Category: Domestic Travel

Yesterday, a friend of mine called and said, “I’ve got a free place to crash in Las Vegas, what are you doing?”
And like a crazy person, I jumped on the road.
Crazy because it takes 8 hours to get to Las Vegas from my house (for those of you that are interested, the route from my house is I-280 S, SR85 S, US-101 S, SR152 E, I-5 S, SR58 E, I-15 N).
Crazy because gas is US$2.50+ a gallon.
Crazy because I got asked at 1100 and I was doing laundry and didn’t leave until 1500.
Well, the 20 or so hours I spent in Vegas was neat. It’s like an adult Disneyland with strippers, hookers, booze and gambling. And you can smoke cigars inside too!
What was absolutely nuts were the other drivers on the road on Thursday. The dual concepts of road courtesy and lane discipline are foreign to most drivers out there. Urban Assault Vehicles (AKA SUVs) driven quickly give the impression to other drivers of a 3 ton truck out of control. Did I mention the video screens?
I saw a lot of cars with video screens being used. Either laptops or portable DVD players. The drivers as well of the passengers were watching…or at least it seemed like it. Their cars were driving with the inattentiveness normally reserved for bad drivers who insist on talking on the phone while their road speed drops or increases, depending on the tempo of the conversation.
I saw three flipped cars in the past 24 hours, one on a Las Vegas street.
It’s dangerous out there…

Famous for movies, TV shows and oh yeah, Amtrak and the Metroliner stop here too.

All hail to Alma Mater,
To thy glory we sing;
All hail to Southern California,
Loud let thy praises ring;
Where Western sky meets Western seas
Our college stands in majesty
Sing our love to Alma Mater,
Hail, all hail to thee!!

Sooooo I woke up early this morning.
Had a healthy breakfast.
Caught the F to Jay Street
Caught the A Train within 5 minutes.
Straight to Penn Station, got on a NJ Transit train within 10 min to EWR.
Get through security. No line!
Right on time.l
Then all the flights to ORD has this ominous word in the place where the departure time should be.
“DELAYED”.
Naturally, the gate staff were absolutely useless. “we Don’t know. Perhaps you’d want to try that gate”.
Flights were being delayed on average, about 3 hours.
I said the magic word, “reroute”. Flying through DEN.
It’s all good tho. I got upgraded on both legs and the DEN-SFO leg is a 747-400 with M-Power in the seat.
Finally!
And the absolute kicker of this trip to NYC: I found a ramen joint on 57th and 5th Ave AND I had a burger at the Burger Joint at the Parker Meridian.
There’s a lot of neat places midtown!

I decided to disappear this weekend to New York City. NYC is all dolled up for Xmas and there’s nothing quite like it.

This is Prospect Park, Brooklyn’s answer to Manhattan’s Central Park. It snowed all morning Sunday and this is pretty much how the neighborhood looked when I trudged (Hey Joe, used yr word!) to the subway to head into town, err, Manhattan.

Me with the big twinkle-y tree at Rockefeller Center while it’s snowing.

As the day went on and it warmed up, the snow from the sky turned into rain and the rain as it hit the ground, melted the snow that was already there.

So at the end of the day, you had slush. Messy icky slush. It would be nice if you could freeze time right after a fresh snowfall and revel in it. I did that today.

But then, it doesn’t snow in San Francisco, does it?

Some big balls to end this post…

I went to LA this past weekend.

Saw the game. Beat the Beavers. Savored the victory and for 12 hours, we all thought we’d be going to New Orleans for the BCS Nat’l Championship. Instead, in theory, we could be playing for a co-championship.

We need out of the BCS, it’s absolute bullshite and it’s biased against Pac-10 teams anyway…

Here’s a shot of an SC tradition…

This is toward the end of the 5th Quarter, when the greatest marching band in the history of the universe plays for the faithful for about 30 minutes after the game.

Then Coliseum security kicks us out!

On the way back, I cruised past LA’s latest landmark and new home of the LA Philharmonic, the new Frank Gehry Disney Concert Hall.

Couldn’t get in though. Or even close because they were doing some kind of shoot that closed all the streets around the Hall. So this pic was taken in the rain two blocks away.

Sunday was visiting friends and former classmates. Wound up at a Burberry’s in South Coast Plaza. Brrrr….! But dinner was fine.

10 July, all day.

Food day again!

