Photos from NYC trip

I've been meaning to post some photos from our NYC trip. Here are a few:

Lincoln Center plaza, where we saw The Met doing Tosca.

Ravi
 Coltrane performing at The Village Vanguard

Grand Central Station.  One of my all-time favorite buildings.  If I had to take just one building with me to a deserted island, this would be it.

On the outside of a fire station mid to upper West side.

Bryant Park.  Spin sponsors this free outdoor table tennis venue (in addition to having a swanky indoor club with a bar that they wouldn't let me take pictures of).  The NY Public Library is in the background.

One of my favorite NYC activities is oggling stone work.  Gorgeous stonework is everywhere.

Another sample of stonework. The Alwyn Court Building.

 

Maybe this is where Scrabble is played in Central Park, but it was closed when we were there so I didn't get to find out.

Tried to see the Daily Show, but it was off for the night following the Emmy Awards. The entrance to the studio is on the left side of this building.

Tosca on the plaza

Here is the plaza in front of the Metropolitan Opera house last Monday, Sept. 21. This was opening night for Tosca.

Long weekend in NYC - Updated to add photos

K has been working a long-term freelance project for about 15 months. In that time, he hasn't taken a day off except for the holidays that his client is closed. He's been exhausted and miserable and cranky, but hasn't wanted to say "no" to even one day of work, since it'll dry up eventually and there isn't much other work out there.

Friday at noon, K called from work and said, "I'm not booked on Monday and Tuesday. Let's go to New York tomorrow." I started looking into airfares and he called back a few minutes later and said, "Let's go TODAY so that I can go to a ping pong seminar at Spin at 1:00 tomorrow." Spin is a table tennis club in Manhattan that is part-owned by Susan Sarandon. I finished some work, found a kennel for Karma and dropped her off, booked a hotel and flights, went home and packed and we made it to the airport by 5:30 for a 7:00 flight.

This is not how I like to roll. I like to research and plan so that vacation time is put to optimal use. But this is how K likes to do things and it was his trip, really. It all turned out well. (Flights were even on time; that's never happened to me before when flying to NYC. This was my fourth trip there.)

Our favorite experience of the trip was on Monday. We went to a recital for a master's student at Julliard. Afterward, about 7:15, I steered us to the Metropolitan Opera House [Update:  photo of Lincoln Center added] so K could see it. The concierge at the hotel had told me that the Met's season wasn't starting until next week, so I hadn't tried to get tickets to an opera, but the building is beautiful and shows up in movies now and then (e.g. Moonstruck), so I thought K should see it. As we came into the plaza in front of the Met, we saw that it was packed with people. There was a huge section with chairs, surrounded by a barricade. A giant, GIANT, screen was hanging on the front of the building and an opera was playing on the screen. Great quality sound came from the speakers. We thought, "Oh cool! They're playing a video of an opera from last season." So we watched from behind the barricades until the end of the first act.

Moments after the screen went to intermission, we saw, through the huge front windows, people in tuxes and gowns moving into the atrium space from the hall, and it dawned on us that what we'd been watching was live from inside the Met. The concierge had it wrong; this was opening night! We tried to get a seat on the plaza, but learned we needed tickets to sit. We resigned to stand and watch, though our feet and backs were worn out from a long day of walking. But then a very nice woman picked us out of the crowd of standing people and offered us her two tickets for the outdoor seating; she wasn't in the mood to stay. So we watched the second and third acts from the 7th row. The weather was beautiful and the sound system was amazing, so it was a completely fabulous experience.

The opera was Tosca. The singers were well-received by the audience, but the director, set designer and costumer designer, who went with a non-traditional approach, got booed loudly. Reviews here: NYT; NYT blog; LATimes; Financial Times. In the blog post, the Met's general manager suggests that the reason for the boos was that the crowd was rooted in the past. I know a smidge about opera, but not enough to have had any clear expectations about how Tosca should look. Still, I didn't like the sets or costumes. It didn't look like it was a particular modern vision being executed; it just looked like they were trying to get by as cheaply as possible.

We loved Karita Matilla as Tosca, but I see her reviews are not glowing. She made us (and the lady next to us) cry at the end of the second act.

I'll post pictures when I offload them from K's camera.

I see that the production was broadcast all over the screens in Times Square too!

The Met's HD live broadcast of Tosca to theaters all over the country will be on Oct. 10.

We also saw Ravi Coltrane, John Coltrane's son, in a quartet at the Village Vanguard. He was great; his drummer (E.J. Strickland) and piano player (Luis Perdomo) were even better. The quartet has been together since 2003. Review of this stint at the VV is here.  [Update: photo of Ravi added.]

