Save the Date!

Last night a group of us met to discuss the next Burnet Road Challenge. We decided on a date....same weekend as last year. So everyone mark your calendars and save Friday, October 27 for the BRC 2006!

Here are some shots from last year.....

funny sticker

I was at Graffiti's on Tuesday night and they had a funny sticker on their fridge.

You can see it if you click here. It's similar to the Keep Austin Weird campaign. :)

p.s. Some other person took this pic, so I hope the link works.....

You Belong in Dublin

Friendly and down to earth, you want to enjoy Europe without snobbery or pretensions. You're the perfect person to go wild on a pub crawl... or enjoy a quiet bike ride through the old part of town.

What European City Do You Belong In?

**This soooo rocks! I mean, if everything goes according to plan, I'll be in Dublin after the Christmas holidays!

Ok, so back to my Colorado trip......

When I left off, I had made it through Wednesday and Thursday in Colorado Springs. Had fun at some local dive bars, ate at the delicious Purple Castle, been a tourist taking tons of scenic shots and met lots of cool people at the MOPP Hash.

So it's now Friday, September 1 in this portion of my update....

HEAVIN' SEMEN and BEAVER CLEAVER came to pick up me and DAY OLD FISH on Friday morning and we headed straight to King's Chef. We wanted them to be able to experience the deliciousness that is the Purple Castle!

After we chowed, we began BROWNIE'S list of things to do on the drive to Monarch.

First stop was Skyline Drive...little road on top of a ridge with some pretty views.




Next was the Royal Gorge. Wow! We almost didn't go inside due to the $25 per person entry fee...but man, am I glad we did. There were several things to do once you got inside. Besides, you couldn't even see the bridge from the parking lot.





Once we got across, BEAVER CLEAVER was set on riding the Skycoaster. I thought he was absolutely crazy for suggesting such a thing. He talked HEAVIN' into doing it pretty quickly. I wanted to inspect everything first. Eventually, I decided what the hell...it was only gonna be $15 each if all 3 of us went and I never do things like this...ever. I can't believe I decided to do it because I like both of my feet on the ground! But holy hell...I am sooooo glad I did. I freaked out quite a bit right at the beginning. And of course I screamed, and screamed, and screamed and then laughed and laughed. Just wait until I get the DVD from BEAVER... Oh yeah, and my camera battery died right after the shot below was taken, so the rest of the Gorge pics are on Jim's camera. Hopefully he'll upload them soon!

Us getting suited up for the Skycoaster

Once the rush from the ride was gone, we were hungry. Found the one food place that was open and had a delicious corn dog to tide me over. I mean, we had plans to eat at Amicas later on in Salida. After our quick little break, we walked across the bridge. All except FISH stopped along the way to take photos. But, apparently, FISHY is totally scared of heights. He hobbled across the bridge in such a way that I asked him if he injured his ankle. Man, I have a bad short term memory! How did I already forget that he told us that earlier?

The last thing we did while inside the park was to ride the Incline Railway down to the bottom of the Gorge. This was cool because once we got down by the water, a group of white water rafters went by us. It was fun to watch them maneuver through the rapids. Maybe one day I'll make another trip up to Canon City to do that. While we were down by the river, we noticed the weather was starting to look stormy so we decided it was time to get back on the road. As we came up to the main entrance, we remembered to go check out the photo they took of us as soon as we had entered the park. Well, all of us except BEAVER CLEAVER...he isn't scared of heights, but man, he sure doesn't like lightning! So he ran out to "get the car warmed up" while HEAVIN' and I were tourists and bought a few copies of the photo. Yeah memories!

Ok, so we were finally on the road to Monarch and to Colorado Invihash! Oh wait, with one stop in Salida to eat at some place on our list of things to do....

