Go Red Sox!

When we left for Austin on Thursday afternoon, it was cool and raining--and now we're back and it's clear and cold. I'm wearing boots! And I wore a coat on my commute this morning! It was amazing. Although not quite as amazing as the weather in Austin--sunny and around 70 degrees during the day, and in the 50s at night. We did not see one single cloud the whole time we were there.

The trip was fun--it definitely started off well, because the first thing that happened was that we were given a free upgrade from our crappy compact car rental to a PT Cruiser convertible. Torsten LOVES convertibles with a fiery burning passion, so he almost peed himself with excitement when the rental car guy told us we could pick any car we wanted off the lot. There was only one convertible, and believe me, there was not even a discussion about which car we would pick--it was just understood.

Austin was fun, although I have to say that it was not as interesting as I had expected it to be. I guess that's because I had really high expectations, but after three days there, we pretty much felt as though we had done everything we wanted to do. This included some time spent at the outlet mall (where I got four sweaters and a dress for under $100--it was great, because it was the real kind of outlets where things are actually cheaper than in the mainstream store, and that doesn't always seem to be the case with outlets anymore). It also included a day spent driving around some of the farm roads in the convertible, and now my nose is sunburned. But it was worth it. And it included time spent downtown, which was very pretty and atmospheric.

And of course, there was the wedding. It was definitely different from how we want our wedding to be. For one thing, the ceremony was very religious and did not feel incredibly emotional, although still sweet. And also, they had about twice the number of guests that we plan to have. It definitely helped both of us get a clearer idea of things we do and don't want from our own wedding. And the bride looked gorgeous and both of them seemed very happy, and it was great to see them get married, knowing how much they really love each other.

Then on our way home yesterday, our flight out of Austin was overbooked and we had a two hour layover in Dallas anyway, so we offered to take the next flight to Dallas and were given $600 in American Airlines vouchers as a reward. And we still made our connecting flight no problem, so it was basically free money, which we are very excited about. We may use the vouchers for something practical like our honeymoon, or we might use them to go somewhere fun on a quick trip we wouldn't otherwise have taken. We are still undecided. Does anyone have any thoughts on this? I have never been good at the Practical vs. Fun debate when unexpected, good things happen to me, so advice would be appreciated. And if you fall on the Fun side of the debate, suggestions of where specifically to go would be appreciated.

I took lots of photos during the weekend, but we didn't get home until about three o'clock this morning, so I haven't uploaded them yet. I'll try to post them this evening. In the meantime, my Google Reader is displaying the unprecedented number of 182 new posts for me to read, so I think I had better get on that. I hope everyone had a great weekend.