Keep Austin Weird

I just got back from a four-day training in Fraud Examination. It was a good week – the training was excellent, I got upgraded to first class on the flight back, and the hotel put me on the club level which comes with all a fancy little room with all kinds of snacks. The training was in Austin, Texas, my first time there. A few observations on Austin.

Austin can get really cold. I was expecting warm Texas sunshine. Instead it was cold and rained most of the time. Not cool, not cool at all.

Austin is a party town. The main industries are the state government and the colleges. It is not all that different from Columbus. There are bars all over the place and these kids know how to kick loose. Many of the bars are clustered on 6^th street. It is just one big bar after another, block after block. Not really my scene, but it was fun to see.

As part of my training, we visited the National Fraud Museum. It was small but well done. If you are geek and into this sort of thing, plan a special trip to Austin. They will welcome you with open arms.

The food is excellent. I ate Tex-Mex constantly and could not get enough of the homemade, fresh salsa. One restaurant reminded me of Uruguay with its outdoor mesquite barbeque set up for cooking. You could smell the wood smoke a block away. In Uruguay, this is very common both in restaurants and in private homes. I think I will always associate the smell of meat cooking over wood fire with cool nights beside the ocean in Uruguay.