And the lloyd spake, go jump in a lake!

18 April - Another stupeously hot day of about 100 degrees (ive forgotten what the conversion factor is si i'm sticking with Fahrenheit and the Imperial system for the next few weeks) - which seems to wilt my new English companion, Callum, but it makes me feel like i'm right at home. Despite being told by John Paul English, a local alcoholic who inhabits the hostel, to wake him up so he could buy me a cup of coffee and teach me some of the haikus he's written (he's a very strange man). He was also very insistent that I go to Barton Springs and jump in it. I instead headed off for a run where I found mdriver's bum prevented me from stretching out my left leg so every time I tried to accelerate I yelped out in pain, much to the amusement of the surprising number of other runners out in the pretty serious heat. Upon my return me and Callum headed out into downtown to see what we could see. As we were in a reasonably sized city I thought i'd try to catch up with the local courier populkation - once they realised I wasn’t there to try to get a job and steal their work they were extremely nice. The town only has about a dozen servicing the entire city and all of them looked superfit - one of them told me to go to Barton Springs and jump in it as well. After this we headed out to the stat tcapital (slightlybigger than the nation's capital building) which was very beautiful and when you stood in the centre of it you could hear an incredible echo from even the slightest whisper. Had a little look around and sat in on a senhearingfor a while which was kind of dull but interesting to see noneheless - we left shortly after the governeor seemed to look me in the eye and tell me to go jump in Barton springs (a lot of people told me to go jump in barton Springs that day). Had a look at the university which was a pretty amazing campus (historically best known for being the site where some crazy man perched himself up in a tower and killed 14 students using a sniper rifle). The heat was getting us to by this stage so after some excellent slow cooked barbeekeyoo we eventually listened to the voices in our head and decided to check out the fabled barton Springs. Its a public pool that charges for the pool but despite the no swimming signs everyone seemed to just jump into the crystal clear river. With my hand in its current sttate I could obviously not get it wet but I still managed t to completely immerse myself (while holding my right hand in the air like an elephants trunk reaching for air) - having a free bathing area in the midle of a city is an absolute godsend - it reminded me of the artifical beach in brisbane - because the heat was really getting intolerable (despite my steadfast proclamation that I was loving it because it reminded me of home). After this we headed back to the hostel and kicked around for a while before a small group of us (half the hostel's inhabitants all seemed to leave that day - at least the sane ones) went out to the continental club to see another of the city's institutions, Toni price, do her stuff. She played a blusey country style of music which I normally don’t like too much but it was an incredible show with a very dedicattd crowd. She was completely wasted on stage and was prone to flashingher underwear to all and sundry which io was not objecting to in any means. Broke the heart of the Caifornaian bartender when I told her I was leaving the next day and we got caught in a massive electrtical thunderstorm on the way back to the hostel where me and Callum ended up chatting until the wee hours. I could live in this city-