The Celebrity Hotel

Here's our very swanky hotel in Deadwood! The view of the mannequins in the window across the street is creepily charming, and as you can see, the room totally rocks! You would never know the rooms would be this nice inside by looking at the plain, flat exterior.

Devils Tower Prairie Dogtown

Wildlife Loop Road, Custer State Park

Goats!

Mount Rushmore mountain goats!

Mount Rushmore

John & Crazy Horse

Hi Deer!

These deer visited us both mornings at Legion Lake and could be seen throughout the day nibbling on the grasses, how sweet!!

Devil's Tower and Deadwood

Today began with a lovely, early morning hike around Legion Lake to say goodbye to our lovely cabin in the woods. The resident Osprey was making is morning circles searching for some breakfast, the mallards were quacking away and there was a noisy woodpecker that was a fantastic escape artist avoiding my cameras capture of him. Oh well, he was cool looking with a huge plume on his head, and we awoke to him pecking away at our cabin's walls.

Our next stop was Devil's Tower, which is actually in Wyoming. I drove today and it was a pleasant, and remarkably fast, drive into Wyoming via the scenic route rather than the interstate. Wyoming seemed even more cowboy country-ish than the Black Hills, and there's red clay ridges cutting into the grassy countryside everywhere that is rustic and pretty. We pulled up to the massive tower awestruck by this thing which is incorrectly attributed to the Devil. If there were a devil, it most certainly couldn't be responsible for this wonder smack dab in the middle of an environment that seems to be mismatched; they believe it was once a volcano, or the inside remnants of a volcano, or just a bubble of magma that popped up. Whatever it is, it seems as if it should be sitting in Hawaii and not in Wyoming! On the long, slow ascent up to the visitors center where you start the walking path around it, there's a village of prairie dogs that skitter and chirp and do cute little doggie dances with each other that are worth a stop of the car to snap photos. They seem to communicate to each other the ever-present danger of golden eagles circling overhead, they are fast and have many underground tunnels to take refuge in. The walk around Devil's Tower is not too long, a mile and a quarter I believe, a bit of a challenge but there are many places to rest, and there is a unique sound that surrounds the tower: the wind. I've never heard wind like this, it's almost like invisible water falls crashing down around you, but yet it's still. It's both sunny and shady, hot and cold along the trail of trees and massive rock. The forest surrounding the tower is a silent beauty, it smells of pine strongly but not overpowering. The rock that has fallen from the tower are huge columnar formations that have broken away and look as if they could kill an entire village in one swoop. After our walk, we shared a little picnic and took a load off, then headed onto Deadwood, SD.

Deadwood, if you've not heard of it, was a gold rush town that has an interesting history. John got into a tv series called "Deadwood" that's based on the whole story, but it was too realistically gory for me to watch so I don't know much about it, other than what he's told me. Most people seem to have an ideal about these cowboys as silent, stoic and honorable men like in old John Wayne movies. They were anything but. It was a grizzly time, so it's definitely an interesting history, but again, it's a pretty disturbing, lawlessness which I find difficult to comprehend. The town today looks a lot like the old west, one story towns from the movies, so much so it almost looks like a movie set. It's filled with casinos, there are slot machines in every window, there are even fake prostitutes in the second story window of the building across from our hotel window, how quaint! But....a little creepy.

Our hotel is the highlight so far, though. We were planning on spending only one night here, so we booked Room 218 of the Celebrity Hotel along Main Street, and upon seeing this grand suite, we promptly went back downstairs to secure it for a second night. It is the largest, most tasteful and extravagant hotel room either of us have seen, and for the low low price of $99 per night, (that's right, $99) we decided to extend our trip another day to enjoy this great escape. I can't even describe it, so we will let the pictures do all the talking.

Where the Deer and the Antelope Play

Again, I must reiterate: wow. It’s hardly to be believed that this place is part of the same, flat, farming state that borders our own, the landscape here reminds me of Pennsylvania. The weather has been absolutely perfect. We keep remarking that we picked the perfect time to come (rock on for May 2 weddings!) because there are hardly any people on the roads. There are tourists, but not too many, so it’s quiet but not completely isolated. Very romantic.

Today we were up and at ‘em around 5:30 (Mountain time) and got on the road by 6:45 to our first stop, the Crazy Horse monument which supposedly opened at 7, but that was a lie, so we took some pictures from afar and left for Mount Rushmore. We were wholly impressed with Mount Rushmore, say what you will about the controversy surrounding its making. There’s a nifty little trail and audio tour that you can take to see some very cool views over the Black Hills. There are more chipmunks than you could ever possibly imagine, and there are also mountain goats! I was hell bent on seeing a mountain goat before we left, and as you’ll see from the pictures, right before we left two of them appeared out of nowhere right in front of the visitors center!! Amazing! It topped off a bit of an unpleasant patch in our trail journey where I got really sick, so I was happy to have it end on a high note ☺

Onto Rapid City for a bite to eat at the Firehouse Brewery where we shared a delish meal, followed by a walk where John almost bought a tuba from an eager salesman (haha!), then to enjoy some iced drinks at Dunn Bros and login to the internet to post yesterday’s entry. We giggled and acted like a teenage couple hovering over our iMac with our icees, it was quite fun, and helped me recover a bit from whatever the hell it was that struck me at Rushmore. We were then going to go to the Wind Caves, but the long drive and the hour and a half journey they promise (all underground with over 300 steps to walk) didn’t sound like it would be best for me today, so we ended up going back to Custer State Park to drive the Wildlife Loop Road. That turned out to be the highlight of the day as you will see in our photos that follow!! We saw wild turkeys, two kinds of deer, antelope, burros, prairie dogs (we think) and of course, BISON! We actually saw wild bison! We even got out of the car and stood to take pictures of a whole herd of bison with their little young ’uns, it was absolutely incredible! A lot of the animals we saw were very close to the car so we got good photos, but the burros, oh my gawd the burros were the cutest things! They literally walk right up to the cars! John was out taking some photos and there was this adorable dark brown burro that started making a bee-line for him, so we made for the car where he kept right on following us. While I love animals, and these did appear friendly, they are wild so we kept the windows up even though it broke our hearts to drive away from those sweet faces, it’s probably for the best. We’ve got pictures of other folks who stopped to pet the burros and who blocked their cars to try to beg food from the passersby ☺ What silly loves!

Monday's Mileage: 156.8

Roadkill Report: Zero!! Double happiness!

(This post is from Monday, last post was from Sunday but we didn't have internet access so they are both a day late.)

Legion Lake

Legion Lake Resort

Pelican!

Black Hills

Wow, well, we made it to Black Hills! It is more beautiful than I could have imagined. Even the developed areas are wild and free by city slicker standards. This would be a cool place to run a restaurant or bed & breakfast, or just own a little cabin to spend the summers. Wow, that’s the only thing I can say to describe it here. Wow.

We started the day with a peanut butter sandwich and were on the road by 8:30 am to get a jump on the long day ahead of us. We stopped at the Corn Palace in Mitchell, which was a disappointment: I was thinking a literal palace made entirely of corn, but it’s actually a community center with large art made of corn above some seats on a basketball court. Not great. Something to do with fire regulations, I think. BAH! We did happen across Lake Mitchell, though, and found an impressive flock of pelicans and got some awesome pictures of them!

