The Great Psychedelic Armadillo Picnic: A "Walk" in Austin (Crown Journeys) [Hardcover]

Kinky Friedman (Author)

Book Description

Series: Crown Journeys | Publication Date: October 5, 2004

Kinky Friedman, the original Texas Jewboy, takes us on a rollicking, rock-and-rolling tour of his favorite city: Austin.

Maybe you want to know which restaurant President Bush rates as his favorite Austin burger joint. Or maybe you want a glimpse of Willie Nelson’s home life (hint: Willie plays a lot of golf). Perhaps you want to get the best view of the Mexican free-tail bats as they make their nightly flights to and from the Congress Avenue Bridge. Or maybe you’re itching to learn the history of a city that birthed Janis Joplin, Stevie Ray Vaughan, and countless other music legends. It’s all here in The Great Psychedelic Armadillo Picnic, the slightly insane, amazingly practical, and totally kick-ass guide to the coolest city in Texas by none other than Kinky Friedman.

This ain’t no ordinary travel guide, neither. “Like most other busy cities these days, Austin is not very effectively traversed by foot,” Kinky explains. “You must understand that ‘a walk in Austin’ is primarily a spiritual sort of thing.” As might be expected from this politically incorrect country-singer-turned-bestselling-mystery-author, the Kinkster’s tour includes a bunch of stuff you won’t ?nd in a Frommer’s guide, from descriptions of Austin’s notable trees and directions to skinny-dipping sites to lists of haunted places and quizzes and puzzles. So put on your cowboy hat and your brontosaurus-foreskin boots and head down south with the only book you need to get to the big heart of this great city.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

A good travelogue conveys a sense of place while pointing the reader towards interesting activities, destinations, places to eat and the like. A great travelogue does all this, but it also stands alone as an enjoyable read, regardless of the reader’s travel plans. This quirky tour of Austin, Tex., delivers the whole enchilada. Friedman (Armadillos & Old Lace, etc.), novelist and founder of the band Kinky Friedman and the Texas Jewboys, is not what most people would think of as a typical Texan. When he suggests what car to buy to fit in (either a pickup or a Cadillac will do), he proclaims, "I myself drive a Yom Kippur Clipper. That’s a Jewish Cadillac—stops on a dime and picks it up." But this attitude gives Friedman the perfect perspective from which to narrate a journey through his city. His suggestions of things to do all come from personal experience and are usually accompanied by a colorful anecdote or observation. In a chapter on places to eat, Friedman gives this tip on dining at the Magnolia Café: "Feel free to light up a cigarette if you smoke, because Magnolia is one of the few restaurants you can smoke in without some asshole trying to make a citizen’s arrest." Friedman’s plain-speaking is part of the book’s charm. What other travel guide would proudly list a mass murderer—Charles Whitman, who shot 45 people from the Texas Tower in 1966—in a section on famous citizens? As Friedman points out, "We like to think that everything’s bigger in Texas. This, of course, includes mass murder sprees." Whether or not a trip to Austin is in your future, this slim book paints a vivid picture of a city that’s as appealingly offbeat as Friedman himself.
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Review

" 'Dear Kinky: I have now read all your books, More please. I really need the laughs' - Bill Clinton. 'Kinky, Mozart, Shakespeare - with what could I equal them?' - Joseph Heller. 'Kinky's writing cannot and should not be compared to that of any other writer or of any other genre. He is his own genre...He is a wordsmith of the first order' - Fannie Flagg, New York Times Book Review. 'Kinky is the best whodunit writer to come along since Dashiell what's-his-name' - Willie Nelson" --This text refers to the Paperback edition.

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Product Details

• Hardcover: 144 pages
• Publisher: Crown; 1ST edition (October 5, 2004)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1400050707
• ISBN-13: 978-1400050703
• Product Dimensions: 5.3 x 0.8 x 7.9 inches
• Shipping Weight: 8.8 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.6 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (5 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #670,178 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

7 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Riding with the Kinkster, January 7, 2005

By 

JimjamKrotz (San Marcos, TX United States) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Great Psychedelic Armadillo Picnic: A "Walk" in Austin (Crown Journeys) (Hardcover)

Kinky for Governor!

Ok, so this review will be online forever and 50 years from now lots of people will probably be saying "Who the hell is Kinky Friedman?" (People in Buffalo probably already are saying it, but that's another story.)

If you want to get a quick look at who Kinky is, you can't go wrong with this slim volume. Its essentially a travelogue for the city of Austin, Texas, but the Kinkster's wit shines through. Kinky covers a lot of ground in short order to tell you where the best sites in Austin are: for music and nightlife (like The Broken Spoke), for food (like Threadgill's), for sightseeing (like Willie Nelson's house, where else?).

Along the way, we get bits and pieces of Texas and specifically Austin history. Whether you are new to Texas or have been, as I have, a lifelong resident, you're sure to find something you didn't already know. If you get through this and are dying to read more, the next step of course, is to get cracking at his mysteries (i.e. Greenwich Killing Time). In the mean time, sit back and enjoy. The Kinkster is at the wheel, and the cigar smoke is filling up the car. I can't see where we are going, but the trip is sure to be fun.

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Delightful tour of a fantastic city, October 10, 2005

By 

M. T. Vancampen (Houston, TX) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)    (REAL NAME)   

This review is from: The Great Psychedelic Armadillo Picnic: A "Walk" in Austin (Crown Journeys) (Hardcover)

The Kinkster (Texas' next governor?) takes readers on a whirlwind tour of Austin. Anyone who has lived in Austin for a significant period of time will not find much new here. Those who have only visited might get some inkling of what makes this city unique and why millions of people all over the country consider Austin home even though the population is 600,000. This is an extremely funny journey. I can't think of a better tour guide than a man who refers to Garth Brooks as the anti-Hank

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars An original, October 16, 2005

By 

Shalom Freedman "Shalom Freedman" (Jerusalem,Israel) - See all my reviews
(TOP 1000 REVIEWER)   

This review is from: The Great Psychedelic Armadillo Picnic: A "Walk" in Austin (Crown Journeys) (Hardcover)

At least this guy's an original. This is my first trip in Kinkyland and I was repaid by getting a few laughs. I especially liked his frank no- nonsense tone in telling us for instance, that he goes around giving advice to people happier than himself.
He is deeply at home in the world of Austin and gives the reader a lot of local color, and a lot of advice as to where and what to visit and see.
On the Jewish side it seems to me that that part of his identity is a lot like the Jewish star on Max Baer's trunks, more for crowd power effect than anything else.
But who knows? This guy may be a genuine Longhorn Yid.
However the Kink should be aware that his love of the four- letter word will not give him an A in the big cheder upstairs which I suspect he is more likely to get to than to what he says he wishes to in this book, the Governor's Chair in Austin.