More House Pictures

A few additional shots of the house as unpacking progresses.


Back patio (full of pecan leaves)


The backyard, looking toward rear of house from one far corner


The kitchen and dining room, starting to take shape
(Sheila et al., note the table)


First home-cooked meal


Some local food items we picked up at the local H.E.B. to stock the new fridge.
Clockwise from top:

• Blue Bell Ice Cream -- apparently once called "the best ice cream in the world" by Time Magazine.
• Sweat Leaf Tea -- much better than Snapple, and available at most Whole Foods stores (also an Austin institution).
• Smoked sausage courtesy of Opa's Smoked Meats in nearby Fredericksburg.
• Shiner Dunkelweizen, one of the many Shiner beers brewed by Spoetzl Brewery.

House Pictures

We will add a few more soon.


Looking at the kitchen from the dining room


Living room (front of house)


Master bedroom, facing windows


Perfect wine- or beermaking area off garage


Jon posting, sitting on fold-out stool (day before movers arive)


Lester finding the carpet comfortable

Move-In Day

The moving truck showed up on time Wednesday morning, and John the driver and Ralph and Michael the movers got to work.


John's giant rig

Things generally went well for us and the movers. Ralph and Michael managed to move our den sofa through the hall and into the middle bedroom by means of a space about an inch wider and taller than the sofa standing on its side. Lester, however, had one minor setback. A wandering neighborhood dog picked our house as the focal point of his exploratory shenanigans. Each time one of us chased it away to the point that it looked like it was leaving, it returned. We kept Lester inside, despite the doors being open for the movers. Finally, Rachel (of course) corralled the dog, who was wearing a tag from a location service -- often a sign of a repeat offender! I placed a call to the service, and five minutes later I got a call from someone who said "I think you have my dog." It turned out to be a college student neighbor. A few minutes later and dog and owner were happily reunited. While we humans all moved on quickly, Lester, who watched most of the events unfold from the living room window, is now apparently trying to make sure he matches all of the spots the mischievous dog "marked" around our property.


Rachel and Lester's new friend


In a little over 4 hours, all of our crap was stacked up around the house. Our first item of business? Lunch. We ate at the Central Market Cafe, then picked up some supplies for dinner. We may not have a refrigerator, but we have an oven. So we had a nice meal, drank a nice wine (2003 Benziger Rose Ranch Merlot) and got to work unpacking.


Jon serving our first meal at home

Our new house - Sim style

It's not exactly to scale, but in my nerdness, I created our house in The Sims 2. It's fairly faithful, though I am not quite enough of a nerd to have designed my own Sim cabinets and furniture. An attempt to create Sims of me and Jon was completely unsuccessful, and somewhat frightening!

Pix of the new pad

Front of the house on Carleen Drive, Austin.


Standing in front room (nice large room with bamboo floors), looking at dining area and kitchen.


Remodeled kitchen, granite counter tops, new appliances.


Master bathroom, also just renovated.


Second renovated bath.


Backyard (from side), with large patio.


Turn your head - a pecan tree in the back (produces a lot of nuts).


One more back yard view.

Where we're living: Wikimapia

We just got back from a short trip down to Austin. One purpose was to hunt for houses. We kept up a furious assault with the help of our agent, Glenn. The two of us did 21 walkthroughs in about 5 hours on one day. Hard work paid off, and we found a nice little place in the Allandale neighborhood, in a good location not too far from the city center.

While we were down there, Rachel started her new job at DisplaySearch. We had a fun time and a nice meal out with some of her new colleagues. We had dinner at the South Congress Cafe, a roomy, lively American bistro-type restaurant. The menu emphasized the local culture, with a lot of Mexican, Tex-Mex and southern U.S.-inspired dishes and accents. A good example was the jalapeno-venison meatloaf Rachel and I shared, served with a good side of roasted garlic mashed potatoes and some good but plain broccoli. It had a lightly smoky flavor, probably from some chipotles, and a nice spiciness that didn't overwhelm.

One of the discussions we had that night was about good mapping websites. Here's a good one that Rachel and I hadn't heard of before - wikimapia. Below is a map centered around our new place.