The drive was beautiful, but I couldn't take any photos due to my dead battery! Seems I left my spare charging back in the Springs. Oh well. We finally got to Salida and found someone who knew where this "Americas" place was. Well, that's how it sounded on the phone when BROWNIE was telling me about our list. We found a shop owner who understood what we were asking and she pointed us in the right direction. Had some good wood fired pizza and microbrew at Amicas. Ok, list complete!

What to do now? Find a grocery store to stock up on anything needed while at Invihash and hit the road. Colorado Invihash, here we come!

You can view all the pics here.

Chasing the Cards

With our sweep of the St. Louis Cardinals, the Astros are only 3.5 games back! Whoo-hoo!!!

You can read the full article here. After a makeup game tonight, We face off with Brownie's Pirates next.

Let's go kick some booty and play in October, 'Stros!

Oh Halloween!

You can tell it's almost October...because of all the Halloween candy everywhere! I was at the store today during lunch and was excited to see that the candy corn and candy pumpkins were out! Now, I'm normally a chocolate person, but something about those candy pumpkins just makes me all happy inside. :)


Ok, well, after eating 4-5 pieces, I'm starting to feel sick. Dangit.

New shoes and Tom Kha, Tom Kha, Tom Kha!

So last Saturday morning I met my mom at her tennis club and we worked out together. Afterwards it was time to birthday shop for my new shoes! We first went to RunTex to get some new running shoes. A couple of people had recommended I try Saucony...and I'm so glad I did! They feel like I'm on a cloud compared to my old, bald Pumas. I ended up with these. I soooooo love them! Next we were off to REI to get some new trail shoes since mine were giving me blisters. My crazy trail running friend suggested this kind, and that's exactly what I ended up with. Man, does my mom rock or what?!?!

Next, it was time to take my mom to the Asians' restaurant. Oh my, tried the Tom Kha soup for the first time. Holy hell it is delicious! I ended up ordering it later on Saturday night as well...and again for dinner on Sunday......


My mom's first time to try out Nat, Marisa & Alisa's new restaurant.

Anyway, after lunch it was time to hook up my new bike rack and haul my new bike back to my place. Unfortunately, the allergy pill my mom gave me totally knocked me out.

When I got home, I zonked out on the couch for 2 hours and barely made it to Bridgett’s birthday dinner later that night. It took me a while to snap out of it, but finally I was back to my normal self. We ended up stealing Bridgett away from her party at one point and took her to the dive bar a couple stores down so we could all do shots. Our little shot group barged in to Raggedy Anne’s and ordered shots of tequila and some fru-fru shots for a couple of chicks. Next door to that bar is Roper’s…a country and western dance place. They let us in without paying the cover since we only wanted one shot. Another round of tequila and we were out. Had to get Bridgett back to the party where she had left her mom. Now things were kickin’. Soon after, we left the restaurant and headed over to Graffiti’s…it was Saturday night so they had karoke. We took over the bar and had a blast. Oh yeah…more shots. Closed the bar down. STRAP-ON ELVIS had some people headed towards his place, so we ventured over there. I don’t remember much after that because I think I made a beeline for the couch pretty soon after we arrived.

I woke up at 8am on the recliner and was ready to bolt because I wanted my own bed and I wanted a ham and cheese kolache from my favorite place! But when I got home that Sunday morning, I started up my laptop and started working on pictures, etc. Never went back to sleep. Next thing I know it’s 11am and time to get ready and head out to meet ELVIS at Plucker’s for lunch and football. Man, where did my morning go? Later that afternoon we hooked up with the hash. I forgot my camera, so no pics of that hash over on the East side. Afterwards, we skipped the On-On-On because we both wanted some Thai food. Headed up to the Asians’ restaurant and I ordered Tom Kha soup again! I just love that stuff. So in 2 days I had that soup 3 times. So get off your ass and go try it!

Since Blogger won't load pics for me today again, you have to click here to see Saturday night's festivities.

p.s. This should be the end of all the birthday week festivities, so I will jump back to the Colorado trip soon. I've got some gooooooood photos from that week!

