Archive for the ‘Travel’ Category
Family Ties
Families come in all shapes and sizes. The older that I get, the more that I realize that the important people in life are not necessarily those that I grew up with or who raised me. I am close to my extended family as I’ve spent a lot of time around my grandma’s siblings and nieces and nephews and their families.
One of the things that I inherited from my grandma is that we claim people we like as relatives regardless of bloodlines. For instance, she had a neighbor who we all called Grandma. Her name was Grandma Meinhardt. Even my grandma called her Grandma. I had no idea until she died that her real first name was Mabel. She was a very dear friend of our family. Grandma also accepted her in-laws as relatives right away. She loved inheriting nephews when her little brother’s eight daughters started getting married. She remembered everyone’s anniversaries and birthdays and always sent cards.
Claire was a dear niece of my grandma’s…Grandma loved bragging about Claire, her niece who was a nurse practitioner. I actually forget that Claire was married to grandma’s nephew, so she is actually related by marriage, accept for the fact that they aren’t married anymore. But she’s still one of my favorite cousins and always will be!
One of my all time favorite things about Claire is that she really doesn’t seem to let much bother her, and she cares so much for her four daughters (3 that she helped raise when she married their dad, and one biological).
Claire invited me on her annual New Orleans trip in June and I happily accepted! The funny part of this trip was when a friend of mine asked who I was going with. Now, I really don’t have a complicated family tree, but when you consider the fact that I’m so close to my extended family and we start getting into Grandma’s nieces and nephews and their kids, it can get a little hard to follow. So, I found myself laughing as I was explaining it.
Claire, and the oldest of the three daughters who she helped to raise, as well as the daughter’s biological mom and step dad were going to be going on the trip along with another one of our cousins. And then me, the random second cousin (I think?)…Six very different people with different personalities from various branches of the family tree living it up in the Big Easy! Half of us had been before and the other half were newbies!
We had an awesome time and the entire trip I kept thinking about how grateful that I am to be connected to these people and how they each have a unique life experience that I can learn from. It was also fun to experience New Orleans with people who had never been before!
Here I am with my unconventional family at a nice lunch at Commander’s Palace, home of the 25 cent martini! I won’t rat people out and tell how many we drank!
Another great trip in the books and another reminder of how grateful that I am for my extended family!
Life in the Land of Oz
I hurried out of work at 4:00 last Thursday afternoon so that I could get to the airport for a 6:00 flight. The sky was gray, but didn’t look bad. I hopped on the highway and turned on the local talk radio station to hear that there were tornado and severe thunder storm watches all across the metro, including in areas along I-635 and I-29, my usual route to the airport from the office. The talk show hosts were telling people to take cover. I kept driving. A guy texted into the radio station and said “I’m in my basement because I’m not a GD moron!” I thought to myself, “I’m not a GD moron, I’m in a hurry and have a flight to catch!”
I kept driving and the farther north that I drove, the darker and scarier the sky looked. I had been in the car for about twenty minutes when I heard that the airport had been evacuated because there was a tornado spotted minutes away. All that I could think about was my little car getting sucked off of the freeway into a tornado. I finally got freaked out enough to pull over at the next exit and found a parking garage in a mixed-use development to wait it out. The tornado watch expired and the airport was open again, so I got back on the road again!
The sky was still black and scary, but I thought, I can survive another twenty minutes in the car. Rain started pouring down in sheets, and hail started beating down on the roof of my car. By this point I wasn’t yet afraid for my safety, I was scared that my poor little car would be all beaten up! The rain got so bad that I couldn’t see and I started driving 20 miles an hour while saying a few Hail Marys just praying that I wouldn’t hit or be hit. I couldn’t pull over because I couldn’t see the side of the road. I’ve never driven through anything like it.
I FINALLY made it to the airport and after driving around the parking garage for 20 minutes, I found a covered spot for my car. I checked the airline app and it said that my flight was still on time. I knew if I hustled, I could make it through security in plenty of time to board. I had NO idea that I was about to walk into a line of about 6,000 people all waiting to get through security. These were all of the people who had already made it through security before the tornado, but had to be rechecked after the evacuation.
People kept cutting in front of me to get to other lines, and I was so angry. Obviously that made no sense because they weren’t doing anything wrong. And everything about this situation was out of my control, so I had no choice but to just go with the flow. So why was I wasting all of that energy? Beats me! I ran into some friends from high school who were trying to catch a flight to Arizona. And then I started making friends in line. After about 90 minutes in the security line and a random airport employee trying to convince me that my flight had been cancelled, I made it through to the other side! I checked at the gate and my flight was delayed for an hour, which didn’t seem so bad.