My sweet love did ALL the driving today, except for a small stretch of highway between the Wall Drug (which is a big tourist attraction, though I’d never heard of it before this, and much better than the Corn Palace of Shame) to the next rest stop after I started having a panic attack about how winding the roads were going to get. I’m glad we switched seats, because that panic was nothing compared to the mortal fear I experienced later as we drove up the side of a mountain to get to the Sylvan Lake Lodge, egads. At one point, there’s a tunnel that is big enough for only ONE car, though it’s a two-way road. The Sylvan had some funny situation going on, so the manager called the Legion Lake Resort to hold us a cabin. It is the cutest cabin, perfect for a little romantic stay in the woods ☺ We’re ill equipped for a cabin stay, but they’ve got a little grocery store and restaurant at the bottom of hill, nice and convenient, and my idea of “roughing it”.

We were amazed at how many deer we saw on the way up the mountain, and they were right outside the car just looking up at you like, “Hey, how’s it going? Got any food?” We haven’t seen any wild bison yet, but they are here in this very park, Custer State, and there are warnings everywhere about how dangerous they are. I’d love to see some and take pictures from afar, WAY afar! That’s the beauty of having a zoom lens. After we settled into our cabin, we took off on a walk, and right outside the cabin looking straight at us were three very friendly deer!! They stayed there and looked at us with interest while we shot a buttload of pics, I couldn’t believe it! I suppose to people out here the deer are as common as squirrels, but to us, it’s so incredible to get that close to them! They nibbled on the grass demurely as we admired them and they never did get spooked, not once, even with all the clicking of our digital cameras.

We explored the large, mountainy ridges that surround this tiny serene lake, and then settled down near the waters edge to admire the mallards coupling, the birds twittering, the fish jumping, and a very large Osprey trying to get dinner for himself. We’ve got photos of it all, never fear! The fluffy sprawl of clouds over the lake had me mesmerized until the chill in the air finally sent us to the cabin to snuggle in for the night. So now we’re here relaxing in silence, no tv, no water park or kids running down hallways, no freeways, no cars, no sounds (except the chorus of our bellies that are strangely in unison, I hope my IBS isn’t contagious), no internet access…just us in this grand place that I imagine is quite similar to what it was when the world was new to human life.

Tomorrow’s agenda: Mount Rushmore, Crazy Horse Memorial, find an internet café (preferably a Caribou coffee, I’m dying for a chai latte!) so we can post this and our photos, then off to tour the Wind Caves, which are reportedly some of the largest caves in the world! YAY! Now I’m off to take a look at the beautiful gemstones I found for a STEAL at the Wall Drug. In case you’re wondering, I picked up 2 rose quartz, an amethyst, moss agate, blue lace, clear quartz, blood stone, fancy jasper, obsidian, malachite and adventurine, all for only $3.07!!!!!! I’m very tempted to stop back there to pick up more because they were so cheap, hopefully time allows. I would still like to stop off at a couple of the trading post places around Rapid City to look for totem animal carvings, cuz I’m into freaky stuff like that. Whee!

Our live animal report for the road is good: we saw LOADS of pheasants, ducks, cows, horses, regal white cranes and deer roaming around alive and well!! It is, however, a sad day for lots of others ☹
Roadkill Report: 3 bunnies, 9 pheasants, a raccoon, a muskrat (perhaps), 2 “chunkies”, and 2 “tiny somethings”. Lots of semi tires also lots their lives today; tons of rubber bits on the road.

Today's Mileage: 366.7

Restaurant Report: Today we only ate out once at a shitty little place called the Cactus Grill near the Wall Drug. It was food, that’s about all I can say for it. I kept telling myself that we were eating better than they did in the old west, and at least I’m not turning tricks for my meals like the ladies of those days had to. Ick.

More Geese!

The Falls of the Big Sioux

Schmoopies In The Mist

The Falls

Mama Goose With Babies!

Sioux Falls

Chillen' here in Sioux Falls, SD, which to me seems a lot like Edina, or maybe Red Wing. It's like a big suburb. What strikes me is that the streets seem very empty, though there are lots of people about, and what strikes John is the large amount of smokers here. It's kind of curious to see so many smokers, I guess we've gotten used to the non-smoking luxury of Minneapolis. We're currently in our Best Western Ramkota Hotel room at the end of a long hallway of families with kids who are here solely to utilize the water park and I just have to thank the gods we didn't book a pool side room. The room is quite nice, very "chain hotel-esque" which is okay because we know what we're getting: a decent bed, a coffee maker and a safe place to kick our feet up. At least I don't feel the need to worry that there's a dead hooker under the bed.

I drove most of the way here until I got my mid-day sleepies and we switched spots at the saddest little rest stop you ever did see. The drive was an absolute luxury with virtually zero traffic the entire way. We had our upbeat tunes cranked most of the way to get us pumped for driving and we had fun singing and goofing together. There were countless hawks and eagles on the way, and we saw a massive eagles nest before we even got out of Minneapolis, so that was cool. It was beautifully sunny, but so windy it was hard to maneuver our little boxy Toodlebug! Of course, our Toodlebug was the coolest car on the road, contrary to what all these red, sporty cars would have you believe.

Once here in Sioux Falls, we lounged a bit before heading out to scope out a couple of bead stores. The first was a cute little shop that had a free class going on, they had some of the most unique jewelry I've seen in a long time, and they were selling the most beautiful cabochons I've ever seen!! They had a cute sign that said, "Shoplifting is bad karma". I'll try to find their website to post with our other links. The second store was a complete ripoff; they were selling mini-strands of gemstone chips for twice the price of what a normal strand should cost, all their beads were in champagne glasses that cluttered the entire store which made it hard to find anything, and they didn't have anything I wanted there anyway, so we split. We ended up eating at a funky diner that seemed to be a local hot spot, and the food was good. John had a corned beef and swiss sandwich with coleslaw, and I went the full fried/fatty selection with a fish sandwich and fries, which I'm now paying for in a big way :( We did have a very pleasant walk near The Falls that we'll post pix of in a minute. Sadly, they're right near a sheep slaughter house which I tried to ignore as we drove past on the way in and out of the parking lot. It seemed like most of Sioux Falls residents were at The Falls, and they're celebrating Cinco de Mayo today (for some reason) so there was live music and kids all crawling everywhere out on the rocks having fun. We took photos of some geese and their little goslings!!!!!! The mama in one of the photos is just giving me the evil eye even though I was far away shooting with the zoom lens. Cute motherly protector of those little yellow fuzz balls!

Anyway, I meant to make this a quick post because we haven't done too much yet, but here I've blogged most every detail! Geez, a blabbermouth even in writing ;)~ Anyway, tomorrow's post will be from Sylvan Lake, which reports are saying got 24 inches of snow the other day. Hmmm, flash floods...let's hope not!

Roadkill Report:
Three raccoons, a very decomposed deer (half of it, anyway), something that looked like a dog, and something that looked like nothing we could figure out...like a raccoon/fox. A silent lament for all the roadkill, please.

Mileage: 258.2

Delayed

We're delaying our departure by one day due to winter storms/tornado warnings in South Dakota, which sound like they will be dissipating tonight into just rain tomorrow. This is a bit of a relief since we weren't quite ready to go anyway.

