Happy New Year!!

Texas Will!!

My New Boots - Hand Made Lucchese 

With Sarah

A Very Texan Christmas!

Firstly i hope you all had a very merry christmas, sorry for my lack of communication, but i wasnt able to get access to the internet while i was in the country, and only now have a got round to updating you on what i got up to.

Alisha, my Couchsurfing friend invited me to share Christmas with her this year, but before leaving she warned me she had a large family and i would be busy attending lots of different Christmas's, little did i know that i would end up having four different Christmas's to go to this year, but what a great Christmas i had!!

Alisha is from a north Texas town called Nocona, not far from Oklahoma, a really small place where i was told i would meet some 'real' cowboys. This was true as Alishas dad was a rancher and so were all his brothers, so cowboy boots and hats were definitely the thing to be seen in around here!! 

the Christmas meal was very similar to thanksgiving, turkey and ham, accompanied with lots of different rich, buttery, sugary (very unhealthy) sides, no Christmas pudding this year, instead things like pecan pie or cheesecake. Very good, and i was given lots of leftovers to take home with me, (everyone was so kind to me here, it really was amazing the way i was so welcomed to share xmas with people I didnt know, that gives you an idea of the southern hospitality, theres little else like it!!)

On Christmas day, in between the noon and evening Christmas parties, alishas brother took me deer hunting, so we went over to the families land, with his rifle and some beers, and sat in the blind, waiting on deer or some hogs. i could really see the appeal of this, it was great, and lots of these guys had memories of past deer celebrated on their walls, and a fully stocked freezer of deer meat. I was given some deer mince to take home with me so i look forward to eating some of that. While out hunting, I saw 4 doe and 2 bucks, but they werent really big enough to shoot, as the amount you can shoot in a season is limited, they tend to wait for the bigger bucks, with the full set of horns. But I was amazed at how easy it would have been to shoot at and still provide a huge amount of meat. 

Finally on boxing day another christmas party, meeting lots of people who had never met an english guy before, so that proved for some interesting questions like 'Do you celebrate christmas in england?' and being asked to repeat lots of words, as you can imagine!!

Now im back in Dallas, back to the city. and looking forward to New Years Eve!

Christmas in Dallas

Merry Christmas!!

The Best Burger in Dallas?

Lakewood Landing - Known as the Upscale Dive!!!

Incredible!! I went with two guys, Oliver and Rick who wanted to show me some of the best food Dallas has to offer, this time Burgers, next time its finding the best Bar B Que!! 

A perfect burger: great bread to meat ratio, warm bun, cold lettuce, everything about it was awesome!! 

If any of you decide to visit me in Dallas, I will be taking you here!! Thats a promise!!

Yesterday I took Sarah to see the Dallas Symphony Orchestra, they play at the Morton H. Meyerson Symphony Center in Downtown Dallas, so that was great to see. They played lots of Christmas songs and even Santa made an appearance!!

Thanksgiving!!

So...I survived my first thanksgiving, (but only just!!!)

The day was very much like Christmas day, but without the present

giving, which was actually a nice sentiment, and more about simply

enjoying the company of others and being thankful for what we have.

We had the thanksgiving here at Wildgrove avenue, so the day started

early as Decided i was going to help with preparation of the meal and

even contribute with a couple of dishes.

Brixs' parents took a flight over from California and are staying the

week here, so that was great to meet them, after the turkey was in we went over to the neighbors house for some drinks and snacks, in total there were 8 of us who ate thanksgiving meal together, while we heard

the story of thanksgiving from Brixs' dad, Bruce.

(I made sure to let

everyone know that the pilgrims in fact were originally from

nottinghamshire!)

As you can seek in the pictures we had a variety of things to go along

with the turkey, they were all really great!!!

I made devils on horseback (another great English tradition) as a pre

dinner snack, stuffing the prunes with Stilton before wrapping them in

bacon, they went down extremely well, and I made a potato, parsnip,

onion and Rosemary mash - which not surprisingly was a success!

After the meal, we had people over for dessert and cocktails. Pumpkin
pie, spiced apple cider, cranberry gin and tonics...and much much
more! This was a real treat and I was so thankful to share my first
thanksgiving with such amazing people, we had the official Christmas
lights switch on, that jeff, brix and I put up outside the house and
on the tree, I'm sure you will agree it looks lovely!

