Travels

I've been back from the States for almost a week now - its about time I tossed some words down on this thing. As most people reading this know, Gwen is already at least two, and possibly three posts ahead of me, having detailed not only our trip but also what we've been doing since we've returned. Such are the "burdens" of traveling (and being) with someone so maddeningly efficient I suppose. And so perhaps this post will come with sort of an "old news" feel, but oh well - everybody can just deal with it.

There are some advantages to posting second, one of them being that I can simply refer any readers over to her blog for the details of our trip (If you still don't have the password, feel free to email me) and use the space below on my jonny-come-lately blog to comment on the high points.

For my part, I will say that the trip was both fun and exhausting, as trans-Atlantic traveling tends to be. Our journey was mired in delays upon delays, with nary a leg of the trip going according to plan (other than perhaps our initial hop from Frankfurt to Amsterdam), and so much so that it nearly became a Planes, Trains, and Automobiles sort of fiasco. In the end, I was sorry to miss the intended wedding, but there was nothing to be done to be done about it, and everything else more or less worked itself out, though we did spend a fair amount of time in airports and train stations.

And now, my musings:

-First, it was great to see everyone. Great to see (and spend time) with my parents, great to meet Gwen's dad, step-mother, and the rest of the Pittsburgh faithful, and great to see some old family friends (Ceil, Jackie), who always bring back solid memories of childhood.

-Second, it was great to be back in the United States. It was the first time I had set foot there since returning from Iraq, and its always a good feeling to be "home". I am grateful for the opporunity to live in and see Europe like this, but after four years I will be absolutely ready to go back. (Its just too hard being a football fan here.) Anyway, its hard to quantify how nice it is to be cognizant of cultural nuances, or how cool it is to walk into a Best Buy and know that all voltage and electronics issues don't even factor in - or that I can clearly speak the language.

-Pittsburgh is a great town. I had never set foot in it before, but after having spent significant time with both Gwen and Cameron (another person lucky enough to hail from the Iron City), I had heard many tales of this strange Western Pennsylvanina town with its powerful aura and unique charms. And I was impressed.

The city is pretty, with a tight skyline situated amidst the infamous "Three Rivers". The surrounding area is hilly, with cool neighborhoods built on industrial history (namely steel) but transforming nicely to fit more modern times. The local brew (Iron City) is gritty but rewarding, the type of thing to put hair on a man's chest without always causing blindness. Gwen showed me around the impressive University of Pittsburgh, we took an "Incline" and ate at some of the hallowed town haunts (Primanti's, The "O") and a nice restaurant or two as well. One night we even ate inside of PNC park (home of the Pirates) in probably the nicest Outback Steakhouse I've ever been in.

There was Steelers (and Penguins, and Pirates) stuff everywhere, and a more loyal fan base - or a town more defined by its sports teams - I can't recall. (Gwen's dad and Donna even gave me a Steeler's shirt to help me try and fit in. I even tried rooting with the accent - "Go Still'ers" - but I'm not sure if it worked. Anyway, as the Steelers are not a direct rival of the Giants, I don't feel like a "dirty" sports bigamist wearing the shirt, and I can even say with pride that the Steelers are BY FAR the best team Pennsylvania has to offer. Like comparing my sister's boyfriends' physical strength with my dad's - its not even close.)

All in all, I have to give the Steel City a big thumbs up.

-For the second leg of our trip, we visited New York City, which, with each trip, becomes more and more one of my favorite cities. I've always thought it would be fun to live in Manhattan for exactly one year to really get a feel for it. And had I not been indentured to the Army for the purposes of my residency, I think I would have strongly considered New York as an option. Regardless, NYC is great. It's expensive and busy, but I love the palpable energy there - and no other city I've been in has such a true international flavor as New York when it comes to the people (and food) one encounters there.

-Spent a hour or two at the World Trade Center Site, which I had visited before (in 2004), but which is always something to see. Again, I was struck by the great empty space on an otherwise uber-dense chunk of prime real estate in crowded downtown Manhattan. Standing there and contemplating the infamous events is indeed sobering. Clearly, the fall of the Towers has played such a role in my own life, of course, and this sense of connected national history is a different, and certainly more jarring, sensation to register when compared to experiencing some of the more sobering landmarks over here in Europe - even the dour Holocaust ones. To stand there and think in some part that I spent seven-plus months in Baghdad (even though Iraq had nothing to do with Sept 11 - but that is quite a different story...) because of what happened RIGHT HERE is kind of a crazy thing indeed. Hard not to stare up and imagine planes hitting buildings and people running like hell. Very chilling and certainly a little emotional.

The memorial they have up currently is simple and effective. There are poignant photographs and little distressing blurbs of text detailing the events of the day. People were strolling slowly by, taking it all in. The names of the victims are posted, one of which I was sad to learn was the son of the people whom we sold our house to in New Jersey as we left for California many years ago.

