Texas is the home of the playas and pimps

Howdy from Austin, Tejas!

The snacks on Southwest beat any I've had so far on any airline. What the airline industry needs to get out of bankruptcy: More Fig Newtons.

Strictly speaking, downtown is a mixed bag. Big, inhuman skyscrapers with blank streetfronts, but also some nice little stores. Las Manitas had great Mexican breakfast food and the atmosphere is about as unique as any place I've been.

Lots of hipsters milling about in anticipation of SXSW with little badges. Think they're so great ... More ironic T-shirts per square mile than any city in North America. Like all the perpetual grad students in the Western Hemisphere all converged on one location.

Sixth street was a long string of bars and souvenir stores. Not our thing, even when we were the target market.

But SoCo has it all, and the Barton Springs strip. Man, some awsome coffee places, thrift stores and music joints. Need to check out Guero's Taco Bar ... lots of music, food, all outdoors. There's a guayabera(sp?) shirt in the window of the church thrift store, but they're closed on sunday and were already shut when we got there Saturday. That shirt will be mine!

Curra's food is great and fast. A little aprehensive about the avocado margarita when it turned out to be frozen, but no worries. Goes down nice and smooth, "like alcoholic guacamole," says K.

And we visited the new 80,000 square foot Whole Foods. Like a liberal Wal-Mart. More organic, fair trade coffee, cheese, beer, shirts, housewares, books and produce you can shake a copy of The Believer at.

Well, gotta say hasta luego. Hot tub and good grub waiting!