Houston- activities

I waited too long to commit to coming out to visit dad, so by the time I was ready, tickets to Texas and Oklahoma were about what I paid round trip for Shanghai. So, I pushed back the timetable. Instead of joining my brother, I followed him.

I did make sure we overlapped, however. I got into Houston early Friday, the day before Tay was scheduled to leave, so we got to spend one day and one night fighting for space on the fold out couch in dad's service apartment.

It was fun, tay found a good bbq place for lunch, and we went to to the Menil collection by Renzo Piano, and then walked to Agora coffee shop. Its a nice, pesestrian, hipster part of town with a row of used clothing stores, including Buffalo Exchange. For dinner,  we went to a nice Uruguayan steakhouse for dinner and Tay and I split the parillada. When we got home, we watched From Dusk till Dawn which was fun.

Yesterday, we dropped tay at the airport and went to go see Django Unchained at a nice theater with wide seats and a bar you could bring drinks into the theater. I found the movie compelling, entertaining, and highly disturbing. After the movie, we went out for some Singaporian food at Banana Leaf. Good food, I especially like,end their chicken satay and tom yum soup.

Today we had a leisurely breakfast/brunch, and then dad and I went out to the Houston arboretum. It was a beautiful day, finally, warm and sunny. We walked perhaps two miles, chatting, looking for birds, etc. The trees really do look stressed out from the drought. Lots of stumps in the wetlands areas.

After the arboretum, we hit the gourmet grocery store nearby and loaded up on everything for a few dinners. Very much like AJ's, but perhaps a bit more emphasis on freshness of ingredients. Also, packed. The parking lot was filled with Lexuses and Beamers, and based on the final grocery tab, its not hard to see why.

Neri made STP and lamb tonight. The STP was superb, she makes the sauce with a bit of molasses, and doubles the amount of dates the recipe calls for.