I ran into my line friends, some trying to get to Tampa, some to Denver, Albuquerque, Chicago, Nashville, and who knows where else, at the hotel bar. Well, it was more like a kiosk with a couple of stools and a cash register. It couldn’t have been a real bar because when I asked for sparkling wine, the bartender said, “we don’t have wine, but we have champagne.” Then he proceeds to serve me sparkling wine…Turns out, the 6,000 people from the security line ended up at the bar/beer kiosk! However, at the time, I had no idea that there was a line and ended up walking right up to the front where my new friends had found stools and cut in front of about 60-70 people. Ooops!
I ended up telling my life story to some guy named Turner, and made some new friends who live in Westport that I’m going to meet up with when they return from vacation in Florida. Before I knew it, I realized that my crappy, energy wasting mood had turned into a cheery, happy, and optimistic attitude. I didn’t seem too stressed when my one hour delay turned into two hours, then three, then we were finally in the air four hours after the regularly scheduled departure! I ended up missing my connection and wasn’t able to get a flight to my final destination until 4:30 the next afternoon,
Gotta love severe weather in the Midwest!
Firsts
Although I was feeling a bit of a let down knowing that my birthday month was coming to an end, I was excited for my start to September.
My cousin, Ellen, lives in Kent, Ohio and has two children that attend school at Columbia University in New York City. She invited me to fly up to Ohio and hop in the car with her and her daughter so that we could take her daughter back to school for her senior year. I would then drive back with Ellen and get to spend some time with their family (gram’s brother, Bob, and his kids and grandkids) back in Ohio.
Long story short it didn’t work out for me to fly to Ohio, but I was able to fly into NYC and meet them in the city. I flew out of Kansas City at 9:20 am and flew to Charlotte where I had an hour layover….just enough time to grab a sandwich, a vodka soda, and catch a bit of the Penn State Ohio football game. I LOVE the new Penn State jerseys…but I digress. I caught my connecting flight to Newark, NJ.
The day before I left, I surfed around online and talked to my cousin about the best way to get to the city from Newark. We determined that it would be best to take the airport train to the New Jersey Transit System train to Penn Station and then catch the subway to Columbia where I would meet my cousins. I travel alone frequently, so I don’t normally get nervous, but I will admit that I was nervous and a little intimidated at the thought of making this trip, my first trip ever to New York City.
With the help of the airport attendant, I found the airport train to the NJ transit. While on the platform waiting on the NJ Transit train, this guy struck up a conversation with me. He was super nice, heading to the city on business from Houston. We chatted while waiting for the train and even sat near each other. I thought, wow, he is kind of cute, really nice, and super friendly. He even offered to help me with my bag, and that is when I noticed the wedding ring! Ha.
Anyway, I sat next to a New Yorker that helped me and Houston guy find our way around at Penn Station. From there, I bought a metro card and slowly but surely figured out how to catch the subway. Two hours from landing at Newark, I made it to the Columbia campus.
I was in awe of the beauty that was Columbia with its old buildings and well manicured campus. Seeing the hustle and bustle of the students moving in made me miss college. I was also a little intimidated by being in the presence of so many Ivy Leaguers. I know that there is no way that I could have hacked it at an Ivy League. I got to see my cousin Elan’s dorm and then we headed out for our first New York City adventure.
We took the subway to Times Square where my senses were overloaded with the mass marketing and commercialization. Every chain known to man was represented and I saw ads for every TV show to air this fall. Everyone there is out to make or spend a buck. The most interesting thing were all of the people that were in character to try and scam money from people by posing for pictures. Super Mario was there but he creeped me out because he was a middle eastern guy that kept taking off his head and walking around with a scowl on his face….way to scare the children!
We walked to Rockefeller Center, Radio City Music Hall, and several other places in the area before heading to dinner at a local Mexican/Columbian restaurant.
I also got to attend Mass at St. Patrick’s Cathedral. The only thing besides the construction that bothered me was the fact that they let tourists mill around the cathedral during Mass. I thought that was distracting and disrespectful. After Mass, we had my favorite meal, brunch, at a little French cafe before heading off for Soho.