This was all topped off with the fact that a cold front came around,
amazingly on thanksgiving day, so it was a lot colder and we had the
fire burning, which made for a really nice thanksgiving. A day later I'm still stuffed and the fridge is full of leftovers that will
probably be around till Christmas! 

All I can say is what a special
day, and I look forward to the next thanksgiving!

6 weeks in – Blog Update

So 6 weeks in what can I say.

Only how glad I am that I made the brave move to head across the pond. I must get asked over 5 times a day ‘So what made you come to Texas?’ and the answer I would have given before I left is still the same as now. Amazing hospitality, a feel of great opportunity, a real sense of community and a place filled with exciting things to see and do. My adventure so far really was better than I ever could have imagined....

I am just back from a friends 30^th birthday party, she initially helped me during my search in dallas, even picking me up for the airport on my first day here – how long ago that now feels!! I baked her a cake using reeces cups – shown in the picture here – it was amazing and I can’t wait to re-create for you it some day!

I am making progress here in Dallas on the work front, applying for interesting jobs, networking and learning so much from all the new experiences that I encounter each day. Last weekend I voulunteered with a friend, we went to a really poor hispanic neighborhood and read to the children and helped them to read, that was really nice as it seemed many of them couldn't speak or read english very well.

So sorry I havent been in touch more,  but hope you like this post and i hope to follow up with more soon.

My First 'Football' Game - Texas Tech vs Missouri

Happy Halloween!!

Out and About in Dallas

So heading into my 3rd week now in Texas!! And things are just getting better and better. Here are a few new photos to show what i've been getting up to this week.

This is Sarah, she helped me prior to coming to Dallas, providing me with lots of good information - I must thank her for that. Maybe without her help and advice I would be now living in Houston or Atlanta!

We went out to a Vietnamese restaurant, it was amazing!! The food was just like what I experienced in Vietnam, and due to this particular restaurant being located in a Asian area it was so cheap

This is the headboard for my new bed. its pretty huge!! I bought it from a garage sale and luckily my neighbour Jeff helped me transport the whole thing back home. I finally found a perfect use for the Dodge Ram!

Me and Jeff are going to watch the Dallas stars on thursday, the local ice hockey team.

Here is Max, the dog I live with! We have a love/hate relationship. He's an old boy, and struggles getting around but is an obedient dog and he seems to enjoy festering around the house.

So I took this while out on a bike ride of the lake, as you can see the Dallas high rise office buildings in the background. I've seen some great pictures of this scene at sundown so I hope sometime soon to get a photo with better lighting. But you get the idea!!!

This house on the lake looked amazing, so I thought it was worth a photo.

Week 3: Wildgrove Avenue

You can see here the location of my house, right next to the lake. I have the use of a bike here and every morning have gone for a cycle round the lake. Its so beautiful, and I think I could never leave!!

So this week I have been getting settled in my new place. Really landed on my feet living with Brix, a really great guy, originally from Califorina, he lives here alone,moved to Dallas to work for American Airlines in the corporate world and then decided to live life how he wants, he went travelling around the world for a few years and now runs his own business from home. 

So here is the new car, which is very kindly being loaned to me by one of my new neighbours (how amazing is that!!) Just by chance on my second day in the neighbourhood there was a block party (see definition here http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Block_party) and I met everyone and got chatting to Kevin who kindly said I could loan his extra car, which seemed like the perfect solution!!

Almost every house on my block has all these signs outside their garden - Unsurprisingly republican!

Week 2 Update

 

Me outside my new home

Sat on the front porch in the sun

So here it is, just letting you know what I got up to during my second week in Texas.

You can see me here in the photo next to my new place, its in a nice neighborhood with lots of character located in East Dallas called Lakewood.

Im living with a guy called Brix, he's interesting and was looking for someone to come live in one of his spare rooms. It is the typical bachelor style set-up - great music system, lots of living space, outdoor BBQ and seating, and importantly a well stocked beer fridge!! Im doing a month-to-month deal here so being here should be a great base to explore Dallas more.

So I did some more exploring of the Dallas area, including visiting the site of JFKs shooting. You can see the X painted on the road which was the location of the shooting.

There is now a museum on the 6th floor of the building behind where the shots were fired, a friend of mine called Anne works there and i'm hoping for a personal tour later this week.

Just a short post this time, but now I'm more settled i'll try and do more regular updates.