Back in Iraq

I know this is a bit overdue, but I've been pretty busy the past couple weeks. I've forgotten many of the details by now, but I've still got the big picture in my head.

I took Luby to Austin on 27 January, courtesy of my dad, to spend a couple nights at the Intercontinental on 7th street. We pulled up to the front door at about 2:30ish and less than five minutes later the bellman was putting our bags away. The room, though not as big as I had in mind, was fairly spacious. The TV was old and poorly placed, but we weren't there to watch television, so I wasn't too disappointed. After we got our bags unpacked and put away, we made our way back downstairs where the concierge directed us to a semi-casual seafood joint. Our faggot sissy waiter, Jeff, was very stuck-up, but didn't let that get in the way of his service. It wasn't until after we had paid and tipped him that he warmed up to us and tried to conversate. We started off with escargot, and since neither one of us have ever eaten bugs before it was a new experience. I'm a big fan of garlic so I had no complaints. Luby had shrimp alfredo and I had a po boy, which was quite unremarkable. For dessert, Jeff brought us a chocolate mug filled with white chocolate mousse and a mix of fresh berries... yum.

On the way back to the hotel, Roy's called me to confirm my reservation for that evening. We were stuffed, but they were more than happy to push back our reservation by a couple hours so we could get in some lazy time. As soon as we got to the hotel we hit the rack and didn't get up and dressed until about 30 minutes prior to our reservations. We got downstairs and I asked the concierge to hail a cab for me; and this guy walked right out into the middle of the street and called one over. We ended up getting to the restaurant a bit early, so we went to the bar and had a few drinks while we waited. I was drinking mojitos, my new favorite drink, and Luby was sipping on a lava flow. We got seated and had a hell of a time figuring out what to order. We started of with some lobster potstickers, of which I ate most of, and when dinner came I proceeded to stuff myself. I ordered kajiki and Luby had the butterfish with a lobster tail. When I was almost done with mine, we changed plates and I all but finished hers. We were both far too full to even think about dessert, so we carried our drunk asses outside and caught a cab back to the hotel.

When we walked in the room, we saw a fruit bowl and a bottle of Moet sitting in a bath of ice water (I guess it had been there for a while). Luby decided we were too drunk to pop the champagne that night so we decided we'd have mimosas for breakfast and went to bed. We woke up the next morning, and before the room service came with breakfast I got some fresh ice for the champagne and set it to chill. Breakfast came with a large caraffe of orange juice to make mimosas with, but after one sip of hers, Luby decided that it was far too dry and that she couldn't drink any more. Not one to waste alcohol, I happily finished the bottle by myself with my breakfast and laid back down.

A couple hours later, it was time for us to get dressed and ready to drive back to Killeen for our neice and nephew's birthday party. After a few hours and a few ill-spoken words, we were back on the road to Austin. Luby wasn't feeling well, so we canceled our plans to go out and stayed in bed all night. The next day, we had room service bring up breakfast and squeezed in about an hour's worth of a nap before we had to pack our things and get out. We were sad to leave so soon, but were also glad to get back to the kids.

On the way up to Killeen, we stopped in Pflugerville to catch a movie. We saw Epic Movie, which wasn't as bad as its counterparts, but definitely would have been more appropriate as a bootleg. We left the theater and headed for the outlet mall in Round Rock. About three hours and $500 later we were ready to leave and headed to Joe's Crab Shack for dinner. Compared to what we had been eating the past couple days, Joe's food was pretty boring. We made our way back to Killeen, and after a quick visit with my suegra we were back at the house, living as commonfolk again.

I know there's more to tell about my leave, but for now this will suffice. I'll get Luby to post pictures as soon as I can talk her into it. I never imagined I'd say this, but damn I miss Texas.