Soho was my favorite part of the city that I saw during my trip. I really wanted to go into Ivanka Trump’s store, but it was closed for remodeling. I also discovered Frye’s leather while in town and I’m still regretting not buying the purple sneakers in the Converse store.
As we were walking back to the Subway, we saw several people stopped out in front of this store taking pictures and there were lines everywhere inside. We thought that there may be someone famous, but we couldn’t figure it out. The name of the store was called Dash, so I pulled out my phone and googled “Dash, Soho, NYC” and a million hits popped up. Kim Kardashian owns the store. Enough said.
We walked down to the financial district and I snapped some pictures of Wall Street and the New York Stock Exchange. The entire time I walked around the city I kept saying, I can’t believe I’m in NYC! I don’t know why I’ve never been before.
We also went to Battery Park and caught a glimpse of the Statue of Liberty before we headed to dinner at a mom and pop greek restaurant near Columbia University.
We did a TON of walking on the trip, so all of the eating didn’t phase me. The only disappointment that I had was that we did not run into any famous people!
I had a lot of firsts on this trip and am already making a list of the things that I would like to do when I go back to the city, which I hope is very soon.
Potbelly: Never Ending Birthday Month
We spent the last day in Chicago as tourists. We did the usual Chicago “stuff”. Walked down Michigan Avenue, went to Millenium Park, Soldier Field, the Field Museum. I figured that I walked about 20 miles a day while in Chicago. I love the thought of living in a place where exercise is built in to your daily activities and commute. Every time I travel somewhere, I imagine myself living in that city. I fantasize about how in shape I would be logging all of those miles…and then I snap back to my suburban reality where we take the car everywhere.
Of course, I also did what I ALWAYS do when I go to Chicago….we ate lunch at Potbelly.
Potbelly is a sandwich shop, but it is more than just a deli, just another Subway, Goodcents, etc. Potbelly is a safe haven. Everyone is welcome without judgement to enjoy comfort food. They serve toasted subs, homemade soups, cookies, and brownies. They have funky decor and indie live music at lunch time.
I discovered Potbelly on a trip to Chi in 2004 and have been hooked ever since. I can’t go to Chicago and not eat at Potbelly at least once. I order the same thing every time I go….a roast beef sandwich with swiss, lettuce, and tomato on wheat bread. This time I got a chocolate chip oatmeal cookie and chips. Its my birthday, I can splurge!
We sat and ate a leisurely lunch and listened to the live music while watching the hustle and bustle of the busy lunch hour. My flight was taking off in 6 hours and I didn’t want to go home! But, I knew that I needed to say good bye for now to Chi-Town, Chris Martin, Bill Rancic, and Potbelly.
Until next time!
Chicago Stalker
When making our arrangements for our Chicago trip, I told my friend that there were only two things that I wanted to do during my stay in the windy city. One, meet up with my British boyfriend, Chris Martin, of the band Coldplay, and two, scout out for my other boyfriend, Chicago native, Bill Rancic.
I don’t watch any TV now, but in college, I had cable for the first time and my own TV for the first time, and became a TV junkie! I discovered Bill Rancic when I watched the very first episode of the Apprentice with Donald Trump. I LOVED him! He was so smart, ambitious, hard working, and of course, good looking! Anyway, he became famous by marrying an E News anchor and having a reality show with her. I’ve never seen the reality show, but found out through the Twitter grapevine that Bill and his wife had opened up an authentic Italian restaurant in Chicago.
When I told my friend about the restaurant, she was super excited, as she is a fan of the reality show. We made reservations and the place is so popular that we couldn’t get in until 10:30.
That just meant that I had plenty of time to do other things. I spent the morning in the hotel lobby drinking mimosas and catching up on some stuff on the computer. Then I decided to venture out for a shopping trip. Normally, I don’t shop anywhere that I can get at home, but I had a DSW birthday coupon that was set to expire before I was going to get back home. So, I found a DSW on State that didn’t have the boots I wanted, so I walked a mile and a half to the next one, sight seeing along the way. I found my boots, and lucky for me, the shoe store was in the same mall as a Whole Foods where I found, yes, you guessed it, Crispin!!
