So many things to see

My San Francisco pictures are finally uploaded, organized, and semi-captioned on my Flickr.

Still planning on writing more about the trip...eventually.

God Bless Austin, Texas

All Austin pictures on my Flickr.


I returned on Thursday from a week spent in Austin for work. This was my first work trip, a big step into adulthood I imagine, which I promptly undid by having cookies and apple juice on the plane. Oops. (That's what you have to do when you've given up soft drinks for Lent.)

Moving on...the work part, i.e. the majority of the trip, went well. There was a bit of stress and some re-working that had to be done resulting in me staying in an extra day, but it all worked out. It was just nice to see something I've been working on for the past two years, come to fruition in the classroom.

The rest of my time was spent out and about in Austin. My hotel was in a great location downtown and I walked everywhere. Emphasis on the "walked" and "everywhere." I wish I could have figured out how to work the pedometer on my phone because I had to have walked at least 10 miles, if not more. But the weather was so gorgeous it would have been a shame to have spent it any other way.

I've been to San Antonio a number of times, which I love, but Austin is different. Most of the time I forgot I was in Texas. It's very progressive and a bit crunchy, which reminded me a lot of Chapel Hill.

State Capitol
This was just a few blocks from my hotel and was the first thing I went to as a tourist. I didn't actually go in it, just walked around the grounds and took pictures. I ended up walking around the grounds many times due to its location in my path to get to UT. It's a nice building with lots of trees and grass around it.


University of Texas Campus
I don't know if anyone has noticed, but I kind of loved my college and my college experience. Thus I really enjoy going to other colleges and seeing their campuses and trying to get a feel for their culture. I spent some time on the massive UT campus, admiring their pretty buildings and abundance of trees, if not grass. I never found a big quad area like we had, but that doesn't mean it wasn't there. I don't think I saw even a fraction of the campus, but what I did see was nice. Guadalupe Avenue is their equivalent of Franklin Street, I imagine, so I bought a few UT items and then went into a boutique-y type story where I was lured into buying clothes and shoes. Damn those friendly Texan sales assistants who insist on picking out clothes and shoes for me they think I'll like. And damn me for liking them and buying them.


I wouldof course have to find something Carolina blue among all the orange:
LBJ Presidential Library
UT is also the site of Lyndon B. Johnson's presidential library. This was one of the highlights of my trip as I love presidential history so much, and this was the first presidential library I've been to. I really don't know where to start to describe my favorite parts:

• Mock up of his Oval Office. (I stood in the Oval Office!)
  
• Large section on Lady Bird's contributions and a mock up of her WH office as well.
• A selection of some of the pens he used to sign Great Society legislation. There must have been 30 of them and yet of course there are still more.
• The animatronic LBJ that uses his real audio to tell funny stories.
• The actual limo he used as president.
• The clothes LBJ and Lady Bird wore when he was sworn in after JFK was assassinated.
• A small selection of the gifts he received from world leaders.
• The view on the fourth floor of several floors worth of the archives of his presidency, all in red boxes. It honestly made me gasp a little -- and scare a man beside me -- just thinking about his entire presidency in those boxes.
  

Sixth Street
One of the main draws of Austin is Sixth Street, which my guidebook compares to Bourbon Street, full of bars, clubs, and music joints. Other than admiring the pretty Driskell Hotel -- where LBJ and Lady Bird had their first date -- I didn't much care for East Sixth. However, West Sixth was fun, with restaurants, a huge Whole Foods, a cool music store with a Tube logo as its logo, and the biggest bookstore in Texas.


South Congress
Another highlight and the piece of Austin I most want to see again, was South Congress. There were tons of amazing vintage and thrift stores on this stretch, one of which I spent an hour browsing (and buying) in. It was just full to the brim with vintage objects, from buttons and lace to old maps and medicine bottles, to stuffed giraffe heads (which I don't approve of). I left with just two items, one of which is for my mom and the other is a stamp carousel. (I am such a dork but I love it. We had these at the library I worked at in college and I just feel academic when I see it. Though probably less so after I use it to display jewelery.)


Buildings
Austin has a ton of great architecture and I got to indulge my love for pretty buildings and cool details. I was constantly looking up and was always rewarded.


