Just Horsin' Around - Thoughts on Central Texas Real Estate and More

I love music.  It excites me, it soothes me, it focuses me.  Chamber music cools me on a hot summer day.  (I have no idea how it does that, it just does.)  Perhaps it's because of my generation, with a sound track for our entire youth.  Whatever, music is an important part of my life

It's hard, though, to get radio stations that play just what I love without playing a lot of stuff that I don't care for. 

Recently, my daughter introduced me to Pandora.  With Pandora, I can create my own stations that will play exactly the kind of music I like, and nothing else, and listen to them on my computer as I work.  And no commercials!  Pandora exists because of the Music Genome Project. 

A plus is that I am learning about musicians and composers that I'd never hear of otherwise.  When you "seed" a station by entering a performer or composer or piece of music, Pandora will include similar music.  Right now, for example, I'm listening to a piece composed by Arcangelo Corelli,Sonate Da Camera A Tre, For 2 Violins & Violone (Or Harpsichord) In D Minor, Op. 2/2: I. Allemanda. Adagi, performed by Robert Woolley.  It's beautiful, and I'd never heard of Corelli or Woolley before.  Now I know someone new to look for when at the CD store.

A few moments ago, in a different mood, I was listening to Chris Duarte.   I have another station set up, Women With The Blues (you can name your station yourself) that contains the likes of Marcia Ball and Lou Ann Barton.

I'm so very excited about this that I just had to share! Enjoy!

Las Manitas is - was - is - a downtown Austin landmark for the last 25 yeras.  "Was" because it closed its doors yesterday to make way for an oh-so-Austin Marriott.  "Is" for two reasons - one, we don't know yet for sure that they won't re-open in a new location, though it won't be the same, not being able to walk through to the back patio, and, two, because just as other Austin landmarks lost to us (Armadillo World Headquarters comes to mind), it will always be with us in our hearts, a little bit of Austin's soul, a little bit of what made Austin a place we want to live. We're slowly losing more and more of those as people love Austin, move to Austin, then change Austin to make it less what they moved here to experience and more the very places they moved from. What's next?  Filling in Barton Springs Pool and building a swimming pool in its place?

There's been quite a bit of talk about the closing.  Some of it is shared here 

Texas Monthly Eat My Words:  End of an Era: Austin's Las Manitas: Closed.

HotelChatter:  Austin's Las Manitas Shuttered to Make Way for Marriott

ValleyWag:  SXSW Hangover Joint Closes

Stevey:  R.I.P. Las Manitas in Austin, TX

Austin Business Journal:  Las Manitas Closes

Of course, this isn't the only time that Las Manitas has been covered by blogs and media.  Some past reviews:

Yelp Reviews

Frommers

Texas Monthly On The Menu

Austin Chronicle

And the list goes on.  We'll hope that they'll open in a new location - but it won't be the same. 

The sign said it best, and it applies not only to Las  Manitas, but to so many local treasures, buildings, businesses, countryside, that made (and make) Austin the desirable place to live that it is, things that have given way to replacements that could be found in any city anywhere in this country: 

“Here was fought the battle for Austin’s soul. Austin lost.”

Las Manitas is, granted, just one.  How many more can we afford to lose before we become Anywhere, U.S.A.?

Every year (this will be the 11th), the Austin Museum Partnership and member museum in the Austin area hold a city-wide, discover (or rediscover) Austin Museums Day - for free! 

This is a great chance to get out and explore the numerous museums in the Austin area, ones you've seen before, ones you didn't know existed. You certainly can't beat the price! 

This year, the date is September 14, 2008. 

