If It's Thursday, It's Gotta Be...

…AUSTIN baby!!!


This is the gorgeous view from my bedroom window as the sun was coming up around 7.15 this morning. Actually, to be more accurate, this is the view from the upstairs balcony beside my bedroom where I sat from 4.45am, bright, breezy and wide awake waiting for the sun to come up.

Jet lag is such a funny thing; not ‘funny-ha-ha’ but more ‘where-the fuck-am-I-and-how-did-I get-here-funny’, which, if you think about it (and I had a lot of hours to think about it this morning) isn’t particularly funny at all.

Stepping out on to the balcony at 4.45am, I was greeted with a blast of warm air (I... eh… had double pepperoni pizza last night) and a crescendo of crickets or grasshoppers doing their Beastie Boys no-sleep-till-dawn chorus. It struck me as a shame that they all whistle or click or sing exactly the same note (C#, I think it is) because if they were a bit more organised they could belt out a pretty spectacular acappella tune. I can just picture them on a street corner huddled around a glowing fire in a trash can debating what their next number will be…

Cricket 1: “Right guys, ‘Goodnight Sweetheart’ in G major. All together now, one, two, three…”
Cricket 2: “Woah, woah, hold on a minute man. We, like, totally did that last night AND the night before and its just, like, SO old. What about something that’s, like, more... now?”
Cricket 3: “I agree dude. Some Snoop or some Diddy would be, like, awesome man!”
Cricket 1: “Oh really. So you two’ve been talking about changes to the set without me and cricket 4 have you?”
Cricket 4: “Hey, leave me outta it man. I only sing bass so, like… whatever.”
Cricket 2: “Chill cricket 1 dude. We just thought…”
Cricket 1: “WE? WE? I started this band. And I was the one who got us the gigs and drove the van and packed up the gear and…”
Cricket 2: “Yeah but that was when we was happening man. Look at us now. Stuck on this street corner at four in the freaking morning freezing our li’l cricket balls off. It’s a change of direction or me and cricket 3 are outta here man.
Cricket 3: “Totally dude.”
Cricket 1: “I can’t believe what I’m hearing. After everything I’ve done. I… I…”
Cricket 2: “It’s just time to move on man. But I tell you what… for old times sake, just one more rendition of New York singer-songwriter Billy Joel’s ‘For The Longest Time’. Take it away cricket 4. One, two, a-one…”
Cricket 4: “Dum, dum, dum...”
Cricket 3: “Woah-Oh-Oh-Oh…”
Cricket 2: “…the longest…”
Cricket 3: “…for the longest time…”

As I was saying… jet lag is a funny thing.

Anyway, today my brother Keith and I played the gorgeous golf course above in temperatures of almost 100 degrees and very pleasant it was too. The cart girl and her ice cold Powerade… eh... I mean… beer, visited us regularly and the course was virtually empty.

That may change in the next couple of days however, because as I type, I’m watching three million people on television clogging up the highways as they head this way from Houston and the gulf coast. Not far behind them is Hurricane Rita and the whole thing is like a scene from ‘The Day After Tomorrow’.

It’s hard to believe a hurricane is on its way and none of the television ‘experts’ seem too sure as to where it’s going to hit or how big an impact it’ll have here in Austin. A lot of sporting events have been cancelled this weekend but we’re all waiting to find out whether Austin City Limits (think ‘T In The Park’ x 2) will go ahead. We’ve got tickets to go and see Coldplay, Franz Ferdinand et al on Sunday so fingers crossed.

More updates, like, later dude. Totally.