We arrived Tuesday afternoon, but before settling into our hotel for the night, we enjoyed a delicious dinner at the Hula Hut. If you've never been, I highly recommend it. Good food. Good views. Good service.
Full and happy, we finally settled in to our ninth floor hotel room with our splendid view of downtown Austin construction. No better noise to fall asleep to than the hums and whistles of racing police cars, the booming music accompanying the constant celebration of weird on 6th street, and the steady hammering of nighttime construction. Ah, the city life. Quite a change from the songs of crickets and cows lulling me to sleep in the middle of nowhere, TX.
Seven-thirty came early the next morning when we were up and at 'em, ready for a "fun" day of coaching lectures. Although we were somewhat disappointed with the content of the sessions, we capitalized on the free stuff from all the exhibits: t-shirts, tote bags, popcorn, and cookies. I even saw a familiar face. As I rounded a corner of one of the aisles, I was pretty sure I saw my freshman volleyball coach from high school standing at a booth about twenty feet away. I thought my eyes were tricking me, so I did a double-take to get a better look, staring awkwardly to make sure. Stalker status, I know. Feeling brave, I approached her completely ready to just keep on walking when I knew she wouldn't recognize me. I mean, it's been 10 years! Surprisingly, she shouted my my name in spastic recognition slurring my first and last name together. Yep, that's her. We exchanged the awkward "how are you" and "where are you teaching now?" conversations, but it was pretty cool to experience a "look at me now, I've grown out of my adolescent acne" moment.
Wednesday was my birthday, so of course, my friends wouldn't let me go without celebrating. Don't worry, we weren't influenced by the 6th street insanity even though we saw our share of crazy. We settled for a much tamer approach (which I prefer) at a fun, authentic Italian place called Mandola's. Pasta and gelato - can't go wrong there.
After dinner, at my prodding, we journeyed the ten or so blocks to the bridge to watch the bats where we encountered an interesting, deaf gentleman who was almost run over. Did I mention Austinites are crazy? This dude was strolling across a busy intersection like it was no big deal jumping in front of speeding cars like a ninja. He just wanted everyone to see the bats and to sell his homemade buttons that said, "Keep Austin Batty," which was apparently worth sacrificing his life. But, finally we heard the squeaking, chattering bats awakening from their slumber.
They started on one side of the bridge and worked their way across like fans at a baseball game engage the wave around the whole park. The bats would start in sections gliding under the bridge in circles around each other like they were warming up for a long journey. After a few laps, they darted above the trees in a line, summoning the next bat section to start their warm up laps. It felt like they could lift the bridge and carry us off with them at any second. Once each section of bats completed their warm up circles, they all exploded toward the trees, flying in a chaotic black cloud over the lake until they met with the rest of their clan. Together, these small winged fur balls, arranged themselves in a long black line that swirled and zig zagged above the greenery. They created pictures and shapes in the sky that resembled what I doodled on my notes during the coaching clinic. Spirals and zig zags. Swoops and swirls. They were a black marker against the pale sunset marking their territory above the trees. It was pretty neat to watch.
(It's hard to see in the pictures, but I tried.)
After a few more selfies and a stroll down 6th street (we had to see the crazies up close), we called it a night, but not before making fun of the show "Pretty Wicked Moms" on TLC as we fell asleep. All in all, it was a pretty great birthday, thanks to my friends Pamela and Allison!
Thursday we endured a few more brutal coaching lessons before we grabbed some deliciousness for lunch and headed home. I had no idea Austin was such a cool place. (Granted, the last time I was there I'm pretty sure I was around eleven and all I cared about was Six Flags.) There are tons of fancy restaurants and shopping places. There are people everywhere walking or riding their bikes, swerving in and out of traffic. There are bats! Where else can you go to watch bats fly around in the same place you can see half naked drunk people strutting their stuff? I'm easily entertained, yes. So, thanks Austin for my mini-vacay this year. You didn't disappoint!
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