ACL & Austin in Instagram

Sorry it took me so long to get on this Texas recap thing, but there's been some stuff going on that was more important than the blog.  But I wanted to get back into the swing of things and start off this recap before I forgot all the wonderful details from our trip to Texas.  I thought I'd begin with the main reason we went to Texas in the first place, Austin.  And more specifically, the Austin City Limits Festival.  I've only been to a couple of music festivals in my life, none of which were very large, but ACL has always been on my wishlist.  My bucket list, if you will.  It always seemed to have the best lineups, and the completel lack of camping in the middle of summer (which I am not a fan of), so Antoine and I finally decided this was the year to do it.

We bought our tickets and then they announced the lineup, that's how it usually goes.  Initially we were a little bummed about the lineup...not that it was bad, but we were hoping for more of our favorites.  Still, after we inspected the lineup a little further we decided it was still going to be a great weekend of music and we were excited.  After we bought our ACL tickets we decided to make a little Texas road trip out of the trip and added San Antonio, Fort Worth and Dallas to the agenda.  And that's how our trip to Texas came to be...

We flew out early Friday morning, the first day of the festival, and landed in Austin a little after noon.  In hindsight, it might have been better to fly in Thursday, so we would have been a little more refreshed to the first day of the festival, but oh well.

I went into the ACL experience expecting to be overwhelmed.  And while the crowds were a little daunting at times, I am happy to say that I didn't have one single crowd-induced panic attack! 

The highlight of the first day, and one of my favorite shows of the festival, was Vampire Weekend!  They were fun and their performance was perfect!

Before Day 2 of ACL we met up with my cousin and his girlfriend for a little sugary sustenance at Gourdough's.  We got the Fat Elvis (a donut with peanut butter frosting, bacon and caramelized bananas) and the Granny's Pie (a donut with caramel, pecans, bananas and graham cracker crumbs)...and wowza!  They were delicious, but our heads felt all fuzzy afterwards from all the sugar.  Warning: if you go to Gourdough's, which you should because it's delicious, two people only need one donut!  Please heed my warning, it's for your own good!

Fueled by an insane amount of sugar we headed off to Day 2 of the festival.  First up was Deap Vally, two rocker chicks who killed it even though the lead singer was losing her voice!

Next up was Walk the Moon, during the hottest part of the whole weekend!  But it was so worth it because they were sweating even more than the crowd, their energy was insane and they put on arguably the best show of the weekend, in my opinion!  It doesn't help that they are all so ridiculously adorable!!!

By the end of Day 2 we were so exhausted, but at least we got to see some fantastic bands...and the weather started to cool down a little that even which was nice.

Antoine's friend Phillip, who went with us to the festival, was nice enough to show us around town.  On Saturday night we tried one of the few places in town he hadn't been, Ms P's Electric Cock.  It's a cute little airstream trailer with a gigantic neon "CHICKEN" sign out front and their serving up some tasty fried chicken!

When A and I got back to the hotel, we finally noticed the crazy sunburn I had gotten that day despite the fact I was wearing SPF75.  OUCH!

Sunday morning, before the festival, Philip, Antoine and I headed to 24 Diner for some brunch.  The highlight for me was definitely the milkshake, roasted banana and brown sugar!  It was so insanely good!!  Probably one of the best shakes I've ever had!

Day 3 highlights were definitely Grouplove (in the video above), the National, and Phoenix, even though Antoine was about ready to fight some rude jerk in the crowd!

The sun coming through the iconic tree at Zilker!  FYI: this is the crowd during a slow time.

On Monday morning, after three days of standing out in the sun, Antoine and I were in need of a little relaxation, aka San Antonio.  But on our way to San Antonio we made one last Austin stop, Salt Lick BBQ.  Antoine and I had both never been, but heard such good things so we were committed to trying as many things as we could.  Antoine got the Rancher plate, which included brisket, pork ribs, sausage and turkey, and I got the beef ribs and then we shared.  We both agreed the beef ribs were the best and had the best flavor!  We also both loved their sauce.  And I was surprised by how much I like the sausage and the potato salad, which are two things I'm usually not crazy about in general.  If you're in the area, I'd say Salt Lick is a must!

All in all, Austin was fun but exhausting!  We loved the bands we saw (though Portugal. The Man was a little bit of a disappointment), but in the end we were just tired.  Three days of nonstop music and sun might be a little too much for us, but we were glad we got to experience it!  And we were glad Philip decided to go with us, because we got to check out some tasty food thanks to him!

Check back later for some more Texas Recap, but be patient with me as it's going to take some time to add the insane amount of photos I took (as per usual)!  Until next time...

Weekend in Instagram

What a weekend! Midpoint was fantastic, I finally got over my stomach bug, we ate some amazing food, had friends in from out of town and went to the park several times.  It was a great time!

Thursday was the first night of the Midpoint Music Festival and I was still feeling a little rough, so Antoine and I took it easy.

We started off the night with some dinner at Quan Hapa.  I got the ramen in order to appease my still upset stomach and it did the trick!  Mighty tasty, I can't wait to go back!  We took it easy the rest of the night and only went to a couple of shows.  But we still had a great time.

On Friday I had the day off and I was finally starting to feel better so I spent the morning cleaning, in anticipation for the arrival of Amanda and Aaron.

It must have been very tiring for Cheese, watching me clean, because he slept most of the morning.  Then Amanda and Aaron arrived and we all (4 humans and two dogs) headed over to French Park for a little hike through the woods.  After the dogs were properly worn out, we got ready and headed downtown.

After some tasty sushi at Fusian, we all made our way to Washington Park to check out Youth Lagoon and The Head and the Heart, which both put on great shows.

