Archive for the 'vacation' Category

Portland

Lefty November 8th, 2008

portland 08

Emily and I just got back from a week in beautiful Portland, Oregon. Here’s what we did:

- Explored Laurelhurst, Mt. Tabor, and Forest Parks.
- Visited some old friends at the local agencies.
- Ate waffles, southern-style biscuits, burritos, and asian stir-fry.
- Checked out a cemetery tour on Halloween night.
- Went to Food Fight, the vegan grocery store.
- Drove to the coastal town of Astoria to visit some sea lions and check out the “Haunted Astoria” tour.
- Gave our umbrellas a workout.

sealions
emily in forest park

Cold Spring

Lefty August 21st, 2008

We rented a house for August up in the lower Hudson Valley town of Cold Spring, NY. Here’s a shot of Emily, Champ, and foster dog Pomegranate on top of Mt. Taurus.

putnam.jpg

Manatee Fever

Lefty March 8th, 2008

I’m off to Anna Maria Island (on Florida’s gulf coast) next week for some chilling on the beach, spring break baseball, and manatees.

manatee

Launch!

Lefty February 21st, 2008

At work, we finally finished the two sites I’ve been working on for the last year:

redken.com
redkensalon.com

As a reward, Emily and I spent five days up in Phoenicia for the Valentine’s Day/President’s Day weekend. There was lots of snow up there, so we gave cross-country skiing a try. It was good fun.

Stay tuned for news on what’s next, work-wise.

Looking ahead to 2008

Lefty December 9th, 2007

I’ve been a bit neglectful of posting here over the last month, as I’ve been focused on getting a huge project out the door at work. Lately, though, I’ve been thinking about the upcoming year and all the big decisions that need to be made. There are a lot of things happening next year, and all of them are going to require some thinking:

1. In February the aforementioned project will launch, so I’ll need to figure out what to do afterwards. I can stay the course, or I can more seriously pursue the online video project that most of my posts lately have been hinting at. We’re also going to take a vacation in March and I need to decide where to go. The contenders right now are: snowboarding in upstate NY or VT, snowboarding and visiting friends in Portland, visiting the state of Michoacan in Mexico, or perhaps just finding a nice tropical beach to surf in Costa Rica.

2. I’ll be graduating from Stern, most likely in the August. The program has been taking up pretty much all my free time over the last two years, and finishing will be a real transition point. It will free up a lot of time and mental energy for me, and I think also open some opportunities to go in different directions.

3. Related to both the above, I need to decide where to live. I’ve been back in NYC for 13 years now (after spending my childhood here), and the pace can take a toll. My wife and I have been talking a lot lately about moving out to the Pacific Northwest, and now that my school obligations are wrapping up, we’ll have the opportunity to do so. But leaving NYC won’t be an easy decision - I’ve got a lifetime of friends, relationships, family, and experiences here. At the same time, the call of life in a more manageable city, and the adventure of new surroundings, is very strong.

Getting Married

Lefty August 9th, 2007

I am pleased to announce that after a blissful two and a half year engagement, Emily and I are getting married this Sunday. We’re going to have a small private ceremony right here in Brooklyn, USA (just us and our parents.) Then it’s off to Phoenicia, NY for the last week of August where we will go tubing on the Esopus and eat lots of pancakes.

I’ll post pictures to Flickr after the blessed event.

Portland Photos

Lefty May 21st, 2007

Emily in Portland

Emily and I just got back from a great trip to Portland, OR to check out the city and visit some old friends. The pictures are up here.

Vacation Disaster

Lefty March 24th, 2007

bates motel

This weekend Emily and I had quite an adventure in the Catskills. We drove up on Friday morning, during the worst snowstorm of the winter, in my 2002 Honda Civic with bald tires. Every 20 miles or so we’d see a huge accident on the NY Thruway: jack-knifed 18 wheelers, cars that had spun out of control and crossed the median into oncoming traffic, etc. By the time we got up to Highway 28, the roads were almost impassable. Our car kept fishtailing on the ice: I did a full 180 at one point, and a short while later slid onto the wrong side of the road. Knowing that we had about another 30 miles to go through steep, windy mountain roads, we decided we’d pull off in Phoenicia and try to find a place to stay.

