Pizza, Rock Concerts & the Revolutionary War

Location: Boston, Massachusetts, USA

Yup, I was right! As soon as I got up from my computer, I crawled right into my nook in the Princess bed and the little munchkin cuddled right up into me and we were both out like a light. We got to sleep in a little today, as we didn’t have much on the agenda. First order was to cook a gigantic breakfast; complete with scrambled eggs, eggs over easy, bacon, sausage, toast, cinnamon toast, tea, coffee, yogurt… the works. Naturally it took us an hour to eat all of the food, and another hour to recuperate, so we didn’t leave the house until about noon or one.

Our first stop was Minute Man Park which is a National Park dedicated to the three gentlemen (including Paul Revere) who rode their horses from Boston to Concord to warn the men there (who happened to be housing a load of militia owned artillery in preparation for a pending militia uprising) that the British soldiers were marching towards them to attempt to disarm them. We walked around the park and the museum and then sat in on a quick 30 minute presentation detailing the events of that famed night ride and the events that followed leading up to the Revolutionary War.

It’s funny how you become interested in History AFTER you’re required to sit in on hours of it in high school and college. I’d gladly go back and sit in on my HS history classes… ok maybe that’s for a different reason, but it would be really interested to see how much more I knew about these places back then. Much more than I do now, that’s for sure. The most interesting part of the presentation was the crowd I was watching it with and the discussion that followed. It was Dan (an Aussie), Mike (a Brit), Amelia (a 4 year old), Brian and myself. It was great to hear some insight from a non-American perspective. Honestly though, seeing war through a four year old's eyes was probably the most impressive. She asked the most obvious but most thought provoking questions like "but why would that man shoot the other man if they're family?" Really made me think a little harder about how difficult it must have been to live in a time where you had to make the choice between freedom and loyalty. Kind of want to go re-watch the Patriot :)

After Minute Men, we went do Robbins Farm Park back in Arlington near the Allen residence and took some great pictures of the Boston skyline and the park. From here, we had planned to take the bus into Boston Proper, but once we got home, we started jamming and decided that picking up a pizza would be much more suitable. I started playing the electric guitar, but I was really just playing rhythm, so I gave that up to Mike and assumed my much more comfortable position at the piano bench. Brian was on bass (ha… haha) and Dan was on rhythm guitar. Amelia was playing harmonica (actually quite well and in tune with our songs) and Kimmie was on tambourine duty. We actually made quite a little jam band and carried on for at least an hour without too many mistakes or interruption. (Maybe we do have a band after all?).

Amelia also entertained us with her rendition of some Hannah Montana song. She required that we all participate, but I was exempt because she wanted someone to take pictures of her while she sang. I swear this girl is going to be a rockstar one day. She's really got some pipes.

Conveniently, SNL popped itself on the TV shortly after dinner so now we’re watching Dave Matthews play Ozzy Osborne (HILARIOUS!) on "The Mellow Show” while Bill Hader is playing Dave Matthews and Andy Samberg as Jack Johnson. Fantastic (listen closely to the words of the Ozzy song). In fact, I’m off to pay attention. Driving up through Maine, New Hampshire and Vermont tomorrow, should be a long drive so hopefully we can actually walk the walk tomorrow and leave town before noon :-/

XOXO

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I'm Shipping Up To Boston

Location: Boston, Massachusetts, USA

Wow, last night was nuts! We went down to the bar downstairs to have a night cap at about midnight and decided to play a couple of games of foosball and pool. The special for the evening was $5 for a shot of whiskey and a PBR. Could Brian and I be in more of a heaven? We played a couple of very successful games of 9 ball and just sat around drinking and chatting, when a drunk woman walked into our little private conversation to chat about who knows what. Turns out the chick is a booking agent and books venues for bands at local places in Manhattan and Brooklyn. So when she asked us if we were a band, the natural response was “well… as a matter of fact, we are!” For the next hour we spit out song names, lyrics, places we’ve played and places we’re going and this girl just ate it up. When I mentioned a made up bar we were to be playing in tonight in Boston called “Wanda’s” after our car (where we do most of our performances) the broad actually said she’d heard of it! HA! Anyway, we ended up talking to her friends the PR Rep and the Graphic Designer and blah blah blah until about 5 AM when we got tired of the game and headed up to bed. We made the smart decision to sleep in and promised to be on the road by noon.

