The rest of the day was to involve meandering through Texas on our way to Austin. Stop 1: the giant cheerleader in Lamesa.
Pervs...
Next door, there happened to be a Mexican restaurant called Acevedo's, so we decided to stop in for lunch. Little did we know what a gem we had stumbled upon. On Sundays, this place has an all you can eat fajita and enchilada buffet. The enchiladas were ok, but the beef fajitas were outstanding. The tortillas weren't quite up to Rosa's from yesterday, but still quite good. And did I mention you can have as many as you want? And it's only $10? Simply ridiculous. We left stuffed to the brim, except for Alfred who eats like a girl. And by "girl" I don't mean Stephanie, cuz Stephanie eats like a man.
Stop 2 was supposed to be the Falkenstein castle in Burnet, but then the fuzz finally caught up to me. I was fiddling with the radio and not paying enough attention to the road, when suddenly we realized I was coming up on a cop. I hit the brakes, but it was clearly too late. He slowed down, pulled up behind me and hit the lights. He got my license and then asked me to step out of the car. Outside, he asked me about where we were headed, where we'd been that day. A little too detailed of questioning for the average speeding ticket. But I guess three minorities in a rental car with California plates are bound to raise some suspicion. Anyway, he was actually a pretty nice guy. As he was handing me the ticket, we joked about the Prius' acceleration issues and such.
Given that we would now be traveling at no more than 75 mph for the rest of the trip, we decided to skip the castle in order to not miss our next stop: the Congress Ave bats.
Apparently these bats live in a warehouse in Austin, and every night at dusk they make a mass exodus, passing under the Congress Ave bridge, right in downtown Austin. We got there a bit after 7, but the bats were clearly not operating on our schedule. After waiting nearly an hour, they finally showed. The pictures we got don't really do it justice, but Stephanie's video is pretty good. In any case, it's something that you really have to see in person to fully appreciate.
Those smudges on your screen are bats.
Some Austin skyline...
Afterward, we went to dinner at Moonshine Patio Bar and Grill. Several things I liked about this place. First, they give you popcorn instead of the standard bread. Second, they give you water in jars, and we all know how I feel about that. Third, they have an appetizer of corndog shrimp. And this is exactly what you think it is. Very tasty.
I had the eggplant parmesan, which was solid, nothing amazing. The mac and cheese I got on the side, though, was bacon-y, and of course bacon=awesome.
Fourth thing I liked was our waitress. I think it's important to take notice when people make an effort and truly do their job well, and our waitress (we'll call her Nicole cuz I forgot her name) definitely fit the bill. She recommended a house specialty (the shrimp) that all three of us really enjoyed. When it came time to order dessert, Stephanie ordered the bread pudding. Then Alfred tried to order apple pie, but Nicole stopped him and explained that the desserts are quite large and meant for sharing so he may want to think twice about it. She followed this up with, "Maybe she (Stephanie) will let you have a bite" of the bread pudding. Nicole, through her amazing waitress powers, had figured out that Stephanie could handle a whole dessert while Alfred could not. Finally, when it came time for the check, she asked, without any prompting, if we wanted to split the bill. We said yes. She came back with two checks, each with a half order of the corndog shrimp on it. Brilliant! My bill was $18.32. I paid with a $50. A normal waitress would bring back $31.68 in change. Nicole, however, is no normal waitress. She brought back $32 in change saving us both the trouble of having to deal with coins. Overall, I would say she was one of, if not the, best servers I have ever dealt with.
Did I really just write that much about our waitress? Moving along, after checking into the hotel, I dragged Alfred out to 6th street to check out the bar scene. Being a Sunday night, it was pretty quiet. We wandered into one place that had sort of a club feel. But when a club is sparsely populated, it starts to get awkward kinda quickly. We did a couple Patron shots and moved on. Next we stepped into an Irish pub across the street. In contrast, a sparsely populated Irish pub might be better than a crowded one. It was quiet in there, the only music was provided by a trio playing some Irish music in the corner. In fact, I suspect they weren't even a band and just some people who show up there to jam. Anyway, good place to chill and have a beer. And yes, Alfred even had a beer. Even if I had to peer pressure him into finishing the last 1/4 of it, it counts. We stuck around there til the end of the basketball game, then decided to call it a night.
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