::REASON #436 I LOVE AUSTIN::He's not afraid to be eight years old:
The house we rented had a kids' play area under the stairs in the living room. One of the toys featured was a wooden roughly-elliptical spiral ramp with various marbles. I caught this as Austin tried to see how many marbles he could drop at intervals and still get his hand to the end of the ramp to catch them: "That's the game I was playing," he told me later. My dad alerted me to the pricelessness of the image, prompting me to get a camera. So I did. Bright, primary, curious, and curly-haired. Yay.
The New Braunfels trip was, as usual, a great time. We spent 7 hours getting there, taking hilly back roads (my little 4-cylinder PT Cruiser couldn't keep up with the other, hulking vehicles in the caravan) and stopping at the
Koffee Kup in Hico for pie and lunch (in that order).
Monday, per tradition, we rafted the Guadalupe. The rapids aren't too rough at the current cfs levels, and we pass the time by shootin' the shit and drinking (my brother brought a camel-pack, and my parents filled it with sangria). The neverending tube of booze, however, proved problematic. "There's no way to tell how much you've had -- there's just this tube!" Austin says, after some problems he had with, shall we say, quantity. Due to said "quantity problems," I had to do a little supervision of boyfriend, and then I eventually had a late lunch at
The Grist Mill and a long nap.
Tuesday, we floated the Comal on "toobs" and went to
Natural Bridge Caverns. I'd never done the latter. Following that day of excitement (ooh! guano!), we ate at a seafood place called
Clear Springs. Austin headed home from dinner, and I was left to pine and/or watch
Spaceballs.
I'm glad to be back in town. More loft-prepping is on the docket, and the Fourth of July! Yay!