I got a phone call from Lauren at about 8:45 from downstairs saying that she was standing with a parking cop who was giving us a ticket. He told us we had to come down and move the car, so we drove around Brooklyn for a solid half hour before finding another spot. Fortunately, on the way, we stumbled upon a street down Lauren’s block that ran into the East River and provided stunning views of the midtown skyline. So we went back to the A.P.T., roused B Lee, packed up our bags and headed out of town with a quick stop down to the pier street for a foot dip in the river and a couple of minutes of silent side-by-side sitting on the wall that encloses the water.

Nothing too exciting happened on the road. We passed in and out of Connecticut and Rhode Island without incident or excitement and instead decided to focus on getting to Kimmie and Mike’s before dark. We were warmly greeted by the whole family, including Amelia who was just beside herself with excitement when we got there. Kimmie had an amazing meal of Mexican Meatloaf cooked up and we sat around and ate and chatted and drank some Winter Warmers, which were these fabulous cinnamon spiced beers from a brewery called Harpoon. We just put Amelia to bed so now we’re watched a little family movie (21 with Jim Sturgess and Kevin Spacey) which I’m not sure I’m going to last through. I have a feeling as soon as I press send on this entry, I will be promptly sending myself to bed.

XOXO

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Queen of New York City

Location: New York, New York, USA

I. Am. Exhausted.

Today began SUPER early as we had to pick up our new traveling companion, Mr. Brian Lee at JFK airport. After taking as many pictures as possible of Van Wyck and Queens Boulevard, we snatched up Brian with an authentic cardboard sign with his name on it and headed back to Brooklyn to get ready for the day.

We decided to start by taking the free Staten Island Ferry across the water so we could get some good panorama views of the Statue of Liberty and downtown Manhattan. I remembered from the last time I did liberty, that the best views in the city were from the boat that drove us to the island. Unfortunately, we had neither the time, nor money to go visit the statue, so Dan had the genius idea of taking the free ferry across and back (about an hour round trip and completely FREE! Obviously). Today, we’ve seen the first cloudy day the whole trip, but it’s somewhat fitting for the city. The views of the statue were great and the views of Manhattan were wonderful as well, although I will admit, it still never settles right to see the skyline without those two important towers.

After the ferry, we headed up to the old trade center site to see the construction of the WTC Memorial which was relatively uneventful. There were some great pictures of what it is going to look like and some good views of the construction site, but other than that, not too exciting. We did stop in this great deli though which was hit hard by the fall of the towers and had some amazing pictures of firefighters taking refuge when the air outside was too thick. Not to mention, the food was amazing and very quick.

From there we headed to Wall Street and the financial district, uptown to the Empire State Building (which for some reason I keep calling the Eiffel Tower, even just now when I typed it the first time) and ended in Rockefeller Center to watch some ice skaters and sip on some much needed caramel apple cider. About this time, it was ready to go back to JFK to pick up Dan’s parents who were flying in from Sydney for the holidays. Brian and I waited at the station in Queens while Dan took the shuttle to the airport and then we all rode the train back to the Upper West Side where the family was staying. They were such a hoot and we had such a great chat on the way. I wish we had more time to hang out, but we had promised to meet up with Miss Emma for drinks down in Gramercy so we had to depart (don’t worry, Dan will see them soon as they’re coming up to Canada for X-mas).

We stopped at Time Square on the way to Gramercy so that Brian and Dan could see the area at night (really the only time to see it) and then we met Em at a German restaurant called Rolf’s. It was so great to catch up and she joined us for dinner at a nearby pub called Barfly before we had to head back to Brooklyn for karaoke. Only… we didn’t really make it. On the way to the train station after hanging out with Emma, I got a phone call from Mary who lived in between where we were and where we were going, so we decided to meet up for just one more drink. As it usually goes with Mary, we had so much to talk about that our one drink lasted about an hour, so we just got back to Brooklyn. We’re going to go downstairs and grab some drinks here, and I’m keeping the boys waiting, so this is me stopping typing!

XOXO

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I want to be a part of it, New York, New York

Location: New York, New York, USA

Ahh… what a GREAT day! I did a couple more hours of work after our bonfire (which was so perfect) and then crashed hard in the princess bed (Amelia’s bed when she comes to stay with Auntie Jennifer). We woke up at 6:30 to get on the road by 7, but unfortunately, Dan couldn’t find the keys (oh ya and I wasn’t ready) so we didn’t leave until 7:30. Fortunately, we were lucky and there wasn’t any traffic anyway, so we headed north to New York. Jennifer packed us a to-go bag with all of the roadtrip necessities (candy from all of the candy food groups, Chex mix, vitamin water, and an assortment of other nifty snacks and goodies).

