Is this weird from a girl's perspective?

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There's this girl I've been talking to. Texting it kind of odd. We can only really talk over the phone because I live an hour and a half away currently for college while she lives in my hometown. We met through a mutual friend.

We're still getting to know each other. I get tired of the conversations starting with a 'What's up?" or a "How's it going?". It feels fake and forced.

I'm used to talking to anyone else over text by just initiating a random topic.

Say you were the girl in this situation. Would it be so weird if he just texted you but instead of a generic "Hey, what's up?" it was something like

>"Did you hear about (Insert recent event) that happened?"
Bring up something from a previous conversation?
(She likes the outdoors/travel) Would it be weird to start a conversation with
>"What's a place you've always wanted to go to?" just out of the blue?

I just want to cut the shit right out and ask what I want to ask, talk about what I want to talk about. Is this a bad idea? Or is this really the norm and I'm just way too rusty for not having texted a girl seriously for the past two years?