Here's my Tex-ass report.
The short (less detailed/boring?) version is: Pogo! and I spent most of the weekend drinkin' and gettin' it on, with intermittent visits in with Moetown and Trompe. The long version is:
Thursday, February 21 – Got into Dallas around 5pm. Ryan picked me up at the airport and we headed to some place I can't remember the name of (probably because we "forgot" to eat dinner there, which was originally the plan). We were back at his place by, like, 8:30pm or something, purty drunk, and we still managed to only get a couple hours sleep. Dude's a machine.
Friday, February 22 – More fooling around in the morning; the perfect, lovely kinda lazy-swoon-y morning stuff that's just TOO sweet. At some point, we realized we probably should eat something (shuddup! I meant something else! Haha!), so we headed out to this Brazilian Café called, uh… the Brazilian Café, I believe, for coffee and sustenance. We did some errands (Ryan wanted to think of something to do that would be equally exciting as my Memphis car-lot trip with Bamah!), attempted to nap in the late afternoon, and ended up "napping" instead. Good times!
We were fixin' to meet Evan in what seems to be the only cool part o' Dallas called Greenville for 9ish, so Ryan and I headed out first for delish Middle Eastern food, then to the very awesome bar Ev recommended, The Libertine. Very hip place. It seemed like a good idea to smoke out in Evan's car (hot-boxing!), but then I was totally zooed and had to drink water for a bit. (Funny, this is the point where our hottie server stopped calling us "dollface" and "sweetie pie" and such. Wonder why?) But don't worry; we were back on the double-bourbon-on-the-rocks beverages before too long! (And by "we" I mean me.) Then I blacked out pretty much all memory, so I'll leave it to the boys to fill you in.
Like, I don't remember saying good-bye to Evan – and I probably don't know what the last bit of convo was about for that matter – or the drive home, or smoking cigarettes at Ryan's when we got back. (Also good times. Sigh.) What I do know is that it was sheer delight. Those boys are just too awesome.
Saturday, February 23 – We were supposed to board Ryan's dog, Wilco, on Saturday for our trek to Austin, but, despite Ryan's reservation at the kennel, they closed shop early. (I wish my camera had been charged at this point, because this place – Toothacres!! – has the most hilarious pet cemetery ever!! Not sure what that says about the quality of their kennel services, but there you have it.) There were a few moments of panic of the "Can anyone else take Wilco for a night?" and "Are there any pet-friendly hotels in Austin?" variety, but Ryan worked it out with his ex. Yay!
Both of us were exhausted on the drive to Austin and we didn't yet have a place to stay, but it's awesome Austin, so of course we didn't care if we had to stay at someplace shitty like the Super 8 Motel just to sleep. (Said establishment was fully booked, by the way, with frat boys who were having some sort of shirtless lawn chair party in the parking lot. Classy!) We eventually ended up at a Holiday Inn, cleaned up our collective acts, and headed out for a night on the town. Wheeee!
The hotel has a shuttle service to downtown, so we could wisely remain parked for drunken times later. While we waited for some other guests, one of the guys already there told us we "had to" drop by the piano bar at the Driskill Hotel (which was way out of our price range). I was thinking, "right, buddy, the two of us at a cheeseball piano lounge?" But after they dropped us off and we walked around a bit, I decided simply "had to" at least see the lobby of this fancy-pants place. (
http://driskillhotel.com/) Once there, of course, I decided we simply "had to" see the piano bar and it was stunning. So big ups to the bourgeois dude who pointed us in that direction. It was really quite swell-igant. AND they had Tito's vodka (which I love). We basically sunk down into a swish leather sofa, looked up at the long-horn cattle head mounted on the wall above the fireplace and drank it all in. And by that I mean we drank.
Reckoned we oughta get some food into our drunked-up selves before meeting Trey and Mari, and stumbled into a really great Cuban place. Delish! Once semi-sobered up (ha!), we headed out to the Creekside Lounge…but it was too packed, so the four of us headed to even cooler digs, the Sidebar. Or Sidecar. Something to do with "sides." Pool tables, awesome music, loungin' couches, a huge patio, and just the right amount of dim lighting. And Tito's. Duh. Had a great convo with Trey and with Mari – they are just so sweet, y'all, and fun and funny. And, yep, we got drunker with 'em.
Ryan and I continued drunkenly on to find a cab and some dude offered us a free share of his. (He looked like a right bruiser, this one, but he was very kind. I love me some Texans!) More fun times back at the hotel, natch.
Sunday, February 24 – very hungover, natch. We climbed out of bed barely in time for check-out, and headed over to the only other part of Austin I knew (from the October trip), South Congress. Re-visited the Italian coffee shop Sue and I had been to; ditto the way cool curio shop, Uncommon Objects, then poked around the lobby and courtyard of the stunning Hotel San Jose (where, once again, they were fully booked, but where we'd originally hoped to stay – check 'em out at
http://www.sanjosehotel.com/). Did I mention it was 80 degrees, all the patios were packed, and I was wearing short sleeves? In February! A-mazing day. We had a great lunch at Guero's Taco Bar, and then pretty much headed back Dallas way… another three hours of exhaustion. Wheeeee!
Again, needed to chillax and clean up a little, but then we went out for drinks and food (and the Oscars on telly…not that we actually watched) at the first place Ryan and I met: the Flying Saucer Bar. Are we "romantic" or what?
Early-ish night (for once), as I was flying out the next day…
Monday, February 25 – What to say? It was so hard to leave. I'd had such a great time getting to know Ryan even better (not to mention all the "napping" we got done), that it was just too sad saying goodbye. Off to the airport, back to reality…
The end.
Author