We slept in a bit this morning, then headed out to Hell's Kitchen for breakfast which was EXCELLENT. Man, that place is the shizz! The bison sausage is handmade on the premises (I believe) and it is better than any sausage I think I've ever had, and trust me, I'm a sausage freak!! I had the Lemon Ricotta Hotcakes, which come with fresh berries on the top and are so good and moist that you don't even need syrup. John had the Bison Benedict with bison steak which he felt was not as good as the bison sausage, but still yummy. We both had coffee because they serve the really good stuff, and our meal was a bit on the expensive side, but hell, it IS our 10th anniversary, after all. No better excuse to blow our money :)

We wandered down to the library because we still had an hour on the meter, and I got wrapped up looking at my new favorite blog (http://oggi-icandothat.blogspot.com/), I was trying to find a cookbook author she blogged about who had Japanese bread recipes, but couldn't find it. We made it back to the car with 3 minutes to spare, then came home to start packing and finish cleaning. Soon, we'll be heading out to catch a matinee of Iron Man (!!) and grub some buttery popcorn. Hopefully we'll come back home for some Schmoopiness, then to bed early so we can head out early, early, early tomorrow!!

YAY! Soon, we will be on the road! Next post will most likely come to you via Sioux Falls!
Love to all ;)~
R&J

South Dakota

That's right! The Schmoopies are off again on another journey, this time to South Dakota! I know, you're probably thinking, "Gee, is that really a travel destination hot spot?" But it really is! There is actually a lot to see there, at least according to all the travel brochures and those South Dakota commercials with the catchy jingle. We'll be seeing Mount Rushmore, the Crazy Horse memorial, the Badlands, Devil's Tower, the Corn Palace and miles and miles of clear, open roads, or one would hope anyway.

We'll be leaving on Friday 5/2, the 10th anniversary of the day we made our Schmoopie-ness legal and have been in wedded bliss ever since, starting the special day off with a breakfast at Hell's Kitchen downtown. (If you haven't been to this fine establishment, you'd best get on it, it's ded good. If you go for Sunday brunch, don't be shocked that the wait staff serve you in their jammies.) Then we plan on heading straight to Rapid City to hole up in this little romantic hidey-hole, assuming there's a vacancy: http://www.powderhouselodge.com/index.htm. The rest is all up in the air at this point, we'll just see where the days take us.

A little unnerving is the fact that it is currently snowing outside, and the forecast for the week is looking quite shitty, but let's try to think positive and hope there is no inclement weather for us during our trip. I turn into a crazed freak woman when driving in crappy weather, so yeah, keep your fingers crossed for us.

This brings me to another horrifying thought: I've got to actually get this condo CLEAN before we leave. Yikes, time to get on that! We'll be blogging and podcasting when we can!!!!
Love to all,
R&J

At Long Last

We have made it home. After waking up with my arms and hands numb from that Sleep Inn bed that may as well been made of stone, I vowed that we were not spending another thin dime on rented sleeping arrangements. We hauled it all the way from Ohio to Minneapolis yesterday. Leaving at 7:30 AM or so, we drove through the rest of Ohio, Indiana, Illinois (with all the scary drivers that place breeds), and Wisconsin and rolled into our home garage to unload the car for the very last time around 10:00 PM. We're toast.

I drove us through the mess that is the Chicago freeway system, passing up a 5 car pileup in the center lanes and I even blew past a toll area (accidentally); I fully expect to receive my ticket in the mail. I relinquished driving duty to the steady nerves of my husband once we passed the city, only after having to peel my white-knuckled hands from the wheel. I like Chicago, but holy gods, only if it's via the El. People have got to be insane to navigate that place in a car. John took us safely and calmly the rest of the way. There were TONS of deer running amok in Wisconsin, so I was trying to stay alert to warn of any bounding fawns near the roadway. Such a long drive brought relief to see the lights of our familiar downtown skyline. Our total mileage for this journey was an impressive 2709.7 miles!!

The kitties were pleased as punch to see us and, of course, woke us up around 4, 5, 6 and 7 o'clock with their chasing and pining for our comatose attention. After kicking Vesta out and getting Boo to lay down by me, we slept in gloriously this morning, and not one of my limbs felt like it was going to fall off! It was a lovely trip, but always a relief to sleep in ones own bed, and to have the kitties trade off laying on my lap all day! John's working on the photo album in iPhoto, and as soon as I've had enough lounging on the couch watching Man vs. Wild, I'll do some photo editing, too. Right now though, I've got to catch up on my tea drinking and laying about with our babies :)
Thanks for joining us on the road!! See you next trip!
Love & hugs,
R&J

Brunswick, OH

Wow! We drove all the way from Newark to Brunswick, Ohio in 10 hours!! Wheeeeee! We could probably keep going for a couple more hours, but by then we'd be in NOWHERE Ohio and we really could use the rest anyway. At least we made it all the way through Pennsylvania. There's a lot of trees and mountains in Pennsylvania, which are undoubtedly beautiful, but too much bad ju-ju floating in the air for my taste. There are religious crosses everywhere, and when we stopped to pee at a rest stop, there were throngs of people praying. Just too creepy for us agnostics. I thought of Deliverance the entire way. Not our bag, baby.

The drive otherwise was uneventful. I drove until about halfway through PA, then John took over so I could eat a sandwich, then I took over for him once we hit the first rest stop in Ohio. I couldn't stand the thought of stopping again in PA, and there really aren't many opportunities, anyway. It is ALL highway. So now we're at a Sleep Inn which is popular with truckers because of the bare bones layout, but that's all we need. In fact, we're kind of regretting not just opting for the Sleep Inn's the whole way, but sometimes they're harder to come by within the cities, they mostly dot the highways. Plus it's kind of smelly and there are ants in here. Better than roaches, but still bugs. I really am ready to be home, I think. I can't wait to see the babies and do our laundry. And get back to my workouts!!! Oy, I've got to make up for lost time!

Anyway, we'll probably make it as far as Madison, WI tomorrow, so we should hopefully be home by mid-day, early evening on Sunday. ROCK HARD!!
Love to all,
R&J

A view of new Yankee Stadium

After the game at Yankee Stadium

Yankee Stadium

We came, we saw, we got our butts kicked. But.....not before giving those Yankees bastards a run for their money!!! What a great game to see in Yankee Stadium! We almost won, allllllmoooossst. There was a whole section of Twins fans up in the nosebleeds with us to cheer the hometown heroes. And as far as nosebleed seats go, um, yeah, this is the stadium to have them. A cool view, the place is MASSIVE and you feel like your going to fall at any second, it's teetery, the stairs are old and crumbly and look as if they were made for a city of elf-sized feet, but it was damn neat. You literally feel like you're on top of New York City. You can see the subway rumbling by, a view of the Bronx sprawling out behind and the New York sky stretched above. The food was cheaper than at the Dome, except for beer which was $7 for one kind only (I think MGD), but all the vendors come way up to the tippy-top! Even the hot dog guys! And let me just say that carrying anything up those rickety stairs is a challenge, so kudos to the brave souls that haul those hot dog carriers above their heads to reach all the fans!

Still, we both agreed that Royals Stadium (Kansas City) is our favorite so far, followed closely by Baltimore. Jacob's Field (Cleveland) is very cool as far as view goes, in the heart of downtown Cleveland, but Royals Stadium is hard to beat, it's way cool and has the best food fare. Getting to Yankee Stadium SUCKED because the subway system here sucks major ass, so we stood in the hot, muggy platform for 45 minutes waiting for what was labeled as the only train (the 4) to go to the Stadium only to have some worker FINALLY come and tell a bunch of us that we actually COULD take the 4 express. Bloody hell. But we made it and it rocked nonetheless!!

