Back in law school, this blog had a week-in-review series of posts called “Best Week Ever.”
These posts were weekly summaries for readers that did not keep with the blog on a daily basis.
Best Week Ever posts were also great place to stick small updates that did not necessarily merit a standalone post. At the risk of losing all interesting updates to Facebook, I have brought back the weekly summaries. This is the first one.
So what happened last week?
Ingrid in a flower-filled forest clearing.
The Great Trinity Forest
We visited the Great Trinity Forest as part of an advertising campaign for Stanley. This “urban park” boasts 6,000 acres of neglected flood lands located near downtown Dallas.
The trip was unintentionally scary but something to cross-off of the Dallas bucket list. We also ran into stray dogs at a nearby park, further confirming that this was an unnecessarily dangerous adventure.
Stray dogs glaring us down near a South Dallas train station.
The Accounting Game
I finally made the time to figure out our apartment billing situation (it was a mess.)
The purported “market rent” of the apartments in my building does not match the reality of Oak Lawn’s oversaturated faux-luxury housing market. So in order to fill the expensive 2-bedroom units, my building has these “2 months off” rent specials.
The building calls our rent special a “concession,” which sounds more like a country losing territory to a warlike neighbor. (Or a hotdog stand at a baseball game.)
Anyway, I got one of these 2-month-off concessions when I moved into the new apartment with Michael and our roommate.
We moved into the new apartment in the middle of April, which resulted in a confusing series of prorated charges. That is why I had to spend a few horrible hours in Excel, breaking out prorated rent and utility charges minus deposits, etc.
We eventually got it figured out. (I hope.) This exercise really made me miss the simplified billing of dorm-life at the University of Miami – you paid for your dorm and meal plan. That’s it. No spreadsheets or other adulting nonsense.
I also finally got my deposit back from my first Dallas apartment (42 days after I moved out.) Threatening to sue does wonders.
Downtown Austin, Texas
My first time in Austin
We went to Austin this weekend to visit Michael’s parents. There will be a full post about this later in the week (with way too many pictures.)
Downtown Austin, Texas
Austin is pretty and many of the neighborhoods have crazy winding hillside roads which I thought only existed in San Francisco.
Downtown Austin is also full of massive bars and restaurants, but you have to dodge hordes of panhandlers to move around. More details on the trip later!
Enjoying a beverage at the epic Summer Kickoff Pool Party at iLume Proper.
Wine & Pools
It is pool season in Dallas, so we are spending some serious time lounging at pools throughout the neighborhood. It’s a nice (and cheap) summer activity, if you don’t count the cost of grilling food (or cocktails.)
Nestlé Crunch Cocktails at the iLume Park pool.
We also made it to the June Cedar Springs Wine Walk, although I found out the hard way that the raffle at the Round-Up Saloon does not operate on Sprint time (We missed it by like 2 minutes.)
There’s always next month!
Summer Kickoff with WeWood
Finally, I have another campaign going on with WeWOOD – a company that makes luxury sunglasses and watches from recycled wood.
This is what they sent me:
Sticking to my diet at the Katy Trail Ice House with my WeWOOD watch and sunglasses.
Wearing my WeWOOD watch in the Belo Garden.
We used the product shoot as an excuse to roam downtown Dallas and the Lamar District.
More on that here.
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