Surprising Septuagenarians in the South West (or "Eating Like An Asshole Week: Day 1")

It's been kind of quiet here on the blog, but not quiet in my life. Unfortunately, I couldn't write about any of it for fear of spoilers.

See the wife and I flew out to Austin, TX, last week to stay with my sister for a few days. Beyond the fact that we love hanging out with my sister and LOOOOOVE Austin--particularly its food--we had a primary goal before us as well, which was to surprise my dad on his 70th birthday.


Back in June, I approached my step-mother, Myra, about Dad's impending October birthday and mentioned that the wife and I thought it would be fun to throw him a surprise birthday party. In our envisioned plan, we and my sister would fly in to my home town in Starkville, MS, a day or so before the party, stay with friends, have everything set up for the party in advance (place to have it, food, etc.) and then on his birthday Myra would take Dad out for a small birthday dinner only to turn up at the party location where we would be waiting with all of his friends. He'd be surprised, have fun and we'd all eat heartilly and party til dawn or 9:30, whichever came first. Myra thought this sounded good. Naturally, Dad wasn't going to make it that easy.


Not long after we returned home to Borderland, Myra informed us that Dad had announced that there was a reunion of F-8 pilots in Dallas on his birthday and he wanted to go to it. He was a pilot in the Navy and flew F-8s for a couple months. He'd even contacted the organizers for permission to crash it--the reunion, not the F-8s. So we decided to relocate the party to my sister's in Austin, because Dad would certainly pop over to see her for at least a day if he was in the area. Of course, no sooner had we all adjusted the plan then Dad called to let us know he was going to be in Texas on his birthday in case we wanted to come down... HINT HINT.


Dammit!


We decided that even if he hoped we would come, we wouldn't say anything about it and would actively make like we weren't planning to come. Besides, it wouldn't be out of the realm of possibility for Dad to change his mind about the trip. We went ahead and bought plane tickets and left it to Myra to convince Dad not to change his mind.


A couple weeks ago, my sister called to point out a flaw in the plan. While we'd assumed Dad & Myra would stay in a hotel while they were in Austin, allowing us to stay with my sister, Dad would be assuming they'd be staying with the sister and wouldn't make reservations. It was a good point. So we let him go on thinking that and reserved a hotel for them as part of the birthday present package.


Meanwhile, we were becoming increasingly of the opinion that Dad wasn't going to be surprised in the least at us showing up for his birthday--after all, he'd suggested it. And while we couldn't count on the surprise factor being strong, we could at least play with the execution of it in ways he wasn't expecting, thus leading to something of a surprise.


(TO BE CONTINUED...)


GASTRONOMICAL JOURNAL FOR DAY 1


Breakfast: shitfer waffles, a bagel and a banana at the hotel we stayed at in Charlotte (where our room smelled like feet and that was the nicest thing we could say about it).


Lunch: A hamburger, fries and a breakfast burrito, plus several bites of the wife's gingerbread pancakes at Kerbey Lane.

Dinner: Indian Food from a nearby buffet.

Beer Journal Entry #1: Lobotomy Bock (which was bitter and not to my liking), and my safety beer choice of Dos Equis Ambar.