back in business

hey guys! sincere apologies for last week's unannounced/unexplained hiatus from the blog. i had a sudden family emergency back in baltimore last weekend and didn't feel up to tackling blog posts at all last week. i'm also buried in emails, so if you've written me and i haven't responded, it's nothing personal. i'll get back to you as soon as i dig out, i promise. however, i am back this week and ready to roll - with some good recipes and fashionable finds coming your way.

nick and i spent the weekend doing some really fun things - thursday night was the AMP party at ACL live where nick and i stayed up way past our bedtime so we could dance it up with ghostland observatory, friday night was a coworker's birthday party followed by cold war kids at stubbs, saturday was a bit of shopping at one of my favorite austin boutiques fab'rik, the lonestar roundup out at the expo center, drinks at perla's and dinner at vince young steakhouse, and yesterday was breakfast at torchy's, grocery shopping, cooking, cleaning, about 600 loads of laundry and dinner with our neighbor at hut's. and through all of that, i didn't take a single photo to share with you guys. bad blogger. bad.

in other news, emilio is once again becoming an escape artist from the backyard. rather than climb the chain link fence like he did last time, he's now squirreling in between two fences, shimmy-ing his way through 10 yards of fence to freedom. makes me nervous that he's gonna get hurt. thank you to our neighbors for keeping an eye out for him until we figure out a permanent solution.

thanks again for being patient with me during last week's hiatus. i'm back in biz.

weekending it up

me and nick at salt lick mid-bbq coma

nick and i had an absolutely fantastic weekend with my bff in the entire world and her husband. katie and warren came for a visit from their new home of LA and we did our best to show them the highlights of austin. you'd think we'd be pros by now, but i still get worried we won't be able to show how awesome austin is with just one short weekend. we spent friday night on the east side (takoba, the good knight, cheer up charlie's), saturday at salt lick, mandola...ahem...duchman winery and dinner at uchi (best hot rock evvvveerrrr), and yesterday was more relaxing with breakfast/lunch at tacodeli and a freezing/wet walk around s. congress and mt. bonnell.

i miss katie tremendously and can't wait to plan a trip out to LA to see her new home. hearts!!!

red lights are optional?

some of you may have already heard about my very first car accident experience on saturday evening. while driving downtown, nick and i were t-boned by a woman who decided red lights are optional. everyone involved is perfectly fine except for our poor car...the door is off the hinges and it's smashed in all the way down the driver's side. the only reason i'm posting this is to say please be careful out there! luckily it was nothing a few (or 10) margaritas couldn't fix, but still...in the meantime, i'll be driving a rental car while they try to band-aid this thing back together.

deciding between two old gringos

on sunday i went on a quick shopping trip with my friend andrea to allen's boots on south congress. now that i'm a texan i've been thinking about getting myself a pair of cowboy boots and up until sunday hadn't even tried any on. i knew the second i did would be the kiss of death.

the good ones are a serious investment and now that i've felt the buttery leather on my little piggies i don't think i can go too much longer without a pair. i know i'll wear them all the time - UT tailgating, shopping trips, out for the night, paired with a cute sundress, yadda yadda. it's just SO HARD to make the decision. here are two pairs i've found and reaallllly like. which would you get - the red statement or the brown staple?

below: diego by old gringo, $350

below: salome by old gringo, $430

chateau annie and nick

so i thought i'd give a quick update on recent happenings in austin...aside from the usual work, etc. nick and i have had a really fun couple of weeks. the chateau (also known as our guest room) has been booked solid...our BFFs christy and bobby came for their inaugural visit and it was so.much.fun., plus a really great long visit from my mom followed closely behind. we love having visitors! hint hint.

here we are at oasis to watch the sunset over lake travis...but it was cloudy and freezing so we took a photo in front of this sunset billboard instead. love it.

and here's me and nick at salt lick in the perfect 70 degree weather while waiting for our table. mmmm bbq...

...and then enjoying a bottle of wine and the view at driftwood vineyards in hill country.

we don't know who this pink gorilla is but he was the highlight of our night at rebel's honky tonk on W 5th st. pink gorilla, i hope to see you again next time.

i wasn't a great of a photog for my mom's visit but we had a great time. we ate a lot of bbq (i decided i'm obsessed with county line but i'm not into the no-fork-rule at kreuz') and tex mex (free margaritas at el chile while they await their liquor license? yes please!), explored the town, did some shopping, went on some long drives through hill country, tasted some delicious pie, saw avatar at the imax in 3D, and about a billion other things i won't bore you with. i heart moms!

in other news, monday's my first day of work at the new gig and i'm super anxious. i've done a bunch of studying and prepping but i definitely have the scaries already...

inaugural trip to austin: the highlights

i won't bore you all with every single detail (ok maybe i will) of our very first weekend trip to check out our new city, austin. i hope you enjoy the photos even though we have a regular old camera and not a fancypants DSLR.

food
apparently there's a huge food-out-of-a-trailer thing happening in austin. so fun. we didn't try any (yet) except for hey cupcake! in the trailer park on south congress. the line was redonk and the vanilla dream cupcake was quite good. i have to stay true to my nyc roots and still vote for magnolia and billy's, but hey cupcake! definitely gave them a run for the money.