The drive to New York City was pretty uneventful. We were both too excited to get there and I was not feeling well, so other than sick stops in Delaware, New Jersey and Pennsylvania, we really didn’t pay much attention to the in between states (oh, except to yell profanities at the Philly Flyer’s rink).

We crossed into NY from Staten Island and found our way to Lauren’s place in Brooklyn quite easily. We parked the car nearby (for FREE, I might add!) and hopped on the train to Central Park to meet up with some of Dan’s friends. After meeting up with Natalia and Jamie at the Plaza Hotel, we began our super exciting Seinfeld tour! As Dan and I are both huge Seinfeld fans, I felt it appropriate to put a little list of famous spots from the show and check them out since we didn’t have much daylight left. We walked to the Soup Nazi Soup Kitchen, to Monk’s (which is actually called “Tom’s Restaurant”), down in the neighborhood where Jerry is said to have lived on the show, and finally to Yankee Stadium in the Bronx. We got to the Bronx late (and had an interesting walk through a seedy area of the borough just after dark) so we decided to head back to Manhattan quickly and grab some food and Lauren’s house keys so we could go back to the apartment and chill.

We stopped for dinner in Little Italy at the first place which seemed reasonably priced and where the staff spoke as little English as possible. I had the Gorgonzola Gnocchi (go figure) and a Peroni and we had a quick dinner before heading back to the flat.

Lauren’s place is… it’s just… I can’t do it justice. The place is huge. It’s exactly what you would expect from Brooklyn; a large exposed brick, high ceiling and open floor plan kind of place that even housed its own freight elevator (which opened into one of the rommie’s bedrooms!). One of the bedrooms was larger than my entire apartment in Los Angeles! Lauren got home shortly after us and we all headed down to the bar underneath her apartment (yes… directly underneath) for a beer (that naturally turned into three). I love this neighborhood. It’s such a great place to live and having spent a night here, I really feel like I could live here. I’ll make another judgment before I leave, but for now, I can’t imagine liking another neighborhood in the city better.

Tomorrow is filled with a lot of sightseeing so retirement is necessary at this point. Should have LOTS of good photos and stories to share tomorrow!

XOXO

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Roasting Marshmallows is Therapeutic

Location: Washington, D.C., USA

Well… here’s to another late night of work. This one was sort of my fault though. I felt so crappy last night that I really couldn’t sleep, so I figured I’d just get some work done so that hopefully I could rest some today (that didn’t happen, though, explanation later).

We were going to get up early to start sightseeing, but for some reason, we just took way too long to get up and around. We waited until Jennifer had to go in for a lunch meeting and she dropped us off at Arlington National Cemetery on her way in to town.

Now, the last time I was in DC was in 1996 when we took a field trip with my 5th grade class. I remember most of the trip, and I remember appreciating all of the sights, but I’m really glad that I have a chance to see everything again after taking all of my high school and college US history classes. As soon as we got out of the car, I knew my sweater was going to be too much clothing, and I couldn’t have been happier. We were blessed with a beautiful 70 degree day and we took advantage and spend the entire morning and early afternoon walking around the cemetery, across the bridge to the Lincoln Memorial and up the lawn to the Washington Monument. The trees that line the pond on either side of the Reflecting Pool were the most beautiful shade of yellow and their leaves were conveniently dropping and littering the sidewalks on either side. All of the sights were pretty much exactly as I left them 13 years ago, which is comforting. Even the snipers sitting on the top of the White House seemed oddly familiar.

Just after passing the White House I got an e-mail that changed the rest of my day. Unfortunately, there were a string of events that led to a serious amount of work to be taken care of. So I found some free wifi in the food court of the Federal Building and sent Dan with a map drawn on a napkin to visit the Museum of Natural History and the Capitol Building. After he got done touring around, we grabbed a quick train home and I resumed work while Dan and Tommy prepped a bonfire and ordered some pizza.

I just finished up so I’m going to stop blabbing and run out to join them outside. I can see the fire from here and it looks so toasty! Oh and Dan's never had a s'more before... that has to change.

XOXO

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Detour = Success... Cruising the Skyline Drive

Location: Washington, D.C., USA

I stayed up way too late working on the reports we are putting out for the Port of Long Beach and I’m quite exhausted, to say the least. Today was jam packed pull of fun and it all started at 6 AM. I practically crawled to the car after an hour of sleep and prayed Dan wouldn’t ask me to drive. After a quick drive by the UVA campus in daylight (to see the Lawn and the Rotunda at Ed’s recommendation – a great one by the way, we headed West towards the Blue Ridge Mountains.

