The Obligatory Vacation Recap, Part 1

(This has been written for some time; I've been back for a week. It's just been a matter of getting time to code and post it. I'm a slacker. Sorry.)

Scene one: So much for Plan A...

(Wednesday morning)

I'm officially on vacation, off to NYC to see Richard Cheese and Avenue Q with Zappagirl and Memnoch. The plan was to leave at an obscene hour of the morning and possibly make it into the city in time to see Hamell on Trial at Satalla.

So much for that bright idea. It's almost 10:30 am, and I'm still sitting in the floor playing around on the as-yet-unpacked laptop.

Maybe it wasn't such a smart idea, going to a concert (VNV Nation at the Madison) the night before we were supposed to leave. Oh well. We had a good time and I actually managed to get more than four hours of sleep, which is helpful when one is driving.

Hopefully more to come... I believe that our living arrangements for the next few days might involve dial-up. (Perhaps we will seek out an internet cafe. Yeah, like we're going to have time for that.) At any rate, a recap of the silliness will be forthcoming....

Scene Two: Greetings from beautiful Tarrytown, NY!

(Thursday afternoon)

After dragging our feet considerably yesterday, we have finally arrived in New York. (We didn't manage to get on the road until 3:00 pm, and crossed the Tappan Zee sometime around 2:15 am. Not bad, considering the construction and the eight billion potty breaks.)

I'm currently on the back deck of Zappabro's house, searching for a club that we can go to tonight. (Hooray for laptops and "borrowed" wi-fi!) It looks like we may have found one near Union Square that might be interesting.... the music format tonight is listed as "70s, 80s, Brit-pop, new wave, glam and electro." And it appears to be no cover - bonus!

We're getting ready to catch a train into the city... more later, I'm sure.

Scene Three: All dressed up, no place to go

(late Thursday night)

Zappagirl, Memnoch, Zappagirl's cousin and I spent the day walking around the city, with Zappabro playing tour guide, pointing out good restaurants and whatnot. We had decided to go to the newly remodeled Museum of Modern Art, which made me quite happy, as it was one of the things I'd always wanted to do while in New York. We only managed to see the exhibits on the fourth and fifth floors before they closed, but it was fabulous.

We stopped and had lunch in the dining concourse at Grand Central Station, since we were starving when we got off the train and it was convenient. Zappagirl and Memnoch opted for Indian food, while I grabbed a slice of pizza from Two Boots. I got the Big Maybelle - marinated chicken, pepperoni, and fresh garlic on a white pie. Yum!

We stopped by the Best Buy in Chelsea in search of a new car stereo for Zappabro, only to find they only carried satellite radios. Silly tourists! Why would they have car stereos in a city where almost everyone uses public transportation? And if they did have a car stereo department, where would they put the install bays? Duh.

At this point, we parted ways with Zappabro and Zappacousin, as they had tickets to see Blue Man Group. We stopped for dinner at The Cottage, a Chinese restaurant nearby. Good, but not great. We all three ordered spicy dishes, and only Memnoch's ended up being anywhere close to spicy. (Perhaps since he asked for it to be really, really spicy about 800 times when ordering.) Oh well.

We headed back to Tarrytown to get ready to go out. The house is within walking distance of the train station, which is good. It's all uphill coming back, which is bad. We also took a wrong turn and walked an extra couple of blocks (still uphill), which was just stupid of us.

We were pretty much ready to go when we received a call from Memnoch's mom. She was checking in on Zappagirl's cats and one of them got out while she was taking laundry out to the car. Needless to say, Zappagirl is beside herself and the night out was cancelled.

Fingers crossed for good news on the wayward kitty....