Globe Corner Blogs

Independence Brewing's Pale Ale - photo by Llalan

As soon as I got off the plane in Austin we headed to happy hour at a local Italian restaurant, Sagra. Half-price pizzas and cheap, good beer. Tried a few local brews like an Independence pale ale. Then, the sun still being high in the sky and the heat oppressive, we napped on the couch for a few hours, the two cats curled next to us leaving splotches of fur on our sweaty skin.  Next came the pool where we experimented with synchronized swimming (it’s harder than it looks) and the day ended on the patio of the nearby Dog and Duck Pub. “And this is our life,” my friend smiled. I’m moving to Austin.

I took in a few of Austin’s best-known sites while there: we revisited Barton Springs, ate breakfast tacos, took in the State Capitol, and visited as many outdoor eating establishments as possible. One thing Austin does better than any other city I’ve ever seen is the patio. Specifically the patio bar.

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Raven Map of Texas

I have recently returned from Austin, Texas.  Everyone says the greatest things about Austin, and I have no complaints.  I’m sure it was lovely.  I bet it was spectacular.  Maybe it would’ve been my future home.  I will never know. I went to Austin not to see the city and its sights…I went to dance!!

There I was on stage in front of 2000 lovely people, or so I assumed, but the lights were so bright!  Not too bad right?  There is a catch though, this was the opening night for the world’s largest drum convention called The Percussive Arts Society International Convention. PASIC asked the Berklee West African Drum and Dance Ensemble to perform the first ceremony of the convention.  So as a drummer and dancer, I was in front of 2000 other drummers and I hoped and prayed that we were all on the beat.

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The Oasis at Lake Travis--photo by Llalan

The verdict on Texas: HOT. With lots of nice folks, though! You can’t let that whole “Don’t Mess With Texas” bit fool you. I happened to meet several born ‘n’ bred Texans who not only procured veggie burgers AND sausage for me (reportedly after several confusing trips to the grocery), but even tried it with me!

More importantly they made sure the air conditioning was on extra-high at all times and didn’t roll their eyes when I yelled, “Oh, hothothot!” each and every time we walked outside.

If I have my stereotypes right, though, big trucks and oil derricks in the backyard belong to Houston; Austin is a whole other matter. As the capital of Texas and the home of the US’s largest university, Austin is therefore also the hipster capital of the state.

Even that lone blue spot in the sea of red can’t help but be Texas, though. And by that, I mean big: one-way streets with four lanes (unheard of in New England!), a school with its own zip code…even the statue of Cesar Chavez is twice life size. And now, I’m not a very big person myself — and I never did get myself a good pair of cowboy boots — but I squinted my eyes to the sun, spat in the dust, and tackled Austin and the Hill Country like a drunk guy on a mechanical bull.

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Moon Handbook to Austin, San Antonio, and The Hill Country

In a few days I will be headed down to America’s favorite neighbor to the south: Texas. (Houston and Austin, to be specific.) Ah, Texas; home of cowboys, cowboy boots, cowboy hats, Cowboy Cheerleaders…Shiner Bock…and most importantly, my boyfriend’s family. This will be my first trip to the state and I’m quite excited. And by excited, I mean terrified. I feel like Gulliver about to stumble into Brobdingnag, land of giants: enormous spans of land, monstrous oil thingies, belt buckles the size of my head. I am not sure exactly where this anxiety is stemming from; after all, my boyfriend is Texan and I like him all right… There are just so many stereotypically Texan traditions that are so atypically me — guns and steak being the first to come to mind. Now, I know that no one in his family was going to hold a gun to my head and force me to eat a flank of cow, but my boyfriend’s next revelation shocked me: they were scared of little ol’ meat-free me!

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