We went to The Lion King. For me, the set and costume design and art direction are the reason to see this. The creativity is stunning. The music is meh.

We saw a retrospective of Richard Avedon's fashion photography at The International Center of Photography. (Review is here.) This exhibit was timed to coincide with Fashion Week last week that took place at Bryant Park, kitty-corner from ICP. People like to poo poo reality TV shows, but I have to say that I've picked up some appreciation for the skills and techniques of clothing design/construction from Project Runway and for modeling from America's Next Top Model. This made the photography exhibit more interesting to me than it would have been otherwise. Also, I learned that Angelica Huston was a model when she was young.

K got to enjoy his table tennis seminar at Spin. We ate lots of great food. All flights were on time. The weather was perfect.

Our hotel was crawling with young men with German shepherds. If I were to see lots of people wearing fezzes in a hotel, I would assume there was a Shriner's convention in town. So my first thought when I saw the fourth or fifth shepherd was that there must be some sort of training seminar for police dogs. But then it dawned on me that if one were to hold a training seminar, one might find somewhere cheaper to do it than Manhattan. I tried to talk to the men with the dogs and they didn't volunteer any information about their dogs or their dogs' jobs. I would guess they were there to do explosives checks for the UN General Assembly taking place this week.

Devils Tower

Those of you who were just there probably know this:

Devils Tower is made of phonolite porphyry. Phonolite refers to the ringing of the rock when a small slab is struck, and its ability to reflect sound. Porphyry refers to its texture, large crystals of feldspar embedded in a mass of smaller crystals.

From NPS.gov.

Another reason for my trip to Little Bighorn

I must admit that I had another reason for wanting to go Little Bighorn - my quest to visit all 50 states. That is why I had a fail-safe point on my route. Had I thought I wouldn't make it within 1 hour of closing time, while I would have been bummed out about that, I would have been able to add Montana to my count. I do have some criteria that must be met:

• I have to have some memory of being there. When I was very young, my parents took me on a trip from Tulsa to Yellowstone. I have no memory of this, so any states that we went through do not count on my list.
• Flight connections where you never leave the airport do not count.
• There has to be a legitimate reason for going there, not just to cross the border to say you've been there. This rule is a bit subjective and is open to some interpretation.

To date, here are the states I'm counting:

Alabama, Arizona, Arkansas, California, Colorado, DC (obviously not a state), Florida, Georgia, Hawaii, Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Kansas, Kentucky, Louisiana, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts,Michigan, Minnesota, Mississippi, Missouri, Montana, Nebraska, Nevada, New Hampshire (this is one that I had to make a ruling on, but I counted it because to get to Maine from Boston, you have to go through NH and I paid a toll), New Jersey, New Mexico, New York, North Carolina, Oklahoma, Oregon, Pennsylvania, South Carolina, South Dakota, Tennessee, Texas, Utah, Virginia, Wisconsin, Wyoming.


So that's 40, plus DC. That leaves me only 10 to go:

Alaska, Connecticut, Delaware, Idaho, Ohio, North Dakota, Rhode Island, Vermont, Washington and West Virginia.


Of these, the ones I really want to get to ASAP are Alaska, Idaho and West Virginia. Obviously some of these can be combined (WA/ID; WV/DE; CT/VT/RI) which leaves the most difficult ones, for me, to be Ohio and ND. I can't think any reason to go to either of these 2 states (with all due respect to Stephanie with regards to ND) and Alaska has it's own set of issues.

So, to help me with my quest, give me some reasons (legitimate ones) to go to Ohio and North Dakota.

Death on the prairie

LJ, I see your death-markers-for-soldiers-on-the-prairie, and I raise you actual-graves-and-interesting-causes-of-death:
(This looks impossible from this vantage point, but the Missouri River is not so far away.)





From Ft. Lincoln, south of Mandan, North Dakota.

Update to give some history about these soldiers (from the Ft. Lincoln site):

The History of Fort Abraham Lincoln

As the Northern Pacific Railroad advanced west across Dakota Territory, the US military kept pace. When the railroad reached the Missouri River in 1872, the city that would become known as Bismarck sprang up and Fort McKeen was established on the west bank of the river as a small infantry post. By November of that year, Fort McKeen had been renamed in honor of the fallen President, Abraham Lincoln.

Fort Abraham Lincoln was expanded to house six companies of the 7th Cavalry under the command of Lt. Col. George Armstrong Custer in 1873. Their mission was to further the advancement of the Northern Pacific Railroad and open the westward expansion of the American frontier.