Museums participating are:

Arthouse at the Jones Center

Austin Children's Museum

Austin Museum of Art - Downtown (I prefer Laguna Gloria, myself, but it's not on the tour)

Austin Nature & Science Center

Blanton Museum of Art

Bob Bullock Texas State History Museum

Butridge Gallery at the Dougherty Arts Center

Capitol Visitors Center

Elisabet Ney Museum

French Legation Museum

George Washington Carver Museum

The German Free School (German-Texas Heritage Society)

Harry Ransom Center

Jourdan-Bachman Pioneer Farms

Lady Bird Johnson Wildflower Center

Lyndon Baines Johnson Library and Museum

Mexican American Cultural Center

Mexic-Arte Museum

Neill-Cochran House

O. Henry Museum

Beverly S. Sheffield Education Center

South Austin Museum of Popular Culture

Susanna Dickenson Museum

Texas Folklife Gallery - Downtown

Texas Memorial  Museum

Texas Military Forces Museum

Texas Museum Museum

Texas State Capitol

Texas State Cemetery

Umlauf Sculpture Garden & Museum

Wild Basin Wilderness Preserve

The links above are to the actual websites.  The link to the Austin Museums Day at top will show you what activities are going on at each  museum to celebrate the day, and when.

This is by no means a complete listing of Austin museums, just the ones that are participating in this event.  This should, however, certainly be enough to keep anyone busy for the day!  Hope to run into you there!

Labor Day means different things to different people.  Officially, it is the day set aside to honor all of those who labor, without whose work we wouldn't have the society we do today.  Everyone is supposed to relax from their labors (except the folks in the stores, presumably, for the Labor Day Sales), have a cookout, a picnic, go out on the lake, etc.

Labor Day, in Texas, also has become synonymous as well with the First Day of Dove Season, falling as it does on or near the first of September, opening day.

This morning I went out on the porch and heard the pop! pop! pop! of shotguns that will be a familiar sound between now and the end of the season.  The dove population is high this year, we've been noticing, the drought not withstanding.  Should be good hunting and good eating for those partaking in this annual ritual that goes back into the mists of time. 

Some folks who move to the country without doing their homework and with no familiarity with these customs, their first September 1 panic at the popping sound of guns on adjoining properties. (This doesn't sound anything like the gunfire you hear in the movies or on television, by the way.)   I usually advise that, if they're concerned about injury to themselves or their livestock as a result, that they first check the county records for the number of people (not actual hunters) who have been injured by gunshot wounds as a result of dove hunting in the country over the past, oh, 50 years or so.  These are, after all, shotguns that are being used.  Such research serves as reassurance.  Likewise with the claim that their horses will panic at the sound of gunfire.  Well, no, they won't, not unless YOU panic and they follow your lead.  Mine don't even look up from the Very Important Business of Grazing, when dove hunting is going on in the pastures to the right and left of them.  Neither do the cattle that are grazing in those pastures. 

Even if you don't participate yourself, try to enjoy the sound, at dawn and dusk, of an historical country tradition - your neighbors hunting in a time-honored tradition.

During all of the hooplah and media coverage of Hurricane Gustav, I've been more than usually interested in every detail.  My daughter Jess will be moving to the Cayman Islands for 3 months mid-September, and her friend Chad will be there as well (more about this in another blog).  My son P.J., with his lady, Nicole, is supposed to be spending a 3 day weekend in mid-September in New Orleans. In addition, hurricanes in the Gulf can impact Central Texas, not only in weather, but in folks evacuating from coastal areas and needing shelter from the storm for them and their animals.  Naturally, I followed Gustav's path and development with some concern.

To that end, I turned to my preferred internet weather information provider, wunderground.  I had not realized before, since I generally  use wunderground to track local storms, that it has its own set of blogs having to do with the weather.  Over the past few days, I've been following Jeff Masters' blog predominantly - it's a great combination of technical information and down to earth, what-does-this-really-mean, plain English explanations of what's going on. Plus, he adds comments from folks who are on the ground in the impacted areas, which REALLY helps. It's a great resource.

He's got me hooked.  When weather of a major import strikes again, you can be sure I'll be heading to wunderblogs, more than the mainstream media, to get the facts.  Blogging strikes again!