shopping
there are so many boutiques and vintage shops and i barely even scratched the surface this past weekend. i did spend a few minutes in emeralds on n. lamar and picked up a boyfriend blazer (which i'm wearing today) for a mere $58, and i'll definitely be frequenting places like uncommon objects for one-of-a-kind home decor items.

parks
the outdoor culture in austin is pretty awesome, not to mention it was a steamy 80+ degrees (on average) while we were there. we went for a run on the river trails and there were loads and loads of people out running.


music
being that this past weekend was ACL, the live music options were endless. we were Losers with a capital L and didn't see any (unless you count having to navigate our way around the massive line outside stubbs for thievery corporation...we were on our way back to our hotel). we're saving it up for when we're legit austinites and not tourists.


apartments
we toured practically every single apartment building within a three mile radius of downtown austin. i think we found one! we're waiting to hear from the leasing company so it's not official yet. i'm still blown away that we can get twice the square footage, twice the bathrooms and twice the bedrooms in a brand new building with a balcony, parking and a pool for LESS than what we pay here in ny/nj. now all i need is a job so i can have fun furnishing it.



bats
who knew austin has the largest bat colony in north america? there are about 1.5 million bats that spend their summers in austin living under the congress avenue bridge. every night at sundown they come out all at once for their nightly feeding. it's pretty awesome to see.


fire ants
i have a WOUND on my foot from where i was attacked by fire ants while watching the bats. it hurt like a mo-fo and i am now so scarred i don't plan on ever sitting down in texas grass or walking through it with flip flops again. ever.

miscellaneous random things a non-resident would notice
1. the fire hydrants are painted silver.


2. all of their traffic lights are horizontal instead of vertical. i've seen horizontal ones before but usually at large intersections or on bridges or something. but every single one in austin is horizontal.


3. i found a moontower! "party at the moontower." - dazed and confused


4. practically every building has a sign on the door specifying that no firearms are permitted. this one was on the door of a residential building's leasing office. amazing.


5. there's a pizza place called hoboken pie that's jersey inspired. chuckle chuckle.

traveling with a laptop

traveling back and forth to austin with my laptop this past weekend reminded me what a huge pain in the ass it can be to lug that thing around. in my haste to get to the airport, i shoved my laptop in my purse and left my sumdex laptop sleeve sitting cold and alone under my desk.

i've been through a couple of laptop sleeves and was never fully satisfied until i found this blue sumdex sleeve for about $16 on ebags about two years ago. NOT a standard issue black nerdy ginormous heinous shoulder strap situation that will ruin my reputation for being the least bit stylish? check. slim yet sturdy case? check. cute color options? check. perfectly sized? check. and most importantly, handles (just in case i can't jam it in my purse with all the rest of my crap)? check. sold!

yep, i did go to austin for the weekend

yep, nick and i did go to austin for the weekend. and yep, we loved it. we had an awesome weekend and we're very excited for our "new life" there. it's about 11pm sunday night and we just got back to the jerz from JFK - so my sincerest apologies for not posting all of the lovely details about the trip first thing. i promise i will post the highlights as soon as i can tomorrow. athough we sadly didn't make it to ACL while we were there, i'd say we did do a good job of keeping austin weird as we drove around in our bright white rented toyota matrix with kentucky plates. will post more soon, i promise!!

above: me with the kentucky matrix

above: you can barely see my head but that's me pointing up at the "annie st." sign

above: the view of ACL from one of the apartment buildings we toured

secret's out: annie does austin (and this is my 101st post!)

big news.

no, wait.

HUGE news.

nick and i are moving to austin.

yes. the austin that's in texas.

TEXAS.

in five weeks (give or take a week or two).

nick was offered a kick ass promotion that's perfect for his career and we couldn't pass it up - even though it entails a move halfway across the country. here are a few tidbits about austin that i've learned in the week or so that i've known we're moving there:

• dazed and confused was filmed in austin.
• "keep austin weird" is the city's slogan. the slogan is grounded in austinite efforts to support local businesses.
  
• forbes named austin the least stressful city to live in in 2009.
• austin had almost 70 days over 100 degrees this summer.
• barton springs is a ginormous three acre swimming "pool" in the middle of the city that is fed by a natural spring. it gets up to 18' deep.
• my favorite coffee shop in the whole entire world, coffee bean and tea leaf, recently opened a store in downtown austin. natch, austinites revolted since it's a chain and goes against the whole "keep austin weird" mantra. i, however, will blog from there as much as humanly possible with a large chai in hand.
  

i've also been doing some blog stalking to learn more about austin's style and it reminds me a whole lot of the hipsters here in brooklyn and the lower east side. i'm going to be "that preppy girl" and stand out like a sore thumb. these are the austin-based sites i've recently added to my blogroll...check 'em out!

• adored austin
• common birds of town lake
  
• this is life in austin
  

i'm so sad to be leaving nyc and the east coast. but i'm excited for what it means for nick's career and for a new adventure with the hubby. and i'm also excited for all of the visitors i'm going to have and to finally get to attend sxsw and acl.

most of the details of the move are up in the air so i'll be sharing updates along the way. until then, keep austin weird!