.: angilou and tucker too :.

cold front

well, i think this is it: the first official cold front in texas.  i say first official, because all the other cold fronts only lasted 2 days, then we were back to the darn warm, sunny weather.  this time, we should be cool for at least a week!  here's cal all bundled up for school:

whining

i admit, my favorite thing to complain about in austin is the weather. i know, i should be happy to have 85 degree days in mid-november, but it's wrong, just plain wrong! i would love to have this weather in the summer, possibly late spring, or early fall, but people, it's mid november!!!! i need some cool brisk air to go with my crunchy leaves.

let me try to end this post on a positive note. i am WAAYYY overdue for some cal pictures, so here's a couple cuties from a recent park outing:

yee haw! another crazy texas weekend

my goodness, where to start?  i kinda over-committed myself this weekend.  it all started on friday, when i had arranged to meet a new mom for lunch.  then, friday night, we had our first official neighborhood-teenager-babysitting event.  we've always left cal with his grammy, or sometimes during the day for a couple of hours with a "professional" babysitter.  we decided it was time to take the plunge and try someone totally new.  our neighbors across the street have three girls, the oldest being a sweet twelve year old named meg.

night watch

so today's high is forecasted for 105.  i think we hit 107 yesterday.  supposedly, a cold front is hitting tonight that is going to drop us twenty degrees to a chilly 82 degrees.  shirley and i are thinking of having some kind of nighttime vigil to welcome the cold front.

i'm melting, i'm melting!

105 degrees today!!!!!  at the end of september!!!!!!!!!!  it's inhumane.

rita

so, people started to panic around wednesday afternoon, and it rose to a cresesendo on thursday. i think wednesday afternoon, josh went to the supermarket, and all the carts were being used and the shelves were picked clean - no milk, no bread. tucker went on thursday and said it was a madhouse - he saw some old lady buying 4 gallons of milk for her little old self. tucker and i looked at each other in puzzlement. i mean, austin is about 3 hours away from the coast, so we wouldn't be surprised if we got a hard storm, but people were going crazy - you'd think we were in houston or something.

by thursday, the storm had already turned a little eastward, so we were even less concerned, although shirley went out and bought 25 gallons of water anyway. i-35 was packed for as far as we could see.

friday people in boston were asking me "are you ok down there?" and i told them that i didn't think it was going to be that big a deal. in fact, as early as thursday, tucker predicted that we wouldn't even get any rain.

so, now it's saturday and it's warm and sunny outside, and thanks to rita, there is a nice breeze blowing. the forecast is warm and windy, with a 20-30% chance of rain.

longhorn season opener

so, josh got appendicitis and had to have surgery on friday night. his situation, while sad, had an unexpected winfall for us: two free tickets and passes to the end zone club. this was to be only my second football game, and my first with tucker, so we were both psyched. we live pretty close to the stadium, so before game time we had a leisurely bike ride down to the game, bypassing all the gridlocked traffic.

ut football is a big deal for tucker, esp since they are ranked number two in the nation this year. he and josh basically grew up watching the longhorns and are big fans. the end zone club was a little bit of a letdown. i don't know what i was expecting, but it was basically a big tent with better concessions, alcohol, and some big screen tv's scattered about. for people who aren't tailgating, it's a nice pre-game excursion and a last chance for booze, since they don't serve alochol inside the stadium. tucker came across this nice little invention, the sippin' seat, which could circumvent that. the stadium was packed and longhorn fever was rampant.

i pigged out on fried catfish, fries, a pina colada and a corn dog, so by the second half, i was hurting for an alka seltzer. the game turned out to be a rout, and we got ready to leave after texas hit the 50 pt mark. i told tucker to keep looking back to make sure i hadn't stopped to throw up. fortunately i made it home without incident. all in all, it was an awesome time.

hyde park home tour

so, this weekend was the hyde park home tour, an annual even that lets people tour homes in this historic neighborhood. i know someone on the committee and she convinced me to volunteer and be a docent, which means you tell people about the house and make sure they don't take anything. it was a lot of fun and the house i was in, #3, was very cool.

on sunday, tucker and i went on the home tour ourselves and got to see a bunch of really neat homes. he said it was inspriational, because it gives you so many ideas about what you can do with your own place. my favorite was this awesome screened porch that one house had added on - it was so wonderful. cal was great. he was in the sling for about an hour, took a nap through half of it and spent the rest of it just alertly watching.

breedlove reunion

ok, so last night was the broadcast live on klbj and the crowd was crazy! i went with amber, who is josh's wife, who is the bass player. she used to go to all the shows with the "breedlove dancers", a group of girls who would stand and dance in front of the stage, but she said they all moved out of state!

we get there and dan dyer played, followed by tyrone vaughn. the crowd was already started to get rowdy and kept yelling for "breedlove!" amber and i were off to the side, and could see that there were a group of women already in front and groovin to dan and tyrone's set. josh comes over and she tells him that she'll be moving to stand right in front of him when breedlove starts. i tell her that will be impressive because it's pretty packed already, but amber is a focused woman.

so, the sets change and the people ebb and flow and i manage to get a place in the front row, near tyrone. breedlove starts to play and the crowd goes nuts. the women are downright insane. there was this one woman near amber who kept trying to jump up on the stage and would almost fall on top of the band members. i catch a glimpse of amber; she's got her spot in front of her hubby. :-) the crowd is totally into the band, cheering and singing along to so many of the songs.

it was my first time hearing them, and i think i was the only person in the front row who wasn't singing along and rocking out. i think some people noticed and deemed me not worthy of a front row spot, and started to try to edge me out. one woman to the left of me kept pressing up against me and rubbing her boobs against me, possibly hoping that i would get grossed out and move over. i wanted to turn to her and say, "lady, i'm breastfeeding right now so i could care less if your breasts are touching me. in fact, i may just whip one of mine out." another tactic breast lady tried was to scream REALLY LOUDLY directly into my ear. fortunately, i was already deaf from standing in front of the speaker, so her screaming was to no avail.

after i took my pics, i decided to head back and see how tucker was doing. the crowd was fascinating. by far the most interesting were the rabid female fans, but there was so many different kinds of people there, they provided a never ending source of people watching. and by different kinds of people, i mean different kinds of white people. there was a sprinkling of color there, but it was pre-dominantly white. i saw older women who were singing every word; middle-aged men who had their "rock on" fists thrust into the air, pumping it in time to the music; lesbians who held each other as they swayed to the beat; a preppy couple, complete with pressed ralph lauren polo and khakis who daintily held their drinks; and so on. cuh-razy.

and it's all going to happen again tonight! here's some pics from friday night:

thundercloud month

so, there's this local sub chain here called thundercould subs. they are like a hippy version of subway - strong local flavor, laid back, et.c this month they are celebrating their 30th anniversary. so for every day this month, they are offering one sub at the original price when the sub was added to the menu. so, today, i had a large bologna sub for $1.25 - it was great! i think so far this month i've been to thundercloud six times, and i fully intend on milking this 30th anniversary thing to the hilt.

what i find interesting is that when i go, i would think everyone would be getting the anniversary special, but a lot of people order their own thing. i think of all the times i've been in line, i've only heard one or two people order the special. i think they're dumb not to take advantage of it...but then again, i am a cheapskate.