Thus far the quote of the month has been:
We should’ve moved here 5 years ago.
So far Austin is amazing. In true Freudian fashion, my fingers wrote that last sentence as ‘Austin is amazon." :) Amazon is amazing, too, but I can’t quite talk about that.
So, it’s August. It’s 100 degrees every day, 81 degrees at 7 am, and it’s great. Pollen counts are laughably low here, so everyone’s improving in their allergies.
Traffic is bad, but manageable. I have 3 good ways to work, two of them toll-free. I can generally make it to work in 20 minutes on a 9.8 mile commute, getting 30+ mpg with the a/c on full blast. One real blessing: Our building has a free parking structure next door, and that lets me park my dark-colored Fusion out of the sun. I’ve so far washed the car once since I got here and the exterior still looks great–no rain and shade/garage will do that for you. Getting home is a bit more ‘fun’, usually taking 20-45 minutes. The one time it rained it took almost an hour.
My office environment is open floor-plan with 4’ walls. Our entire development team is in one big room I’d estimate at 30’ x 60’. And that’s everybody: Project managers, developers, managers, etc. Conversations do carry, and there are usually lively debates ~4pm or so every day on various topics: Static -v- dynamic programming languages, type safety, interview experiences, etc.
The building does lack a cafeteria, but there are usually adjacent food trucks, and a great street with lots of options is about a quarter-mile away. That is, easily walkable.
The only thing that’s not going so great is our ongoing search for a new church. The results so far:
- A great little church with awesome music, good sermon, and somewhat friendly folks. But simply too small at 100 people. We’ve done the small church thing once and would prefer to avoid it.
- The hollow shell of a megachurch complete with vegas-quality AV/lighting and production values. The place can’t pay its bills after several scandals in the past decade. Again, we’ve done a church that can’t pay its bills, and would prefer to avoid.
- A church that, on paper, seems perfect–~400 or so attendees, life groups, beliefs that match our own. Problems: We went to service and walked out with a literal headache from loud, bad worship music and a diffuse, monotone sermon.
If it were just me, I’d love to go back to that little church again. I really felt the Spirit there and man could they sing!