6.17.12 Swimming in Sunshine pt1

 Angela and Xander invited me to go to Wimberley with them today.  She wanted to take me to Blue Hole. Since I am always up for a watering hole excursion I gladly agreed that it would be a great way to spend a Sunday morning. I headed out to Angela's a little later than usual today. It took us around 40 minutes or so from her house to get there. Wimberly is a cute little touristy town that reminds me of the mountain towns in Colorado. Lots of antique places and cutsy shops. And lots of water. I keep kicking myself that I never visited these places before. I always knew there were places like the Guadalupe and the Comal rivers but I didn't really realize how many awesome water spots there are in the hill country. We got a little lost but soon were back on track. We arrived after they opened and were able to find a nice spot in the shade to lay out our stuff. Blue Hole in Wimberly is an interesting place. It reminded me of a painting. On one side there are small rocky cliffs with a valley of green grass and then on the other side there is the Blanco River with large cypress trees and rope swings. There were already plenty of people there sprinkled along the grounds. It was like a secret place. Dads were sharing rope swing time with their kids.

 

Xander immediately wanted to get on a rope swing and he did pretty good. I personally was having a hard time with the rope swing. I wanted to jump then swing but it didn't allow enough time for me to pick my feet up. I was starting to figure it out toward the end of the day. I always liked the idea of the rope swing but was never a fan of doing it because I always chickened out. But back in the day you had to climb a slippery tree to a rope that barely looked like it could hold you, and you had to make sure you cleared the rocks first. Here there is a dock and the rope swing that consists of a chain that has a hoop to hold on to at the end. We played around for a while on the swings and then took a break. We jumped in a couple more times and then took off for home. When I got to the house my little sister was still over and she wanted to take Isaac to Deep Eddy. I figured what the heck...two swimming holes in one day works for me.

6.16.12 My Soap Box

I am a server at a local restaurant in Texas and I work for $2.13/hr +tips. Yes that is right $2.13 an hour. When I lived in Texas in the early 90's and waitressed I made $2.13/hr. For some reason, and I am sure I could look it up on the internet, restaurant owners in the state of Texas do not have to pay more than that.
So hey I get tips right? Well on a good night that all works out and is worth it (as long as everyone I wait on is happy) but say I only make $30 on a slow night(and there are slow nights.) So for 6 hours I might actually make minimum wage.
BUT THIS IS NOT THE PROBLEM**************


Edited:I recently reread what I wrote about a situation that happened to me at the restaurant. I was upset when I wrote it and have decided to retract it. Luckily it never was posted.


But just a heads up***************

Please remember that you don't have to be mean to get your way.When you are at a restaurant even if you get bad service you do not have to be mean. You can voice your concerns to the server or a manager, or don't leave a tip (because believe me-leaving no tip at all screams to the server that you thought the service sucked) but please just don't be mean.

6.11.12 What was lost is found

Today was errand - get things done day. I had ordered some new seat covers for the Jeep because the ones on it were falling apart. The new covers had been sitting in a box in the foyer for 2 weeks so I decided I should probably put them on. It was already hot but I went out and got to work on it.
Last August I was going kayaking at the Texas Rowing Center for the first time with HCO and I had my back pack full of electronic stuff for video and such. I decided that there was no need for me to take everything with me so I took my ipod Touch out of the bag and I thought I had put it under the passenger seat of the Jeep. I was late and in a hurry so the details get a little confused. I ended up not taking my bag with me. I left it at the counter because the kayaks were the open kind and I didn't want everything to get wet. When I got back it was late and I looked for the ipod Touch and couldn't find it anywhere. I decided it had been stolen. My alarm had not been working at the time. It was very disappointing because it was an expensive little piece of technology. The next day I looked all through out the Jeep and couldn't find it anywhere (there are really not that many hiding places in there). I went online to try and locate it but that doesn't work if it isn't turned on. So I sent a kill order out on it so that if I had anything important on it no one could steal it.
Back to today....As I took the old seat cover off the driver side seat- I found the ipod Touch hidden in the really tight space between the driver seat and the console. I guess since I thought I had put it on the passenger side I must not have looked too hard on the drivers side. I finished with the seat covers and took the Touch back in to the house. The case it was in was dirty but it appeared to be ok otherwise. I called Apple to see if there was anyway to get rid of the kill order on my Touch but they weren't very helpful. Basically the answer is no. I charged it up and was able to see what was there previously but as soon as I hooked it up to the computer it wiped the whole thing clean. I only lost some pictures that I would have like to have kept.
I also headed back to the school with all of my paperwork for residency.When I got there I was told that it looked good but since I didn't move here til the 20th that I needed to bring it back. She double checked to make sure I hadn't lost my classes and I was sent on my way again. Ugh!

