Visit all the cities (New York)! March 2015

NYC March 2015

The King and I at Lincoln Center-this is just as the ufo was overhead :)


The opera house!  I have been going to see them at the movies for a couple years now so had to peak while I was here.  What they were missing was objects in the gift shop related to specific operas-a postcard at least!


The last thing we saw at the Met art museum was Celestina, a multi-media piece.  In the Italian square (which has my favorite Bernini statue)  they presented the work.   It was...complicated.  The music was pre-recorded, but coming from a number of different speakers throughout the room, so surround sound.  Projected onto one wall was a mix of shadow puppet action scenes, abstract moving shapes, and spotlights onto statues (one group was the designated chorus).  It was odd and compelling.  I had no idea what it was going into it, but we had to leave before the end and am a bit sad I will not see the whole...but what we did see is such a strong memory it is ok.

We always eat well in NYC :)
This time we had Indonesian food and bagels for starters, then Ma Peche-never disappoints!

A few years ago they started the dim sum style carts-always a good idea and today was brunch-yeah!

Mimosa trio

pretzel roll

pork bun

broccoli salad

love the slaw

and finish with a biscuit :)

And sometimes you just need your food to come with too much atmosphere!  This is home to the singing waiters-such a great idea, too much fun!

and the quiche was lovely.

but you really can't go wrong with mac n cheese in a bacon bowl.

Sunday afternoon/evening was all Wolf Hall all the time

The show was quite good-love the minimal staging highlighted by fire (in the torches, the fireplaces, the candles).  Somehow they managed to extract the essence from the books-impressive.

There was a dinner break between the shows and we signed up for the 'Classic English feast' provided at the cafe that is rink-side to Rockefeller skating rink. 

Turns out I've never skated here-it always seemed very touristy.  And it is, partly.  We had a ton of fun watching the group who had never skated before wobble their way around the rink.  But even better some good skaters come to see and be seen.  The dude in the Rangers jersey, the woman with nice twirls and light jumps, the kid dressed almost as a ninja quickly weaving in and out, and the guy who looked too cool for school from the eighties-kind of Bruce Springsteen with a cool hat.  But the most amazing was beret guy.  Tall, thin, trench coat, big sunglasses, i-pod in hand and beret.  Smooth and silky skating style would swoop past the restaurant window, pause for 3 seconds with a grand gesture sort of directed to someone sitting inside and then move on.  He did this for the whole meal, chatting up fans outside and even talking briefly to eighties dude.  Clearly a regular.  I had no idea.  

Anyway!  Dinner itself was excellent.

Scotch eggs, shepherds pie, fish and chips, Eaton mess

And a lovely gin based drink-cheers!

And I finished the trip with a swing through Missouri where I had a nostalgia dinner at Steak 'n Shake.

Visit all the cities (Charlotte and New York)! March 2015

We had some amazing meals in Charlotte, BBQ in burritos, classic BBQ at Mac's Speedway, fun sandwiches at the local deli.  But the best was The Cowfish.

Cute logo!

Sushi on flatbread

Fancy fries

Amazing milkshakes, with or without alcohol :)

umm, we maybe ordered too much food.

but it was delicious!

We also ran around downtown Charlotte.

I really like the statues representing the foundations of the growth of Charlotte, commerce, industry, transportation and the future...why yes, that is a wasps nest in the statue!  

And the Firebird statue outside the art museum!

The most fun we had?  Playing Buffy the Vampire Slayer, the board game.  I am a total Whedon fan and a board game fan-how did I not know this was a thing!!  Luckily, Biggles owns a copy and we played it 5 or 6 times before leaving.  It is fantastic!  It is co-operative good vs. an evil (one from each of the first four seasons).  It helps to know the show-we felt like we were able to describe the game play like scenes.  In one game Willow died-clearly the season closer.

Good times, good times.

