Jackson West’s Obsessive Compulsion

The last two days have been decidedly Austin-centric instead of SXSW-centric. I flew in a bit early specifically to see Topaz play, and to have Friday pretty much to myself to explore the city. Now that I’ve had some time to play, I feel like it’s going to be easier to focus on what’s important here at the conference instead of feeling like I’m missing out. Also, Austin is pretty freakin’ cool, all considered.

First off, all the bars have free wifi. The bars. Though I admit, I don’t think a teetotaler would have a lot of fun here in Austin (which may be why everyone here seems to hate George Bush — they did have to live under his leadership a lot longer than the rest of us). But for coffee shops, while there are a few independent shops, none are downtown. In fact, a lot of the city is covered in big-box chains, which is sad.

Speaking of big-box chains, I’d like to mention the architecure here in the city. I think that the big-box model may have been invetend, or at least perfected, in Texas. What’s the motivation to build up instead of out? Homes are square, warehouses are square, shops and restaurants are square. The nicest stuff are the older brick buildings with the tall, shuttered windows. But everything is else is aluminum sided or stuccoed, and pretty shabby at that. Still, a two-bedroom home five minutes from downtown with a huge yard goes for about $110,000, which is ridiculously cheap.

The geography of the city is actually pretty neat, with greenbelts, dry stream-beds and spring-fed pools from aquifers in abundance. An interesting note is that all the various watersheds and aquifers are marked along the major highways. I’m not sure if this is for navigation, or for environmental concern, but it’s pretty neat. Since there are so many trails along the various greenbelts and not very many steep hills, it makes for great bike riding. Though if you’re under the Texas sun all day, wear sunscreen (I’m rather pink after riding about 16 miles yesterday).

The ethnic makeup of the city is primarly white and Mexican — and most of the Mexicans seem to be from Michoacan, which reflects California to an extent (though that’s changing in San Francisco with the influx of Yucatecans and Central Americans from El Salvador, Nicarauga and Guatemala).  There is a black community, but it doesn’t seem particularly centralized, though it’s my understand that most live on the east side.  The Asian population is very small in general, though much better represented on the University of Texas campus than around the city in general.

Talking with Topaz, the word on the street is that the downtown bar scene is so ridiculous on the weekends that most don’t bother.  As in San Francisco and New York, where Thursday night is the big night for city hipsters avoiding the tourists, in Austin it’s too avoid all the students.  The University of Texas is huge, and the number of young, beautiful and preppy kids wandering around town is astounding.  But they’re definitely balanced by the massive live music scene, here partly for the cheap living and for the great variety of venues.  Last night we went for a beer at a bar that was maybe 600 square feet, but had two stages, and an act on each stage.  That’s just ridiculous.

All in all, I’m learning to love Austin.  The good definitely outweighs the bad, and my friends Topaz and Brie, while scraping by as artists, are still building equity as homeowners who pay less for their mortgage than I pay in rent for my studio apartment.  I wouldn’t want to live here full time without a car, but the transit system is clean, cheap and efficient and as I mentioned, the biking is great.  Hopefully I can spend some more time exploring the city between bouts of geeking out.