Last Week in Dallas: Clutches and "Bridesmaids" and Cinco de Mayo, Among Other Things

After a few days catching my breath and catching up with Mom and Granny in Brownwood, it was time to head back to Dallas for the last 5 days of my trip. I headed out early Wednesday. Halfway through the trip, my clutch started getting cranky. My car wouldn't accelerate that well. I hit traffic right as I got into Dallas, and during a stop and go moment under a bridge, I clicked on my lights. 20 minutes later, I was at Dad's house. I forgot about the lights being on. I was worried about the clutch. But mostly, I was hot. So I took a shower, called up Kate and Anna, and made dinner plans. Of course, as soon as I got in my car, it was dead thanks to the lights being left on. Bobby was flying in on Friday night, and we were driving back to Colorado together on Monday. I was pretty certain the clutch wouldn't make the trip, and after repeated tries the battery just wouldn't take a jump. A tow truck and a clutch replacement were in my future. I called Bobby, and he said  he'd do some research to find a mechanic. In the meantime, Kate and Anna came and picked me up and we had dinner as planned. I have to say, it was absolutely perfect timing. I had done all of my Texas running around, I had met up with all of my friends during the first  leg in Dallas, and all that remained for  the trip was a birthday party and a wedding, both of which I could easily get rides for.

We celebrated my clutch going out by eating at Twisted Root Burger Company. They have the best black bean burger I have ever had, plus made from scratch sauces and lots of different fried things on the side- green beans! pickles! And the standard french fries/onion rings. But the best part is their made in house root beer. They always have plain, and then some crazy flavor. I've tried their Irish Cream, Strawberry, and this time I had their Chocolate Peanut Butter. Just trust me, it sounds nasty, but it's so good.

Fun fact- my camera broke that night as well! That's why the pictures are all blurry

You probably shouldn't take me to restaurants...

 During my week jaunting between Austin/San Antonio/Austin/Brownwood, Kate had moved in with Brooke and Chris. I crashed at their house, and Kate let me drive her to work the next morning so that I could meet up with my friend Jess for lunch. Lunch with Jess was great. I wish we had more time to hang out, but she is a busy girl, always traveling, and she is spending the summer working at a breakneck pace so that she can pay for and take 21 hours of college classes to finish up her neuroscience degree. I told her she has to come to Colorado for some snow sports, so hopefully a winter meet up is in our future.

After lunch I headed back to my dead car to give it one more try of a jump before we succumbed to a tow truck.

 The thing is, this car has more than 160,000 miles on it, and clutches (and batteries) are bound to go out. Plus, this was the original clutch, so I'm not holding it against her. I love this car down to its bones, bad clutches and worn out batteries and all.

 Dad tried his best, but it just wasn't happening. I called Bobby in Colorado, and he called a tow truck to come get our lil' 'rolla. I took advantage of the "tow truck should be there in two hours" news by taking a nap on my Dad's back porch. It was beautiful Texas weather, there was a nice breeze, and the loveseat is super comfortable.

After the car was safely on its way I headed back North to Plano to pick up Kate from work. She works as a manager at a nursery, is a master certified horticulturist, and loves her job to bits. I always like seeing her in her natural environment.

Tomato plant aisle, AKA the snack machines for employees

 I had made plans to go out to the Church that night with my friend Daniel, but I just wasn't feeling up for going out. Instead we watched the Biggest Loser, I took some medicine, and crashed out. The next morning he dropped me off at the train station so I could ride the DART home to my Dad's house. On a whim, I decided to get off at the Mockingbird Station exit. I've spent a lot of time there, and one of my first few dates with Bobby was at the Angelika. Since I had time to kill and nowhere to be, I got off for nostalgia's sake. I walked around a bit, got some coffee, and then headed back to the train station. As I walked up the steps, I saw a man in a white tux, a TV camera crew, and about 15 to 20 girls in bridesmaid dresses. I recognized the man- we had gone out on a few dates back in the day, his name was Robert- and he called out "Hey, it's Cortney!" I waved and smiled, and then continued on my way, assuming he was busy and working. As I started  to get on the escalator, he ran around the corner, and told me to come join him for an pre-screening of the movie "Bridesmaids". He was the former host of Good Morning Texas, and he was doing a bit of publicity for it. It was pretty random chance that we would run into each other! I took him up on the offer, and joined him in the Angelika.

