Houston

I moved to Houston because I fell in love with one of her native sons. Just 5 minutes before I wrote this, there existed a band around my chest with the stresses of my job, the past four hours of my work day and the like getting tighter, and tighter and then he walked in. Without him having to say a word or anything, all is right in the world and I can smile again. It's that simple.

I love him.

And I live in Houston because he is here.

And since I now live here, I'm happy to say that I'm falling for the city too.

Houston is an amazing city. It boasts a population of 2.16 million residents and is one of the fastest growing cities in America. It's also one of the most diverse. I mean EVERYONE is here. Out of the 3 large cities that I've explored in Texas - Houston, Dallas and Austin, I feel most at home in Houston. Dallas is too conservative, Austin too liberal, Houston feels just right.

And did I mention that Houston is one of the hottest food cities in the country??? Ding. Ding. Ding. Will travel for food lol.

I have yet to have a bad meal in Houston, and I’ve eaten A LOT! Just about everywhere I’ve gone, the customer service has been great, the food has been reasonably priced, and the portions big. And because Houston has become a patchwork quilt of cultures you can find good meals representative of each resident. Down home southern cooking, barbeque, some of the best Mexican food you can find, French, Vietnamese, Ethiopian, Jamaican you name it, you can find it here. I.AM.IN.FOOD.HEAVEN.

But there is a flip side to this; Houston is also the second fattest city in the country. Houstonians love to eat and they’re proud of it. Food, Family, sports... yup that about sums it up. And then, add to that a lack of a need to take public transportation or walk anywhere....OH BOY!!!! I relished in every bit of my new lifestyle and my new curves.

Did I mention that the men down here like their women thick? I’ve never felt sexier- until I saw THE photo. Haha. Here it is: Feel free to laugh I had a blast taking these. Really, Who doesn’t like playing dress up?

In 3 months, I managed to indulge myself to 220 lbs. That's 30 lbs heavier than I was in Mexia,TX... 45lbs heavier than I was in NYC. Do I regret it? Nope, I regret not a meal. Its all part of the ebb and flow of life, but I do know when enough is enough. And enough is enough! So how am I going to drop the weight? We’re going to do it together ☺.

Until then, here are a few photos of my favorite meals with some of my favorite people in Houston. Mmmmmm food, but now its time to preserve my health and the sexy, Happy Humpday people. Bang. Bang.

Danielle, Danielle and Sherrie at The Breakfast Klub.

With Nari at La Guadalupana Bakery and Cafe.

With Monet at Sparrow Bar and Cookshop.

And a friendly reminder from Massah..... :-) peace

SK in Texas Month 10 of ????

Who am I kidding? My little "adventure" to Texas has become a big ol' permanent move. If you would have asked me ten months ago when I got on that first plane to Dallas I would have said probably not. You see, I'm a nomad. A proud wanderer and although I would have been open to the idea of staying for a while, my next stop was going to be the Bay Area, probably Oakland so that I could hang in San Fran with my sister and her family. After that, I decided that I would probably knock around the country for a little while, working and saving some money before going abroad - I'd start in Australia ( they pay cooks pretty well in Australia and I could learn about the Aboriginal culture and history) and then go wherever the wind blew me until I decided to settle down and start a family.

Obviously the winds had other plans for me :-) While living in Mexia as an Occupational Therapist at a State funded Mental Hospital (bizarre I know). Mexia is a small town in central Texas with a population of about 7,000. Not exactly a booming town, but the friends I made there, Ms. Gloria, Karen, Sheila, Crissy, Heather, Genipher, Barbara, Admerle, Rhonda and Jay were great and life there for me was pretty simple. But the challenge of living in a small town was that most people my age (29) were married with children, so after work I had little to nothing to do. This gave me a lot of time to think.

Sure there was the library and Walmart, but that gets old quickly. So after work, I would often drive to and sit by the lake. In the video, I call Lake Mexia "my" lake but its not, but I loved it so much that I adopted it as my own. Kinda like how Christopher Columbus discovered America.... but I digress lol.

Mexia was so quiet and so far from my norm that when my father came to visit me, he asked me in a concerned voice what I was hiding from. I like to think that I was finding myself. After the past year and a half of a tough break up, a serious leg injury, no health insurance, moving to NY from DC, losing my job, having to put culinary school on hold, finding a new job, learning who my real friends were the hard way, pinching pennies to pay for culinary school, traveling across the country on a train, graduating culinary school and then finally moving to Texas, I needed the break. Mexia provided that, I was away from friends and family and was forced to figure out who I was and what I wanted in my life. And for that I will always be grateful to Mexia and the folks who befriended me out there. :-)

I realized that I really wanted to settle down.
It took me about 3 days to realize that and an additional 6 months to finally make the move south to Houston. And this my friends is where my story begins again :-) Houston.