You know it’s Fall in Austin When…
You break out your UT hoodie for those brisk eighty-degree evenings.
You need a new bottle of SPF 100 and a pool noodle without teeth marks, but HEB wants you to buy a five-pound bag of Halloween candy.
Your hair gets to take advantage of nature’s blowdryer just by virtue of stepping outside for five minutes.
You break out the calendar to plan your obligatory annual trip to the pumpkin patch, only to realize your entire October has been booked up since February.
The days get shorter, the sun starts to peek behind the trees, and there’s enough shade to hose all the cicada exoskeletons off the side of your house.
You get to worry about COVID, head lice, flu season, and West Nile virus at the same time.
You’ve overdosed on all the hatch pepper things you bought from Central Market and must now resign the leftovers to their fate: either in the trash can, or in the back of the freezer.
You have to plan all your family’s weekend activities around college football, postseason baseball, pro football, or all of the above.
Your BookPeople brain wants Paul Tremblay’s Horror Movie, but your BookPeople body wants Emily Henry’s Beach Read.
It finally gets not-hot enough to contemplate a family camping trip, but all the state parks within a two-hour radius have been booked up for the fall since June.
Costco is constantly cleaned out of the Gatorade and postgame snacks for the eight-week fall rec league soccer team you signed your kids up for, for reasons you now cannot understand.
You’re already planning your commute around ACL Fest and Formula 1 weekend.
You mark the start of spooky season with the arrival of your annual property tax bill (or as we call it in my house: Elfant on the Shelfant).
You don’t know whether to laugh or cry at fall fashion ads for sweaters, jeans, and fuzzy boots.
Costco stops selling the 12-foot dancing werewolf to make room for the 12-foot dancing Santas.
HEB takes a break from its Usher and Letters to Cleo rotation to start playing Christmas music. (Seriously, retailers of Austin – stop Christmasing my spooky season!)
Let’s face it, there is no “autumn” in Austin… only pumpkin spice summer.