We initially missed the turn onto Skyline Drive, but after stopping to chat with a chatty old Vietnam vet, we got on the right track and began the 105 miles along the ridge of the mountains. The skyline drive is basically a road that winds along the ridge of the Blue Ridge Mountains from south western Virginia through north western Virginia. We got the recommendation from Hazel (the lady at the Virginia, NC border) yesterday and realized we HAD to take the detour. There were deer littering the sides of the road the entire drive, which I’m sure made Dan a little nervous, but other than that, it was a great drive. It was a beautiful day, with decent visibility and although we didn’t time it perfectly to see the fall colors, we still got quite a few great landscape panoramas.

About two thirds of the way through the drive we stopped to take a short 2 mile hike up to the top of the Little Stony Man Cliffs. The large boulders jutted out over the valley of trees below and we vegged out on the rocks for about 30 minutes just taking in the solitude and the early morning breeze. The weather was still on our side today, as it has been for the entire trip thus far. It was sunny and 65 the whole drive; perfect windows down sweatshirt weather. After doing our fair share of screaming random phrases out to the echoing cliffs in the distance and me scaring Dan by standing too close to the edge (I was going to test out the phrase “I lean against the wind, pretend that I am weightless”, but I decided against it as the odds of me falling over a 100 ft. cliff seemed too high).

From here we drove to West Virginia to stop at Charlestown and the Dairy Queen hosted there. After scarfing a dip cone, we turned back east and started the quick drive to Washington D.C. Once we arrived, we were greeted by a very enthusiastic cousin (Miss Jennifer) and her amazingly adorable colonial cottage in Fairfax. Her husband Tommy cooked us up an AMAZING meal complete with steaks on the grill, sweet potatoes and grilled mushrooms & onions. I ate for about an hour straight (I was not about to leave food on that plate) and we washed everything down with some brew before settling in front of the fire in the living room. I’ve got a decent amount of work to do tonight, but I have a killer headache, so I may have to just surrender to my sickness and go to bed. Work is giving me a stress cold right now, so hopefully, a little break this week will be just the medicine I need!

XOXO

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Everything I learned in HS US History is right in front of me...

Location: Charlottesville, Virginia, USA

Last night was a great fun. After a quick cat nap, some surprisingly tasty Papa John’s pizza and a little football, Chris, Dan, Cassie and I geared up for a great evening of fun. Chris and Cassie had a formal to go to so after dropping them off, Dan and I walked through the NC State campus to grab a drink and wait for them. The campus was beautiful, as most college campuses are, but there were a few very unique things about this campus. The most notable was the Free Expression Tunnel (read my Sosauce.com review here). This tunnel is a pedestrian tunnel where university students are encouraged to express themselves. It mostly looks like a wall of junk, but the fact that a university has embraced an idea like this is really quite remarkable. Apparently also during rivalry week when NC State plays UNC, Tar Heel fans often come and express themselves all over the walls of the tunnel.

After wandering around campus for a bit, we found ourselves at a small bar where we had a quick drink and waited for Chris and Cassie to arrive. They came and picked us up and we all headed to downtown Raleigh to check out a great little piano bar called Rum Runners (read my Sosauce.com review here). The place was relatively small, but had a great vibe. Honestly, I’m not sure you can screw up a piano bar, but needless to say, they did not screw anything up. We spent some time singing and swaying and headed home to catch some good Z’s before a long day’s drive to Washington, D.C.

Only we didn’t exactly make it to D.C.

But I’ll back up. So we began our drive a little later than we had wanted to. But we definitely needed the sleep. We headed out of Raleigh just before noon with a quick stop to grab some gas and grub. North Carolina is beautiful, but we didn’t really stop to look around. Once we hit the state line in Richmond, we naturally had to stop and take our picture at the sign which happened to be on the property of the Welcome center. We decided to go in and grab some free propaganda (something I am now a BIG fan of!) and started talking to Hazel, the nice woman working the info desk. Within minutes she had convinced us to reroute our journey completely, taking a westbound highway after Richmond and driving across the top of the Blue Ridge Mountains along a path called the Skyline Drive. We weren’t a hard sell, and after calling my cousin Jennifer (who we are staying with in D.C.) we picked up and headed in our new direction.

