Hairy Man Road part 2.

After writing the first post, I decided to research Hairy Man Road. I learned 3 things quickly:
1) The legend of Hairy Man Road, explained nicely here: www.texasescapes.com/MaggieVanOstrand/Hairy-Man-of-Round-Rock.htm
2) That there's an annual Hairy Man Festival in Round Rock with a website, which I will not link you to because
3) there's a short video of the Hairiest Man contest at the festival.

I didn't learn that I shouldn't watch the video. I knew that before I (unfortunately) did.
No pictures for this post.

Hairy Man Road.

Yes indeed, you did read that right. Hairy Man Road. Dad discovered that today driving back from Temple, TX. He was looking for a gun shop in the Round Rock area when he saw a road labeled Hairy Man Road. Naturally, upon reading the title, Hairy Man Road, he thought to himself, "That must be a very pretty place, I must go there."

And this is a little bit of what he saw:

Actually, he went there to get a picture of a road sign that said Hairy Man Road, but it was not to be. Apparently Round Rock has gentrified itself because the stretch of road once labeled Hairy Man Road is now known as CR 174 according to the street signs.

Fear not, go to Google mapping and put in Hairy Man Road, Round Rock, TX and see that it lives on in memory..........

Whew!

I know I went kinda crazy with the blogging last night, but I had some catching up to do. I had to find a night where Mom and Dad were able to help me get everything set up.

I'll be adding more soon cuz there's lots more to tell. I can't believe we've only been here two weeks!

I'd say we're pretty settled in the apartment now, and I think we're ready for guests, so come on out!!!

Mental mouthwash

Here's a cute picture of me to wash the bad taste of that last long-winded, rambling post out of your mouth.

Oh yeah.......BURGERTEX (I know, it's long, feel free to skip it.)

Dad's gonna write this post, I gave him permission only cuz I wasn't there to witness it.

For those that don't know, Austin has an incredible amount of restaurants. Each one has more character and better food than the next, and most aren't part of a big chain. I dare say that Austin may have more dining choices than the San Diego area even though it's smaller.
Well Kelly and I have been passing a place called BURGERTEX in a strip center west of us since the day we first arrived. It's more "rural" than the area we live even though it's probably not more than a mile away. Every single time we pass it, Kelly always says exactly the same thing, "BURGERTEX....we should try that place!" Finally one evening we were driving back from the city of Bee Caves (population 656....not to be confused with the city of Sunset Valley [population 365] which exists entirely within the southwest area of the Austin city limits and seems to consist entirely of a strip mall, yet they have their own police force. We know this because there is usually a patrol car and two officers parked on the sidewalk [for traffic control purposes one would assume].......you guessed it, in front of their strip mall. But I digress...)and we decided to stop and try BURGERTEX. The windows were tinted so we couldn't see inside. Once we were inside, it was too late to back out. We had entered a cavernous structure with seating for hundreds. And we were alone. There was no one in the place except for three smiling Chinese faces behind the counter, awaiting our order. During the long walk from the door to the counter I had plenty of time to take in the vista of empty tables disappearing off into the distance. I finally was able to make out a far wall and saw a small television bolted to the wall. And on a Monday night, during football season, in a burger join in Texas.....they had a soccer game on. A British soccer REPLAY complete with British announcers.
It was pretty much downhill from there. The food was good once you got past your chewing echoing through the empty building.
As we were leaving, we felt bad and brought our trays up to the counter. The old Chinese lady's eyes lit up as she asked, "Did you like it?" We muttered a generous, "Sure." She smiled widely and said, "You come back, right?" looking at us like the neglected nerdy 5th grader who always ate lunch alone and smelled liked musty baloney looked at us after ravenously opening the valentine we gave them (only because mom made us give one to everyone in the class, and judging by his nonexistent pile, all the other moms weren't like ours) and asked, "We're best friends now, right?" And when she looked at us like that and asked us that question, we felt that same queasiness in our stomachs and gave her the same noncommittal "Sure" we learned in 5th grade.......with our same 5th grade intent to never be seen there again.

Wow, Dad was pretty long-winded........sorry about that. If I had know he was gonna go on that long I wouldn't have said yes. And he didn't even have any pictures!!!

Becoming (real) Texans

I heard Dad talking about Lone Star beer and Big Red soda before we moved here. I know it's been fun for both of them to have easy access to Lone Star and Big Red. In fact, I think Mom and Dad have had a few of both as they've been helping me with the blog. (My spelling isn't so good yet.)

We went down to the river downtown as a family the other day, and we were feeling pretty much like Austinites. There are tons of trails down there for people and us and Bruiser and I made a lot of friends and got to run around. I think I scared my parents a bit by repeatedly jumping over a steep ditch as I was chasing Bruiser. It was a beautiful day and so nice to be down by the river. I felt like such a tourist, but I wanted Dad to take a picture of me by the river.......I think it's my favorite place in Austin so far. I have a feeling I'll be seeing a lot of Austin, everyone here is seems to be outdoors a lot and they take their people with them.