 They had to film some segments for the show before the movie, so I watched them give fake toasts...

  and hand out goodie bags. After the camera work was done, we headed into the movie. If you haven't seen it yet, I would highly suggest it. Afterwards I said my goodbyes to Robert, grabbed some lunch, hopped back on the train, and then walked from the station to Dad's house. J-Ben and I had dinner plans, so she came and picked me up and we headed out to Pappasito's. It wasn't until we got there that we realized it was Cinco de Mayo. Perfect.

 J-Ben, reflecting on the day.

Me, worshiping guacamole. Also, my bangs are totally telling the story of how I walked several miles from the train station to my Dad's house in some serious Texas heat. Don't worry, I had the option of showering before we went to dinner. I just picked napping on the back porch again over a shower. Priorities are important.

Bobby's plane landed that night, but he went straight out to his parents house. I spent all day Saturday celebrating Mel's son's first birthday party, and then I spent the evening with Bobby, his parents, and our friend Lindsay. Sunday was Mother's Day, but more importantly, it was Karin and Hermes wedding day! It was beautiful, the food was great, and we had a lot of fun. Lindsay photographed it, and when the pictures are done I'll be posting lots of them here.

Monday morning Bobby and I picked up our car, and then we set off for Colorado. We broke the trip up into two days so that, per usual, we could stop and visit with Great Granny in Kansas- she is perfectly halfway between Texas and Colorado. We came home to a house full of boxes, but I was instantly in love with the new apartment and was so glad to be home that the boxes didn't even matter. After being gone a year I'm so grateful I got to spend such a long time in Texas, and it couldn't have been better timing, with the two birthdays and a wedding. Even with the clutch going out, it was an excellent trip.

Deep in the Heart of Texas We're Keeping Austin Weird

Upon our return from San Antonio, I bid Arielle a temporary goodbye, and settled in for a few days checking out Austin. Now, I've been to Austin on family trips, and on school trips, and I went there when I interviewed for the English teacher job in Japan. I also went there as a delegate to the Democratic State Convention, which was great fun. But I had yet to experience the heart of Austin night life- bar hopping 6th Street. My cousin, Mel, and her family had recently moved to the area, and the trip to Texas was the perfect time to see their new house and let them show me a good time out on the town. But first, Mel and I had a good old fashioned girls' day, catching up, eating Taco Cab, and shopping for unnecessary clothes.

 Sweet, delicious, cheap Tex-Mex. Oh Colorado. You are surely a wasteland when it comes to anything to do with Mexican food. Dear salsa bar at Taco Cab- relocate. I'm tired of making my own.

 We hit up Ross, which is always unintentionally entertaining. Case in point- eww. These jeans should never, ever have been made.

 On the other hand, Mel was able to experience the glory of HD glasses. She took them off and said "I wish I could wear them, always". Damn you, Ross. We DO love it.

 She took me by their favorite local ice cream shop. I was generously allowed to sample whatever I wanted- I hate it when an ice cream shop offers samples but then shames you for taking them up on the offer. My motto is- do not offer unless you are going to come through with a smile. This place delivered.

It is hot in Texas. Ice cream is a necessary food group to protect one's health.

 We stayed up late that night eating chips and salsa, catching up, laughing and talking and making plans for the weekend. The next day Melanie was a blessed angel and allowed me to sleep in until NOON. Oh, glorious noon. We lazed about the rest of the day, and then we headed out to Polvos to meet up with Arielle and her friends. Let me just say, if you have never been to Polvos, go. You won't regret it.

