaritas with MIL

Two of the three kitties who visited with us

Good shot!

The next day was Bill’s birthday.  I already wrote about the crappy bar experience we had.  Before that, however, Mother-in-law took us out to brunch at Tre Trattoria, in downtown San Antonio.  We had a really nice meal and some very creatively prepared mimosas.

A horse and buggy outside the window…

I had duck confit with an egg on top…

Bill had a big meatball…

Mother-in-law had eggs with pesto…

 

We really enjoyed this restaurant and would eat there again.  After our shitty bar incident, we went to the Menger Bar and celebrated Bill’s birthday properly.

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