Long Day ...

Yesterday, that is. It is now almost 2:00am ... AGAIN. And I am up because I got home and couldn't stop playing with all my new photos.

The look on Charlie's face says it all about our whirlwind trip ... although this is her look ON THE WAY THERE ...

She did get to come (duh ... it's late ... cut me some slack ...) and behaved ... well she had many behaviours - we will leave it at that ... oh, and that we didn't kill her.

Stopped in La Grange on the way - and I couldn't resist taking photos of the courthouse and surrounds ... per my usual visit to the quaint little town:

And then to Austin and Ryan's apartment. He wondered why I didn't take any photos of it - but it seemed just too full of furniture and not photogenic, but a lovely place to live.

We put Charlie on a leash and walked the UT Austin campus. Charlie is a butt on a leash - she pulls and it is EXTREMELY ANNOYING so sort of a problem. But she got tons of attention! '

I was saved having to deal with crazy-dog-on-a-leash since I was juggling three cameras:

If ANYONE OUT THERE can tell me WHAT EXACTLY this turtle is doing - I would appreciate knowing. He held this zen / yoga / Pilate's / freaked-out-turtle / stretching-turtle pose the entire time we were at the turtle pond:

Gary thinks he is doing one-handed push ups ... but he wasn't moving AT ALL ...

Then off to lunch at Magnolia Cafe - we ate about 4:00pm and had dinner plans to meet up with Ryan's girlfriend Alessandra for dinner at 7:00pm so pretty much we just pigged out the rest of the time we were in town.

A plant on our way into dinner at Stubbs BBQ. VERY good BBQ - complete with Wonder bread - it ain't real Texas BBQ without it .... We got it out of Gary's system - he has had a hankering for Texas BBQ since flying into town ...

On the way to dinner I was talking about my most favourite building of all time and Ale (Alessandra sp?) explained that it was designed to look like an owl. Looking at the building face on - there is only one circular window - so I was kidding her that it looked sort of like a cyclops owl. She said you had to see it from a corner.

On the way into Stubbs BBQ I looked up, and there it was - clear as day - AN OWL!!!

Had to get a ton of shots - made Gary stop the truck in multiple places to take photos - running into intersections, acting like a tourist ... big time. Got the best ones at the last place we stopped (duh ... again) so those are the ones I played with. Isn't this the coolest building ever?

Hoot, Hoot!

And on a final note:


OUR DOG IS CRAZY.


The end.



OK, not really. She got reprimanded TONS during our walk on campus then unceremoniously dumped in Ryan's apartment (and told not to bark since no pets allowed) while we ate lunch. We came back and she acted ... well ... weirder than she has ever acted in her life. It was as if she thought we had left her forever in a strange place, all alone after yelling at her and she was just simply overwhelmed with so many emotions that she just couldn't act them all out fast enough in succession ... over, and over and over again.

Then GARY WALKED IN and she just went berserk with the "I love this man so much because he throws a Frisbee for me" and all other emotions were smothered.

We then left her and went to dinner and as we were walking toward Ryan's apartment after I said we should be quiet since she would hear us and start barking. I stealthily got to the door and opened it and there sat Charlie, Frisbee in her mouth making her growly talking noise CLEARLY stating that it was time for a Frisbee session. She DEMANDED IT - complete with a mouth full of Frisbee. One thing about our dog - unless you are dumber than dirt - you know EXACTLY what she wants at any given moment in the day ...

She won out and Gary went to throw for her in the dark. She wasn't overwhelmed that time - I guess she realized that we were going to come back.

She was one tired pooch on the way home. She stretched out on the back seat and fell promptly asleep.

Total nut job ...




Which ...



of course ....



means she fits in at the Hurst household just fine ....



Night all ...



Over and out ... (OK, hopefully 'out' - a girl can dream that she will actually fall asleep even though she knows she is too sick and miserable to actually do so ...)