Mel and Josh

On the walk to Polvos we cut through an alley. I noticed the light was great, so we snapped some shots.

Allow me to get sappy here- I'm super lucky to have such a great cousin. I'm grateful that our dads were so close so that we were always around one another growing up. In our family "cousin" isn't too far from "sibling". I wouldn't have it any other way.

Walking up to Polvos after the alley way photo shoot, we were unaware of the epic food that was about to enter our lives.

Our feet are too hipster-licious fo' ya, babe. We were eating cupcakes, too, you just can't see our hands overlapping and holding them in adorable ways like hand models.

We waited patiently outside in an enormous crowd of would-be-patrons. I think I've figured out why I don't have 15 sponsors and 3,000+ followers- I clearly don't have enough pictures of my feet in cute shoes. Internet, I give you not one, not two, but FIVE pairs of waiting shoes! Blog success, here I come!

Everyone but me ordered margaritas while we waited, and our table freed up right as the pitcher came out. The perfection of Polvos was already in motion.

Arielle approves!

All sorts of salsa, all sorts of wonderful. My deep and abiding love for salsa variety continues.

Looking at this picture, I am tearing up a little bit as I realize that I can't go down the street and eat this. Poblano cream sauce should be a regular occurrence in my dinner time experiences. Life is sometimes so unfair.

Once we were all thoroughly stuffed, we parted ways with Arielle for the final time (tears!) and headed downtown. As luck would have it, a high school friend happened to be playing a show, and it ended up being a bit of a Brownwood High School reunion. Kind of random, and neither good nor bad. The show wrapped up, and we struck out to bar and club hop along 6th street.

The following pictures were all taken on my cheap-o LG decidedly NON smart phone. Apologies.

 We started off at the Blue Moon blues bar. An awesome band was playing, there wasn't a cover charge, and people were friendly and happy. +5 points for 6th street already, plus +10 points for the no cover charge. Dallas charges cover for everything, even just to dance. Here, I'm getting great blues in a chill atmosphere with nice friendly locals... for free? With no pressure to buy a drink? Yes, please.

 We went in a few random fun bars I can't remember the names of, and then we hit up this "swanky" club, that was totally empty at 11 p.m. Personally, I love random empty clubs because I don't need to be drunk or in a big group to dance. And you get to play around, as Melanie is illustrating above.

 Random little nooks that made me think that an 80's coke addict would be at home in them lined the walls.

 Upstairs we found a nice dusky dance floor, and the D.J. was excellent. Empty dance floor all to ourselves, with windows overlooking the pedestrian traffic below? You keep racking up the points, 6th street. We left that club and continued on our bar crawl way, and each new stop was enjoyable. They all had no cover, good music, dancing everywhere you went, and there was a refreshing lack of snobby clique-ish ness. For anyone familiar with the snottiness that permeates so much of the nightlife in Dallas, you know what I mean by that.

 We wrapped up the night dancing on the rooftop at the Blind Pig, and around 2 a.m. we headed home. This picture is a great example of the huge difference between Dallas and Austin nightlife. Austin shuts down 6th street and only allows foot traffic. This makes going out a lot safer, and also fosters a block party feel where random strangers are pretty friendly. There was also a surprising lack of drunken fights and cops arresting people. I felt safe, I wasn't heckled, harassed, or pawed at (all things that happen on the regular in clubs in Dallas). I danced with random French dudes who were hilarious, struck up conversations with friendly girls, and danced my ass off everywhere we went. In Dallas, when you go out in Deep Ellum, the traffic and parking are horrible and there are random pockets of deserted warehouses that are the perfect environment in which to get assaulted (that's not an exaggeration, things have gotten hairy for me a few times in downtown Dallas, much as I love it). Even with my many years long history of late night fun in Deep Ellum, I was already converted to Austin after only one night. Good thing cities can't read blogs, or else Dallas might get her feelings hurt...