On our way out of Washington Park.  We headed over to Street Pops for some tasty popsicles, then listened to Warpaint for a bit before heading to Japp's.

Good Graeff put on a great show at Japp's (they are so cute!) and I totally fell in love with their pumpkin they carved!  Antoine and I finished off the night with the Kishi Bashi show at CAC (awesome!), while Amanda and Aaron went to see Murder by Death at the Taft Theatre.

Saturday morning started with Cheese jumping into our bed, being adorable and staring out the window.

After a quick breakfast at Panera, we took the dogs to Alms Park and then Ault Park for another walk through the woods to tire them out!  

I think it might have work...

Then the humans got cleaned up and headed over to Barrio in Northside for some tacos and margaritas.  And that's when things got really interesting.  The first pitcher of margaritas tasted so good that we decided to get another...

And the tacos were delicious too.  But those margaritas...so good!  And we left Northside feeling all kinds of good.

We headed downtown for the final night of Midpoint and continued to drink and just got happier and happier.

 And then Aaron rode a pig!  (I'm pretty sure he was a rodeo cowboy in a previous life!)

And then Amanda decided to straddle two pigs, because why not!

All in all, it was a pretty fantastic weekend with some outstanding music, great times with friends and amazing food!  How was your weekend?

Park Love (on film)

This will likely be my last post for the week, what with me having a bug the last couple days (bleh!), tonight being the first night of the Midpoint Music Festival, Amanda and Aaron coming in to stay with us for Midpoint, and then Antoine and I gearing up for our trip to Texas.  I don't think I've mentioned our Texas trip on here yet, but we'll be leaving shortly for our multi-city, seven day road trip around Texas.  Antoine is from Texas, but I've never been...even though I have some family there.  We're starting off in Austin for the Austin City Limits Festival, then heading down to San Antonio for a day just to relax, and then finishing up in the Dallas/Fort Worth area before we head back home.  Since we've got so many people to see and so much good music to listen to and good food to eat, it should be equal parts exhausting and fun!  Here's my Texas Pinterest board, in case you want to check it out and recommend something that I definitely need to check out that isn't on there.  I always love some travel tips and must-see recommendations!

In the mean time I'll leave you with my other roll of film that I recently got back.  This one is from about three and a half weeks ago when Antoine and I decided to get some take out and head to the park for a picnic, but instead we ended up going to three different parks!  While we were waiting for our Indian food, we headed up to Bellevue Park to check out the view... 

It was a little humid and hazy that day, but still beautiful.

With our delicious Indian food in hand we made our way to Alms Park to have our picnic and snap some pictures.  I've already expressed my new-found love for Alms park and my digital photos here, but here are some film ones I took.  [Again, I'm so lucky to have Antoine who's willing to lug around my extra camera for me and wait for me to take all these silly pictures I take!]

 Then we headed of to Ault Park for a leisure walk (and so I could geek out over all the flowers still in bloom and the beautiful light making its way out of the park).

I hope everyone has a wonderful weekend!  I'll be enjoying a bunch of awesome music with some of my most favorite people, what could be better than that?!

Pierogies and Hot Dogs

Cleveland really has become my favorite Ohio city when it comes to food!  You've got fun comfort food places like Melt Bar & Grilled and Lucky's Cafe.  You've got a slew of Michael Symon spots (of which I've only been to Lolita, but it was pretty awesome).  And then there's Sweetie Fry, which definitely doesn't disappoint on the sweet treat front.      

There's also a plethora of deliciousness within Cleveland's own West Side Market.  Located just south-west of downtown Cleveland in Ohio City is a chaotic haven for food fans known as West Side Market.  One of the best parts of West Side Market, in my opinion, is Pierogi Palace...and my sister will wholeheartedly agree with me on this.  Their homemade pierogies come in a wide variety of flavors ranging from traditional potato and cheese to creative bourbon chicken, bbq pork and peanut butter/banana. My favorites are the loaded baked potato and the bbq pork.  So tasty!  And, the best part, they're not too bad calorie-wise and they're really filling.  I highly suggest you check Pierogi Palace and the market out the next time you're in Cleveland, though a word of warning...the market on a Saturday is not for the faint of heart, that place is crazy packed on the weekend!

After a quick stop by the market to stock up on pierogies, you can continue driving further west for about 5 or 10 minutes and find a little unassuming dive bar called Happy Dog.  And there you will find awesomeness in hot dog form.  Oh, and about a million different things to put on top of said hot dog (or veggie dog)!  Don't believe me, here's the list of 50 or so toppings!  And the best part, you can pick as many as you want and it's only $5 for the dog.  And for $3 you can get a basket of fries or tater tots with any of 19 different dipping options. 

Happy Dog magic, complete with delicious dogs (and veggie dogs, so says Amanda and Aaron), awesome toppings, a great beer list, righteous tots and fries with some pretty kick-ass dipping options.  Of their sauces, my favorites are the roast garlic aioli, the bacon balsamic marmalade and the Brazilian chimichurri.  So good!

A close-up of Antoine's dog, complete with bacon, blue cheese slaw, grilled onions and a fried egg.

My dog with bacon-balsamic marmalade, grilled onions, brie, bacon and blue cheese slaw.  Yum!

Happy Dog also serves up some great live music.  Sometimes you can find great local musicians there, like my wonderful cousin Christa, also known as Uno Lady, or her talented boyfriend Tony Cross' band, Little Bighorn.  I highly recommend Happy Dog and my talented musical family members, if you're in Cleveland you should check them out!

Also, Happy Friday everyone!  Does anyone have some great plans in the works?  I'm planning to hit the gym for the first time since my ankle injury and maybe get some reading in.  And hopefully enjoy the wonderful weather we're supposed to have on Sunday!