My Trip Across the Country

For those of you who did not know I took a 10 day trip recently. I went to SF to see mom, get my tattoo and see some of you lovely people in the bay area. I then went to New York for four days to visit my sister and then to Canada for my grandmother's 80th bday. I made it back in one piece about a week ago ago and my suitcase was still full and sitting in the living room until about two days ago. I really hate unpacking.

My trip started out with a bang, having realized after going through security that I was missing my phone and that it was probably in the trunk of Deanna's car. Of course I couldn't even call Deanna because her phone number is on my phone and it was in her trunk. I managed without it though, having mom's cell phone which she doesn't really use. But after calming down and realizing that I would be okay without my phone, I checked my messages and found out that I had LOCKED my cat in my room. For those of you who don't know my room is in the back of the house, separate from the house, so I had locked the door before I left and taken the key for it with me, leaving Deanna with no way to open it. So now the cat is stuck in my room, (with food water and a litter box so technically he was fine) and no way to contact my housemate.

It was a great start to my trip. Ribbon got out fine for those of you who are concerned. He was stuck in there for about three days though, but seemed to have slept the whole time and not noticed.

While Ribbon was locked in my room, I got my tattoo and had a great visit with all you bay area people. Most of you did not get to see the tattoo as it was bandaged when I saw you. So here it is a lot less red and swollen.

I then jetted off to New York where I met Rocky and managed to get along well with my sister. I think that was a first. Wasn't it sister dear? I was very proud of us.

And then I spent ALOT of money. I splurged and spoiled myself by shopping and eating my way through New York. My first day I went to the day spa Bliss and had a facial. I had a hard time finding it as it had no number on the building and was located in the Dior building which made me think that it wouldn't be in there. I must have walked by it at least 10 times. I finally had to call them. I felt so dumb, but apparently it happens all the time. The facial itself was so great. THEY HEAT THE TABLE YOU LAY ON. It was so damn relaxing and a great change after the cramped flight to New York.

That night Ady and I went to Don't Tell Mama to go visit Stephanie. She is still a fantastic singer and I had a great time watching her go off on the dumb customers. It was very amusing until one of the dumb OLD customers starting hitting on ME! Ady was nice enough to shoo him away while I took the tactic of ignoring him completly while trying not to be rude. I think Ady's rudeness worked better.

The next day I did my Walking Tour of Greenwich Village, which was fantastic. We ate so much food. A list of the places we visited can be found here. The highlights for me were the Cheese shop, the chocolate store, the italian specialty store and Chumley's which was a speakeasy in the 60s and an illegal bar during the prohibition. The coolest thing about it is that the owner asked every writer who frequented the bar to give him a jacket cover from their latest book and they're all over the walls. The table tops are also the original ones where everyone carved their names, or initials or a phrase. It was just a great place to get to see that I probably never would have known about otherwise. But because I had eaten SO much food I didn't have a chance to try the best french fries in the city when I was in the neighborhood because I was so damn stuffed. I never was over that way again. It's so damn sad.

After eating all day my sister and I then went to the Peninsula hotel and had dinner at their restaurant Fives which was very upper east side. It was a good meal, but very proper, I guess would be the word. It felt like we were getting stares of "what are you doing here?"

I shopped tremendously on Thursday. I went to a store called Pookie & Sebastian as well as Warehouse of London. I also went to Vintage New York which is a wine store that only sells wine from New York State. I bought mom and granny a bottle each for their bdays. Besides that I bought postcards I never sent and took in the scenery.

That night we met Clint, David and Will for dinner at Les Halles, which is a vegetarian's nightmare but serve up a damn good steak and french fries. It was a great night and lots of fun thanks to Clint, David and Will for taking the time out to come have dinner and entertain me. I've gone ahead and upload a couple of pictures from that night on cementhorizon.

It was that night that we also decided we were probably going to be taking Rocky with us to Canada after all. Course that meant we had to get his shots done the next day in order for him to be allowed into Canada. So Friday morning Rocky and I took a trip. Him in his itty bitty bag with his head poking out and me trying to keep from smacking him into something accidentally. We rode on the subway and were mostly ignored. The mean bus driver made me put him all the way in the bag that was too small for him, but he survived and we made it to the vet's office where he was terrified. Poor thing. He doesn't really get out much and is not used to new places. He did great though and got his shots. I tried to walk him outside so I didn't have to stick him in the bag again, but well....see Rocky (at this point) couldn't go down stairs, and we were thwarted as we came out of the vet's office, with you guessed it, stairs, so it was back into the bag with him.

I got a cab to take me to Ady's work so that Rocky could stay there during the day while I got some last minute things in New York. Then in the cab Rocky started to make sounds like he was hyperventalating. I thought at first that he couldn't breath, and then it happened, puke all over my scarf. At least it wasn't on my clothes or the taxi, I don't think the driver would have been too happy about that. I think Rocky gets car sick, but Ady thinks it was the shots and being all nervous. I still think he gets car sick.

Canada was fun. It was a lot of sitting around and eating chocolate and watching movies. There were so many things I didn't get to do while in New York though. I think one of these days I actually have to go with someone so I can have some company during the day.

So that was my trip. The best part was coming home to Santa Barbara after Canada. Canada was bare, and cold and snowing and then I get to Santa Barbar and am driving to work the next day and it's sunny, warm and the flowers are all in bloom and all I could think was, "I'm glad I live here."