Blogs from Austin, Texas, United States, North America - page 20

Welcome to Texas! The first day in Texas was great! We started by going to the Lyndon B Johnson Presidential Library and Museum. It is very infomative about his life, family, and presidency. We toured it for a couple hours. After lunch, we visited the capitol building. They are right.. everything is bigger in Texas! This building was IMMENSE and beautiful. The stone building sits in the middle of a large, grassy park. The dome gleams in the sun and a goddess is perched on the very top of the building, holding a Texas star. Next, we went to the Lady Bird Johnson Wild Flower Center. What a dissappointment! I thought there would be actual FLOWERS there! Nope.. everything was dead. It must be better in the spring, but in the heat of summer, most of ... read more

After the long drive yesterday, that took us into the wee hours of the morning, we decided to sleep-in this morning ! We thought "why not" it's not like we're in a big hurry to get anywhere and I don't think the Wal-Mart police were going to run us off anytime soon. Although the kids, the dog and Mike (Porkchop) were growing a little weary back at home, we assured them that we were on the home-stretch and it wouldn't be much longer. We had sent them some money for groceries a couple of days ago so we knew they weren't gonna go hungry or anything and we thought we had better enjoy what precious little time we had left !! We rolled out of bed sometime around noon and began the daily rituals of bathing, ... read more

Gabe got up early and headed over to do the client work while Rece, Samantha and I got the car packed up. We'd picked up frozen breakfast sandwiches which we microwaved into barely edible form. We giggled a lot when the directions were completely unhelpful. I'd never seen an analog microwave either - it had dials for the time. Those, plus some soy milk, and we were on our way. As I'd claimed "brownie points" for being so understanding about stopping for a work-related event in Austin, the original meaning of "brownie points" was questioned: According to wikipedia, Brownie points are a hypothetical social currency, which can be accrued by doing good deeds or earning favour in the eyes of another. The origin of the term is uncertain. We only had a short drive, about 175 ... read more

We are starting of on Rodney's Retirement Trip. But first things first. Rodney had the forth flat tire in the morning we were going to leave on his new run flat tires in 3 months. The people at Sterling Acura were nice enough to put on new tires and rims so we could leave on our trip. We plan to spend a week in Ruidoso and then head up to Canada via Boise, Salem, and Olympia. In our travels we have visited 45 state capitols and this should add 3 more with Juneau and Honolulu left. We had hoped to get to Juneau but couldn't work the ferry schedules and the distances in Alaska combined with the lack of roads make the task a little daunting so we plan to visit the Nortwest and Canada. Who ... read more

So, first off, my dad is awesome. Now, let me backtrack to clarify. Last year I apparently made some of the fine folk with airport security mad, because somehow, my brand new suitcase ended up before making it to London. Long story short, I had to buy a new one. To avoid the temptation to over pack I bought a slightly smaller case. I didn't realize how much smaller. So, as I stood there this morning debating between bringing a second pair of shoes or my toothbrush with me, my father swooped in, and bought me a larger suitcase. Why? BECAUSE HE KICKS ASS!!!! Speed bump one cleared, should be nothing but smooth sailing from here on out.... read more