larry kubin

I spent the last half of April in San Francisco and had an absolute blast. I stayed in the Pacific Tradewinds Hostel and met some really cool folks from England, France, Germany, Spain, and just about every other European country. I plan to write about this trip at some point, as I had many adventures and it was one of the my best trips ever. Here are some photos.

When hanging out in Berkeley, I walked past some club and noticed that The Coup was playing. I totally dropped everything and went. The show was in a basement club called Shattuck Down Under and reminded me of the Elephant Room here in Austin. It was a fantastic performance, especially since The Coup are from that area. Here are some highlights:

40 Acres Fest was last Sunday. This year the Octopus Project opened for the Roots in front of the famous UT Tower. In case you didn’t know, the Octopus Project is an Austin band that plays some sort of electro-pop-rock. I’ve seen them several times already and they are always fun. They are perhaps best known for dancing around with their instruments and rocking the theremin more than most.

I remember back in school when a guy was building his own theremin in the Electrical Engineering Lab. The schematic was pretty simple and I always wanted to build one myself, but that one has since been filed in my large folder labeled “Projects Larry plans to work on, but never will”. Join the club.

The Roots took the stage afterwards and really tore it up. Check out this guitar solo from their epic cover of Bob Dylan’s Masters of War.

So I just got back from Las Vegas a couple days ago. Luckily I came out a bit ahead this time, thanks to a couple of these guys:

Results

• March Madness is awesome. Ashley and I each had successful 3 game parlays the 1st day, and I hit a 2 gamer the following day. Nice.
• The craps went well and was really fun. Even Mike rolled a few points.
• I was eliminated from a Holdem’ tournament early when a guy went all-in on a flush draw and I called him. I had the better hand and odds, but the last card was a spade. I hate when that happens.
• I’ve decided to never play 3 card poker again. That game is for suckers — unless you are Jason, in which case you will hit a 3-of-a-kind and a straight flush, which pay 30-to-1 and 40-to-1. The most likely scenario is that you will light $100 on fire though.
• Texas got destroyed in their Elite 8 game. Pro Tip: Don’t bet on a team to win just because you like that team. Bet on the better team. Yes, this seems like common sense, but everyone in our group bet on Texas. Then we realized that Memphis was 37-1 for a reason.
• Kevin and Mindy got married. This was my first “in the wedding” experience.

Here is a picture of us acting stupid.

This shot is just dead sexy:

Here are some other photos I took:

Photo Slideshow on Flickr

In other news, Ashley got a job offer in Austin and we just moved into a place on North Loop and Burnet. Now I won’t have to sleep in a different place every 3 days. If you need me, I’ll be unpacking boxes.