100 Fundamental Austin Truths, Part III (The Final Chapter)
It's time to put this baby to bed
Without further fanfare, here’s the third and final installment of this series, which is already garnering some early Pulitzer buzz.
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33. If someone corners you to talk about their Cybertruck, a gluten allergy, or Crypto, excuse yourself and run away forever.
32. When there's a severe drought, Westlake cuts watering from four days a week to three.
31: It's easy to get laid here. Also easy: getting VD. Wrap it before you slap it.
30. Real Austinites find their best friends at shelters, not breeders.
29. Travel in packs on Dirty 6th and be prepared to politely pay $20 for someone to "watch" your parked car.
28. The next Stop Sign a bike rider obeys will be their first.
27. Westlake is viciously made fun of and it's 100% deserved. People there pay $20,000 for a kid's parking space at the high school.
26. You'll bitch about floods and drought within a month of each other.
25. Beware: the real serial killers aren’t on Rainey Street, they’re driving cars with "Coexist" bumper stickers.
24. If someone can smell what you're grilling, you should probably offer them some.
23. If a neighbor says "all of you all" they're from California. Proceed with extreme caution.
22. If you're forced to rank huge Texas cities the order should be: Austin, San Antonio, Houston, El Paso. Dallas is on the second page.
21. You might use snow water to flush your toilet during a blackout and then lose your A/C because of an outage three months later. It’s called the Texas Power Grid.
20. This is the capital of cringy vanity plates.
19. Half of Austin wildly overpays for housing and the other half can’t afford to.
18. Westlake is the cradle of both NFL Quarterbacks and wealthy, out-of-touch twatwaffles.
17. Lakeway is a less rich, more crazy Westlake.
16. Tarrytown is the Rollingwood of Rosedales.
15. ABIA handles gate overcrowding by opening up a cool new restaurant.
14. The last person you want to talk to at a party will always find you.
13. The Driskill is the perfect night out for wealthy west Austinites between 55 and 57 years old.
12. You don't have to pay $6 for a coffee, but they'll be happy to take your money if you're dumb enough to.
11. Barton Springs is tops and bottoms optional. They also have mild dress code rules.
10. There's plenty of good music here but people are too lazy to find it now.
9. People bitch about how ACL and SXSW are getting worse. They’re correct about SXSW and simply being nostalgic about ACL.
8. If you drive a Cybertruck, trust me, they’re not laughing at you because of jealousy.
7. Elon Musk thinks of Austin as his Fleshlight.
6. You can pay $39/Lb. for good Brisket but you don’t have to.
5. If you can’t find something to both love and hate about Austin you’re not trying very hard.
4. A car driving under the speed limit in the fast lane is being aggressively bumper humped by another. Both of them are somehow 100% wrong.
3. If you have a walking trail fetish, buddy, Austin is your kink.
2. Buda is the Tarrytown of Kyles.
1. A highway-themed parody account might somehow have enough cache to hand down legitimate wisdom about the city and even launch its own cool merch line (which it would love you to check out here, starting at 4 PM Sunday) without a hint of irony.
Just discovered your Substack. Love it! I was born in Austin and grew up in Hays County. Austin in the 70's was the best. Love the Buda/Kyle thing. And it is true.
Would like more advice re #31.