This random guy jumped in the picture with me.

We found our way back to the car, I DD'd us home, and I crashed out at about 3 a.m. The next morning Mel was sick, so I accompanied Josh to a family picnic in Zilker Park and then headed out to Brownwood. I have to say, Austin won me over. It didn't even feel like I was in Texas, in a good way. 

Of course, the oppressive heat reminded me I was, in fact, in Texas. Driving a few hours to Brownwood at around 2 p.m. in a car without air conditioning was the opposite of enjoyable. I was double fisting water and Gatorade the whole way, because I truly didn't want a heat stroke on the back roads of Texas to be part of my trip re-caps. I arrived at Mom's house covered in sweat, tired, and windblown. But I arrived without a heat stroke! It was really nice to be back in my hometown, hanging with Mom and Granny. After the breakneck pace of the previous week's socializing and late night partying I was more than ready to settle into easy nights on the back porch, eating Mom's delicious food, and watching the horses play in the back yard. 

Oh, and if you ever happen to find yourself in Brownwood, TX, I highly recommend Prima Pasta. I definitely enjoyed some of their Italian take out on the back porch, too.

Texas Girls Part V- The Last Stand at the Alamo

Our first weekend was pretty wall to wall gogo with late nights and early mornings, from Brooke's birthday party to clubbin' it up at the Church and random lunch meetups and afternoon coffee get togethers with friends. Monday we all recovered, and then we headed out for sushi with a big group. I think this picture sums up the day after pretty well...

Love Arielle's face here. I felt that way on this inside, but I'm really good at turning on suck it up smile

Tuesday was more laid back visiting, spending an afternoon on my Dad's back porch drinking coffee and continuing to catch up. We hit the hay early-ish (midnight for me, about 2 a.m. for Arielle) because Wednesday morning we were heading out early to go to Austin for lunch, and then continue on to San Antonio. I have an embarrassing confession to make. I'm a Texas girl, born and raised with the exception of a year in California in the 2nd grade... and I had never seen the Alamo. Or the Riverwalk. I went to San Antonio with a boyfriend when I was 18, but we didn't do any sightseeing, just went straight to his sister's dorms at Our Lady of the Lake. So, yeah, I knew that San Antonio had to be on my "to-do" list during the trip.

Wednesday morning we headed out early, and I made a mercy stop at Denny's. Y'see, Arielle runs a great blog called Foodie Asshole, and she was on a mission to take part in their "Baconalia" promotion. Basically, it was Denny's regular craptastically opposite of delicious food, but they added bacon to it so it was supposed to be special. Do yourself a favor, and pop over to Arielle's review of the experience. It was so bad, she cried a tear.

I just judged, harshly. I think I was also annoyed because we were eating Denny's next to a dumpster at a convenience store off of I-35 in rush hour traffic. We started at the convenience store across the street, but had to leave after we attracted a pack of men who stood at our bumper and stared while we attempted to eat our "food".

Eventually, we both just gave up and trashed the whole lot. Good riddance.











We hit the road towards Austin right as the traffic was clearing up. A short three and a half hours or so later, we were in Pflugerville, having lunch with Mel and her husband Josh. We couldn't stay long, though, because Austin traffic is notorious and we still had an hour and a half to get to San Antonio before rush hour. We were staying with my childhood friend, Sarah, who was also going to show us around town.

 After hanging out at Sarah's house and showering off the result of having no air conditioner in Texas, we headed downtown to a tapas style restaurant Sarah recommended, the Liberty Bar, a restaurant in a restored convent. First of all, I just need to say that I had such terribly negative assumptions about San Antonio. I didn't realize it was a real city, more so even than Dallas. It has a bustling downtown, people were walking and biking, dogs were out with their owners, children toddled on sidewalks in front of their parents during an evening trip around the neighborhood- it was quite charming, really. And this place was incredible. If you're ever in San Antonio, please try it out. You won't be disappointed.

