Sal’s Pizza, some of the best pizza I know.

The next day was spent walking around again. We walked from our hotel to downtown, all around the River Walk, over to the The Institute of Texan Cultures. That was okay. We learned that lots of different cultures moved to Texas many years ago. We also learned that the tickets are a little overpriced, and that the lights in the building were acting funny. We thought of going up the Tower of the Americas, but we were getting tired and hungry and needed to sit down for a while and not pay $12.00 for an elevator ride.

Off to the River Walk we went. We found ourselves a boat rental station and headed out on to the water with a bunch of other people and a tour guide. We learned of many things while on our boating adventure. We learned when every hotel along the river was built, and even a thing or two about some of the restaurants. The guide also threw in some facts about the flood gates and other things like that, but the most interesting thing had to be when we boated by the mall! The guide did focus a lot on some odd things, but it was a good ride, and I think we both would recommend it.

After the boat ride we decided to eat at the oldest restaurant along the river, the Rio. It was nice, we had a table right next to the water. We got to watch ducks swim all around, some boats pass, and a girl have her 16th birthday. Fun was had by all!

From the River Walk and the restaurant we walked over, closer to our hotel, to a pedestrian street with many Mexican things on it. Mexican shops, Mexican bands, Mexican food carts, Mexican girls singing Journey songs… just watch the video.

On Sunday we drove home, but first we stopped by Cascade Caverns for a peak inside the Earth’s guts. It was a nice sidetrip. We learned some about the “living” walls and why we should not touch them. We got to see some bats, hit our heads, and have a good time in the cool, damp caverns. If you are in the area I would say you should check them out.

After posting all these pictures I realized, I forgot about the Alamo! We went there on Saturday, and it truly is something you can forget about. I am sure there is plenty of interesting history that one can know about the Alamo!, but they were not telling anybody that history when we were there.

Here in Bryan Texas, we have a thing called pizza night, and it happens on Tuesday.

This day began early today. I had to drive Teresa to work in order to use the car. We have a busy afterwork schedule this fine Tuesday. After work I have to go sign up for the kayak class/trip I am taking this Saturday. Teresa is working late. Tuesday is pizza night. And finally, Teresa is taking a kayaking roll class this evening. It’s going to be a busy evening.

This is one of the giant pizzas from Gumby’s. They are still in one of the top spots for best pizza around. We only have a few other pizza places to try.

At the movie theaters here you can not only get a trash bag size bag of popcorn and a wheelbarrow full of soda, but you can also get a cold pickle in a bag! I am not trying one, though maybe I can get Teresa to…

This is a little bar somewhat near us. It is the type of places with no windows, and some interesting locals. It is also the kind of place that draws the greek people around. Not sure why that is yet. Anyways, we have gone a couple times, and besides being an play bar, it has very cheap drinks, especially during happy hour. The Aggie Martini is just a beer with an olive in it. We don’t know what the Flaming Dr. Pepper is, but I think we can make a good guess.

Teresa was brave enough to try the wings during happy hour at the Ptarmigan Club. She is still alive, so I guess they were okay.

They put Texas on everything out here, even on the porta-potties. It’s crazy.

As Wylie mentioned, we had dinner with most of my cohort and their families on Thursday and we discovered that pizza rolls are better than pizza at Double Dave’s…we will have to sample some others. The other awesome thing about that night was watching 4 year-old’s make friends. It seems like they have it right—the eyeballed each other, saw they were the same height, said, “My name is ____” and they were off and running. That was it. Seems so easy that way. Why does it seem to get so much more complicated later in life? After dinner we walked around campus a little bit and ended up at the Dixie Chicken for an adult beverage. We saw many people playing dominoes and many animal heads on the wall. It seems like a nice place to hang out. Although, the college kids come back next week, so we are not sure how much we will go there then…

Yesterday I got to go to “Fish Camp” with the other interns and the director of the counseling center. Freshmen here are called “Fish,” so it was not something nautical, but rather a whole lot of freshmen doing a whole lot of cheering. We left here at about 6:30am and drove 2-ish hours. The “Fish” spend about 3 days up there learning the traditions of A & M and how to do all the cheering that will be required of them during the football games, etc. It seems like it is probably fun. It reminded me of student council conventions or something–where everyone is trying to show that they have the most spirit for their team and some very zealous folks dress up or dye their hair to match. We talked to them a little bit about the counseling center and showed a video about the services we offer. We did this for 3 groups and then came home. It was a very interesting day. I was tuckered out at the end of it, and happy for a nap and a nice dinner at Cafe Capri.

Today we tried the bagels at Blue Baker at about 11:45, and we learned that “breakfast food” is only to be eaten at Blue Baker before 10:30am–they had turned the toaster off, so we ate our bagels untoasted, which was fine. However, since Wylie and I are rarely up and moving before 10:30 on a weekend, Blue Baker is probably off our breakfast list…Then we ran some errands–got a softball glove for me, and braved the “best” grocery store that is near campus. That was kind of bad thinking on my part because it was a little crazy with folks moving in to town. They do have lots of good stuff though, so I will remember that at a later time, when it will not be so crazy.

