We�re not taking a vacation this year. We�ve taken short weekend trips, and I�m sure more are in store for the fall, but it just doesn�t make sense for us to spend a jillion dollars on travel, hotels, boarding the puppy, etc when so much is in flux for us � Kent�s about to start school, I�m interviewing for new jobs (cross fingers, wish luck, no jinxing, etc), and right now we have neither the time nor the guilt-free funds to spend on a vacation. But I�m off work this week � the store is closed for 10 days! � and Kent doesn�t start business school for another week, so we came up with the following idea: Vacation At Home!!
In order to sell the Vacation At Home!! idea to each other, we have declared NO RESTAURANT TOO EXPENSIVE and NO NAP TOO LONG for the week. The plan is to enjoy New York and all it has to offer, to be tourists without actually having to pay for a hotel room, to have a Vacation At Home!!
Less exciting but no less a priority is my goal of buying a filing cabinet and getting the enormous pile of miscellany in the bedroom organized. Not exactly Vacation!!-worthy, but I want that pile GONE. So we may or may not go to some museums, movies and noteworthy destinations, and we may or may not get our apartment organized. We shall see. But we are eating out a lot! A lot lot lot, as a matter of fact. Saturday night we had sushi at Blue Ribbon, last night we ate at AOC Bedford, and tonight we�re going to 71 Clinton Fresh Food. Trust me when I tell you that while these places may not mean anything to you, they have all been on the semi-short list of restaurants I�ve wanted to try for a long, long time, so me and my belly are HAPPY.
(Oh, and lest you begin to covet my fun, girl-on-the-go, New York lifestyle [ha ha HA!], please read on�Last night we had dinner at AOC Bedford, a tiny restaurant in the West Village. It is definitely a Grown-Up place, very quiet and civilized, with great food and a cozy setting. Cozy enough so that upon my return from the restroom, when I FELL ON MY ASS, the whole restaurant saw. I am still mortified. I fall a lot � like, A LOT. I�ve always been clumsy. But I had previously never engaged in a total pratfall for a roomful of diners. My heel slipped, I tumbled, I fell. And today, I am SORE from it. Humiliating.)
Vacation At Home!! may or may not be a total failure. It is raining out and I�m sitting at the computer, un-showered at noon on a Monday. So we�ll see how much Kent and I accomplish. But in honor of vacations everywhere, I bring you pictures from trips past�because I know how the internet loves a photo essay!!
First:
Kent and I went to Mexico a few years ago. And I participated in a local elementary school project � Flat Stanley. Flat Stanley is apparently a kids� book about a kid (person? doll?) named Stanley who is (yep) flat. And because he is flat, he is able to travel all over the world, via suitcases and mail and pockets (I think). The local school was doing a Flat Stanley project and asked for volunteers to take the kids� own Flat Stanley dolls on grown-up travels. So I took one, soon re-named Flat Babette, with me to Mexico. She had a great time.
In Paris, I admired the Minis:
In Hawaii I sat and pondered my inability to get a tan:
Long before there was Kent to take me on trips, there was Jay. My gay best friend took me on a gay vacation to Gay Key West and we stayed at a gay guesthouse and went to drag shows and went gay snorkeling and gay kayaking and took a gay boat ride. Note the sarong (his):
And of course, Disneyland. Also with my friend Jay (he of the Gay Sarong):
But I saved the best for last. I went to Disneyland with my best friend�s family when I was about seven. We drove there, and I got carsick. We stayed at my friend�s grandmother�s house, and I got homesick. We rode Space Mountain, and I got scared. But I also got some kick-ass mirrored sunglasses ON A PURPLE SUNGLASS-CORD-THINGY, which can be seen if you look hard enough at this picture. You have to look really, really hard because the wild and crazy print of my hideous circa-1982 shirt obscures said sunglasses. But they are there, and they are mirrored. I believe they fell off on the Mattehorn, though.