By 1874, Fort Abraham Lincoln was the largest and most important fort in Dakota Territory and was considered the “premier“ frontier fort on the Northern Plains with 650 Infantry and Cavalry soldiers keeping the post maintained and operational.

May 17, 1876, the troops left Fort Lincoln on the Centennial Campaign, which took the 7th Cavalry into the valley of the Little Big Horn. They were attempting to force non-treaty Indians back to their respective reservations. Outnumbered, outgunned, and out-maneuvered, 260 cavalry troopers would not return to Fort Abraham Lincoln, including every member of the five companies with Custer.

By 1883, the Cavalry had been detached to Fort Meade, the NP railroad had been completed to Montana and Fort Abraham Lincoln’s importance declined, leaving Fort Abraham Lincoln to be later officially abandoned in 1891 by order of Congress. Fort Abraham Lincoln and General Custer’s 7th Cavalry would leave a lasting legacy for years to come.

Today, the visitor can relive what Fort Abraham Lincoln was like for General Custer and his command in the year 1875. We invite you to take a step “back to 1875“ as uniformed soldiers and laundresses conduct “Living History“ style guided tours through the reconstructed Custer House and Central Barracks. Relive the Legacy! Come out to Fort Abraham Lincoln and see for yourself.

Update II: I should note that the most surprising thing about the causes of death in this cemetery is that at least 90% had nothing to do with engaging an enemy (at least not directly), but instead were these kinds of things.

Pictures from the great road trip of 2009

Try to picture Kansas in your mind and this is what you should come up with:




The bison have the run of Custer State Park. When they cross the road, they amble. They seemed oblivious to cars and trucks and minivans - motorcycles they didn't really like. You could hear them grunting and making all sorts of noises. I liked watching them roll around in the dust:




Some of the elk I saw, as the bikers pulled up:




Picture South Dakota in your mind and this is what you should come up with:




One of tunnels on the Iron Mountain Highway. The white-ish area on the mountain to the right looking thru the tunnel is Mt. Rushmore:




The best tunnel, which is on the Needles Highway. It's longer than it looks and there is a 45 degree turn to the right at the other side:




The first view of Devils Tower you get on the road coming from the northern route from SD:




Pictures really don't do Devils Tower justice - I kept looking for the Mothership:




Looking down towards the Little Bighorn river from Last Stand Hill. The markers are not graves - they mark where each soldier fell. Most of the remains were moved to the cemetery located near the visitors center. Custer's' remains were moved to West Point:




Driving towards Little Bighorn, hoping to make it before closing:

Great road trip of 2009

For over 20 years, I've wanted to go to the Great Plains. Don't ask me why, because I couldn't really tell you. Perhaps the vast openness; perhaps the lack of people; perhaps what I call "the pull of my people" (since I am part Native American). I was planning to do this back in the 90's, but never really got around to it. But now, a perfect storm of life situations made it possible. My proposed route was to be basically Dallas - Black Hills (Mt. Rushmore), SD- Devils Tower, WY - Little Bighorn, MT - Boulder, CO - Dallas. I wanted to stay off of interstate highways as much as possible, so I could see more of the countryside. The only part I wasn't sure about was making it to Little Bighorn - my problem when I left was having to be back on a certain day because C was possibly traveling. That part was going to be a last minute decision. Overall, I loved the trip. The only negative was that I picked the wrong time to be anywhere near the Black Hills - it was Sturgis week. I've never seen so many bikers in my life. I started seeing them in Kansas and the further north I went, the more I saw. Luckily, they were all heading south (since the motorcycle rally was ending that weekend and from what I was told, most of the bikers leave by Friday). Well, if most of them were gone, I can't imagine how many are there. They were ALL OVER THE PLACE. The hotel guy where I stayed in the Black Hills told me that you basically draw a circle 100 miles around Sturgis and that is how far they have to stay. Which also explains why I had to pay $100 for a hotel room that would normally be $40. Sturgis week + summer rates = $100. I guess I was lucky I could find a room at all. I can see why bikers love the BH - great weather, hilly and curvy roads. But they certainly hinder wildlife viewing. I can't count the times I was stopped on the side of a road watching elk or bison or antelope when here would come 5 or 6 or 20 bikes. They would stop to see what I was looking at and with all the noise of idling bikes, the animals would stroll or run off. Some of the little towns would not allow non-motorcycles down the main street because the traffic was so bad. Making turns took forever; buying gas took forever, trying to eat took forever. Then again, if I had a bike, I'd probably be up there with them.