More and more birthdays

On Wednesday of my birthday week, I met up with my dad, step-mom, uncle and cousin for some good burgers at Phil's Icehouse. I don't know what kind of bread they use, but it is DEE-LISH! Then we went next door for some Amy's Ice Cream. Mmmmm, Mexican Vanilla with Butterfingers is my ice cream of choice at that place. Brings back memories from high school when we used to go to the movie theater in the Arboretum that is now a freakin' Cheesecake Factory. Anyway, after we would go see a show, we'd hit up Amy's. Ahh, the good ol' simple high school days.


One of my gifts from my Dad & Carol!


On Thursday the 14th, as I was driving home from the gym, I got a message from Gordon that Bridgett was celebrating her actual b-day that night up at Sam's Boat. So I took a quick shower and headed up to join the festivities. Wasn't planning on staying long because I wanted to eat dinner up at the Asians' place, but that didn't happen. It was one of those "One more bucket" nights. We closed out so many times...until it was 2am and we had to leave. Bridgett and I did score on free birthday shots. We even worked the system. Told the waitress to go to the other bars inside so we could keep using our ID to get another free shot. Ended up having 1 Jager and 2 tequila shots. Yum yum.

Shot #1


Shot #2


Shot #3




The Birthday Girls


Friday at work did suck on 4 1/2 hours of sleep though. But I wouldn't change a thing. It was good times, good times. :)

Friday night wouldn't get me bring me a lot of rest either. Met my best non-hasher friends up at Riata Bar & Grill for some b-day drinks and appetizers. At one point in my life I was roommates with all 3 of them. I don't see these girls all that much anymore because they all went and got married and one just had a kid. I'm the lone single girl of our little 4-some. It was really great catching up with my girls and just having a nice chill night.

Margaret, Kathy, Jen & Ellen


We decided we needed a change of scenery and something not so relaxing, so we headed off to bar #2...Little Woodrows North. We thought Kathy's brother would be up there since he pretty much lives there, but no such luck. We did run into our old friends Janelle and Eric though! Hadn't seen them in ages.


Finally my week of partying was wearing on me and we all decided to head home. I had a gym appointment with my mom on Saturday morning and I wasn't gonna bail!

...b-day P.M.

So after work I met my mom at Trudy's for dinner. Migas, bacon and a Mexi-mart....yum yum!


After dinner my mom and I made one other stop and then it was about to downpour...plus I was a little tired. We decided to put RunTex on hold until Saturday. So I headed home to put my leftovers in the fridge and I got a message from FREE MEAT. She found my present that she misplaced on Saturday. Since it's right by my place, I went up there to meet her. Look how awesome! She knows me so well. :) I love me some Butterfingers!

We then headed over to the Asians' new restaurant and met up with several other hashers there. Devin wanted to take some pics with my camera, so most of the restaurant shots are thanks to him. What a sweetie!

And guess who else just happened to be in town and up there having dinner? PUERTO RICAN JEW! He was having dinner with DBD and TUCK IT. They decided to follow us to our last stop...Merkaba Lounge & Grill to meet up with ELVIS and SLUT.

When we arrived at Merkaba, STRAP-ON ELVIS and (MASSIVE) SLUT SLINGER had already arrived. We soon discovered that it was "$2.50 You Call It" Tuesday. Hells yeah! Also, on a side note, it seems that ELVIS moved to the great town of Austin 5 years ago...on my birthday! So we had 2 things to celebrate. We soon received a text message from 3 Wankers. Seems that RING AROUND THE PANTY, BABY G and DAY OLD FISH wussed out. They went home after dinner. Helloooo? Did you not hear the anything you want to drink for $2.50 special?!?!?!

Tongues galore.....

Good times, good times. :)

All the pics are here.

B-day continued....

The day is already shaping up to be a great one. Had my 40 ounce o’beer at midnight, had a 2 hour lunch with co-workers at Vivo’s where I devoured their scrumptious queso ( I am a queso FREAK!), one of their famous puffy tacos and then a yummy birthday dessert. Only thing that could've made it better was if I had one of their killer margaritas. And yes, they will knock you off your feet!

