my life

Last weekend Marie, Alban and myself took a 5 day road trip to Texas to stay at a ranch in Kaufmann on the outskirts of Dallas.

The family who own the ranch are friends of Alban, so we were invited as guests to stay with them for the weekend….

Our ugly red sports car

We hired an ugly-looking sports car and fourteen and a half hours later, through the states of Colorado, Oklahoma, and Kansas, we finally arrived at Texas.

Now without bigging it up to much, this place was amazing!

It covered 8,000 acres of land surrounding a town called Kaufmann. We each had our own luxury room, there was a free bar, four fantastic meals a day with waiter service, swimming pools, hot tubs, tennis courts… the list goes on.

The family who owned the ranch were great! Jimmy and his wife Dee, their son Todd, and daughter Fallon. They all made us feel really welcome all the time we were there… Remember the 80s TV show, Dallas? One of the 3 families in the show was based on this family!!

The first night we arrived we were pretty tired after driving for so long, so after a little nap we went to the dinner table where we had the best beef I have ever tasted in my life!! This stuff was amazing… cooked in an open oven, and so tender you could cut it with your fork. After a 14 hour trip and a three-course meal, as you can imagine we were knackered! But not wanting to appear rude we stayed up until about midnight sampling the exotic delights of the free bar (as you would)… the barmen (Tim and Nath) were more than willing to mix any cocktail you fancied, and we (especially Marie) were more than willing to create our own recipes for them.

I invented a crazy mix of: 3 parts Vodka, and 3 parts Coke. I think it’ll catch on.

The next day, after a good sleep in, we did a spot of shooting darling… Not animals, just skeets (clay pigeons to us). I’d never done this before but it was really good fun! It’s a right buzz when you hit both of them, which I only did once. I enjoyed it so much I think I’m going to invest in some tweed trousers with matching  jacket. And a shotgun. And a horse. Okay, maybe just the jacket.

Clay pigeon shooting - like shooting pigeons, but made of clay, round in shape and bright orange in colour

Another waiter-served three course meal after the shooting and we were ready for a dip in the pool. One requires a little soak after shooting flying orange discs, one really does :)

It’s much warmer in Texas than in Colorado. So here I was, in February, relaxing in an outdoor swimming pool, with the sun gently warming my face. This beats Saturdays in Sunderland I can tell you.

Actually, this beats any day in Sunderland.

Everyone knows, one can’t have a swim without a spot of tennis afterwards, and so it went on… I won’t go on too much about what we did at the ranch, because most of our time there was spent extremely lazily and it doesn’t make for very exciting reading. But needless to say, I had one of the best times ever at this place and I’m so glad I went!!

Snipe hunting

One night during our stay Jimmy (backed by everyone else) suggested a bit of Snipe hunting. A Snipe is a small bird native to Texas, and to catch these rare, non-flying birds they had adopted a clever system involving car headlights and bin liners (or trash bags)…

We waited until night fell and took 3 cars down to the spot where the Snipes hung out. The idea was that we all waited in the dark, drove the cars away and waited until the snipes congregated, then drove the cars back full beam on and the birds just, I quote, “walked blindly into the trash bags“.

Now me being a bit of an animal-loving human and not wanting to catch any poor little birds in bags, I decided to be one of the drivers who would take one of the cars back. We left everyone about a mile away from the house, in the middle of nowhere and me, Todd and Dusty drove back to civilisation.

On the way back I asked Dusty how long we would be waiting before we went back… to which he replied “That my friend is what’s known as a Texas prank!”

The 2000 mile round-trip we took from Colorado to Texas - it's a lot further than it looks!

Basically, everyone on the ranch has had this particular prank played on them in the past, and were all in on it. A bird called a Snipe does actually exist (as we were shown a picture of one in a bird book), but it doesn’t just go walking blindly into bin liners.

“But it all seemed so plausible!!”. I suppose the best pranks always do.

We left everyone there for about 45 mins. Pitch black. Pissed off their faces, before we went back, lights off, starter pistols in hand to scare the living daylights out of them. This was possibly the funniest thing I have done in a long time!!

My visit to Texas has certainly been the highlight of my stay in the USA so far. The ranch has a website if you want to find out more, or book a room. It’s not cheap though.

By the way, I’m not on commission, honest :)

Just a quick post to let you know I have a new mobile number. I was sick of the robbing sods otherwise known as T-Mobile shafting me for $50 every week (for receiving calls!)… so now I’m with Cingular, and I get 400 minutes to anywhere in the US, plus free evening and weekend calls, blah blah blah… It’s better anyway :)

My new number is +1 303 884 6274

Last night was my birthday night out, and it was really good fun!! There was about 25 of us out, which isn’t a bad turnout seeing as I’ve only been here for three weeks.

There were friends from university, friends who I met when I first got here, flat mates (old and new)… and even people who I’d met from the previous week when a few of us were wondering around looking for a taxi to go home when we saw loads of people dressed in kilts and wearing bagpipes (do you wear bagpipes?), and I swear Super Gran was there too!! … Anyway, I went over to talk to them and ended up going back to their hotel, and drinking wine and vodka from their car boot in the underground hotel car park until stupid-o’clock… so they came too! It was a fun night!

We started off the night in a bar called ‘The Bank’ which was a good place to start because it was 2-4-1 all night, and the drinks were really cheap anyway… then went on to a place called ‘Lotus’ which was like one of those stuck-up London clubs where the drinks are too expensive and the people swan around like David Essex, but we were all too far gone to care by that time and spent the night dancing to R’n'B (and we all know what the ‘B’ stands for!)… We all ended up in the VIP bar where you had to buy a $200 just to get in… none of us did though, our friend Brandy flirted with the bouncer for a bit and it was VIP all the way! A good night was had by all!!

I don’t mess about… or I do mess about, one of the two. Anyway, I’ve moved house. To give you a feel for where I used to live, Sunderland: imagine living in Peterlee. Hull: imagine living in Woodmansey. That’s where I lived; miles away from anywhere. It wasn’t even officially in Denver. I had a great big nice room, fantastic flat mates… but every time I went out into Denver of an evening I was paying about $25 for a taxi to get back home.

The new house - a day after the snow. It's the one in the middle.

So I’ve moved to a place about 5 minutes drive from the campus – it’s a cool place! I’m paying slightly more, but I get a bed (at last!), a desk, and even a PC, with wireless cable internet, which is great for a geek like me! Plus, I have my own living room area, and my own bathroom. And my flat mate, Krista, is really nice too. She’s a fashion designer who makes skimpy suits for male and female wrestlers… I suppose someone has to do it :)

And it’s great because now I can walk to university… it takes about 40 minutes. There’s a trickling stream, trees with roots that push up the pavement, squirrels running around and empty baseball fields… and when the snow has fallen it’s like walking through a Christmas card scene!