Food
Of course it wouldn't be a trip to Texas without eating. A lot. Of meat. Tex Mex and brisket galore. Oh, the brisket, I think I'll miss you most of all.

And that was Austin. Considering I was there for work I got to see a lot -- largely because I was also there for a weekend -- but I would still love to go back and see more.

Los Angeles

I really will get around to writing about my L.A. trip. Hopefully before I leave for Austin for a work trip. But until then, I did manage to upload and caption my pictures on my Flickr. All nicely organized and labelled.

After the flood all the colors came out

The past few weeks have seen a succession of gray, windy, dreary, chilly days. Saturday was a nice change, at least somewhat, in that it was still gray, but rather warm and pleasant outside. Thus I set out to capture some of fall's colors.

Coming from eastern North Carolina, we don't really have trees that change colors. We don't really have the trees that ignite in reds, oranges, and yellows. Our pine trees are regal, but they just coat the ground with their crunchy brown needles. Other trees also tend to just drop their dead leaves everywhere, though sometimes it seems like the leaves just dissappear entirely. (We do, however, have magnificent Bradford pear trees in the spring.)

Because of this, I still find changing leaves a novelty. I'm almost childike when encountering a tree blazing red or orange, that just last week was green and lush; I become entranced. So on Saturday I walked around town until my feet cried and my camera whined, capturing all the colors while they last.

Pictures are uploaded to my Flickr. They aren't amazing or anything, it was just too gray outside and I'm not sure I have the color settings on my camera right.

"If people are interested in magic, then we're up for it...the spell that can occur when a band and audience really connect." (Bono)

Last weekend I went home to North Carolina for the U2 concert at Carter-Finley Stadium in Raleigh. I bought the tickets in April and can't believe how fast it got here, and that it's already gone.

I've said it before, that I think for the most part I've grown more tolerant of other views, except for when it comes to U2. I think this is because I connect to their songs on such a deeply personal level. The best word to describe it is visceral, which is how my friend Jan described it after we saw them in concert in 2005. There are certain lines, notes, guitar riffs, and Bono solos that just inspire and pull at me unlike anything else. I very rarely let my guard down or let something sweep me away, but when I listen to their music, I barely notice anything or anyone around me. Which when you're in a stadium with 60,000 other people, is a big deal. It was a practically-perfect show and I hope to repeat the experience many times in the future.

The spaceship stage. (Amid the regrettable sea of Wolfpack red. Ugh.)
Mom and me.
Opening - Breathe.
Video screen expanding.
Close-up.Bono.
A blurry Edge and Bono, acoustic Stuck in a Moment...
Ultraviolet (Light my Way) and an attempt to capture the coolest mirror/disco ball ever.
Sunday Bloody Sunday - green for Iran.Thanks, boys.

Highlights:

• Improvised Amazing Grace and Lean on Me
• Acoustic Stuck in a Moment...
• The point where Bono took an audience member's political banner and began singing a hymn, before tossing his microphone to the guy and letting him sing, which he did very well, before tossing it back.
• Anytime any of the band members moved around on the bridges and around the stage.
• Mom really excited the first time she saw The Edge

Lowlights:

• Drunk guy beside me who fell on the row in front of ours, then stomped on my foot, kicked over our drinks, and kept trying to sit in my seat.
• Drunk couples in front of us, one of whom kept rubbing on her friend's husband, before later also falling on the row in front of her.
• Seriously, too much Wolfpack red.

"I think I need a sunrise; I'm tired of the sunset." (Boston, Augustana)

I have had nothing to say for the past few weeks. Absolutely nothing. I couldn't even muster up enough indignation for a soapbox post on Friday. If that doesn't prove how dull I've been lately, nothing will. (Don't get me wrong, plenty to get worked up about, just not enough to justify putting into the written word.) I am in desperate need of sleep but so far still quite alert so thus I present what I'll call Tuesday Three, since I like alliteration.