After leaving the game, we made our way back into Manhattan to wander around a bit. It was raining so it was kind of a bummer, but we had supper at a neat little soup & sammie shop and took a long stroll. The crowds are pretty unbelievable here. Even at 8 pm, the downtown streets are jammed with people. This literally is a city that never, ever sleeps. Times Square has become something of a carnival, there is neon blaring and hundreds of people milling about shopping and taking photos. As much as I despise crowds, New York City is really fucking cool. There's just no denying it.

It's a tad disappointing to have to turn right back around and head home, but we are going to try to catch another AAA game on the way home and possibly catch a movie (Ratatouille or Transformers) at a drive in somewhere along the way. We've also been perusing the maps sketching out another trip for the future. There's so many places we'd like to see!!

Anyway, it's my turn for the shower & John's going to post some photos of Yankee Stadium!! Whoo-hoo!! Catch you somewhere in PA or OH!!
Love to all :)
R&J

We miss our kitties!!!

Doubleday Field!!

Baseball Hall Of Fame, Cooperstown, NY

New Jersey!

We made it to New Jersey unscathed! It's kinda depressingly industrial here, but we've seen it before so no big whoop. I started the day driving, but because I couldn't sleep (again) and ended up taking a Benadryl around 1:00 AM, I was too groggy to be behind the wheel, so John took over and drove us all the way, yay for Schmoopie!! I'm getting a bit better at navigating, and I can't believe I didn't get us lost on the turnpike because the directions to the hotel were pretty funky. But we're here now at the Courtyard Marriott right next to the airport, decidedly the best hotel we've had yet, a bit more fancy but not bourgeois fancy. We decided that since it's rainy and gloomy here, we'll probably skip out on doing late night New York City fireworks tonight. As cool as it sounds to watch fireworks over Lady Liberty, to be dealing with all the people and rain and traffic to get back here sounds like pure aggravation (for me especially), we figured we may as well get a good nights rest, head off early in the morning for a full day and save $50 in the process.

Yesterday we finally made it to Cooperstown, toured the Baseball Hall of Fame and saw Doubleday Park, which is the agreed upon "spiritual birthplace of baseball", if not the actual birthplace. The HOF was really cool, a bit smaller than I envisioned it, and a lot more crowded with idiots than I'd hoped, but still very groovy. TONS of pictures taken there. None of the trinkets they had were neat enough to warrant opening of the wallet, so we passed on those. Neither of us are shoppers, anyway. We stopped off and ate burgers at a little joint along the touristy streets of the town. We got lucky and found a little cottage-style motel room that was very homey and they had a little flock of ducklings that they took care of!! I got pictures of the ducks having their daily bath in the kiddie pool :) Happy ducks!!

Since most of our trip has been driving, it's been harder to blog this time around. Overall, we've not done too much. There have been cute little things on the road we've seen, like wild turkeys, sheep, horses, cows, loads of hawks. The tolls are so frequent now that I've stopped keeping track. We've spent a good deal of money on them, let's just say that. The roadkill tally is always ticking, but mostly now all we see are muskrats. I'll post the mileage later since I've neglected once again to remember to bring the book up to the room. I've taken a crapload of 15 second video of trees and scenery with our small camera, so I don't know how much fun those will be to watch until I splice them together to make arty stuff. Other than that, we're just happy to be on a journey away. I miss the kitties terribly, so I guess I won't be too upset to get home in a few days to see them, but for now I'm loving being footloose and fancy free, as they say. I wish it were easier to travel with cats, but I don't think Boo would stand for that. Vesta's too unpredictable to say for certain. They will be such loves upon our return, though :)

Anyway, I've rambled long enough. We hope all is well at home. Have a great 4th of July everyone!!
Love,
R&J

Dunn Tire Park

Maid of the Mist

Buffalo Bisons vs. Rochester Red Wings

After leaving the wondrous countryside of Canada, we took a Maid of the Mist boat tour of Niagara Falls which was romantic, wet and wild!!! They drive the boat right up into the spray of the falls, so you get a good soaking. We got some spectacular pictures (and lots of them) so we'll have to post those as soon as we can. We had a leisurely walk around the park after the tour to dry off, then once the crowds started getting awful we made for the car to head for Buffalo to get a hotel, relax and then go to the AAA team, The Bisons, game, which pains me grammatically to say, but yes, they are called the BISONS, with an 's'. The game was so relaxing and I've decided I think I like 'A' and 'AAA' ball better than the majors. It's such a different feeling, more relaxed, more quiet, just a plain old game with big spirit. We were weirded out by the 3 mascots they had, though, still trying to figure that one out. The Rochester Red Wings (who are one of the Twins' minor league teams) were losing big in the 7th, so we decided to leave a bit early because I was a zombie, the game was going on really late and we wanted to get back to the hotel. Thankfully, this hotel had a feather bed so I was able to FINALLY get some sleep. These hotel beds have been so hard that my limbs fall asleep before I do, then I can't sleep. So I'll have to do some of the driving today now that I'm well rested.

Hope all is well back home. We'll be heading to Cooperstown as soon as we finish getting ready. We're debating going to see 4th of July fireworks in New York City or just skipping it. It sounds so romantic and extravagant, then when we thought about taking a subway (or worse, driving) out of there at midnight, suddenly it doesn't sound that pleasant. Either way, we'll post the results here!
Love,
R&J

Canada Day!

Day 3: St. Catherine's, Ontario

We finally made it to Canada!! Holy crap, what a long day in the car. We've been driving for about 10-11 hours. We went through Detroit, took a few pictures of Tiger Stadium, which is about to be torn down, and of Comerica Park and proceeded to get the heck out of there. It was a very depressed city, almost all of what we saw was completely run-down buildings and shitty roads in dire need of repair. Deserted streets void of everything but the early-bird panhandlers who aren't shy about approaching people in their cars. We got in the "tunnel to Canada" and I got some awesome video clips of that. I felt all weird and shaky after the customs drive through "interview", but moments later we were in Canada!! It right away felt different than America; very safe feeling and things better cared for, certainly more than in Detroit.

We made our way to the Point Pelee National Park which is the southernmost tip of Canada and other than me getting a wee bit crabby at the parks lack of signage, we had a lovely time. There were tons of tourists, birds, bees, bugs, and even a snake: we got a couple of photos of him!! The tip has been withered down to a little slice of sandbar that's being eroded all the time by the crashing waves of Lake Erie. It's a dangerous place to be because of the severe undercurrents, there are signs reflecting that everywhere and yet people let their little kids wade around in it anyway *rolls eyes*.

Then we drove for hours and hours up the rural road along the coastline, the 3, which has got lots of farms that are right on the shoreline. It strangely resembles Minnesota, other than having rows of corn and crop bordering a massive lake. Drivers here are much more courteous and I've decided we need to buy a lake home here because it rocks. The other cool thing: NO ONE here owns a Scion XB because they're not for sale here yet, so we've had loads of stares on the highway, and a couple of inquiries about what kind of car it is. A couple of small crowds formed to admire it while it sat in the Pelee parking lot. The dude at the hotel desk asked John all about it, said he loves it and really wants one. Everyone loves The Toodlebug :)

Tomorrow our plan is to spend the day at Niagara Falls. We'd like to take the Maid On The Mist tour, which I think is a boat ride under the falls that gets people REALLY wet, so hopefully that all works out. I know nothing about Niagara Falls other than it's a big waterfall and a hot tourist spot. I'm hoping it doesn't mean three-hour waiting lines and idiot parents with screaming kids, but that's probably wishful thinking. Even though John did the majority of the driving today (I still didn't sleep well, so he was a love and took the wheel), I did the last leg and I'm completely exhausted. I think I'll be going nite-nite soon.

