Cover Up

What, a tent for the car? That's right: covered parking here is like the equivalent of your own free parking space in Cambridge or Boston (except a zillion times easier to come by).

Sad Cactus

This is one sad little cactus. I guess some of them don't like the "winter" in Austin.

Mural

Pretty cool mural on a building. The yellow & red parts are all just painted on.

Devil Tree

Apparently there's this tree called the Mountain Cedar that lives in Central Texas & parts of Oklahoma. Sounds nice, eh? Pleasant name and all. Yeah, well, chlamydia sounds pleasant too and from what I understand, it sure isn't. Same with these trees. And their damn Cedar or Juniper Pollen.

Allergies, you think, not so bad. Lemme tell you, friend, you are WRONG.

If you zoomed up real close on grains of this Cedar Pollen, you'd see each one has a pair of devil horns.



So although it may be in the 60s & 70s and sunny down here (and for the next 10 days, which as long as the forecast shows), it is also slightly hell-ish. Well, unless you don't enjoy breathing normally.

PS: I also caught some sort of virus. I am a WINNER this week.

Inauguration Day '09

Figured this would be appropriate for today, inauguration day.

(it's the Texas flag, for all y'all who needed that pointed out to you)

Cars for Jesus

I doubt you can read the marker writing on this car cover but it says "This car belongs to our Lord Jesus Christ".

In 4 places.

Ain't Kinky

This amused me.

Starr

So the other day the baby & I were out for a wandering walk in a very residential neighborhood when I saw this sign:






What?! I turned the baby's stroller so she could look in too.

And this is what we saw: I think it's a pig but since it wouldn't turn around, it was hard to tell. We'll go back & I'll get a better photo.

Mailbox

Check out this random mailbox!!

House #8, perhaps? Awesome.

Local Spoken Here

I nanny over in the SoCo area now & bring my camera on some of the walks that the baby I and I go on... SoCo is the "real" Austin, the heart of the "Keep Austin Weird" world. It is pretty awesome: little independent stores, hippies, crazy liberals, houses in vibrant colors... so there should be some decent photos coming!

Readjusting & Caffeine

Little Things I Have to Re-adjust to After 1 Month in the North:

1. Driving nicer, not like a Bostonian.
2. Speaking of driving, making sure to not parallel park too close to other cars.
   
3. Friendly strangers.
4. Friendly strangers who carry on long conversations with me.
5. Saying excuse me when passing someone in a store aisle.
6. My use of the word "wicked".
7. Only sorority girls carry Vera Bradley bags.
8. How much the temperature changes throughout the day.
9. To hold the handle down for a long time to get our toilet to flush normally.
10. The frequency of hearing Spanish spoken.
11. The sun!
12. Frustratingly sparse NPR coverage (5-9am, 5-8pm).
13. Lack of sidewalks on side roads (not cool when you're taking a baby for a walk).
    
14. Damn speedbumps!
15. The intense amount of burnt orange everywhere.

Back in ATXion

Despite an unexpected morning snow, a delay in Boston and a run through Atlanta's airport, I made it to Austin last night.

Austin. Where flowers are blooming in January despite it being in the 30s-50s today.

FYI

I'll be leaving the Yankee North next Monday... back to the Scary South it is...

Fiesta

Hook 'em