Austin Google fiber space and event

This morning, we braved the "traffic delays" (dead stop for half an hour) to go downtown... And, yes, we could have walked faster, but my daughter had somewhere to be at 11, so we needed to be able to get out quickly (at which time the streets were back open again).

Where did we go?

The old Austin children's museum!

...Which is now the HQ for Google fiber here in Austin. We've been meaning to go check it out, anyway, but today they had an event, Saturday Morning Cartoons, wherein they were showing stuff from Disney Junior and, allegedly, XD (which is how we got my 13-year-old to go, though they never showed any XD when we were there), and having breakfast.

The first thing I have to tell you is that about nine months ago or so, there was a similar event at a downtown hotel that was a pancake breakfast (I think affiliated with ACL or some other larger event), and they took RSVPs, but they had reached their fire-marshal-approved limit about 20 minutes before the event even started, so even though we all got there when it was supposed to begin, we were turned away. So, I was a little nervous about arriving at this thing as it began, but our road was closed down for the run, and my teen doesn't do really early mornings.

However... there were more staff there than visitors when we arrived! (5:2 before we got there.)

First, the space.

It's a big, wide-open room with various couches and poofs on which you can sit and watch the big-screen television or use your own device using Google fiber's 1 gigabit internet. (See my girl there on the left in the "Gravity Falls" pine tree trucker hat? "Gravity Falls." You know, from Disney XD. We were kinda hoping.)

There is an interactive area to compare the regular internet speeds versus Google fiber. I loved the mouse. There are a couple of other televisions streaming programming, too. 

The space is very comfortable. A lot of the couches have blankets, in case you get chilly. Nice touch.

The Star Wars cartoon actually looked pretty interesting.

Also, there are signs up in the common area that say, basically, your presence is acknowledgement and agreement that you might be photographed and your image used without compensation or further permission, so if you don't like it, you

Today, though, was special. In addition to the displays, wi-fi, and complimentary copies of the NY Times newspaper, they provided...

... breakfast! Including...

...a doughnut bar! It included chocolate, glazed, blueberry, and cinnamon doughnut holes as well as scones. They had chocolate syrup, vanilla icing, maple syrup, sprinkles, and bacon bits for toppings!

Oh, and milk, coffee, and OJ.

I was super impressed by my idea of chocolate syrup and bacon. However, it was the cinnamon doughnut holes that were super addictive! Nonetheless, my husband ended up co-opting the choco-bacon thing, too.

If you're in the downtown area, Google fiber space is worth dropping into just to check it out. But you might as well take a gander at their website and see if anything special is going on. They have a couple of kick-off (and closing) happy hours coming up, and a tailgate party next Saturday afternoon!