We'll post tomorrow after Niagara Falls, probably from some Comfort Inn in Buffalo, NY.

Rachel's Birthday!!!!!!

Day 2: Ann Arbor, MI

We're safely tucked into our Comfort Inn for the evening in Ann Arbor. Got my hot tea and Blogger, John's got the remote and baseball galore: the world is as it should be. John slept like a log last night, I didn't sleep very well last night, but was refreshed enough to enjoy a nice continental break-trist with Schmoopie and open my CUTE birthday card and present -- an iPod Shuffle!! My big honkin' iPod is starting to do funny things, so he got me the teeny one that will fit perfectly into a small pocket or even just my hand when I have no pockets, and it's PINK!! YAY! My card was super-cute, I'll have to post a picture of it :)

Our day was filled with driving, driving and more driving. We spent a good portion of the day stuck in the hoards of Chicago traffic and the construction nightmare that is their tollway. I took lots of video clips of trees whizzing past and the traffic jams to show why we don't mind Minneapolis after all. John did all the driving today, which was a relief not only because I was tired, but he handles city driving much better than I do.

We saw a flock of sheep running around, a couple of wild turkeys, lots more birds of prey, horses and little baby calves :) All happy and alive!

Roadkill Report: one deer, one muskrat, one stiffy raccoon and lots of bits. Poo :(

Tolls: $3.90

Today's Mileage/Gas: 293.4, and 35.1 miles to the gallon (not as good as yesterday because of all that idling on I94). Gas set us back $26.03.

Rachel and Snappy!

Watching the Game in Beloit

Beloit Snappers WIN 3-0!

We made it to our first destination, Beloit, Wisconsin. I (rachel) drove the entire way today and it felt good to be on the scenic highway again, I feel like I could drive to Red Wing with my eyes closed now that we've driven down this way so much lately. It's beautiful as ever, the hawks, eagles and black vultures were out in full force, as was the stinkiest road kill I've ever smelt!

The drive was pleasant, the weather was absolutely perfect and we had fun singing to our silly songs together :) Once we hit Madison, Wisconsin the drivers became noticeably more rude, but I didn't use many expletives, so I must've been more relaxed than I thought. We made a stop for lunch about 11:30 to share homemade sammies, fresh berries and some Quaker snack mix and then again right before we came into Beloit, about 4:30 for more sammies, bananas and snacks at the most pristine rest area. My driving knee was really bothersome which I've never experienced before so it was nice to walk a bit.

Once in Beloit, we snatched up a hotel room at the Holiday Inn Express, another gem among roadside rooms, it's clean, uniquely designed and they even have a pool! If I would've remembered my suit, I could've gotten up early and done laps thus keeping up with my workout!! Then off to the Snappers game for a fan-TAB-ulous time!! It was the coolest game ever! We got scalped tickets for $4, and I met the mascot, Snappy the Turtle, right away and got pictures with him!! YAY! The game was great, very cool to watch these minor leaguers, they're so good but still a little rough. I loved all the errors, so unpredictable!! They won 3-0 and had fireworks after the game and we took some video of those :) There were the CUTEST kids there. One set of siblings had a funny, lighthearted peanut fight, playfully whipping peanuts back and forth; we had fun watching them. There was also the most adorable little girl who shyly came over to get Snappy's autograph on a novelty pink bat, she waited silently and patiently for him to finish with other kids. As he signed her bat, she sat down next to him, watching him intently with her hands crossed, then she politely said, "Thank you, Snappy". He patted her on the shoulder (you know that mascots never speak) and she bounced away to show off her treasured item to her parents. Later, she found him again and led him over to get her mom to take pictures with him. As John put it, "Now THAT is precious."Today was such a relaxing and romantic day! We needed it, John is SO relaxed. He's never more at home than when he's traveling AND watching baseball. I think maybe we should become mascots for a living so we can do both all the time ;)~

A change in trip plans; we decided tonight that since The Taste of Chicago is going on all weekend, and Chicago isn't really known for its pleasant traffic, and there are no tickets available to the Detroit Tigers/Twins game, we're just going to head off to Canada. Hell with it, I've never been there and I'd love to spend my birthday in a foreign country! So we'll be off for Windsor and Toronto tomorrow! Lots more driving, lots more memories ;)
Love to all!
R&J

Roadkill Report: Many deer out there today, stinky beyond stink and probably their spirits hovering over their carcases rolling their eyes at all the SUV's, then gallivanting away into astral fields a-plenty. A kitty bit the dust, as well as a fox and I think there might've been a skunk out there, too. A silent lament to all the poor animals today :(

Gas Tally: $26.55, and check this: 37.3 miles to the gallon!!!!!

Today's Mileage: 334

Groggy Excitement!

Well, I've not slept that hard in many moons! My normal 5 AM internal clock overslept until 7! Since I'm still covered in sleep-fairy-dust, John is fixing egg sammies for us so I can wake up a little over tea. He's bubbling with his usual travel excitement and I imagine he literally leapt out of bed. My throat is pretty tender :( so I tossed all the meds we have into my bag just in case I get ill on the road. There's nothing I loathe more than having to purchase expensive meds that I know I've got sitting at home getting closer to expiring. So far, my hot tea is nice and soothing!

Anyway, now that you've got the blow-by-blow on our morning activities, we should be heading out by 10:00 AM, if not sooner. Dave should be here to pass the condo torch to around 9:00 and by then we should be pretty much ready to hit it!!! Yipppeeeeeee!

Next post: Beloit, WI!

Road Trip 2007 Starts Tomorrow!

Well, we're officially off on another road tripping adventure tomorrow! We'll be hitting Beloit, WI, Chicago, Detroit, Toronto, Niagara Falls, Cooperstown and New York City. If you haven't guessed, it's a baseball themed tour, and we're hoping to catch some great games along the way. Starting it off with some minor league fun in Beloit, maybe catch a tour of Wrigley Field or scare up some scalped seats to a game in Chicago, see the Tigers in Detroit, hopefully see the Toronto Blue Jays, the Baseball Hall of Fame in Cooperstowns and finally, *drum roll, please* see the TWINS vs. the Stankees (NY Yankees for you non-baseball fans) at Yankee (f-in') Stadium!!!!!! We might also be able to make a Chicago White Sox game on the way home, time permitting. We are SUPER EXCITED!!! WHOOOOO_HOOOOO!

So tonight we're eating up the last of the leftovers (and I feel like I could quite possibly puke up three days and 6 meals worth of Chinese food right now) and charging up all of our battery powered items. We'll be making a late night trip to Cub for some last minute items like cough drops, fruit and snacks. I'm depressed about leaving the kitties, but they will be in the capable company of John's eldest brother. Dave, if you're reading this, take good care of the babies :) Pet them, love them, call them "pretty kitties" and don't kill them when they wake you up at 4 AM begging for food.