My cannoli on chocolate dessert!

Oh yeah! Then upon returning to the office, I discovered a gorgeous flower arrangement had been delivered.

After work I’m meeting my mom at Trudy’s for dinner. Gonna have the migas with a big ol’ Mexi-mart. (That’s a Mexican martini for those of you who don’t know the lingo.) Once we’re finished with dinner I’m gonna go get a bike helmet since I finally own a bike in my adulthood and then off to score some new running shoes! My current ones are pretty much bald on the bottom.

After all my b-day shopping, it’s time to party up with friends again. Not sure where yet since Lesley lives down South and everyone else is up North. I’ll figure something out.

Party on Wayne!

I almost forgot...one co-worker, who knows me well, gave me a big ol' gift bag of mini-Butterfingers and Reese's. Oh yeah!

Happy Birthday To Me, Happy Birthday To Me......

...so I went back up to my new favorite hangout this evening for my birthday beer at midnight. I had stopped in earlier for dinner and to use their wifi. Thought blogging about Invihash would be more fun up there. When I left, FISH and FREE MEAT told me to come back for a birthday beer at midnight. When I sent them an IM around 11pm to see how long they were staying up at Chon Som, they said only for one beer.....so I said, one BIG beer. When I arrived at 11:30pm, I found one large 40 oz of Old English waiting for me!

I immediately asked if there was OJ. No? Ok, so instead of a Brass Monkey, I had a straight up 40 of OE. What a great way to begin my birthday celebration!

Just so you know, I had taken a shower and showed up in pj pants and wet hair...but who cares, right? Dang, that OE tasted good. C'EM CUMMIN showed up shortly after I did and joined in the festivities. We all had some fun scratching and mixing the record player on my shirt......





Here are all of the pics.

Colorado - Thursday, Aug 31

So when we woke up on Thursday morning, we found a list of things to do that BROWNIE left for us.
He rode with someone to work so we could use his Jeep for the day. First on the list was to eat breakfast at King’s Chef, or as we like to call it, the Purple Castle. DAY OLD FISH, CLOSET FREAK, WET SPOT, BLACKS ON BLONDES and I all loved it. Holy hell…if you are ever in Colorado Springs, you MUST GO EAT THERE! It is the cutest, smallest diner with awesome food and friendly, humorous service. Sue is great! It would be a great hangover meal place for sure. I can't believe how big my meal was, and I ordered half of The Thing.

Next, we added something to the list ourselves. We decided to stop in at a dive bar we passed earlier on Platte Road…Irish House Bar & Lounge. Hung out with Johnny the bartender...super nice guy, but damn that boy is slow! Guess he isn't used to people ordering liquor drinks. We hung out there for a drink or two...listened to some good tunes on the juke box and then were off. As I was getting into the Jeep my shorts ripped! ARRGGGHHHH!!!!!! Oh well, what to do now? Continue on to another dive bar that was not on the list. BOB noticed a place called Tex-Mex Tavern in a little strip center. It was now 1:20pm and they didn't open until 2pm. BUT, the new manager/owner guy named Francisco told us to come on in. Whoo-hoo! The whole bar to ourselves. This one guy that was arriving at the Irish House when we were leaving actually showed up at this second bar...so we were chatting with him. His name is Art and he knows some tejano band here in Austin, but I can't recall the name. Anyway, after one drink, I was getting ansy to get back on track with the list. I mean, I hadn't been to Colorado in years and I was ready to be a little tourist.

So the Jeep was headed towards Garden of the Gods. DAY OLD FISH and CLOSET FREAK came with me as well. BOB and WET SPOT decided to continue drinking, but stumbled upon a sex shop. For those of you who watched the midget porn and abused the blow up doll at Invihash, you can thank them! Wow, GOTG is awesome! Totally gorgeous. And yes, I walked around with my ass hanging out of my shorts. We were starting to run out of time since we needed to pick up LATE NITE DRIVE THRU at the airport and it was on the other side of town. Looks like we weren't gonna make the last 2 items on the list. Oh well...guess we'll just all have to return for a visit. :)

You can see the pics from Thursday afternoon here.