We just finished the third Indiana Jones movie, and it was good. I liked them all! (The second one was a little cheezy, but Data was in it (from the Goonies), so the cheeze was overlooked, for the most part!)

Getting ready now for another week of working and maybe planning an adventure for next weekend…any thoughts on where we should go?

The other day Teresa and I met two-thirds of her cohort, and their families, at Double Dave’s pizza. We had not been to Double Dave’s yet, but in our quest to try all the pizza places around, we needed to. Plus it was going to be good to get out and do something with people.

Seems that in these parts they like to essentially take a pizza, cut it up, and roll those cut up bits of pizza into rolls, making what they call pizza rolls. Perhaps these rolls are in more places than just here, but I had never seen them. The most common kind of roll is the pepperoni roll. I believe they have cheese and pepperoni in them, and as you eat them you dip them into either a red sauce, or ranch dressing. Double Dave’s is the one place we know of that has rolls other than pepperoni rolls. They have a 4 cheese roll, and that is what we ordered. The 4 cheese roll is really just dough wrapped around cheese, well 4 cheeses I guess. They have to be the 4 most mild cheeses because we did not detect any 4 cheeses like you can sometimes. I am guessing that the 4 cheeses were different kinds of mozzarella. Perhaps even 4 different brands of mozzarella. Regardless of how many cheeses were actually in the thing, they were good. Better than the pizza in fact.

If you come to this area, first give us a call, second get yourself some pizza rolls.

Speaking of my cohort…I think I love them! They are all really fun and nice and I will be glad to go through this with them and hopefully hang out some along the way! We all attended the annual Division of Student Affairs social this evening and brought our sweeties and families, and it was good to get to meet them all. We ate some BBQ and a lot of desserts. There were a few weird things though, like a sing along and the chicken dance…I’m not sure about that stuff…

Hmmm…Wylie already wrote about the biking, and I am glad that that seems like it will work out for me, at least some days. We have been having fun in the evenings…last night we made cookies to take to the social and there was the bike riding…we also tried another pizza place on Tuesday–Buck’s–which was my least favorite so far. I do get tired pretty early though, so hopefully I will learn how to manage that better…Any tips???

Then this evening Wylie and I did some spontaneous errands…about which there is a rant coming at the end of this post…and tried Gumby’s Pizza, which was ALSO full to the brim with local color and charm. It was super yummy (don’t tell Mr. G though) and super cheap, and pretty much the definition of “no frills.” It seems like lots of college kids go there and they have a dining room that is a haphazard collection of various kinds of tables and posters that a 15 year old boy would like (i.e. a Monty Python Ministry of Silly Walks, a Mullet Guide (hairdos, not fish), a monkey drinking beer, etc…). The tables and posters are unattended, and there are no plates in the whole place. They called my name, gave us the pizza, and we ate it straight from the box. So, it’s kind of like being at home, only in a restaurant. I liked it. It is my new favorite place…the only negative was that they have Pepsi products, but even that was forgivable in such a relaxed atmosphere…Everyone seemed to be eating these little pizza roll things, so we will try those next time.

I have also been busy with dissertation stuff, which is good. I had to buy a subscription to Zoomerang for a year, so it is quite possible that you will start seeing random surveys around 10gallonhat.com because I want to get my money’s worth.

In other news…WARNING, A RANT COMING…I got my Texas vehicle registration yesterday, and it turns out that TX requires front and rear plates, which I do not now nor have I ever had on Atom, and it seems that getting a front license plate mount is more of a hassle than it should be. Here is my opinion: There should be a standardized rule for all 50 states–one plate or two–and cars should come at least with the holes so that you can easily attach a cheap mount. The Scion dealer wants $35 just for the mount, then who knows how much to drill the holes…I am going to try to sweet talk them into putting on my cheap $5 mount from Auto Zone tomorrow…we shall see. For some reason this particular detail of moving has made me more annoyed and upset than it should, and for that, I apologize to Wylie because he has had to deal with it. A couple of naps helped. Also, the memory foam for the bed came yesterday, so sleeping like a baby angel tonight will help too…

We have had a busy two days here in the Lone Star state. Monday evening involved going to many stores; Bed, Bath & Beyond, Pier 1, World Market, and Office Max, all looking for a basket to attach under our desk to hold computer wires. After we finally found the right basket at Office Max, we had to get something to keep it held underneath the desk, so we headed to Michael’s for some little brackets.

This afternoon involved getting a license plate holder for Teresa’s car. Texas requires two plates on your car, but her car does not have a front holder. Hence our quick trip to AutoZone. After that we needed a drill in order to pre-drill holes for the basket under the desk, so off to Lowes we went. Then we were feeling hungry and decided to have our pizza night tonight, so we searched  for local pizza. We looked around a bit, but decided on Gumby’s Pizza mainly because of the name. When we got there the sign was awesome. The inside was what I imagine a dorm room to be like, dirty and full of college students. Thankfully it wasn’t too dirty to eat, so we ordered one of the best pizzas we had had in a while, and enjoyed ourselves.

Tomorrow we will complete the desk fixin’s. I am growing tired of kicking wires.