On the road again: Austin, day 4

I have two traditions on the last day of any trip to Austin: BBQ for dinner, and ice cream for dessert at Amy's Ice Creams. Though I have not been able to adhere to those traditions on every trip here, I was able to do so tonight.

Dinner was a sampler of three meats--sausage, brisket, and beef ribs--at County Line by the Lake, a place I like for both the food and the beautiful setting. As you can see from the photo of the sign that makes the restaurant easy to spot from the road, this isn't a subtle place, but it is a good one. You have to love a roll of paper (to use as napkins when your cloth one wears out) on each table and "how to speak Texan" lessons coming over the loudspeaker in the bathroom. I barely touched the sides and so managed to escape without over-stuffing myself, though the portions are so big that it was a close call.

I do love BBQ.

One of the benefits of business trips is getting to spend time with people I either rarely see or didn't know before the trip. I find time and time again that our clients are cool and interesting people, and I learn a lot from each of them. Lots of folks talk about how most people are boring, but I don't believe that. I feel that if you think someone is dull, you probably just don't know them very well yet. (I won't deny some people truly are dull, but not most of them.)

I also find that the older I get the more I reject the common description of a typical person's life as being one of quiet desperation. Sure, we're all desperate in some ways: we're neither as successful nor as good looking as we'd hoped, our lives didn't work out as we'd dreamed, and so on. But what I also see in people all over the country, all over the world, are lives of quiet dignity, even heroism: people doing their best to deliver on their promises to their loved ones, their principles, their dreams.

I'm not trying to be Pollyanna here. I'm not saying I like everyone; I certainly don't. What I am saying, though, is that the world is full of people doing the best they can with what they have, trying hard to be decent, and that's an amazing and inspiring thing.