Once we returned from picking up LATE NITE, it was time for a quick change and we were all off to the MOPP Hash (Moon Over Pikes Peak). It started at a place called the Finish Line Lounge, which was in walking distance from BROWNIE'S place. Several of us even wore our plaid skirts/kilts for the occasion. It was a live lay, so many people were hoping to snare the hare. NUTHIN' BUT NET held Chalk Talk while the hare slipped away and then we were off. First beer check, or should I say...first Boone's Farm check was at BROWNIE'S house. And who was FRB? Me! How that happened I'll never know. Somehow I caught up to the pack because they couldn't solve a check...I saw Alexander Road and knew exactly where it was going. A little inside knowledge never hurt. :)

On the way to the next beer check the hare was snared. He claims no, but somebody caught up to him and there was no beer in sight. This check offered brass monkeys!!! I just love C-4 and NET! My Tex-Mex hash weekend buds. I also had my very first Beer 30. Pretty good.

Soon we were off again and ended up at the same bar I was at on Weds night...Knob Hill Lounge. There were a lot more regulars there on Thursday, plus we filled up the place with hashers. Good times, good times.

We were sent off one last time and finally arrived at the On-In. The hare got floured, we had a naming and many accusations. This one chick was apparently offered $100 if she'd sleep with her 82 year old neighbor. She was closed lipped on whether she took him up on the offer...regardless, she was named $100 BUCK FUCK.

Check out the pictures for more on the night. Only other thing I recall off the top of my head is that C-4 brought out the Sharpie tattoos again, BROWNIE dove through his window, some flavors of Boone's Farm are way too sweet and we played beer pong using the door to the laundry room until the wee hours of the morning!

MOPP Hash pics.

Individual pics aren't loading for me anymore. Hopefully I can add in a few tomorrow. For now you have to check them all out using the above links!

Let's Go 'Stros!

Houston still in playoff hunt
By Mike Bauman / MLB.com

HOUSTON -- It is a strange thing, playing below .500 in mid-September, but still being solidly in the hunt for the postseason. But it beats the much more typical alternative, which is playing below .500 in mid-September and knowing that the only postseason you will see is the one on television. (Pirates!)
The Houston Astros have not been over .500 since June 22, but they are still very much alive in the crowded race for the National League Wild Card spot.
"I hear that there's a nice pennant race going on," Astros manager Phil Garner said with a smile on Sunday.
At least seven clubs still have a shot in the NL Wild Card chase. This is something like what Major League Baseball wanted -- parity, a lot of clubs on relatively equal footing, a lot of clubs with a shot at the postseason with just three weeks left in the season. This is good for competitive balance. This is also good for business....The Astros now have a three-game series in St. Louis that can fairly be termed crucial.

With only 19 games left in the season, the Astros must face the Cardinals 7 more times. Come on 'Stros, you can do it! Buck up and get that Wild Card spot!!!!!!!!!!!!

Royally Pissed!

Well, I was working on my day 2 post from Colorado tonight and disaster struck. Blogger wasn't loading pictures properly and then whammy! Almost everything I wrote was deleted...and I had been hitting the "save as draft" button in case I lost my wifi connection. What the?!?!?! All I had to do was load a few pics and it would have been finished. Oh well...guess I'll have to try again on Monday. It's time to sign off for the evening.

On another note, I met Robert Earl Keen at the concert on Friday night and got a great picture taken with him! He kicks ass!!!!!!!!