6.10.12 Promethius SPOILER ALERT

It is getting hot here in Texas! Kyleigh and I went to swim for a little bit in Lake Pfluggerville and then off to the dog park. On our way home we stopped by Kawaii snocone place. I got Ky some ice cream and me a Maui-Wowie sno cone. I was impressed with the ice cream-it was really good. Kyleigh enjoyed it too. The Maui-Wowie was very good as well and fruity. I dropped Ky off at the house and headed south to Angelas's so we could go see Prometheus at the Alamo Draft House on Slaughter.
We got to the theater and had to stand in line for a while. The guy in front of us kept adding people and sort of pushing us into the people behind us. For those who don't know, Alamo Draft house is a theater that is set up so that you can also have dinner in it if you like. We got to our seats and sat in some comfy chairs. Angela wasn't too hungry but I hadn't eaten so although it took me a while to decide on something I finally ordered a meat pizza. Soon the movie started and we were off on a sci-fi adventure.

Prometheus is a prequel to the Alien movies. It went back to the old style of being scared at the implied instead of the gross and disgusting. A couple of scientists discover in many cave paintings dated during all different periods in Earth's history a common drawing that leads them to believe that they have found the creators of Earth and the human race. So they take off in a spaceship with other scientists, a human robot and a greedy corporation that funded the whole thing. They find (relatively easily) where these creators our from and proceed to check out their "home."  They find that these "creators" were actually preparing to destroy Earth when something went wrong.
It was a good movie with amazing graphics and effects.
Halfway through I ordered chocolate chip cookies (Unfortunately they came 3 to an order) that were warm and delicious.
After the movie we went to 400 Rabbits which is the bar inside the theater and we sat outside, had a drink and discussed the movie.  I had three issues with the movie ***SPOILER***********

I believe in the suspension of belief in a movie especially when that movie is fantasy/sci-fi BUT there are still some rules even in make believe that have to be followed for something to be believable. 1) As the doctor was running and running at the end to the pod her suit kept telling her she was out of air and she barely makes it to the pod in time....ok that is fine but then she encounters problems inside and has to leave again. She doesn't switch suits she just throws back on the helmet and takes off again and is outside even longer. I have been told that maybe she grabbed a different helmet and maybe that is where the air was held. I think this is a bit of a stretch because most life support systems are held in the suit but ok. (This also predates the other Alien movies so it is closer to time when technology wasn't as advanced) Next after she is sliced open and the alien is taken out the machine staples her up and she is on her way running all over the place. Yes she had some issue with it but the women I have talked to that have had caesarians have basically said you can't really move much for a week or two after your abdominal muscles are cut. This is the one I had the most trouble with. But once again I was told futuristic machine-maybe it healed her. If it was so futuristic, why the staples? I would have believed it more if a laser light had healed it up. And lastly, at the very end when she goes back for David, She is in a dune buggy thing and she travels in the alien ship but when she is leaving she is repelling down the outside of the ship and her transportation is sitting outside. I guess this could have been an original one that was left there when they first got there but  it was a little strange.


Other than that I liked how the movie flowed and it worked for me.    

6.9.12 Boys of Summer Tour pt2

We found our seats easy enough. There was a mother and daughter on my side. The mom reminded me of my friend Kathy. They were really nice. There was an older couple who sat on mom's side and we had a group of college age girls in front of us.
Jake Owen was first. I have seen him before at The Grizzly Rose in Colorado. He is good but doesn't have enough of his own songs out there so he sings some Lynard Skynard and some other cover music. I have to say I almost think he was the best "performer." He really walked around the stages and got down with the fans. He even laid down on the stage while singing a song and grabbed someone's camera and took a picture of him and the person. It was pretty cool. He was very high energy and looking pretty cute. Mom and I decided he looked like a cross between Tom Cruise and Matthew McConaughey. I tried to call Angela during "Barefoot Bluejean Night" because that is one of her favorite songs but I waited too long to do it and by the time I got her answering machine it was over.
Next up was Grace Potter and the Nocturnals. I thought it was strange that there was a girl on the Boys of Summer tour - I could have gone for some Billy Currington instead and she wasn't even a country music singer. She does sing one of Kenny Chesney's new songs with him though so I guess that is why she was there. Her music was ok. She was very high energy bouncing all over the stage but then sometimes she just looked high. She would just stare at her hands as she waved them around. At one point her whole band joined in on the drums and did one giant drum solo which was kind of cool.
Tim McGraw was next. He is looking good but too skinny. I hope he is just overdoing the workouts and isn't sick. He moved around some and signed a lot of autographs while he was singing.