Richmond was beautiful. I don’t remember it being this gorgeous. Once we crossed the James River, we got out of the car and took a quick hike to the Boulevard Bridge to see the river and the changing leaves a little more up close. After this we headed North through some really great old colonial neighborhoods, an area called the Fan which, aside from the iPod toting joggers, could fit right inside a period piece. We also stopped at a little lake called Boat Lake which has the most perfect still water reflections of the trees on the horizon. From here we headed northwest towards Charlottesville.

We arrived in Charlottesville just after dark and made a quick stop at Barnes and Noble to pick up a little book called “The Game” (if you haven’t heard of it, look it up – it’s by a guy called Neil Strauss and it’s pretty genius – I’ll let you know how it goes as we read through it) and checked into the Super 8 motel. Tonight we are relaxing. We grabbed some Panera and are watching Monday Night Football. Hopefully I can get some work done tonight and get enough sleep so that we can be nice and fresh for our long drive across the ridge tomorrow!

XOXO

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A Perfect Day for College Football

Location: Raleigh, North Carolina, USA

The journey has officially begun!

I boarded my flight from Tulsa to Greenville about 6 PM yesterday evening (with all of my bags barely packed, but definitely ready to go). My flight went off without a hitch, with a quick layover at DFW I arrived in Greenville at about 11 PM to Dan practically waiting for me at the airport (fantastic timing)! From there, Dan drove us back up to Raleigh where we promptly crashed at his brother Chris’s girlfriend’s apartment.

Today was pretty relaxing. Dan isn’t going to see his brother for a couple of months so we wanted to spend one last day hanging out. We slept in pretty late, but got ready quickly because we wanted to get to the football game early. Today, I was not a Cowboys fan, I was not a Longhorns fan, rather I was a North Carolina State Wolfpack fan. It was a hard transition (as their color is red… which I despise, generally speaking) and we were rooting against a team in Orange (Clemson). I snuck in as a student (thanks Samantha, whoever you are) and we got FANTASTIC seats on the front row of the endzone. Although the game was pretty much a wash, it was amazing fun to be so close to the field, even though we were losing. We battled to catch field goal attempt balls, helped raise the net to catch the extra close ones, took our picture with Mrs. Wuff (the mascot bride) and chatted with the security guards keeping any overzealous fans off the field. The weather was perfect, the sun was shaded by the stadium walls and all in all, it was a pretty perfect day.

On the way home, we grabbed a pizza, tossed the football in the parking lot until dark and then headed in for a quick catnap and some TV football. Unfortunately, neither the Texas, nor the Oklahoma State games are showing out here, so I have resorted to following the score via Sportacular. But hopefully, neither team needs my help.

Today really went off without a hitch. A good relaxing start to a hopefully relaxing trip. My only major blunder today involved a car called Wanda. Wanda is a 1996 (ish) Bermuda Grass Green Ford Escort with as many problems as Britney Spears pre-comeback. Wanda (who I named after the domestic abuse victim from the Dixie Chick song “Goodbye Earl”) has a number of issues. She has attachment issues; her front bumper is held on by twisty ties. She has trust issues; her driver door doesn’t open, so to enter the car, one must sneak in through the passenger side and open the driver door from the inside. She’s not very bright; the interior lights do not work at all. She’s got a bad clutch (not a metaphor) that squeaks and creaks every time you step on it. When she cries, there’s really no stopping it as the windshield wipers are relatively useless and completely have a mind of their own. She also has is incredibly picky, she only has one key and without it, you’ll never get in.

So when I asked Dan for the keys so I could go get my pack out of the boot (my accent and vocabulary transformation has already begun), Dan responsibly reminded me, “don’t forget to not lock the keys in the car because we don’t have a spare!” I walk towards Wanda, laughing and thinking that I would do something like that. I open the trunk, grab my pack (which required two hands and a brief set down of the keys – aw, CRAP! That’s where I went wrong!) and slam the hatch down quick to run back inside the house… But without the keys. Literally less than 30 seconds after Dan had reminded me to steer clear of this very predicament. Fortunately, I had made a mistake earlier in the day that saved us. I had accidentally forgotten to lock the passenger door when I got out of the car earlier, so we (and by “we” I mean Dan) were able to crawl into the car and reach for the keys. Crisis averted.

Not sure about the plans for tonight yet. Probably something relaxed as we begin Dan’s roadtrip tomorrow and drive North to Washington D.C.

XOXO

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