1. Vegas pictures finally posted to my Flickr.
   If you care for me at all, you'll select the Vegas collection in the right sidebar, and then go through the neatly-organized sets. Yes, this makes me "rigid and unbending," in the words of my mother, but it also makes for a far more enjoyable picture-viewing experience for you.
2. Today is the official first day of Fall! For some reason, I am really excited about it this year. It's odd because most years in North Carolina if you blink you'll miss it, since we tend to go from hot hot hot to cold cold cold with barely a glance at anything in between. And while I feel this Summer was far more mild than what I'm used to, I'm still ready for the change. Sweaters, boots, and fuzzy socks; new TV season; college and pro football; leaves changing and falling...it should be good!
   
3. I think I need to add creepy to my over-used word list. Random, yes, but having to do with what I was going to make my soapbox post but decided against. Just something on the mind lately. Already on the list are words that happen to put me in the running to be a Valley Girl: so, totally, and dude.
   

With the brother coming up this weekend and U2 next weekend I should have far more exciting things to write about, relatively speaking, in the future.

Gourds, Portobello Road, London, October 2006

Chicago!

With the roommate/friend, a small guidebook, and all the Chicago knowledge I've picked up on from Kanye, Oprah, and Obama, I set off for my first trip to the mid-west on Friday and had a wonderful mini-vacation in Chicago.

I've uploaded all my photos to my Flickr, in the Chicago set on the right. I won't go into a lot of detail here as the pictures pretty much speak for themselves. But here are the main points I will remember about the city, in true you-really-shouldn't-take-me-too-seriously fashion.

1. The Windy City really is windy, and cold, especially for July. I honestly don't know what the weather typically is like there, so maybe it's normal. But as a die hard East Coaster, particularly a Southern East Coaster, July without oppressive heat and humidity just isn't July. I had some jeans, but only sandals and one cardigan, and spent most of the weekend cold. Seeing as how I barely survive D.C. winters, I've always known I could never handle a Chicago one. But I thought I could at least make it through a summer weekend. I really am far weaker than I thought.

2. It smells a little bit. I don't mean this rudely, but it did. D.C. doesn't exactly smell like roses, but I really don't notice an odor that often, unless we're talking about certain metro station areas or alleys. But there was a definite smell. In its defense, though, I was primarily in the tourist-heavy areas, so that may have had something to do with it. And maybe D.C. really is stinky, too, I just have become one with it and don't even know it. (The fountain has nothing to do with the smell, I just really really love it.)

3. There are revolving doors in nearly every building. I've been thinking about this a lot because that's just what I do. I recall quite a few in New York and barely any in London. And maybe D.C. has a lot that I just don't realize, but I swear I've never seen as many as I did in Chicago. I mean, even a Walgreen's had one! I just don't do well with them, not surprising, I'm sure. I'm constantly waiting for my foot to get stuck behind me or to miss the chance to exit and get stuck going 'round and 'round while people laugh and gawk 'round and 'round me in surround sound. Plus there was an episode of Dead Like Me where a guy tripped and fell into the door just as someone was turning it and his neck broke and he died. (The one revolving door I didn't mind was at Tiffany's, where I finally bought something after being in love with the store since I first saw Breakfast at Tiffany's more than ten years ago.)

4. Literally towering over the city on The Ledge. After an interminable wait we finally made our way to the Skydeck of the SEARS Tower. (Yes, it changed its name a day before we arrived, but I refuse to acknowledge it.) First, I am terribly afraid of heights. Or, rather, terribly afraid of plummeting to my death. I also get vertigo and lose all sense of perception when I'm up high or on spiraling or steep staircases. But after waiting in five lines, for three hours, with incredibly pushy and smelly people, once I made it up to the top, I knew I'd regret it later if I didn't take full advantage of every opportunity. This included venturing out ever so cautiously on the newly-opened "Ledge," where one can stand on a glass panel extending away from the building, to look down at the city below as your life flashes before your eyes. I only stayed a minute or so, tiptoeing the whole time, and never quite losing the swaying feeling heights give me, but it definitely was one heck of a view. That I have no desire to ever see again. Ever.

5. Getting away. I love travel almost more than anything and as much as I love home, most of my trips in the past two years have been solely to there. So it was nice to go somewhere new, get away from my real world, and just be still for a little while. It was also nice to go with Brandie, who I've never travelled with before.

All in all, with the beautiful "bean," view of Lake Michigan, majestic Buckingham Fountains, gorgeous architecture, and more, I'd definitely go back. Cold, smell, revolving doors and all.