Even Bruiser has been in a good mood since we've been here!!! He's been a lot more social and playful with both me and all the other dogs we meet. I'm happy he's not a grumpus as much anymore!! Heehee.....don't tell him I said that.

There's Mom helping keep Austin weird!

Dad's pretty excited by the Texas gun laws as you can see. I have a feeling that's gonna be his new toy very soon... (It's convenient that we live less than a mile from a 100 yard indoor shooting range. Like I said, "hick" side of town.) That jacket he's wearing is one he bought the second day we were here for $40. He loves it, it's a softer more comfortable Carhartt knockoff. He thinks it's his Texas jacket.

This is Mom and Dad's new favorite BBQ place. It's close to them and the food is great. They didn't bring any food home to me but they smelled great!!!

Mom got the chicken and Dad got the sausage and pork ribs. They both loved the BBQ sauce even though they normally don't like it. It was a thinner sauce that was very tastey.

Becoming (legal) Texans

This is the boring stuff, and most of it was just stuff I overheard as Dad was muttering to himself as he was researching online.

Getting your driver's license and car registered in Texas is a three-step process.

First, you get your car inspected. You have to take it to a state approved shop to be inspected. They put one sticker on your windshield and give you a slip that proves your car has been inspected. You take that slip with a bunch of other papers (registration, insurance declaration forms, etc...) to the tax assessors office.

The second step is presenting that pile of papers to a clerk to register your car. The cool part of that process is that if you give them a big enough pile of papers, they reach in a box under their desk and pull out your new license plates! Instant gratification!!! You also get a second big sticker for your windshield. (Dad drove up north and did this at a big office where they waited for a long time. Mom learned from his mistake and went to the "rural" office about 2 miles from home and was in and out with no waiting. Oh yeah, we live in the "hick" side of Austin we're told. More on that later...)

You then have another piece of paper to add to your pile so you begin the third step and go to a third office and present your papers along with social security card, birth certificate, and out-of-state license. If they deem it acceptable, they take your picture and give you a temporary license. I think Dad said he has about another week till his comes in the mail. Mom did the first two steps and has to do the third one soon.

Like I said, boring. But apparently necessary.

Getting settled in our new home

The first week was very hectic. Dad did a good job unloading the truck, but decided to hire movers for the really heavy stuff. Mom did most of the organizing while Bruiser and I supervised. The place is still a bit of a mess but it's all coming together.



For the first 5 days or so we didn't have a washer or dryer, so when they were finally delivered mom had a lot of laundry to do. I tried to help her out.




This is our bathroom. Not as much space as our old place but since I go outside anyways, it'll do.




This is our office/spare bedroom. Photos of dad's new desktop computer are to come....

This is our cluttered kitchen. There isn't as much cupboard space as our last house, but since mom forgot to pack all of our pots and pans, there was a little extra room. Don't worry, dad went to Costco and bought a new set.

Some photos from the first day of driving:

Me saying bye to San Diego!!!!



Are we there yet?




I like this one. Very dramatic.



Just me and the open road.......wind in my hair.......nothin better i tell ya........


We all know bears $h!t in the woods, who knew I could too?!?!?!

(And I know nooooooooo one has any idea what I wrote cuz I added the $ and !.....)

Bruiser came from the streets before Mom rescued him, so by the time this photo was taken he had fashioned a shiv and was gonna rob Dad until he got closer and recognized him. You can take a boy from the streets.........

Our view for the first day.

If you want to get the full effect, stare at it for 14 hours.

Just to catch y'all up....

At 5 a.m. on December 12th, we left San Diego for Austin. Mom was driving Dad's car with me and Bruiser in the back and Dad was driving the 17 foot U-haul truck pulling the trailer with Mom's car on it. They had decided to drive in tandem and stay in contact via walkie talkie (since they both are pretty handy with the radios).

I felt pretty bad for Mom cuz I know she could drive much faster than Dad, who was limited to about 60 MPH. So after about 15 HOURS of driving, we finally made it to El Paso.

Having learned from the mistakes of the first day of driving, Dad got up extra early on the 13th and left 2 hours before we did. That was nice because we got some extra sleep and our view that day wasn't of the back of the U-haul.

Even though we left El Paso 2 hours after Dad, we got to Austin over a half an hour before him. We made very good time considering we made a lot of stops so Bruiser and I could run around and stretch our legs. We made such good time, in fact, that two separate police officers decided to stop Mom in the space of 1 hour to congratulate her. They both even gave her some sort of slip as a reminder of what good time she was making. She was kinda grumpy when I asked about the slips so I'm not sure exactly how they chose to congratulate her.....

In spite of all of that, the whole family finally made it to Austin after 11 HOURS of driving the second day by Dad. We were finally here!!!!!!!

Moving is exhausting!