2:54 p.m. - 2006-06-05
vacation: what we did
What did we do on vacation, you ask?
Perhaps a better question would be: What DIDN'T we do!!!
No, the first question was better. Which question I'll now address.
First, we embarked in an aeroplane, bound for New York. (City, not state. Well yes, it's true that the city is in the state. But it's not OF the state.) The thing about flying is, I really don't much care for the flying. It requires a ridiculous amount of energy for me to keep the aircraft aloft with the power of my mind, leaving me exhausted and depleted. I think of myself as a rational person, a person who understands that cars, trains, boats and rickshaws are all more dangerous modes of transportation than flying. How many people die in car crashes in a year compared to in plane crashes? How often does a commercial passenger plane crash in the whole world, like once or twice a year? And so forth. But still, whenever I step into that crowded, weird, big metal tube with all the mysterious lights and apparatus and noise I become seized with a low-grade sort of animal panic. I read once that early in the development of agriculture and animal husbandry farmers experimented with domesticating a wide variety of animals, soon learning that certain animals would never be domesticable. In the most extreme cases, the animal would try and escape being fenced in by ramming the fence repeatedly with its head until it died of blunt trauma. That animal is me on an airplane.
Except, I don't have to ram my poor uncomprehending animal head into the walls of the plane in a vain escape attempt anymore, because I finally hit on the proper formula for a care-free, groovy flying experience: Four alcohol drinks (consumed as close as possible to take-off) and a milligram of lorazepam (consumed an hour before take-off). Plus whatever booze is on the plane, if it's a pretty long flight. Groovy flying, guaran-fucking-teed!
So, we finally landed safely in New York (LaGuardia) and took a cab to our posh midtown hotel. We opted for a hotel because the only New York residents we know live way the hell in the middle of Brooklyn, which is very cool and all but we knew we'd want to do stuff in Manhattan and not have to spend hours getting back and forth to Brooklyn each day. Plus, the one we know best, Carl, wasn't even in town when we were, so we wouldn't have gotten to see him anyway. Anyway, so, it was starting to get late when we arrived and we were tired from the trip, so all we did the first night was wander around the Times Square area all agape at the lights and Broadway hurly-burly, find a place to eat pizza, and retire to our room, from which we'd emerge the next day, fresh and alert.
Activites the next couple of days included:
*Visiting the Met twice. The second time, they were open!
*Visiting the Guggenheim after the first, failed Met attempt in order to use its bathrooms. Does the Guggenheim have enough bathrooms? HELL NO, YA IDIOT, it's a Frank Lloyd Wright building!
*A couple or three fine meals. I tried conch for the first time!
*A couple drinks at the Village Vanguard. It being Monday night, the Village Vanguard Monday Night Jazz Orchestra (used to be the Thad Jones/Mel Lewis band) was playing, and they were very good. Also, neither Kia nor I had never been to the Vanguard, so it was very cool to see where Coltrane and bazillions of other jazz legends played and continue to play. Apparently it hasn't changed at all since Coltrane played there.
*Visited Penn Station. This is where we met Nate, who came up from Philadelphia via the rails.
*Ambled through the park!
*On our second, successful Met visit, we went to an exhibit of British clothes, from the 18th century to the present, give or take. The audio tour was recorded by Johnny Rotton, of all people. He talked a lot about the environment that created the Sex Pistols and his theory of monanarchy (Monarchy plus anarchy) (?). Then he read the lyrics to God Save the Queen in their entirety. There was no mention of anything in the exhibit.
*Strolled through much of the Chelsea area. Which is a nice walk. It's pretty downtowney and cool but also partly residential and quiet. Plus, I understand there are a number of art galleries. We walked by that famous Chelsea Hotel, had a couple drinks and heard a concert.
*The concert was works by Matthew Greenbaum, I think his name was. There was a solo piano thing that I liked. And we ran into Steve Dembski. And there was a table with wine at intermission!
*That whole thing about New York Never Sleeps is a crock: It was only eleven at night and it took us three tries to find a restaurant that wasn't closing, and then they told us we had five minutes to order once we were seated. It was good: Thai. I think Kia's dish came with a side of tripe!
*Finally, a second visit to Penn Station: so depressing that they had to build it underground. This time to see Nate off and embark ourselves, north to Massachusetts.
NEXT: MASSACHUSETTS!!!!