Anyway, we'll be posting all week long and probably recording our own goofy and maybe even a little creepy podcast that no one cares about but us, but feel free to tune in. Check back!
Love to all :)
R & J

COMING SOON: BASEBALL ROAD TRIP!!!

Hi Everybody!
We're planning another road trip! We're super excited and can't wait until June/July to start posting :) The plan is to go to Chicago, Detroit, Toronto, Niagra Falls, Cooperstown, New York City (Yankee Stadium!!), Pittsburgh, back through Chicago and home! There are Twins games in Detroit, New York and Chicago that we would catch, we plan a stadium tour in Toronto, visiting the Baseball Hall of Fame in Cooperstown, and perhaps catching a Pirates game in Pittsburgh. It'll be quite a haul, but we're ready to take our new car, dubbed "The Toodlebug" out on the open road. I'd love to make another stop at the Field of Dreams, especially this year, because it was such a beautiful and even spiritual place. It really does feel like a place where dreams come true. We'll see if we have time to swing it.

If you're into Podcasts, we've got our own Travel-Cast where you can listen to us babble about our fun times and silly adventures :) Anyway, stay tuned folks!

Home

We made it home from the Big Apple to the Minni-Apple, which seems so mini now after fighting through throngs of New Yorkers, ducking through subway doors and trying not to get hit by the relentless traffic eager to plow through red lights. The plane was this little dinky-shit thing that bounced us considerably at the start and end of the flight, but other than that (and me thinking of plane crashes even though mentally I kept telling myself, "it's just turbulence, we're not going to crash you ridiculous paranoid freak") it was quite pleasant as I settled into my library book and got lots read. I swear, though, there's something in the airplane air that makes me sick. I'm super congested and my throat is KILLING me. So I'm sucking down my "special" medicinal tea that my mom got for me and I drink when I'm not feeling well (thanks, Mum!). John's been pretty congested all week (he'll kill me for saying this, but when he's mega congested he snores like a beast--sorry, my love!--) so I think we're going to call it an EARLY night. I was konked and ready for sleep when we stopped by my mom's to pick up our keys, and that was at 7:00!! We decided to just skip the grocery store, grab some takeout and head home to catch the re-run of the Colbert Report that we got to see recorded LIVE!!!! Anyhoo, thanks for reading, sorry this wasn't more precise...my brain is fried! We'll catch you again for our next trip, which will hopefully be soon!
Love to all! ROCK HARD ;)

Packin' Up

The week went so fast and it's already time to leave! Checkout time is noon, but we'll be heading out about 11:00 to catch the bus to the airport. I figured I'd blog for a little while cuz, well, there's nothing else to do. There's a massive traffic jam outside our window, reminding us that for most New Yorkers it's just another workday. It's sad to leave, but we miss our kitties, and I miss my own bed since it seems I've had nightmares the whole week. Last night my dreams were just strange, not necessarily bad, but still....there's nothing like sleeping on the Sleep Number!!

I had to end my blog early last night due to a dizzy spell that left me wondering if it wasn't just time for bed. I'm still extremely tired and feel like I could sleep the rest of the day. We'll have to get home, get the washing machine going and hit the grocery store since we have zero food in the fridge. We ate everything down really well so we'll have to restock the cupboards and the fridge with fresh stuff. Ugh...

Well, I might sign off. My head has not been in writing mode for this trip at all--I've left out so many little funny details just because I've been too lazy to type it all. But we will be home later this afternoon and hopefully the kitties will be in a snuggly mood ;)

"Even Stephven"

Oh maaaaaaaan.....The Colbert Report fuckin' ROCKED!!!!!!!! The line waiting was considerably more tolerable than the Daily Show since they had a nice little enclosed area to protect from the wind and cold, and we were 9th and 10th in line so were admitted quickly (well, after the 2 hour wait outside) once they started letting people in. Majorly annoying security check, but to be fair, you can obviously understand why New York would screen people for anything and everything. We were seated in the second row on the very end--right near Stephen's desk and the Eagle's nest that's sitting by it with it's own little spotlight shining on it. Then a comedian dude came out to get us all "pumped" up, and we were told that Stephen would come out and answer a few questions, but I was too chicken to ask any of the three or four I wanted to ask.

1) My number one question that I've been dying to know ever since I read an interview with him and found out he is a HUGE Lord of the Rings geek, he said that when he first saw The Two Towers he hated it because of the whole Faramir issue, so my question would've been: What did you think of the DVD extended edition and do you feel that it tied it all up better than the original release?

2) My second question was going to be a joke, and since the lady who let us into the studio (who also got us all pumped up before letting us in) said that he loves silly questions and he really feeds off of the energy of the crowds, was going to be: Were your scenes with Paul Dinello in Strangers With Candy real? (they were closet-gay teachers having an affair)

3) My third thing was going to be a request rather than a question, which was this: Could you please do the Emanuel dance that you did at the end of one of the Strangers With Candy episodes (that I just can't explain, but it's frickin' HILARIOUS) and I was going to offer him $20 to do it.

But. I chickened out of asking any of it, cuz I'm a big baby and despise drawing attention to myself in front of crowds. He was very sincere in his answers and seemed like a great guy that you could have a blast going to dinner with. Someone asked him if he was a dog or cat person, and he said he was a CAT person!! YAY! The whole rest of it was just awesome, and totally made up for us missing out on the Daily Show last night. So watch it tonight at 10:30 (Central) or the repeat tomorrow at 7:00 (that is if you have Comedy Central). The guest was Steve Croft from 60 minutes! I told think they did any camera sweeps of the audience, but you can probably hear John & I CACKLING our asses off!

Anyway, we're going to hit the sack now but I wanted to quick post that little bit. Oh, and we had two beautiful trips on the Staten Island Ferry, saw the Strawberry Fields park dedicated to John Lennon, got pics of the apartment where he lived (The Dakota), Central Park, more Times Square, too! Well, we're so beat and I think we may have picked up some icky germs from the subway (despite our best, and in my case, completely anal efforts to thwart them) because I'm so tired, like beyond tired, and all sore throaty and congested.

On Board the SIF

Staten Island Ferry

No Daily Show

Welp, one of our biggest highlights on this trip did not happen. We got to the Daily Show to find a massive line, and after standing (ugh, MORE standing) forever (45 minutes) in line, they came out, told us it was overbooked by 25 people, proceeded to hand out about 40 VIP tickets, plus about 150 regular tickets, and there was more than 25 of us left out in the blowin' wind, lemme tell ya. They said they could issue us VIP tickets for guaranteed entry at another show, but we won't be here in April, we're here NOW. Those fuckers. So we were disappointed, sulked home through the amazingly frantic and crowded rush hour and just chilled in the hotel the rest of the night watching more News Radio. Which actually was SUCH a relief for me because I didn't think my legs were going to make it home. I drew up a bath to soak for a bit so that was nice. We were going to treat ourselves to some yummy takeout, but not knowing what to order and not wanting to go get anything made our decision to use up some more of our food. It was a pleasant evening, and we decided that we won't mope, we'll just get to The Colbert Report VERY EARLY. We can't bitch too much cuz the tickets were free, so whatever. Of course now that means we're going to have to do MORE standing, we're going to get there the recommended 1 1/2 hours early and I'm sure I'll be a whiney bitch for the duration. Oy, John is SOOOOO patient with me. And he's been such a love making our breakfasts every morning, doing literally all the planning and navigation...he's so wonderful ;) YAY FOR SCHMOOPIE!