After my afternoon excursion, I headed back to the hotel where we had happy hour and then headed out to a FANTASTIC wine bar, Bin 36. Bin 36 was not only a wine bar, but it also had a wine and cheese shop, and dining area. We sat at the bar and enjoyed wine flights, and hand crafted cocktails with some of the most talented bartenders in the city. I even left with a recipe to take home…Lychee Cucumber Cooler was a refreshing summer cocktail served over ice with lychee liqueur (very hard to find in Kansas City), house infused cucumber vodka, and freshly made lemonade)
We headed out to our dinner reservation with hopes that there would be a Bill Rancic sighting, although, I had been Twitter stocking all day and didn’t get any indication that Bill was in Chicago. In fact, according to Twitter, he was spotted in Corpus Christi at a speaking engagement. Anyway, although it was 10:30 at night, it was CRAZY busy. There wasn’t an empty seat in the house. We started with one round of drinks, then a second round of drinks, and then the waitress took our appetizer order. At first, I appreciated the way that she gave us time to enjoy a leisurely dinner, but then I realized, she was just too busy to be too attentive to us. appetizers consisted of bruschetta and truffle garlic bread!!! Truffle anything??? YES PLEASE! It was to die for! Then came the Brussel sprout chopped salad. For the main course, I ordered the lobster ravioli. I will say that there is a lot of hype surrounding this restaurant, but everything that we had was amazing.
The highlight was the gelato flight that they brought on the house to celebrate our birthdays. Three hours later, we waddled home, full and satisfied, but without any Rancic sightings.
Chicago Bound!
I’m usually very busy leading up to time away from work trying to get everything done and making sure that things are in order during my absence. Getting ready for Chicago was no exception. I had a late day attending an event in Manhattan and got home at 11:00 and still hadn’t packed. My flight was leaving at 6:20 the next morning.
Long story short, I didn’t give myself enough time to get to the airport, and I missed my flight. Lucky for me, there are about 10 flights a day between KC and Chicago, and I was able to get on the very next flight and was only about 20 minutes late.
Needless to say, I was a bit rattled. So, what did I do as soon as I landed? Went to the nearest airport bar and had a bloody mary! The great thing about this trip was that I didn’t have a whole lot planned. The idea was to have a relaxing few days scouting for my boyfriends, Chris Martin and Bill Rancic. More on that later.
I tool the train and eventually made it to our hotel in downtown Chicago. I took a quick nap and then made it out for the first thing on the agenda….a run on Lake Shore Drive. The hotel had a pocket map of a four mile run and a seven mile run. However, I didn’t realize that the distance from the hotel to the lake counted as a part of the run, so I had intended on doing the four mile run and ended up doing about 8 miles. It is amazing what the water does for my endurance. I never checked the clock and ran further and faster than usual.
I walked back to the hotel and stopped in a corner drugstore for a post run cold drink, and what did I find, Crispin!!! Crispin is distributed by Miller Coors, based in Chicago, so, Crispin is readily available in drug stores, grocery stores, convenience stores, bars, and restaurants all over the city.
After my run and cold drink, I showered, threw my wet hair up, and headed out to the blow dry bar. This is a concept that is pretty foreign to my area, but popular on the coasts and in other major cities. I have thick, curly hair, and it takes me forever to blow dry and flat iron my hair, so I thought it would be cool and save some time to make an appointment at a blow dry bar. There happened to be one about four blocks from our hotel. The girl that did my blow out was so cool. She was my age and we spent the 45 minutes talking about our cities and all of the fun things to do.
As soon as I stepped outside of the salon, the rain started pouring. Just my luck! But, the receptionist was so nice, she chased me down with a shower cap! Yes, I walked the four blocks back to the hotel in a shower cap! Who cares, I’d never see any of these people again, right?
My friends and I met for dinner and drinks at a local burger and beer joint on Michigan Avenue. After dinner, I was headed to the United Center!
I hailed a cab that dropped me off a few blocks from the UC where I was able to buy a floor seat at face value! And I didn’t have to sell a kidney to afford it!
Let me just say that Chris Martin and the boys put on a PHENOMENAL show! It was hands down one of the two best live shows that I have ever seen. The crowd was AMAZING! It was one of the most alive and engaging crowd that I have ever seen at a live show. One of the coolest things about the show was the wrist bands that they handed out at the door. They lit up in sync with the music, so it was awesome to see the dark stadium light up in multicolored hues to the music. They played for at least two solid hours. I was in awe of how Chris Martin just gets into the music. He is such a talented piano player…I could feel his heart and soul in the music.
I am so glad that I got to go to the concert. It was a great experience and such a fantastic way to continue the birthday month celebration.
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