All in all a very sobering experience.




-We saw "Phantom" on Saturday night on Broadway, which was a great night out. What I find interesting about Broadway Musicals (Tm), however, is that the experience of dressing up, of going out to a nice dinner, of then hitting the theaters amidst crowds of other theater-goers and having cocktails in the lobby, is in fact far more enjoyable than the actual performance itself. Mostly I think this stems from the fact that I'm not really a "musical guy" - I find the entire story-telling device to be snicker-worthy, even outwardly hilarious at times. I knew I was in for it when the first words of the first song were sung and I had to suppress a laugh. Why is he singing? Why can't he just TALK about it? Does he deeply and emotively serenade his mirror every time he brushes his teeth? Is anyone else finding this funny? What the hell is going on here? Why can't everyone just settle down?

Anyway, this sort of attitude doesn't quite mix with he musical scene. I've probably just seen too much MST3K and other satire... That said, WITHIN this story-telling device, the performances were mostly top notch and I still enjoyed it. The singing was excellent, and the woman who played Christine was amazing, both in acting and voice, and I thought she blew everyone else off the stage, especially the Phantom, whom I found a little lackluster in his acting (though his singing was solid).

-Gwen surprised me with Business Class tickets for the trans-atlantic portion of our trip (to and fro), and I must say that it will be difficult to go any other way from now on. The leg room was vast (I had to stretch fully horizontal to touch the seat in front of me with my foot), the chairs went almost completely flat, and well, this picture of my chair control should say it all:




-And finally, some more photos from the trip:



Heinz Field with PNC Park (on the right)


The Burgh




The Cathedral of Learning at U Pitt (Where Saruman came out and threatened us)





You can really taste the Iron!



Being an Ass in Pittsburgh - its Easy and Fun!



An unfortunate encounter at the NBC Studio Store...







Saw Bill Murray and the other Ghostbusters here...



Empire State Building - Inside



Empire State Building - Outside


Spider Sense Tingling...




Calling for the curve on Willie Stargell



Now, back for a week, Gwen and I have embarked on a home improvement weekend (maybe Bed, Bath, and Beyond - if there's time). The most exciting prospect, of course, is the development of my Man Room (Tm). Stay tuned for details...

Travel Madness

Gwen and I are sitting in the Amsterdam Airport at a flight lounge. Six Euros has bought me 30 minutes of internet time. Today is to be a travel day for the ages in an attempt to get to a wedding tomorrow.

Our tentative plan:

Frankfurt --> Amsterdam --> New York (change airports: JFK to La Guardia) --> Chicago ---> Grand Rapids (finally).

Our supposed arrival time is around midnight Michigan time. Sitting here, however, and due to foul weather in the Northeast, we've learned our flight from La Guardia to Chicago has been cancelled. Now we're trying to figure out other options. Sounds like its going to be a rough day.

The wedding is tomorrow at 3 pm....

Stay Tuned.

Say it Frenchy

We got back from France last Saturday after a week of skiing. Those in attendance: Myself, Gwen, Pete, Libby, Brian (Pete's Brother), Betsy (family friend of the Hennings), and one George R. Mount IV (Eagle Fan).

Many of you have already seen Gwen's post on the subject, and since time is short this week, (a busy week of work for me followed by more traveling here shortly - to the States), I'm finding that I'm in a work-man like mode of just getting this post done. Which is too bad, because the week was fun, and probably deserves a lengthier and more thought out post, but oh well. We'll see what happens in the lines of text below.

This trip was one of those classic travel stories where the actual vacation part was fun, but the traveling to and fro were quite nightmarish. George flew uneventfully into Frankfurt on Friday, and we caravanned down toward the Alps with Pete and Libby the following day, having to stop in Geneva to pick up Brian and Betsy. After several traffic jams and delays, and even a missed flight (due to weather), we all finally united at the Geneva airport (though Brian's skis were missing) late that Saturday already several hours off schedule. The traffic to Val D' Sere wasn't bad AFTER Geneva, but we got turned around and lost a couple of times on the French highways and I think it was at least 9 pm before we even rolled into town. Then Pete had to jump a series of hurdles for us to get our apartment key (since we arrived after 7 pm, there was a lengthy key obtaining process, mostly involving us finding a piece of paper, which led to another place, which led to another paper, which led to a map, and then to a key...and so on - it was comical).

Finally we got our keys and found the apartment - we offloaded the cars and then Pete and I went to park them. Sounds simple enough, right? Wrong. Pete and I parking two cars in a crowded ski village with icy roads and minimal parking took AT LEAST an hour - and both of our cars were on empty with the only gas station in the village closed for the night. By the end of the ordeal Pete's car was parked illegally and Gwen's was parked just about in Italy. Upon walking back to the apartment, Pete and I requested stiff drinks and decided never to speak of parking the cars again.

