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Back on the East Coast

June 30, 2006 1:42 AM

irst night here in Albany. It’s hard to believe that this day started at 4:23am. Let me fill you in on it.

I got into Ryan and Ben’s place in Chicago at about 10:20-ish. We hung out for a little bit and watched some MASH. Then, they went to bed because they had to get up for work. But not before they gave me directions for how to get to the appropriate subway/bus entrances, etc. We hit the sack around midnight, and I planned to get up at about 4:15am in order to get to O’Hare by 6am, one hour before my 7am flight. I set my alarm for 4:15 and went to sleep.

At some point later, I was uncomfortable on the couch I was sleeping on. So I woke up. “God, this sucks.� I thought. “Thank god the alarm hasn’t gone off yet – that means I’ve still got time to sleep.� No sooner had I thought this than I rolled over and decided to go back to sleep. But, before I could return to a state of slumber, I decided that it might be prudent to check my phone to see how long I had to sleep before I had to wake up. So I looked at the phone and, to my horror, saw that it was 4:23am. My alarm hadn’t gone off.

“Fuck,� I thought. Fortunately, I had gone to sleep in my “travel clothes� and I was ready to go in minutes. I had to walk about a third of a mile. I covered the distance quickly and was on the El in no time. Then I took a bus and then the Blue Line up to O’Hare. I checked in and everything was in motion.

My flight was pretty much event-free. A simple flight from O’Hare to Detroit, and then to Albany. PJ’s friend picked me up at the airport and dropped me off at PJ and Karen’s place. There I saw one of my best friends from college, Chris, for the first time in years. It was great to see him and his girlfriend, Roxanna. We hung out for a while, walked around, checked out the local scene.

Empire State Plaza, by the way, is one of the ugliest places I’ve ever seen. And extremely Orwellian, to boot. I swear, I saw the Ministry of Truth (Min True).

Finally, PJ got off of work and we met up with him. Then we picked up Karen. It was the first time in years that so many of my good friends from Flagstaff were in one place. It was a great feeling.

We feasted on a meal of PJ’s excellent home-made fettuccini alfredo (I want to take a moment to recognize the fact that PJ insisted that it had to be fettuccini. When we were at the market, he and Karen were sure that they had fettuccini at home, so we didn’t buy any. When we arrived back home, PJ discovered, to his horror (and his alone) that he didn’t have fettuccini. Instead, he had only linguini. Now, I don’t see the difference between fettuccini and linguini, except that one isn’t as wide as the other. But they taste the same and (as Karen and I demonstrated most effectively) consist of the exact same ingredients. So, why PJ insisted that we had to go for a twenty minute drive in search of fettuccini is beyond me.) and then commenced drinking. As much as it pains me, I have to admit that PJ’s home-brew beer was, in a word, awesome.

Then, we went to a bar here in Albany called Mohar’s or something. It’s this bar where you sign in and, based on what you’ve had in the past, you get a print-out of various beers you can order. It was actually an awesome bar.

After that, we somehow crammed 8 people into a normal Crown Victoria taxi. The cab driver told us that the two girls had to go in the front and the 6 guys in the back. It was a tight fit, but we managed to do it. This was one of the proudest moments of my life. We actually got applause when we closed the door on the thing. The thing that sucked about it is that we actually broke on of the guy’s doors. Still, we got the door closed and the guy sitting closest to that door managed not to fall out. We got dropped off, all exited from the driver’s side door (so as to not let on that the passenger’s side door was broken), paid, and got the fuck out of there.

Then, we came back and played some Flagstaff-style asshole (I’ll teach you all the rules soon), drank, discussed various super-important things, and then passed out.

Or, rather, everyone except me passed out. Now I’m blogging, I guess. Expect further updates during the trip and pictures to come soon enough.

Tomorrow we drive to Hartford and I see Frank for the first time in a year – on the day before his wedding. Frank, you’re my oldest friend, and I can’t convey how excited I am to see you tie the knot or how honored I am to be one of your groomsmen.



7 Comments


Elise said:

not sure if you've noticed that some of the text shows up funny. notably when you use quotes and/or puncutuation of any kind besides what comes at the end of a sentence (i.e. periods etc.).

new blog bugs be gone!

June 30, 2006 12:59 PM



Lauren said:

Tell everyone I said hi! I wish I could see you all there together..and tell Frank congrats!

June 30, 2006 9:15 PM



RPM said:

I didn't hear any of the panic in the living room. I figured you may have had to rush based on the leftover pizza still there uneaten when I woke up. I'm glad you made it!

I used to live a block from that neolithic state plaza. It is really based on the capital complex in Brasilia. One look at this and you know where the "egg" and towers got their godforesaken inspiration. The capitol building itself is beautiful. I say it's the best non-domed capitol.

Well done on the clown taxi trick.

June 30, 2006 10:18 PM



Ismael Tapia II said:

I saw some of those symbols. But they go away if you refresh your browser. Or, at least they do for me.

I agree, the capitol building is really awesome, but I've still gotta vote for the Wisconsin capitol.

Lauren, I will tell everyone you say hello.

June 30, 2006 10:34 PM



You're a tool said:

Who gives a fuck? You're not the first and you're certainly not the last to be a slob and complete weirdo. If you're going to have a blog, please contribute something other than supermarket checkout lane material.

July 1, 2006 2:39 AM



Ismael Tapia II said:

Nice. Listen, no one's forcing you to read the blog. I'll ignore for the time being the fact that the whole point of blogs is that they give you a forum to talk about whatever you want. If I wanted to blog about the various things I find on the soles of my shoes, that's my prerogative.

Your command that I "contribute" something is nonsensical and, frankly, hypocritical. In the future, please feel free to comment here, but only if it contributes something. You fucking asshole.

July 1, 2006 10:22 AM



Chrystal said:

Interesting comments flying about in here. I'm glad you made it there and that you're having fun catching up with eveyone.

July 2, 2006 3:43 AM



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