Other than missing Jon Stewart, we made it to the Planetarium and got to see one of the most AWESOME space shows we've ever seen!!!!! It was SO great! And the whole museum was completely packed, as was the space show. We were happy to see that science and natural history are important here. We walked around the museum afterwards and looked at more space photographs, an exhibit about the earth and then footage of the volcanoes at the ocean floor! It was very nice, even the hundreds of kids there were very well behaved, more than I can say for the adults.

So today we're planning on some bumming around taking photos until we've got to stand in another line for a million years (but worth it to see Stephen Colbert!!) and then we're going to try to catch a Staten Island Ferry for a ride later (and probably more standing in line for that). They actually have ferries that run every half hour ALL NIGHT LONG here. It's true this city never sleeps. We almost went to one last night late, but decided we just really wanted to chill. We haven't taken many photos, still have not filled out the postcards we bought and haven't bought much in the way of trinkets.

Anyway, I'll write more later. Hope all is well at home on the range!
Love to you all :)

"Then I took out my razorblade..."

53rd & 3rd

Rockefeller Center

Bloody Amazing

Yesterday was great! We started the day with an excursion to Yankee Stadium! We were hoping to get a tour, but the only one that was available was at 2:00 pm and we got there about 11:30 am. Just too long to wait, and tickets were $24 each! Those Yankee bastards just aren't getting that much of my money, dammit! Like Derek Jeter needs anymore money! Plus, the stadium is located in The Bronx, surrounded by some of the toughest neighborhoods in NYC, so we didn't want to be just loitering around the area. We took a few pictures while John moped our wasted trip. We decided that we can make another trip here when the Twins are playing the Stankees and then just catch a whole game :)

After John got over his intial bumminess, we got back on the subway back to Manhattan and decided to find the Museum of Television and Radio. This had to be one of the strangest museums I've ever seen. It was cool, just very bizarre. We caught a few of the listening/viewing rooms exhibits, and and awesome exhibit of The Muppets, which reminded me of little Fiona with her love of Cookie Monster, Big Bird and Elmo. They also had a library of television shows and radio programs where you can reserve any program in their database, and then they bring you to a room where you have two hours to sit and watch whatever you want. So of course, we reserved three season four episodes of News Radio!! The employees, though, were the STRANGEST of all...they all seemed like they should be working in a mortuary or something. But I shant waste time analyzing that ;)

After a slight feeding rampage (I hadn't eaten in 6 hours by this point and was getting the low blood sugar rages), we decided to just chill at the hotel and get a nap in before The Pogues!! At about 7:30 we hopped the shuttle to Times Square to hit the Nokia Theatre. A nice venue, sort of like First Avenue meets the Orpheum, clean, contemporary and AWESOME sound!!!!!! I grabbed a Red Roses For Me t-shirt and some buttons (if you're reading Bill, we got one for you) while we enjoyed some Guiness. We weasled our way to the very front and ended up meeting a couple who'd flown in from Milwaukee for the show. They kept the crowd waiting a good, long time, finally they shined all blue lights at the empty mics and a song sung by the late good friend of theirs, Joe Strummer called "Straight to Hell" was cued while the entire crowd started singing it. They started with "Streams of Whiskey", and after that the set list is a blur. They played a long set plus three encores! Some fun highlights were usual antics by Shane MacGowan--he'd put a glass of water on his head while walking around the stage, try to dance a bit, he'd announce the next song incoherently while the crowd would respond "What???" or "Speak English you drunk!"--Shane would change tempo in the middle of songs, at one point during Irish Rover the whole band was just staring at him, stopped playing and he looked around and said, "Whaaaaaaaaaat?" and they said, "Shane, you're going too fast!". He did that also during their last song, Fiesta, but the band would just wait til he came round to the next verse and start in again. He also screwed up by announcing "Irish Rover" when they were actually playing "The Sick Bed of Cuchulainn". The crowd was more tame than we expected, but even then there were MANY MANY unrulies. I think a lot of people, mistakenly, think that because this is Irish "Folk" music that it will be a mellow show. This has NEVER been the case with this band, as security always seems to be their number one issue, even more so than many other punk bands we've seen. There were a lot of (what I like to call) "dress-up" punks and full-blooded Irish blokes who seemed more into the drinking aspect of the Irish music than the actual music, so that was a disappointment. There were many fights going on, and since we were right up front, our view would get blocked by the mass of security guards dragging people out of the audience. Though unlike shows in Minneapolis where if you're pinched by security you get tossed out of the club completely, here they simply threw them into a different area of the crowd! At one point, one of the security guards seemed to be seriously injured, but after writhing in pain for a bit, he got up and we deduced that he'd probably just been punched in the gut. Loads of people were photographing and bootlegging video, and they'd get warnings. Interestingly, though, there were Nokia employees wandering around with little printers who would print out your digital photos for you. After the show, we had to go out and buy a couple of the Pogues pint glasses for John. We walked home, Pogues booty in hand and crashed right away.

Anyway, I've rambled on quite long enough. We're off for more New York excitement!
Love to you all :)

Statue of Liberty

Rachel hanging out at CBGBs

Day Two

What a walk! We started the day nice and leisurely with breakfast by Schmoopie. After lounging a bit, we set out about 10:00 AM. We hopped our first subway and then walked to the site of the World Trade Center. A sad way to start the morning; I couldn't help but shed tears as we looked into the empty hole that remains. I did not think I would cry, but all the footage from that day started replaying in my mind. There was a hushed, respectful silence of the crowd as many people there looked at the devasted area. It did seem to have a strange smell to it, kind of dusty. People were taking pictures and video, though we refrained as we usually don't think of gravesites to be appropriate photo opportunities. It was tremendously windy today, but at the site it was eerily still. We decided not to linger too long as I started to really get emotional when we walked by the photos and timeline they have posted on a fence in front of all the construction. After our silent lament, we left to find Battery Park.

It was SO windy, I have to say it felt colder today that it has at home recently. Battery Park is right on the Hudson River which was beautiful. There were tumultuous waves, and we took pictures of the Statue of Liberty from the edge of the park. I got a few pictures of the park areas that reminded me of the footage from Desperately Seeking Susan, though I don't think we were in the same area as they were in the movie....darn it! It was just too busy, too windy and too cold to mess around with being a stickler for finding the exact area. My sister will appreciate the photos, though, as both she and I are big fans of the movie ;) There were THOUSANDS of tourists, and it didn't take us long to decide that an 1 1/2 hour wait for a ferry to the Statue of Liberty was out of the question today! We decided just to buy some New York gear and move along to our next stop.