I was convinced by a Park ranger at Devils Tower that I could make the trip to Little Bighorn before it closed. So I decided to give it a go. My route was going to take me thru 2 reservations, so I was advised to fill up before taking off, since there isn't much out there. I also had a back-up plan if I felt I wasn't making good enough time and had to call it off. About 20 miles before I had to make the decision, I ran into a really bad rainstorm. The temp dropped from 75 to 55 in about 5 minutes and it was raining with some hail mixed in. I was driving 80-85 (and getting passed) and had to slow down to below 55. But, after about 15 minutes, it stopped and the skies cleared and it looked good to the west. I made it with about an hour or so before the park closed. I was an interesting place, a bit eerie, and was the one place where I really thought about the history of the area and the Plains in general.

Some other observations:

• I've heard of the "seven wonders of the world". Until I drove thru Kansas, I'd never heard of the "seven wonders of Kansas". One of which was "The Big Well" - the deepest hand-dug well in the world. For Kansas, I guess that is a big deal.
• Why anyone would live in Kansas is beyond me. Nothing there, flat and just miles of dirt, corn, or wheat and a stench that made me gag every time I got out of my vehicle. All the people I saw were rather large, which surprised me because I could barely eat. But I guess you get used to it.
• I saw a crop duster airport - a long shed and planes taking off one after the other. Cool!
• My parents have always talked bad about Nebraska (the smell, the flat fields that go forever, brown and no trees). Well, the part of Nebraska I went thru was nothing like that. I saw trees, rivers, grassland with rolling hills. Not much wheat or corn. I even went thru a national forest that reminded me (sorta) of parts of Colorado.
  
• The Iron Mountain Highway in the Black Hills is the coolest road I've ever been on. I was on it early in the morning in the rain, so I didn't see a single bike. Only saw 1 other car. Great views, great wildlife, unbelievable "rock tunnels" and then BOOM - Mt. Rushmore. And I think Mt. Rushmore is something every American should see (as well as a trip to DC). I thought all the faces looked like the person, except for Teddy Roosevelt.
  
• The road curves and spiral over and under itself. Even at slow speeds, you get a bit dizzy. The best individual tunnel was on the Needles Highway.
• When you first see Devils Tower from the highway, you are 20 minutes or so from it. When it popped up after taking a curve, I had a "Close Encounters" feeling, like I was being drawn to it. It was as awesome as I expected. The grooves and crevices were incredible and it looked really cool with the blue skies, white puffy clouds and birds flying on and around it.
• Montana folks drive really fast. Then again, the roads are flat and you can see forever and you wonder why they even have speed limits. I seem to recall that parts of Montana didn't have them until just recently.
• I spent Sat. night in Sheridan, WY. I couldn't believe how dead if was. I was trying to find a place to eat and had a difficult time finding any place that looked open. I think I may have been on the wrong side of town, but still, it was strange. I ended up having to get a sandwich and some chips from a convenience store where I bought gas.

I had a great time and probably could have spent another day in the Black Hills area, but I was worried about finding a place to stay and I was getting tired of bikes. Not the riders, because all the ones I talked to were nice and friendly. Just dealing with driving and noise and the hassle was getting to me. I want to go back during off-season and perhaps I can talk C into going as well.

Destination of the mystery trip was.......

Telluride, CO. My cousin, who lives in Boulder, has friends that live in Telluride (year-round residents) and has being trying to get us to come visit for a couple of years now. I've been to Telluride to visit with my cousin and her friends once before, but C has never been. Even if it had been a disaster, just getting away from the the over 100 degree weather in Dallas would have made it worth the trip. But we had a great time. Warmer than expected weather, rained just once, altitude didn't really effect us and really enjoyed the 4th (which is a HUGE deal in Telluride). The only negative was that I was promised a TomKat sighting, but from what I understand, they either weren't there or even if they were, they don't venture out from their 100 acre compound all that much. A few of the highlights:

• 2 bighorn sheep standing just off a road, frozen like statues.

• numerous deer sightings when C and I would walk in the mornings.

• birthday dinner we cooked and ate overlooking the golf-course with the mountains in the background, windows open, sun setting, great wine and even better birthday cake.
  

• driving a float in the 4th of July parade.

• sitting as close as we could to the fireworks that night, soot falling on us and feeling the concussions of the fireworks that didn't quite make it high enough.
  

• riding a motorcycle that had been modified to all electric - max speed supposed to be 18mph, but was (per the owner) " a bit more than that".
  