After that, things went great (minus the return trip, which we also won't speak of). The apartment was sweet, the company was good, the snow levels were solid (and we got hit once while there even), and things were generally wicked fun. We brought Guitar Hero (version 1 and 2) and just about every day started, ended, and middled with rousing sessions of two player battles (and later co-ops). Even the non-video game players were drawn to the game, as is par for the course (I'm learning) with Guitar Hero.

Despite our daily exercise on the slopes, it wasn't the healthiest week in the world with both massive food intake and excessive alcohol use. At times, it felt like we were back in college as both Asshole and Quarters were played on various nights.

Some of the other highlights:

-The food in France is normally quite divine, and ordinarily far superior to German food, but this time it didn't hold up, likely owing to the fact that Val D' Sere is mostly a ski resort town with a captive audience and no incentive to keep multiple gourmet restaurants around. That said, we did have a couple of good meals and the grocery store had an excellent selection of cheeses which we feasted upon daily in between sets of Guitar Hero.

-And speaking of France, half the fun we had during the week was in mocking France, and of course the French (and the language), either by imitating the accent or by laughing with the snobby "Haw, Haw Haw" French-style laugh. Its always good fun to be American Idiots (Tm). And what were they gonna do about it, surrender?

-One of the best things about this trip was the re-unification of the Stup-Mount-Taint (Pete) team which hadn't happened since residency ended. The old stories came out, the jokes came flying, laughter was plentiful and we basically had a blast.

-At one of our meals, the listing of "Cock in Red Wine Sauce" was labeled as an entree and I simply couldn't resist. I ordered it, not so much because I was in the mood for poultry, but mostly because I just couldn't let the chance slip by to make about a thousand immature "cock" jokes over the course of a two hour meal. And most people reading this can imagine just how far I took this joke over the course of the meal (and some might say the next several days). I could drop some examples, but its probably best if we just move on.

-On Thursday, we hired a guide to take us through the back country of the mountain and get some untouched "lines". This turned out to be a great move. Our guide was from Boston, but had lived in France for the past fifteen years, and was a good resource of information about all sorts of things (the mountain, the culture, etc). The snow was great, as was the scenery. It was definitely worth the expense. The only down-side was that I was the only snowboarder and lots of the connection points from run to run involved significant taxiing or traversing. But overall it was a great day in the relatively untouched wilderness.

-One of the most amusing things about this mountain was the on-mountain Apres (after ski) scene, which featured several techno bars on the mountain. One place in particular, near the mid-mountain, was the best of all. After coasting over a flat, you'd come over a ridge and the bass would hit you first. Seconds later, the bumping lodge became visible and the techno was in full effect. Most hilarious was that by the end of the day there were Funboys (Tm) there who had shown up JUST for the after-party (i.e had taken the gondola up at about 3 pm). They had shoes and nice clothes on - it was hilarious. Libby was good enough to capture footage of some of this scene, which I'll post below and is worth checking out. There will be pics as well.


And finally a list of one-liners, quotes and such, mostly to remind the people who were there:

-"I am Peter Henning. I am on the Mount-ain..."

-"Argh, I'm a Pilot"

-Euroherd

-Tractor Beam

-Brian stuck at the Gondola

-From an Actual Conversation on the Phone:

French person: "Bonjour... (followed by more French Greeting)"

Me: "Ah, yes - Bonjour...uh...Parlez-vous anglais?"

French Person: (slight pause) "Non"

Me: "Um...OK....well, uh, I guess we're done here....good bye!" (Hangs up).



And now - the pics!




The Big Three


George Schools the Slopes


Brian stuck in the gondola line after the rest of us get through


Jumping Jackasses


Action Libby





Brian Schools a Turn


Brian is the tiny dot in the middle amidst the ugly scenery



Henning Boys


Pete and Libby slopeside


Pete gets X-treme!!!



And now, prepare for a Funboy Special. These guys were all over this techno bar. There were three main players (pictured). Check out how they play off each other (in a classic Funboy Triangle Maneuver) in the video. Hilarious.



Funboy 1


Funboy 2




Funboy 3


This video is gold:

The Eagle Fan has Landed

...and taken quite a liking to Guitar Hero.




It's been almost two years since I've seen the legendary G. Mount and damn if it isn't great to see the guy. Eagles and Giants taunts are flying, residency stories are spilling out - entertaining all of those who were there and boring all those who weren't - we're well on our way to being solid old men.

Next stop, France!

More Berlin

Gabe demanded more posts. Here you go.

This one is mostly visuals. And look how Picasa "Art-i-fied" the pics are!

Tomorrow Gwen's Mom and Step-Dad leave. And as they take off, one George Mount arrives. We're going skiing in France, leaving Saturday for a week. Game on!