We walked into the local gas station to ask if there was a motel near by. Three guys with huge beards, missing teeth, boils on their faces, and reeking of alcohol were eager to help. One of them informed us that he owned a motel, and he’d be happy to rent us a room. We were fully aware that this was a cliched horror movie beginning, but we really didn’t have much choice. We followed the guy’s truck down some country roads, and checked into the hotel.

After a vigilant night of watching the door for Ma Bates, we continued on our way to Halcottsville, where we had rented a house for the weekend. We took advantage of the nearly two feet of snow that had fallen and headed over to Plattekill Mountain for some snowboarding, which was the highlight of the trip. On the way back to the house, though, the alternator on my car died, and the car stalled a few hundred yards from the house. We called a tow truck, who informed us it would be at least until Monday before they could fix the car. We ended up checking into another motel (in Grand Gorge, NY) with WiFi so we could get some work done while waiting for the mechanic to finish.

Understand that we were in an extremely rural and remote area. There’s no place to rent a car, and no cab companies - we had no way of getting around at all. And Grand Gorge was the epitome of a no-horse town - there was nothing there except the motel, a post office, and a gas station/mini-mart. Luckily they had a great selection of gourmet microwaveable burritos, so we were all set for meals.

On Monday, the mechanic told me they couldn’t get the new alternator until Tuesday, so Emily got on the local Adirondack Trailways bus back to the city. Champ and I sat around in the motel another day, until they finally finished the car (on Tuesday afternoon), and I immediately hit the road to head home. I don’t think I’ve ever been so happy to see a vacation end.

Here are a couple shots on Flickr.

Random Personal News

Lefty March 12th, 2007

It’s been a couple of weeks since I’ve written on here, since I’ve been super swamped with school and work. Here’s a post that qualifies as “random personal news” if there ever was one:

- Materialite, my team’s entry into the Stern business plan contest, just got passed through to the next round. We’ve just got three other teams to beat out now in order to win the $100,000 first prize.

- I had a great poker night at Michael Malice’s on Friday. I was the third to get knocked out (out of six players), but the company, Chex mix, and Modelo Especial were a big hit. I also walked out the door with a brand new copy of the Batman: Year One graphic novel, courtesy of Scott.

- Guitar Hero 2 rules. My love for karaoke now has a serious rival.

- Emily, Champ, and I are heading up to the Catskills this weekend (specifically Roxbury, NY in Delaware County). I’ll post some Flickr shots of our planned snowtubing outing when I return. (link to Googlemap)

- We finally hooked up our Netflix subscription a few weeks back. I was skeptical about signing up for a long time, but now I’m totally sold on the service. They make it so much easier to watch and rent films. Movies rented so far: Dog Day Afternoon, Grey Gardens, The Departed, and Enron: The Smartest Guys in the Room. Up next I have about 30 Japanese samurai movies, starting with Shogun Assassin!

- My ice hockey team, the Tanya Hardings, upset the #2 team in the league in our first round playoff game by a score of 3-2. Semi-finals, here we come. (I was also fortunate enough to score a goal in the game, the credit for which I give entirely to my hard-nosed, never-say-die teammates.)

- Gotham Girls Roller Derby finally got a new practice space - it’s a big warehouse in Astoria. I haven’t been up there yet, but I hear it’s looking pretty good. The plan is for the season to start up again in the spring sometime.

- No SXSW this year for me. My entrepreneurial finance class was on Sunday, and I really didn’t want to skip it (since it’s the best class I’ve taken yet at Stern.) I’m hoping to hear some good stories of A-Town adventures upon people’s return to NYC.

That’s about it for now. I’ll write something more tech/entrepreneurship/nyc related next time, I promise.

Back from Exuma

Lefty January 18th, 2007

exuma

We just got back from the Bahamas on Tuesday night, where we snorkeled, sea kayaked, and infiltrated the Four Seasons hotel. Pictures are up at my Flickr account.