• hiking up a trail above town (elevation change of 1,000 ft) to a waterfall and in the course of 10 minutes, having bright sunshine, rain and hail, then sunshine again.
  

• the free gondola that goes from the Mountain Village above Telluride (where we stayed) into town that runs year round, from 6am to midnight. Even carries bikes. Awesome view and the easiest way to go back and forth.
  

We want to go back, C especially to ski. We just need to find a way to make getting there easier and quicker (much easier said than done). I want to go back for the 4th again, but this time I want to be on the float, not driving it!

Here are some pictures:


The view from the 2nd floor deck of the house we were staying in





The float I was driving, the Liki Tiki. It won funniest float. Last year they won Best in Parade.





"Men without Rhythm", doing a Blues Brother routine during the parade.





Me, driving the float, pointing to C and my cousin, telling the little kid to shoot them with his squirt gun.





Me, drinking from my fake Rum bottle. The real stuff was being enjoyed by the adults on the float during the parade.





"Irrational Exuberance", the group that won Best of Parade. Their theme was "Party like it's 2006" and they were sooooo funny. My favorite sign was "In Madoff we Trust". The ladies were wearing VERY skimpy, madri gras type outfits. It was difficult for me driving, as I was getting distracted and my co-pilot kept telling me stuff like..."don't look at that little blonde over there, wearing white and just coconuts".





Looking back from the 13th green. The house in the background was were I stayed on my first trip to Telluride back in the late 90's.







Many references in the parade to the failing economy. While Telluride is in some ways very conservative and traditional, it is also very liberal. Not many GWB fans that I ran across.





The town only has 2,500 residents, but George Clinton was going to appear at their Civics Center in a couple of weeks. The tax rate here is unreal.

Back from the mystery trip

Can you guess where we went based upon these:

Re: Re: Minding the gap

Scooter, for you....C was as enamored with "way out" as I was with "mind the gap".

Re: Minding the gap

On my first trip, I was asking for directions in a train station and was told to go, "Way out." He pointed in a direction. 200 yards later I still had no idea where I was going until I noticed they didn't have "exits," they had "Ways Out."

Images from Great Britain

I'm so bad about keeping up with what I've posted or not. I thought I had put some pictures on here, but I guess only the one. I'll pick the best or most interesting and start today....







I know this isn't very interesting, but when riding the Underground, this phrase is broadcast before, during and after every stop. After about 3 stops, it drives you crazy. After a day or 2, all I would do while riding the train was just repeat this over and over in my "trying to sound like, but awful" British accent. I drove C crazy doing that.












This is the London Eye - which when described to me didn't have much of an appeal. But it was super cool and even though it was foggy the day we did it, you still could see all over the metro London area and I thought foggy pictures captured what London looks like. The pods would hold about 20 or so people and it took about 30-35 minutes to make a revolution. If I remember correctly, all the parts were built and/or came from foreign countries - nothing from the UK.





This is Henry VIII. Well, not really. At Hampton Court, they do a recreation of his marriage to Jane Seymour. You get a "wedding invitation" and a listing of events and while you are touring the grounds, you run into the wedding party. Earlier, C and I were walking down a hallway and Henry came around a corner and talked to me. He asked me if I was there for the wedding ( I said no, but congrats anyway). He said OK and said he hoped I enjoyed "his" house. The funny thing about this picture was that there was a group of people in front of them and one of them asked the guy with Henry if he was Wolsey. Henry got upset and told the guy that he should address any questions or comments directly to the King, not to underlings. The tourist apologized and Henry told the underling he could answer (he wasn't Wolsey, though I can't recall who he said he was). C and commented that this whole production was the ultimate Renaissance Fair.





Taken on the Royal Mile in Edinburgh. Really doesn't need an explanation....and no, C nor I tried any.






The "Old Course" at St. Andrews. The weather was horrible - very windy and raining off and on. Yet, no one complains and you just play. The wind was blowing from left to right on the 1st tee (and in the face of the golfers), so it was fun watching the tee shots. Of the 3 groups we saw tee off, only about 3 of golfers got the ball in the air. I could do that - I DO do that. So I could play this course and not feel bad. The prices aren't that bad and there are like 6 courses (the "new" course is over 100 years old, which cracks me up). I wanted to run out and stand on the bridge, but was afraid that the caddies or officials would get me.





This was taken somewhere in the Scottish Highlands. If I saw this picture, I would never guess Scotland. It looks more Germany or Austria to me. We just drove around on this day and hit every type of weather (rain, sun, cold, warm, windy, calm). It was so British, so Scottish.