Today was pretty fun – a very long day.
We arrived in Austin early friday (around 12 AM) and then went over to a friend of Michael’s – Elisa. She was very nice and the apartment was very comfy. We stopped for dinner at around 2 AM at a small restaurant, Kerbey Lane. This place (Austin, that is) has a lot of mexican food, which is good because I like mexican food. Anyways, I had some enchiladas and rice/beans, and some apple pie. I noticed here they’re pretty big on black beans – in LA it’s usually pinto beans, but they’re both good so whatever.
Anyways, after hanging out and talking for a while we went to sleep and woke up at around 11 or 12 or so and got ready to go check in and pick up our badges and all. Around then, my friend Michael was just arriving at the airport. We went down to the Sheraton (a rather nice hotel – previously a Marriott till very recently), which is about 6 blocks from the Convention Center. I got all unpacked in my room on the 14th floor (if anyone wants to come over and hang out sometime, let me know).
By the time everyone was ready it was pretty late so I took a quick taxi down to the convention center to get my badge and all. The line was huge, but I attribute that to the fact that it was for film and music as well. After a few minutes, Michael found me and we hung out together. I picked up a goody bag which had a bunch of cool random stuff. Nothing to write home about but all in all it was interesting. The whole bag was pretty cool, with a big adobe logo on it. In it are a bunch of magazines, including HOW, Linux World, and some other stuff. A bunch of random ads, stickers, mini-sharpies, so on. Even some strange thing called Nicogel, which is I guess a nicotene gel. I threw that away but it was pretty funny.
We went to How to Rawk SXSW when it was about half done, but it wasn’t really as useful as we thought it’d be. Mostly just about partying and the music and stuff. We were going to eat with Mike and Alex but after waiting for about an hour we (Whalesalad and I) figured we should just go on our own.
We saw a few people we knew. Said hi to Tantek. I think I saw Cameron Adams but didn’t get a chance to say hi. Hopefully at the panels and events we’ll get a chance to actually meet people.
After spending quite a while trying to figure out where to eat (I’m vegetarian so the BBQ/Steak places are out), Bryan Veloso suggested the Iron Cactus. It was pretty good, though we had to wait for a while. Their guacamole was pretty cool, made right at the table. The Nacho Fajitas were also good, with refried beans/cheese on tortilla chips, and with some sour cream, etc. The main stuff was ok (I got enchiladas again, and Michael got a burrito) but very spicy. These Texans sure do like their spice. Anyways next time I go I’m going to ask for less spice; besides that small issue it was good stuff.
I guess I’ll also keep my eyes and ears open for good places to eat over the next few days. Any suggestions? Also if anyone wants to have lunch or dinner sometime, let me know :)
Anyways, after dinner (and lunch really, we were starving) we decided to go see the movie 300, which had just come out today. We took a taxi to the theater that the people at Iron Cactus suggested: Tinseltown. However, when we got there, we didn’t see 300 on the list of movies playing. Uh oh.
We had the taxi driver take us across the street to the Metropolitan. He looked up the showtimes and there was one at 10:25 and 10:45. It was around 10:20. Perfect. And that’s where our night’s operation went down.
We tried to get tickets at the little machines, but when we found out that they were sold out and the next available showing was in almost three hours, we were pretty disappointed. We’d come a long way (2 or 3 miles I think) and paid a bit for the cab. Now I had just been reading The Bourne Identity and was feeling a little dangerous, so using a mixture of social engineering and clever planning, we made our way into the showing.
Michael wanted to just get a ticket for another movie and go to the other one. But that was risky. For one, they could be in opposite directions. And if they check ticketes at the gate there’s nothing we can do. If something went wrong, our tickets would be useless. So instead, I told him to get tickets for Saturday at 10:45. It was risky – I had no idea if they might be color coded by day, or have the day and time displayed very prominently. But at least this way, if the operation failed we’d be able to just come the next day.
So in we went, and it worked without a hitch. The theater was packed (well, it was sold out) but we found two seats right at the front. Hard to really describe it, but getting in was probably funner than the movie.
The movie itself was interesting. A Sin City twist on The Last Samurai, practically. The plot was pretty shallow, though it did have some cool parts and intricacies. It was good enough for the purpose – any more and it’d have probably been too complicated. I guess I just didn’t like how the story turned out towards the end. Stylistically, it was pretty cool. The battle scenes were pretty unique, though a bit like Sin City. I particularly liked their use of strategy and battle styles rather than just brute force and unnatural strength. Very well stylized, and not boring and repetetive. I liked that ever battle was unique and they didn’t just keep using the same moves and tactics over and over again. I’d probably rate it a 9/10. 6 for storyline, 10 for battle scenes, special effects, etc. and 8 for small bits of humor.
Well, it’s late at night now and I’ve got a bunch of panels I want to attend tomorrow morning (10AM – Writing, Better; 11AM – Field guide to design inspiration [really looking forward to that one]).
Good night!
Comments
This place isn't ALL about me — just mostly.
Abdul
1 year, 4 months ago
Your doing everything i’ve wanted to do for a long time! Luck you, Anand, lucky you, but someday i’ll go, someday.. :’(
Have fun for the both of us! and lots of pictures
Those were all the comments. But don't be shy — Add your own!