Kenny Chesney had a real long intro that was kind of cool. It was ACDC Shook Me All Night Long playing while the video was the sound going in and out while it traveled all over a map to great beach locations probably where Kenny had played. He came out from a separate stage on a swing and sang as he swung over the crowd to the main stage. He puts on a good performance but doesn't move around much. He mostly stays in front of his band. He is also not as cute as I thought he was. During the beginning of his performance the roof of the stadium opened up It was really cool.

 

At the very end during the encore Tim and Kenny both sang "She Thinks My Tractors Sexy" and "Indian Outlaw." It was cool that they sang each others songs. Jake and Grace came out too and sang some cover music with the other two at the end








It was a great night! mom and I took off back home and even though the GPS tried to take us a strange out of the way back road kind of way, we made it home safe.

6.9.12 Boys of Summer Tour pt1

So I bought the tickets in November of 2011. Finally I was going to get to see Kenney Chesney & Tim McGraw (The last time I tried to get tickets to Tim McGraw I screwed up royally and got the upgrade without getting any tickets-long story-unhappy ending). I bought a ticket for mom as well as a Christmas/birthday present (since by the time we were going to go it would be close to her birthday).
We took off in mom's car earlyish and headed to Dallas to Cowboys Stadium. I wanted to make sure we were going to get there in time to eat and relax a bit before the concert. The drive was about 3 hours. We were pretty hungry by the time we got there. We decided to stop at Pappadeaux because it was close to the stadium and we now were early so we needed to kill some time. I thought I had been to a Pappadeaux before but it didn't look or seem familiar. It is Cajun style seafood. And oh my it was sooo good. We started off with a sampler appetizer platter. It had gator, calamari, lobster crawfish fondue. After eating that we were already full but we had ordered one entree to split-Red fish Pontchartrain with dirty rice. I wasn't sure if I would like dirty rice so I had also ordered red beans and rice. I am not a big fish eater but oh my the fish was so delicious and the dirty rice was good too. I was actually not impressed with the red beans and rice and had little room left for them anyway. I did not want to waste the fish so I ate as much as I could. As we were leaving we saw a bird taking a bath in one of the several waterfalls surrounding the restaurant.
Next up: Cowboys Stadium.
This was my first time at the new stadium and boy is it pretty. We were early enough that parking wasn't really bad and we parked near an exit that was a little further out (we needed to walk off lunch). There were a lot of people tailgating. I am not sure of the rules of tailgating because I have never really been a part of any tailgating party before so we just kind of walked past all the people with their tents and checked things out. I thought there would be more sponsorship stuff going on outside the stadium before hand since we weren't allowed in until 3:00.

We did get our picture taken in front of the Kenney Chesney Sponsor bus. We checked out his line of sunglasses too and had our picture taken with his cardboard cutout. There was also Tim's sponsor Penzoil who had a green screen that we had our picture taken in front of. Later on they would match me up with Tim in front of a Jeep :)  That was pretty much it for sponsors. We waited in the shade near "our" gate until we realized no one else was hanging out there and a line was forming at a nearby gate. Come to find out that during special events you are supposed to disregard the gate number on your ticket. So we went to stand in the correct line in the sun. We ended up behind these two cute guys (unfortunately married to two cute women) who were hilarious and in front of another daughter who had bought tickets for her and her mom to go to the concert. When we were heading in we ended up helping the guys and their wives get pictures of them in front of the stadium and vice versa. We went inside and it was amazing. The stadium was huge and there is a ceiling that they can open up. It was so cool. I bought mom and I glow in the dark leis and we walked around to check everything out. We stopped in at a souvenir store and I bought us some t-shirts. The stores were crowded and people were crazy.  Before we sat down we grabbed a couple of regular sized bottles of water for $5 each-someone is making a killing!