I can now officially check Austin, Texas off my list.  Besides Seattle, Portland and New Orleans, Austin was one of the only major cities I had yet to visit.  Now it’s down to just three.

And, believe me, you need to visit Texas’ capitol city.  Their unofficial, official slogan?  Keep Austin Weird.

Austin is a town rich in culture, arts and eccentricity.  This past weekend the annual Austin Comic Con was in town.  It was a nerd’s paradise … and the geeks were out in full force.   I sat next to Superman at dinner and spotted Boba Fett in the hotel Starbucks.

No one batted an eye.

The nightlife is unparalleled.  Every weekend is like New Years Eve.  There were a chaotic number of revelers partying in hundreds of bars and eateries downtown.  It’s a young, vibrant college town where live music can be heard on every street corner.  I shelled out more dollar bills in Austin than I have at both the strip clubs I’ve visited in my life.

It’s a notorious sports town too.  The Texas Longhorn stadium holds an impressive 105,000 fans.  And when the game got over Saturday night, it was like an entire city was on the move.  A rowdy and raucous city too.  The only drawback is the unappealing team colors … a sort of burnt umber/rust/rancid carrot color that no one looks good in.  Especially en masse.

Even weirder, every night at dusk you’ll find tourists lining up on the Congress Avenue Bridge.  They show up to watch 1.5 million Mexican Free-tailed bats emerge from under the bridge.  It’s the largest urban bat cave in the world.  As the sun goes down, you can hear a high-pitched hum get louder and louder.  And then, as if on cue, the bats stream out in one long continuous band that can be picked up on weather radar.  I found myself ducking for no good reason, like one errant bat was suddenly going to break away from the pack and get tangled in my hair.  The bridge’s long horizontal grooves running the length of the bridge’s underbelly make it an environment ideal for bats to live and raise their young. The bats make a pilgrimage to Mexico in the winter and return every March.

Besides being the nation’s #1 college town (according to the Travel Channel), Austin also boasts the most bloggers (and blog readers) of anywhere else in the United States.  I’m writing this in hopes of getting more hits.  Maybe this entry will go viral.

Now that WOULD be weird.