Blink

The last couple of days have been a whirlwind of fun! We spent the day on Friday at Barton Springs and Trent met us after wards for Jim Jims. We came home and showered and packed the cooler with some brew and pop and headed out to the Salt Lick to give cousin Jodi the real deal Texas BBQ!


Saturday we packed up rather early (6 am) and headed out to Bastrop where my cousin and I raced The AdventureRaceGirl Challenge, an all girl adventure race put on by my friend Debbie Richardson. My cousin had never done an adventure race before and I am not sure she will ever do one again :) Not one of her 'bucket list' items she told me mid race. It was a pretty hot race and my cousin had never mountain biked before. We did well on the first trek leg and then started doing some race math the next 3 legs. We were able to do at least a checkpoint in each leg, didn't break Chris's ego, didn't kill Jodi and had an official finish! Pretty successful race IMO. On the way home we picked up our packets for Sunday and had Taco Express again.



Saturday night was the Jeff Dunham concert that Cathy, Garrett, Brian, Jodi and myself had tickets for...we went to Eastside Pies for dinner before the show. The show was great but Guitar Guy was lame. His Obama smashing was ill humored IMO. There was an older couple in front of us that got up and left cause it appeared that Guitar Guy offended them so much.
Sunday morning we got up bright and early again, packed the bikes and took off for Sunday's adventure, The Urban Assault Ride. I was slightly concerned about my cousin since the heat almost killed her on Saturday but she did awesome. Brian and Garrett did the race also and we didn't see them until the very end at the rubber duckie special test. We finished with all the checkpoints before the race cutoff and then had a couple of beers from New Belgium. I won a new Giro helmet for the G-man in a bean bag toss competition and a new hat for Dani in an ultimate disc competition. We had Five Guys for lunch, went home, shwered and took a nap. Trent came over around 6:30 and we all headed down to the lake for Dani's swim team end of season party and awards. After, we came home and watched Hustle and Flow. It was an excellent day!!

Later, Rob

Go Fast Shoes

My cuz came in on Wednesday from Florida and we hit the deck running! After picking up Mighty Cone for dinner we headed to Blues on the Green to see Carolyn Wonderland. Cathy met us there and then took Dani home early as Jodi and I closed down the show.


Yesterday we worked on the quiz for the ride on Sunday and then picked Dani up from soccer camp at noon. We had Maria's Taco Express for lunch (a big hit with the cuz) then headed off for a longer than anticipated hike on the greenbelt to Sculpture Falls for a dip.


Dinner at Gueros last night rounded out the day...then a quick stop at Whole Foods and we both crashed last night watching True Blood.

later, rob

Farmers Market

Yesterday the Gucciones (aka 'Ithcyonnes') came over to swim and have dinner. There were a few new recipes I had been looking at that I wanted to try. We picked up some grass fed beef from a local rancher as well as some tomatoes and eggplant at the farmers market last weekend. So I included it to make 1) Korean style short ribs 2) grilled eggplant with a tomato basil relish 3) lime and cilantro coleslaw 4) romaine salad with a bacon balsamic vinaigrette 5) flank steak with prosciutto and Gouda. Everything was tasty but the flank steak was too tough IMO. Diane brought over some delicious cupcakes and banana cake and I also made some homemade cookies and cream ice cream. We played catch phrase for most of the evening and had a great time. Like I said before, summer is time to catch up with friends I don't get to see nearly enough!

This morning I went out to the garden and noticed the tomatoes are about to explode. I also noticed there was a couple of red birds (I don't think they were cardinals but ?), that were trying to eat the yellow 'maters. I ended up putting some of last year's netting over the plants and hopefully that will be enough to discourage the birds from feasting on our hard earned produce!!


A couple of pics from this morning...a cicada and the sun coming up on the back deck...




later, rob

Number 9, Number 9

Like I said, summer = birthdays! We celebrated the Loo Poo's birthday yesterday since Momo just left last week, my cousin is coming this week, and we start our summer travels the following week. There was no twisting of arms to convince Dani to have a lake party :) We have a great set up for that since our neighborhood park is on the water and when the kids tire of the lake they jump into the pool.
Snacks, beer, water balloons, good friends all made it an awesome day!


Thanks for the canned food donations and for celebrating Dani's 9th birthday!!

Summer Breeze

Summer means a lot of things not the least an association with travel, friends, swimming, birthdays, adventure and much, much more.
I can't keep up a yearly, daily, whatever blog. I don't have the patience nor the discipline. But after blogging our adventures last summer it seems a really great way to stay in touch with my family and friends. I am picking a random point to start...this week seems as good as any since it already involved activities I only do in the summer.

I was originally gonna do Juan Pelota's 2nd Moonlight Tower Constellation Tour with my friend Pascale but she wasn't feeling good at the last minute so I went myself. Cathy was at a Friday night swim meet with Dani and Garrett was being a lazy teenager. I knew that the ride started at the Zilker Tree because that is one of the more famous Moon Towers in Austin but for some reason I went to Mellow Johnny's instead (this is where the ride ended). I was running late and had to park a zillion miles away because it was friday night on 6th street and the crowds were already crazy. I got to the shop right at 8:15 when the ride was supposed to start except I was about 2 miles off-doh! Let's just say I spent the next hour and a half doing interval training :) The group ride alluded me until 41st and Speedway where the now dark night showcased all the red blinkies in the distance. I finally caught up and found some friends that were like "where in the world did you come from?" Ha, playing catch up!!
It was all good and we ended the ride together. There was cold beer and a summer breeze at the end of the ride...excellent!