Excess City

Like most modern cities, Austin has a very ritzy shopping mall – the Domain. As in other places, this is a multi-use environment; up-scale shops, high-dollar apartments and ritzy offices, all stirred up together. I suppose if you were careful, you could live in the same building where you worked, eat at your favorite Italian Bistro, park your Lamborghini in the covered garage, buy high-dollar furniture for your Yuppie pad – and never leave the building.

But leaving the building is part of the adventure. This place designed so that pedestrian traffic is the norm and sculpture and fountains and side-walk cafes provide the ambiance suitable for such a prestigious address.

We touch the edge of the Domain from time-to-time. Two stores close to the entrance are a Border’s and a California Pizza Kitchen. We’ve discovered that Yuppie pizza makes a nice change from McDonalds, so when we are in the mood for to-die-for spinach avocado dip and a Goat Cheese and Sun-dried Tomato pizza, we end up at CPK. Okay, I’m kidding about the Goat Cheese & stuff (though the other night we did have Hawaiian pizza - pineapple and Canadian bacon).

When we finished, the evening was so pleasant we strolled off down the street to explore a little of the Domain’s ambiance. Stores like White House / Black Market – a clothing store for men and women where every item in the store was white or black. Period. Or Sur La Table. Let’s just say that if we could afford the dishes and cooking utensils, there would not be money left over for food. Or the Z Gallery – everything needed to furnish that apartment upstairs. Mom’s comment was that “There is nothing in that store that anyone needs.” I guess that’s true of many stores – unlike Home Depot and Wal-Mart, where you go when you need something. Bet they don’t have a plumber’s friend for sale in any store in the Domain. They probably don’t allow plumber’s friends in the Domain!

We finished off the stroll looking in the display window of a Jewelry Store at a 2 ct. diamond – no setting – with a price tag of nearly $46,000. I must be confused about the economy; I thought things were not going well. But, then again, by this time next year there may be a Dollar Store below a lot of empty apartments in the Domain. I just hope they still sell Goat Cheese pizza.