Travel Tips

I'll be heading to New York to spend Thanksgiving with my better half. We plan to see the Macy's parade, spend some time on Long Island with a friend and just generally enjoy the city!

Send Photo to a Friend

Craziness in the Kitchen

Okay, I'll admit it. I spent much of the day watching football while Jeannine and Valerie cooked up the best Thanksgiving meal I've EVER eaten (apologies to my mom and mother in law but it 's true). Alex helped out too.

This is them in the midst of the meal prep.

Send Photo to a Friend

Ice Skating

On Friday night we went ice skating at Woolman Rink in Central Park. It was busy and a bit cold but a lot of fun anyway. I am NOT a good skater but fortunantely, neither are most folks out there.

Send Photo to a Friend

We're still standing!

This pic is probably the only time in the evening of skating that we were all together and all upright!

Send Photo to a Friend

A respite from Turkey

I like Thanksgiving as much as the next person, admittedly I am more fond of the side dishes than the main event but after a day or two of Thanksgiving fare, I'm ready for a change.

This is a great excuse to head off to Ray's Pizza in the Village. It's almost always a stop when I am in town.

Send Photo to a Friend

A tree for the "Box"

Alex calls our apartment "the box." Given its size and shape, she's got a point! At any rate, one of our last outings before I headed back to CA was to find a Christmas tree for the box.

Now understand with the space "challenges" that we have it was going to be small. The question was how small and how "Charlie Brown?"

We headed up to the wholesale flower district (mainly between 6th and 7th on 28th St). After a few peeks at midget Chrsitmas trees, we settled on a slight variation-

A Rosemary Christmas tree! In other words a Rosemary bush shaped like a tree. It's the right size, smells great (although not like Pine) and heck, Jeannine could cook with it after the holidays!

Send Photo to a Friend

A drink in the Meat Packing District

The Meat Packing District (in the Chelsea area) has recently become home to several very nice resturants and bars. We went to "Markt," a Beligan establishment for a drink and where very pleased with the atmoshpere and the spirits.

This is Jeannine outside (does she look cold?!).

After a really wonderful five days it was time for me to head back to the west coast part of our existance. I always take United's last flight out of JFK (Flt 21). It's a bit challenging- you leave NY after 9 p.m. and arrive in LA after midnight, but it gives me another whole day in the city and the flight is rarely full so there is room to spread out.

One interesting thing I've noticed on these trips is the celebrity factor. On this flight home I saw Snoop Doggy Dog (of course he was sitting a little bit farther forward than me!). On my way out to NY this time I was in the cab line with Robert Wahl (star of HBO's Arless). I've also been on the same flight with Brook Shields and been in the terminal with Neve Campbell and Tim Robbins. You get pretty used to it but it is still interesting...

Send Photo to a Friend

Flying on a 767

United flys 767-200's between LAX and JFK. I've found them to be pretty comfortable. I think their best feature is the coach seating layout- a "2-3-2." so even middle seats (which are never any fun) have only one person on either side. The galleys in the back are spacious if you need to streach your legs and since it's a twin aisle plane you can get up and down without always feeling like you are right in the way of a drink cart.

My major dissapointment with them is the movie screens. There is one screen in the center of the bulkhead in coach that can be hard to see from any seat in the back of the plane and challenging from the side sections closer up front.

I've been lucky enough to fly in the business class cabin a few times and that is pleasent way to spend the trip. The attendent to passenger ratio is great and the seats are plenty big and include foot rests (although they aren't that helpful for me at 6'2" as they don't go out that far).

Here's a pic of me with the crew of flt 848 on a trip to NYC in July.

Send Photo to a Friend

First things first

My first major outing upon arriving in the city was a trip to the Old Navy Store on 6th Avenue. I had packed some warm clothes (knowing it would be in the 20's when I got there) but Jeannine and I quickly determined that the best course of action was to go purchase some "real" sweaters (as in not California weight) that I could then just leave in NY. This was a smart move as they were the "item of the week" and I wore them most of the time I was in the city.

Send Photo to a Friend

Need Food!

You can usually bet that when I arrive in the city one of the first things that Jeannine and I have to do is go "stock up" on food. We headed over to Jefferson Market to pick up essentials.

One thing that fascinates me about the city is going to the "store" to get staples and meats and cheeeses, to the bakery to get bread, to the package store to get liquor etc... For a part time resident like me it's a novelty and a nice change from the huge supermarkets back in CA.

Send Photo to a Friend

The Macy's Day Parade!

Having watched the Macy's Day parade on television many times, I was really looking forward to seeing it in person. We bundled up (read layer upon layer) and headed uptown to find a spot to see the show.

Send Photo to a Friend

Where do we watch the parade?

When we exited the subway at Columbus Circle, we thought we were pretty lucky to find a place to stand right by the subway stop and facing Central Park West. We had about an hour to wait for the show to start so we settled in and tried to stay warm.

After we'd been standing there a little while some guys walks up and asks us if we'd like "free" tickets for some bleacher seats? I was a bit skeptical so we took 4 of them (our friend Valerie and her daughter Alex was with us) and sent Jeannine to check out where they were.

Turns out they were right on CPW and 62nd. We climbed in to the bleachers and counted ourselves lucky that we weren't going to stand for the next several hours after all!

This is Jeannine, Alex and Valerie trying to stay warm.

Send Photo to a Friend

Big Ballons!

I always knew the ballons were big by the way they were described on televsion but to see them up close was impressive. Many were half a block long and took many, many more handlers than I thought. It was interesting to watch them come down the street. In front of each ballon was a crew member who took wind speed readings at each intersection to make sure it was safe to proceed and then coordinated everyone's movement forward.

This is a picture of Cassie from Dragon Tales. It was her first year in the parade. My wife does a lot of work with Dragon Tales so she was really happy to see this ballon!

Send Photo to a Friend

Big Bird!

Here is the Seseame Worskshop float with Big Bird, Ernie, Bert, Elmo and the rest. Jeannine was pretty happy to see this one too!

Send Photo to a Friend

Thanksgiving day on Long Island

Valerie and Alex live on Long Island so Jeannine and I headed out to Pt. Washington to spend turkey day with them.

Getting there is a snap. It's about a 45 minute train ride on the Long Island Rail Road from Penn Station and it only costs a few bucks too! In fact the train was so crowded on the trip out that the conductor didn't even come by to collect tickets. They couldn't get through the aisles!

This pic is outside the Pt. Washington station