Again, I work downtown, so it wouldn't be so bad for me but I can imagine it you don't go there every day and have a place to park, it could be discombobulating. Easier to meet along Midtown/Upper Kirby/Montrose for folks if you are looking for something craft/hipster. Personally, I live SW currently and have spent almost all of my Houston life along SW 59 in one form or the other, so all of the places that come to mind are Downtown/Uptown/Midtown/Kirby/Galleria/Southwest Freeway/I-10 out to the beltway.
This will be the worst week in 10 years to do anything near Downtown, though, since the Superbowl is killing traffic and parking. Not on Sunday, mind you, but my parking garage on Main Street had signs for people parking for the NFL Experience yesterday with CRAZY hours. Work is talking about all kinds of things for later in the week due to the crush.
it was cool watching them practice approaches with various military helicopters yesterday. They flew what we were best able to determine was a Pave Hawk around for a couple of hours.