Family, Friends, Food, the Fair, and Football in Dallas!

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Wow! What a fun long weekend in Dallas. Dallas is known for its restaurants and I must say we participated in an eat-a-thon! We got in late Thursday night. Love Field was a zoo. Bart and my mom were nice enough to pick us up from the airport.

The eating started first thing Friday morning. I met my step-mom, brother and sister-in-law at Angela’s, a diner style restaurant very close to my old house. They make the best basic breakfast…eggs, bacon, hashbrowns, and toast. And the price is right!

My friend Suman was able to join me for lunch. We met my old work colleagues downtown as I had a craving for Chef Wang’s. This chinese food place is so good it’s only open from 11-2, Monday-Friday. There is nothing fancy about it. There is line for ordering and a line for pick up. I recommend the spicy green bean chicken which isn’t on the menu. It was really fun to see my colleagues too. It had been a while! I’m excited a few of them may come to Denver in December.

As if I hadn’t eaten enough already, I couldn’t skip dinner. Suman, my mom and Bart, Debby and Norb, and I enjoyed a nice dinner at Lark on the Park. The cauliflower soup was rich and delicious and the mussels were spicy and tender. We really enjoyed the food and atmosphere. Giant chalk boards lined the walls and different artists drew their creation on them. Each chalk art was listed on the back of the menu. What a cool idea.

We capped off the night with drinks at Savor Gastropub which provides a lovely view of Klyde Warren Park. It was my first time to finally go to Klyde Warren Park. Built in the last five years after I moved from Dallas, it covers Woodall Rogers Freeway. I couldn’t figure out how it was going to work. It seemed like it would be loud and it wouldn’t attract many people. I was wrong. The park is beautiful and the restaurants are great! I loved seeing it and we had such a nice night.

Suman and I got a break from food on Saturday morning…a much needed relief since we were headed to the State Fair of Texas. We scheduled attending the fair on the same day the Texas OU game was playing. We weren’t sure what to expect because it can be a mad house with 92,000 college fans attending the game. We opted to take the Dart Light Rail from the Market Center Location to the Martin Luther King stop. This was a good choice as there was plenty of parking at market center and we only had to walk three blocks or so to the main entrance.

Suman bought our fair tickets online. Not only did we save some money, we skipped the long lines and walked right in! She bought the food coupons online as well which we had to pick up at a hospitality building. This was a bit more challenging, but no matter where we purchased food coupons, there was a line.

We arrived at the fair just after 11 which was perfect timing as that was the scheduled kick off time for the game. I have to say, this might be the best time ever to attend the fair as everyone was inside the Cotton Bowl while we were walking around trying out fair food and looking at the exhibits. I don’t believe we tried anything healthy at the fair. Our snacks included Fletcher’s Corn Dogs (has to be Fletcher’s), a fried Twinkie – YUM, a fried Reeses, and a fried Snickers! I’m not sure the four hours we spent walking around counter acted all those calories, but who is counting. I mean we were at the largest State Fair in North America.

The exhibits were nice. I was particularly amazed by the cow made of 1,000 pounds of butter that sold for $130,000! Of course, we had to stop to take a picture with Big Tex, the iconic cowboy. We visited the livestock show and the Clydesdales, and opted to stay for the pig races at 3pm. It was hilarious to watch them race to the finish for an Oreo as their ears flopped! It was even worth maneuvering through the mass crowd that let out of the football game, though I don’t think I’d do that again.

I began to wonder if we had made a mistake staying at the fair this long as we walked back toward the entrance weaving our way through now ridiculous lines at Fletcher’s. Eventually we made it to the Martin Luther King station to find a long line waiting on the light rail, but to our surprise we got on the train and got the last two seats! It turned out to be a glorious afternoon of weather too, so we couldn’t have had better luck enjoying the State Fair of Texas.

So to add more unhealthy food to our diet, we met my old soccer team at Blue Goose in Addison for some TexMex! You can’t go wrong with chips, salsa, and margaritas. And reminiscing over the dumb things we did in our twenties had my sides aching I was laughing so hard. What fun!

Well, we awoke to more food. The morning called for us to catch up with my SCUBA buddies at the Oasis on Greenville Ave. I had never been here, and I was pleasantly surprised by breakfast. Another diner style type, as I prefer bacon, eggs, and hashbrowns at a reasonable price over a fru-fru omelette. My breakfast was cooked to perfection. The consensus was the french toast and the pancakes were also quite tasty. It was fun to catch up with my friends. I need to get them to go on another SCUBA trip, but it seems they’ve traded in the tropics for ice cold Sweden this winter. I expect they will see the Northern Lights!

Our final outing for the three day weekend was the Cowboys-Bengals game at AT&T Stadium in Arlington. I think it has been almost two years since I made it to a game. Of course the billion dollar stadium is known for how nice it is with its collection of art and impressive facilities, but I’m more interested in football. The Cowboys played a great game. What a way to cap off the weekend! ETB

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Check out the photographic note cards and key chains at my shop.  Each card has a travel story associated with it.  20% of proceeds are donated to charity.

 

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