Jenna jokes she and Hoda keep running into her ‘exes’ during their trip to Austin
Jenna Bush Hager has been giving Hoda Kotb a tour of her hometown of Austin, Texas, and they two have apparently bumped into a few of Jenna’s former suitors.
The TODAY with Hoda and Jenna co-hosts traveled to Austin this week ahead of Hoda’s event, “Making Space: A Wellness Weekend with Hoda Kotb.”
Viewers got to see the pair zipping around Jenna’s old stomping grounds during the Oct. 24 show. Donning a cowboy hat for the occasion, Jenna drove Hoda around Austin in a vintage red pickup truck.
“I’m going to to show you what Texas is all about. Buckle up, baby, you’re in for a wild ride,” Jenna said as they embarked on their journey.
The pair stopped at Jenna’s alma mater, Austin High School, where Jenna was lauded during a special ceremony. They also swung by one of Jenna’s favorite Tex-Mex restaurant, Joann’s Fine Foods, owned by her high school pal Larry McGuire.
As Jenna and Hoda munched on chips and queso, Larry noted that he’d been roommates with Jenna’s boyfriend during his freshman year at the University of Texas.
“We had such a good group of friends,” Jenna remembered.
Hoda got to meet more of Jenna’s friends from high school at Donn’s Depot, a local music club, where the co-hosts two-stepped on the dance floor with fellow revelers.
Later, Hoda and Jenna shared highlights from their outing in front of a live audience in Austin. That’s when Hoda mentioned that she’d met a few young men from Jenna’s past.
“Being with Jenna in Austin is incredible,” said Hoda, adding, “To turn any corner and see, like, Jenna’s 7th grade date. Her prom date showed up at Donn’s the other day.”
“It sounds like I have a lot of exes that still live in Texas,” joked Jenna, referring to George Strait’s 1987 country music hit “All My Ex’s Live in Texas.”
Jenna fell in love with her most special “date” of all, husband Henry Hager. The couple, who tied the knot in 2008 and share kids Mila, Poppy and Hal, met through mutual friends in 2004, when Henry was working for Jenna’s dad, former U.S. President George W. Bush.
Though Jenna knew early on that Henry was the one, she has also credited him with taking her on the “worst date” of her life. The fiasco involved Henry’s car running out of gas and the two of them crashing into a Secret Service vehicle.
“My worst first date involved the Secret Service, let’s just leave it at that,” Jenna told a surprised Hoda on a February 2021 episode of TODAY. “It was with Henry and his car ran out of gas and went backwards and hit the Secret Service.”
Jenna explained that she and Henry were driving up a hill in Arlington, Virginia, so that they could reach a corner gas station.
“He started to go up the hill and then booooop, crash,” Jenna said, laughing, as Hoda gasped.
“Were you scared or laughing?” Hoda asked.
“I was laughing, but he was horrified,” Jenna recalled.
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