Austin-Bergstrom International Airport broke its passenger record last year. The airport said last week that almost 12 million passengers walked through its gates, up 11 percent from the same period in 2014. But that's not the important news.
According to someone whose job it is to keep up with things like this, those 12 million passengers consumed, purchased or otherwise enjoyed:
- 65.5 tons of brisket, up 3.5 tons/7,000 lbs. or 5.5 percent over 2014
- 693,375 breakfast tacos, up 71,065 tacos or 11.5 percent from 2014
- 1,190 live music performances (23 per week)
- 51,278 “Keep Austin Weird” T-shirts, up 15,082 or 41.5 percent from 2014
Barbecue is big in Austin and probably the biggest player of all is Franklin's. With an average 4 hour wait to get served, you have time to meet, fall in love... and get married! One couple queued up in the line last Wednesday with a judge and a wedding license and profitably spent their waiting time getting hitched!
True to form, the couple wasn’t offered any special treatment by way of line jumping. The wedding party didn’t get to cut the line for their celebratory smoked meats lunch reception — they still had to wait for the restaurant’s opening at 11 a.m.
This is a 3-part story:
1) "Austin Parks Department rangers are investigating reports of a possible mountain lion sighting on the Turkey Creek Trail at Emma Long Park. Several hikers spotted the animal at about 12:30 p.m. Sunday, as they were hiking on the trail off of City Park Road in northwest Austin, officials said."
“It was huge. We thought it was a full-on lion at first,” said Michael Law, who was hiking with his wife and two dogs at the top of a mesa when they saw the animal about 20 feet ahead of them. “It was the biggest thing, like a Great Dane but twice as heavy. We both did a double take and slowly backed up and then ran for our lives,” Law said. “I think we ran 4 miles at a 7-minute pace. It was nuts.”
2) That mountain lion reported by hikers on the Turkey Creek Trail at Emma Long Metropolitan Park last weekend? Turns out it wasn’t a mountain lion after all, but a stuffed target from the nearby Austin Archery Club. And not even a mountain lion target, at that. It was a cheetah, according to officials at the Austin Parks and Recreation Department.
3) So the question is - if I go walking in Emma Long Park, is it likely that a member of the Austin Archery Club is going to mistake me for a stuffed mountain lion/cheetah and put a Carbon Express Maxima hunting arrow in some important part of my anatomy?
The answer is no, according to Don Ferguson of the Austin Archery Club, if one stays on the marked trail and pays attention to warning signs.
“Targets are placed so shooting is directed back into the range, not out,” Ferguson said. “Anyone who wandered into the ranges would be in back of the shooter and out of harm’s way, but they would be seen if they were in front of a shooter.”
Right. Tell that to the mountain lion/cheetah.
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