Oh yeah....the Longhorns suck!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Colorado Rocks! Weds, Aug 31

I woke up early on Weds, Aug 30 because I needed to finish packing for my trip. I had gone over to my place the night before to gather up a bunch of stuff and bring it over to my mom's house (I was dog sitting for her)...but I wasn't in the mood to officially pack. I had been staying up way too late the week before my trip doing family stuff, etc. Anyway, I finally got all my crap together and was off to the airport. I was pretty excited because I hadn't been to Colorado since my friends got married back in 2002.

The plane I rode on was the smallest one I'd ever been on. One side had 2 seats and the other side only had 1! And if you are over about 5'10", then you had to duck down while walking through the aisle. Pretty funny. I was in seat 1A and felt like I was almost in the cockpit. Chatted with the cute, young pilot before takeoff. He was pretty damn funny.


I tried to take some pictures of the beautiful mountains as we were coming in to CO Springs, but it just doesn't look the same! You can see them here.

Once I arrived in Colorado, FULL SERVICE picked me up and took me to where I'd be crashing while in the Springs. I relaxed there while waiting for WET SPOT and DAY OLD FISH to arrive. As soon as they got there we decided we were hungry. FULL took us to Old Chicago for food and beer. Ok, we asked for a place that wasn't in Texas...I had never heard of this place, but apparently they have them all over. At least it was new to us. Next stop was FULL'S condo for some adult beverages while we waited for BROWNIE to get home from work. We played some 3-man, chatted and just relaxed. Soon after we all headed down to the hot tub.


Somehow a game of "I Never" broke out. Man, hadn't played that since college. It didn't last too long though because next thing I know we were off to the airport to pick up CLOSET FREAK. From there we went to a dive bar close to BROWNIE'S place....Knob Hill Lounge. Pretty cool little dive bar with some interesting patrons. This one guy was hammered. He entertained us with his slurred ramblings and even fell off the bar stool. Oh wait, that was FISHY!

Hee hee hee.... But there really was a drunk regular at the place. Not sure why, but at one point he pulled down his pants. Crazy drunkard.

The 3 Drunkards



It was soon time to get home since Wanker Boy had to get up early for work. I ended up driving us all home since the boys were D-runk.

Here are all the pics from Wednesday, August 31.

Throwdown Before the Showdown/The Big Game

Ok, I'm starting to get excited now. I didn't really care about "the big game" earlier in the week. Wasn't even planning on watching it anywhere. But now I'm getting jazzed. Tonight I'm going to the "Throwdown Before the Showdown" concert at Waterloo Park. Got invited to hang out in the VIP section, so I'll be partaking in free-flowing beer and food from Plucker's all night (Thanks Kristin!). Hells yeah! I haven't been in my Texas country phase in a while, but Robert Earl Keen always puts on a great show. The road goes on forever and the party never ends!

Anyway, Plucker's did some advertising up in Columbus, Ohio to try to get some Buckeyes fans to show up. Should get interesting! And who doesn't love the ESPN College Game Day crew?! They were so great when they came to College Station one year. And yes, I actually made a sign, got up early while all my lazy ass friends slept, went down to get in line at Kyle Field so I could get in close to the College Game Day stage and cheered for my Aggies. Yahoo!

Ok, back to the subject at hand....

GO BUCKEYES!

CO Invihash!

Wow, what a vacation! Good times with old and new friends, experiencing new places and things. Colorado is so beautiful. I'm glad I went up a couple of days early so I could be the little tourist. I have a ton of pictures, but you'll have to wait for me to post them all later. Wish I would have realized earlier that the CO Springs airport had free wifi! Oh well, I was too tired to type anyway.

A sneak preview is below.

At Garden of the Gods

MOPP Hash beer check

MOPP Hash beer check

MOPP Hash - The hare was floured

The Royal Gorge

Getting ready to swing over the Gorge!


During trail on Saturday

(MASSIVE) SLUT SLINGER'S shirt made an appearance

Saturday night


During Hash Olympics on Sunday

Made a stop on the drive home to view the Continental Divide



P.S. I should do these out of town hash weekend trips more often because I lost 5.5 pounds!