It doesn't seem like only two stops should take so long, but it was quite a lot of walking, and in the nasty wind and cold we'd worked up an appetite so we wandered around until we finally came upon a Subway. A touch of the crabbies had hit me (low blood sugar and completely snarled hair is never a good mix) so we chilled for a bit and regained our strength for more walking! We decided to find CBGB's next! I'm always surprised when people aren't familiar with the legendary CBGB's, but in case you don't know, it's one of the most famous punk rock clubs anywhere!! It was the starting place of the original punkers themselves, the Godfathers of punk rock, The Ramones. After many years in business, it will be closing this November, and we had to make our punk rock pilgrimage. We even got to get a close up look of the owner who was wandering about!! He's just as hairy in person as he is in pictures ;) It's nothing more than a shitty hole-in-the-wall type of place, but just thinking about all the wonderful talent and pure energy that those walls have seen, it was pretty cool. So I got a red and black "girly" CBGB's t-shirt. I said I would never buy an unofficial CBGB's shirt--and now I've got one right from the bar/gallery! The gallery side had a bar, lots of funky photos (that included pix of Joey, Dee Dee & Tommy Ramone, Sid Vicious, Steve Jones, Stiv Bators, Iggy Pop, Joe Strummer, Stan Lee playing with The Damned, Lux Interior, and Doyle from the Misfits), different kinds of *unique* art and where they sold all the t-shirts. I was surprised that they had more photos of Sid Vicious than of The Ramones. We didn't actually go into the club part of CBGB's since it didn't appear to be open yet. We took a bunch of photos and also of the street "Joey Ramone Blvd" that was dedicated to him after he died. What a highlight!!!

Then off to TEANY (singer Moby's vegan tea shop) which once we got there, I felt too stupid to venture into and so we just took pitcures of me outside the door. *Blush* I'm an idiot sometimes. Quickly we found Joe's, The Art of Coffee and stopped in for a couple of *delicious* latte's, a chocolate cupcake by Amy Sedaris and a much needed rest for our feet. After that, a swift run through the Gourmet Garage to try to find Amy Sedaris' cheeseballs, to no avail. We left with just a regular brick of cheddar and a couple of other things and headed off to find a subway home. Point of note: the subway system here is a lot more confusing than any other city with rail systems we've been in. And we witnessed a couple of dudes that seemed to be starting on of those "fake fights that turns into a real fight" so we hurried on our way. Right outside Grand Central Station we just happened upon a big protest that we almost joined in, but we had no more energy so just hustled on back to the hotel.

Now it's cracker time as we take a little rest at the hotel. I'll relax a bit and then try to post some of our photos of today :)

Here We Are In The Lobby Of The ESB!

Cuteness!

HAIR!

If you can stop laughing at my wall of hair, you can see the Chrysler Building behind me!! We couldn't get the flash to behave, this was our crappy little camera since we didn't want to mess around with the digital 35mm and all the security b.s. This wasn't even close to the windiest spot up there!!!! WOW!

St. Patty's Day On Top Of The World

We spent our evening last night at the top of the Empire State Building!! It was absolutely beautiful--worth the 45 minutes and mega security hassle. There were throngs of people, but probably nothing compared to daytime tours. We thought it was simply amazing to see all of New York lit up from so high above the city. They said the visibility was 25 miles last night! The wind, though, my gawd, the wind was fiercely bitter. We didn't stay very long, but we left with a few trinky-dinks for the family :) Everything was completely over-priced so we didn't get everything we wanted for people, but we'll hit other touristy stores I'm sure. Plus we got suckered into paying $27 for the pictures they took of us plus a CD full of pictures of the view (which I thought was worth it cuz I love cheesy crap like that) but as one guy put it, "There's a new hustle on every floor" because people just line the tour line and try to get you to buy more crap, audio tours, "express" tours, etc. We'll have to post some of our first pictures!

John slept like a rock. I didn't sleep well, I had worries all night and woke up a couple of times. John just made us some yummy egg sandwiches, OJ, tea and coffee and we're just catching up on the weather. It's going to be in the 40s but with winds up to 30mph! So a little chilly, we'll have to dress for that. We're still deciding what we want to do today. I'll post later when we're back!

Love to you all, hope the weather is getting better there!

How Yooo Do-un?

We've arrived in Detriot for our 1.5 hour layover. The flight from Minneapolis was uneventful, other than me having to pee whenever the seatbelt sign went up. We got a few zzz's in which was actually quite nice and I'm not groggy and crabby like I usually am after a nap. We're already missing the kitties, though Boo Boo left John with a little souvenier on his right thumb before we left! Her little way of getting back at us for leaving her alone with Vesta! Now we're having a snack, stretching our legs a bit and I'm typing this into Wordpad since they charge for Wifi here. Welp, next stop, Newark!! We shall write more from the hotel, probably :) YAY!

Later......
Here we are!! We made it to New York unscathed! The city is completely packed with people, it's like a busy little ant colony, most of whom are wearing glittery green hats, beads, t-shirts, and face paint for St. Patricks Day. Our hotel is perfect, a tall tower but we're just on the 4th floor. It's got a kitchen so after grabbing a yummy lunch at a little cafe on 39th & 3rd, we stopped off at a nearby grocery store and stocked up on some good stuff. We're planning on eating breakfasts and dinners here at the hotel and then just grabbing lunches and snacks, if needed, when we're out and about. Now we're relaxing with some tea and the weather channel. . It's beautiful here now, sunny and 45 degrees! We'll be heading out a little later to check out the Empire State Building (that for some reason I keep calling the Eifel Tower, no this is NOT Paris...) so we'll have to give the lowdown on that :) I'm sure it'll be cool, but just like looking down from any tall building.

Baby I'm Ready To Gooooooo

We are soooo ready to go on vacation!! I've been a crabby little biddy and John has been anxious for the past two weeks. The break from the mundane will be most wonderful. We're super-jazzed because we just found out today that we got tickets to The Colbert Report!!!!!!!! So the breakdown so far is this:

Arrive NYC on St. Patrick's Day: avoid as many unruly drunks as possible, go see the Empire State Bldg which is open til midnight, thankfully, or we'd probably never even bother with it.

Saturday: not sure, John's got this all mapped out....probably Yankee Stadium, maybe CBGBs.

Sunday: The Pogues!

Monday: The Daily Show!

Tuesday: The Colbert Report!

Somewhere in there we also need to hit my foodie stuff: Amy Sedaris' cupcakes & cheeseballs which are reportedly sold somewhere in the Village (which is conveniently located in the same area as her apartment where she makes them); Moby's vegan tea shop, TEANY, and maybe we'll take photos of Bobby Flay's restaurants. If Jamie Oliver's restaurant is still around, I'll have to eat there, no question. And I'd love to see where the lovely Ms Julie Powell, my all-time office drone hero, lives, but she recently moved and I've been lazy about keeping up on these details in the blogs. Plus, it would just be weird to be wandering around with a camera asking about The Powell's because that's something that she would notice and blog about, and I'll be DAMNED if I'm going to go down in blogging history as some crazy lady wandering around trying to take pictures of a bloggers apartment.

On the kitty front: Mom will be taking care of the babies. Hopefully they won't give her much trouble. We're hoping that Boo Boo will see the error of her ways in her hatred of my mom (because she took her to the vet ONCE 10 years ago and the cat refuses to let bygones be bygones) and realize that hey, mom isn't so bad, she's feeding me, cooing at me and at least she doesn't chase me around the condo like that madwoman, Vesta!!! We'll be calling the machine to leave the cats messages. Dorky, we know.

We've got most everything packed already. The real trick will be getting to the airport. We wanted to take the LRT, but we'd have to walk about 1/2 mile to the darn station that is now covered in icey snow with two check-in bags and two backpacks. So we'll probably cab it. Oh, and this is going to be at 4:00 in the morning, cuz we need to get to the airport by 5:00. I guess we'll be going to bed about 6 pm on Thursday night!! GEEZ!

Anyway, I'm off to think of something to fix for dinner to use up the rest of the fresh stuff. Next blog will probably be from the original big city itself!!
ROCK ON!!!!