Rice Homecoming 2015

Katie and I were in Houston last weekend for Rice's annual Homecoming & Reunion. It was a lot of fun to be together back in our old stomping ground and we packed an awful lot into just a few days.

The weather really, really cooperated as it was sunny and 70s F (20s C) almost the entire time we were there. Weather like that makes it easy to romanticize our life in Houston, selectively forgetting the miserable summer weather! We took advantage with lots of outdoor runs and beach volleyball. One of our runs was along Buffalo Bayou, which has changed significantly even since just a few months ago. Through landscaping, the addition of many pedestrian and bike paths, and the construction of new venues (not to mention an epic dog park), the City of Houston is investing heavily in Buffalo Bayou. It is still a work in progress but it is easy to see that it will soon be a tremendous asset to life inside the loop.

Buffalo Bayou is far from the only part of Houston under construction. As booming as Houston's economy is, there is construction everywhere! The downside to this is that there is traffic everywhere. It used to be that you would deal with traffic if you lived out in the suburbs but you were relatively insulated from it inside the loop. No longer! There is no escape! As quickly as Houston is growing, I don't expect the road construction to keep pace with the traffic and, unfortunately, public transportation efforts like light rail are being developed at a snail's pace.

Fortunately we didn't have to drive around too much as we spent most of our time on campus for Homecoming. The events were fantastic as always, including Katie's reunion at the new continuing studies building. As this was the first Homecoming in three years that Katie and I weren't chairing, we were really able to relax and enjoy it. We were able to see many friends in a short amount of time and Rice won the football game to boot, becoming bowl-eligible for the third year in a row - go Owls!

We also checked many Houston food destinations off of our bucket list while we were there: Goode Co. BBQ, Roost, Beaver's, Torchy's Tacos, some more authentic tex mex, and even the Lovett College servery. Say what you like about Houston; it is definitely a great food town!

It was just a quick trip, but it is always nice to be back together in the place we called home for more than 10 years - even if that place is changing at an incredible pace. It was a blast, Houston, and we'll be back soon!