The object of Arielle's affection? Geranium cream. Yes, that's right. It was phenomenal, as was the rest of the food.

 We conned the waiter into taking a group pic. Also, note Arielle's lack of chair in the reflection. That is a skillful photo squat. After picture time we meandered back through downtown checking out where we'd be going the next morning. We all agreed that an early bed time was preferable to going out, so it was back to Sarah's and promptly to sleep on the trusty air mattress.

The next morning Sarah took us to a local bakery called Broadway Daily Bread Bakery- Arielle's review can be found here. They had a huge cutting board filled with samples, and we unabashedly helped  ourselves to a little bit of everything before carb loading our final choices.

 This is my food review of the place. A picture is worth a thousand words, right?

Golly, thank goodness for these instructions, or else I'd NEVER know how to shove money in a slot.

 After breakfast, we sadly parted ways with Sarah. She had a lot to get done before heading back to work, and Arielle and I needed to cram a lot of sightseeing into our afternoon so that we could head back to Austin that night. We headed downtown, found super cheap parking, and set off to revel in our home state's rich and glorious history. Remarkably, the weather was cool and sunny. Perfect for wandering around an unfamiliar downtown.

Putting a female face on history

 So, the Alamo was kind of...ok, I don't want to say "not impressive". It's not that. I'll say... unassuming. I guess I just had this idea in my mind of it being a bit bigger. It was a lot smaller than I thought it would be, and it was also crazy how it's just chillin' in the middle of downtown. It's interesting how the town just crept up around it. Funny story- when I told my Granny I was a bit underwhelmed with the Alamo in person, she said that she had the same experience. After years of living in Texas, apparently she told my late Pop Pop that she was going to finally see the Alamo. They booked an expensive hotel room with an Alamo view. She excitedly planned the trip, they drove down, checked in, and she pulled open the curtains. Silence. Then- "Well, I guess I can finally say I've seen the f***ing Alamo!". Don't worry, they did a real tour and all, despite her initial reaction, haha.

 It's also interesting that this is called the "Museum". It's a gift shop, ya'll. Straight effin' up. Gift shop. However, this was the perfect opportunity to pick up some post cards to send to the lil' nuggets in my life. I snagged a wooden postcard and sent it to three of my favorite kiddos. How rad is a wooden postcard? I would have loved to get something like that as a kid.

 After the Alamo and various downtown wanderings, we moseyed to the Riverwalk. Again, where did my negative expectations come from?! Can I be frank? I assumed the Alamo would be in the middle of a crappy "downtown" consisting of one strip of chain restaurants and tourist shops, with a piddly little dirty river running on the other side. Instead I experienced something that had a distinctly Californian feel to it. The Riverwalk is gorgeous. It was tree lined and breezy, perfectly landscaped, and covered in flowers and cute local restaurants and bars.

 We ended up eating at a place called Boudro's, because my friends had recommended the guac. Apparently, this guac is in one of those "1,000 blah blah blah to blah blah blah before you die" books.

Good, but don't sweat if if you do die before getting a chance to eat it

 After lunch, we rambled back down the Riverwalk, loaded up on Gatorade- aka our internal air conditioners- and once more we were in the car.

 Once more, we were a little punch drunk..

and we played around with the scorpion sucker souvenir I picked up at the Alamo in the museum that was not a museum at all. I was so overtaken with the sheer ridiculousness of the ingredients list- "Watermelon flavor, red number something, Scorpion, something or another, etc."- that I bought it without thinking about the fact thata I'm a vegetarian and thus bugs are off the menu. Anyway. We made it back to Austin safe and sound, which is where Arielle and I took leave of one another. She was off to spend the night at her friend's house, and I was staying with Mel for a girl's night. We would meet up one last time the next night, which would also be my first time going out on 6th Street. Again, this is a shame! How did I not go out on 6th street until I was 28 years old?! But that's a blog post for another time.