Met my friend @ Katz’s Deli in the Lower East Side. That’s a big old school deli that is new again with the hottie crowd, especially on weekends. However, it was late lunchtime on a Thursday which meant it was only kind of crowded as opposed to being really crowded. Had a thin sliced pastrami with chicken noodle soup. Mmmmmm.

As far as I could tell, this was the place where the infamous deli scene in “When Harry met Sally” was filmed. Nice movie, even though it was directed by Rob Reiner.

Wandered around other parts of SoHo and TriBeCa before having to head back uptown. Found Dean and Deluca’s and had a NY Egg Cream. No egg but some cream.

Dinner was Pizza Blanca, or white pizza. NY seems like the only place you can find this thin crust pizza. Came out of the subway and had the fastest dinner in recent memory.

Went to the Great Lawn in Central Park to catch a performance of the NY Phil. Their summertime in the park series of concerts are free and attract a LOT of people. It was nice. Big. And organized. Best of all, no bums so you could enjoy the show.

Everyone stayed until the end to catch the fireworks. They were intense but brief. 5 minutes of fireworks! So short!

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I would wind up walking 25 blocks back to the hotel since the MTA wasn’t running buses down 5th Avenue. Naturally, when I got back down to 58th Street, three busses show up. Maybe their bus division is secretly run by MUNI. Bleah.

But right at the entrance to Central Park, there was this really nice fountain. So i took it. A picture, that is.

Of course, these are the folks responsible for keeping New York clean! I have a healthy respect for the work they’ve done over ther past seven years…

9 July, all day.

A friend asked me why I go to New York so often. Of course she should talk since she’s from Singapore, land of the most traveled of travelers. And she got to go to Scandinavia last summer!

Why do I go to New York? Because New York is so big, each time I go there solo, there’s always new places to visit. Today was food & booze day. I was taken to a store called Century 21. Thought it was a place for real estate (ha!) but it was a big crazy clothing shop housed in an old bank. My NY friend has pretty good taste in what works clothing wise. It’s the big deal over there.

Lunch was at Shanghai Joe’s in Chinatown (xiaolongbiao is great) with shopping afterwards. Kind of routine, eh? Wound up strolling up to SoHo to drink coffee while she shopped around. There was a fantastic Apple Store in the heart of SoHo. Free broadband to boot. Nice. I spent two hours in there.

When it’s really hot outside, it does goofy things to your appetite. So no dinner tonight; more like a bunch of snacks. Green Tea ice cream with mochi at dinnertime in a chi chi Japanese place and a Cookie Dough Surprise sandwich at a peanut butter restaurant in the Village behind NYU. nice. And that was dinner.

8 July, High Tea to Dinner Time

Wisdom of free Wi-fi

After my visit to the house of Nat, I sauntered across the street to Bryant Park. This is a community park that was taken back from the powers of scum (drug dealers and bums) by the powers of good. Besides free Wi-Fi that blankets the park, there’s a cafe and games and private security. Very safe and very busy.

So I sat under a tree in 90+ degree heat and went online. Did my business for two hours (!). Time passes when you have free Wi-Fi. Even in that kind of heat.

Met up with my Hells’ Kitchen friends at John’s Pizza near Times Square. A famous pizza palace in an old church. Mmmmmmmmm.

8 July, Early AM

It wasn’t too bad getting into town. Took the Airtrain to NJ Transit commuter rail into Penn Station. 40 minutes. Nice. Beats the subway from JFK. Faster, cleaner, less stops, place for baggage.

Subways are not designed for baggage.

The station turnstiles and gates are also not designed for baggage. Try going through these with a roller and a backpack!

Got an early check-in at the Helmsley Windsor. It’s on W58th @ 6th Avenue. Very nice location. Central Park is a block away, the Madison and 5th Avenue shopping districts are close. And the F line (subway) is across the street from the hotel. The hotel is a bit worn, but for $85/night, I’ll deal with it.

Went puttering with one of my friends who escaped San Francisco. She likes it here but misses her home in Southern California. Can’t blame her, but she IS in a better place than San Francisco.

We met at the Popover Cafe where they serve popovers with strawberry butter. Yummy place. Stuffed animals all over the place. Kinda cutsey. Stayed there for two + hours because of the heat and my need to recover from my flight. Lots of coffee…

Madison Avenue has all the chi chi shops and we puttered up and down the strip. Dunhill moved here from Park Ave and they have a very spiffy new humidor. I think we stopped at or poked into every fancy haute couture boutique before we split up. She went back to Hell’s Kitchen (where she and her husband reside) and I went down to Nat Sherman’s to pick up some supplies…