Quick visit to Chapel Hill for some family time.  We went to the super cute Science museum and rode the train, saw the butterfly room, played in the kitchen....

and yet the only picture I took was of my nephew wearing socks on his hands!

 I'm always looking at the art in airports, but even though I saw this from far away I almost didn't go check it out.  Glad I did....do you recognize it?  The top is RDU and the bottom is DFW when it wasn't quite finished.  There were about 20 different airports depicted-so awesome when things get self-referential.

Off to NYC!  We did a ton of stuff in a short time including hitting the Metropolitan Museum of Art on Saturday

My single favorite room in the met-the temple of Dendur.  Atmosphere, people watching, and of course the temple itself.

Okay, this is a reindeer made out of glass balls.  In the Asian section, that little room with the window that overlooks the temple of Dendur.  I am just not sure how I feel about it.

Also in the Asian section-just thought these were the cutest!

One of the special exhibits was on the lute-a single room with some paintings, some lutes and lute music

Very nice way to pull it all together

Unusual exhibit on the Plains Indians-nicely pulled together material from a number of different sources.

The displays of the decorated hides were amazing

And finally a quick trip through the Islamic art section

I love the tapestries so much!

But this also caught my eye.

Visit all the cities (Denver and Charlotte)! March 2015

March 2015

Sometimes you just have to cram in as much as possible in one big trip!  In under 2 weeks I visited 5 cities, three groups of friends and three groups of family.  

First up, Denver.  Friday afternoon, fun bunch arrives-you know we will be having a great time if it is the fun bunch!

Downtown Denver is great-food, shopping and entertainment all reachable by free tram service.  We ate at Mellow Mushroom-nice!  We needed the snack to sustain us on the way to getting drinks at ChoLon :)  Of course once we were there we couldn't turn away a few snacks.  My personal fave is the Kaya Toast.  While travelling for work in Singapore I came to love their concept of breakfast, crustless toast with way too much butter and a coconut spread (kaya) served with a barely cooked egg and tea.  The geniuses at ChoLon (disclaimer I know the chef) have turned this into crispy toasts with kaya and an egg cloud that is so light....sooooo good!

Then we went off to have dinner by helping taste test the now open Cho77.  So much fun! 

We barely rolled to the home of friends up near Boulder and the next day woke to such a nice day

that we had to go hiking at Heil Valley Ranch.  Such a mix of hikers and bikers, nice to see everyone respectful of each other on the trail.

almost spring!

The evening light is amazing.  Back into Denver for dinner at the Union Station bar.  We were here a couple years ago and the train station was basically abandoned but now it is a happening place and the trains actually arrive here.

And the food and drinks at the bar were just lovely.  Of course those were just pre-dinner snacks because now we go eat actual dinner at ChoLon.  The lamb just fell off the bone and the lemongrass cheesecake with spicy cotton candy?  Genius!

Did you know that there is a brochure about the art in the Denver airport?  The blue horse with glowing eyes is the most famous, but we were taken with the miniature cliff dwellings.

E- and I are now off to Charlotte NC, a new place for us, but with and old friend-yeah!  Although I like to do off the beaten path stuff, sometimes you really should do the most touristy thing available.  Charlotte?  The NASCAR museum-we had to do it though I have never been to a race in my life.  The main hall has an excellent exhibit of tracks across the country

Here you can see the steepest banked track

and you can get all the info on your local track.

Nicely put together exhibit-informative and fun.

They also do a nice job with the history of the sport,

both the people

and the machines.

Oh hey!  Go visit my friend Amy's page where she talks about cycling across the country and Be The Match.

When you first enter the museum, you will get a plastic card, like a credit card, and add some info about yourself.  Exhibits throughout the museum are interactive-trivia games, build your own car, learn to be a ref, and pratice being a pit crew!

 This is a ton of fun and if you go on a slow day they will let you do it a couple times to improve your performance.

The final stop is a race simulation, pitting you against up 15 others.  I moved up from 6th to 3rd, not bad, not bad.