Our Crazy Week Part 1

Usually our blog posts aren’t too exciting, because we usually don’t do anything worth writing about. But this past week we have been busy! Last weekend I had enough of running errands and being responsible adults, so I brought back something called “Saturday Fun”. For those of you who don’t know, “Saturday Fun” was something Madelyn and I did while we were dating, each Saturday I would have a fun activity planned that we had never done before. Now that we are adults we can’t have “Saturday Fun” each week, so I have decided to do it once a month. This month we visited the San Antonio Zoo, which is one of the biggest collections of animals in the United States. I don’t really have any memories of other zoos, besides Hogle Zoo, so this was a real treat for a big nerd like me. I was excited because I got to see a Komodo dragon, an Anaconda, and a bug exhibit. Madelyn was excited because she got to watch a baby bear play in a metal bucket. On the way home we stopped at the “Texas-sized” outlet mall in San Marcos, about halfway between San Antonio and Austin. Texans love outlet malls, and they love to describe things as “Texas-sized!”



Later in the week, my sister Cadence and her friend Danica came for a visit. We went out to dinner with them to a place called Shady Grove, an Austin original. Madelyn and I have eaten at this place a few times and love it, but we have only eaten outside, under the “Shady Grove” that the restaurant is famous for. This time, we said “first available” when we were asked our seating preference, and it took about 3 minutes for them to get us a table inside. We realized that this just may be the ugliest restaurant we have ever eaten in. I think that it was built in the 70s and was really kitschy, and instead of updating it and making it cool, they just decided to make the décor as ugly as possible. Here is a picture of Madelyn, Cadence and Danica at our table, which was under a shelf thing holding some sort of cat. You can’t see it very closely, but there was a horse-head on the wall right by where Madelyn is sitting. We also took a picture of the bear trimmed bush out front. The thing that you have to understand is that Shady Grove is not a “crazy” place, this is the norm for Austin restaurants, which makes dining here a whole lot more exciting.





We also made a stop at another Austin favorite….. Peter Pan mini golf. This place has remained untouched since the 50’s, giving it the charm that makes it so cool. The ceramic animals are missing there arms, the greens are torn, and the video arcade is straight out of 1980, but the place is always packed. We took some fun pictures:





Coming up next in this two part McAustinTX blog, “Our Trip to Dallas”….. Stay tuned for this exciting installment. I would write more now, but there is a serious storm rolling through I am obsessed with watching the 24 hour Doppler radar station….. I like to watch the rain come toward us.