Didn't Sleep To Well

9/11

Yesterday was a very, very long day. But it was also amazing.

Still didn't sleep too well, and the sun is coming in through our window like a giant spotlight early in the morning. After tossing and turning for a bit we got up and headed out. Our breakfast plan was the uber-health conscious dunkin' donuts, and despite it being literally across the street from us, it took us about 10 minutes to find. In our defense, it was down by the subway and not at ground level.

We walked down 53rd street to Moma, but were 40  minutes early and rather than wait in line took a stroll around the neighborhood, through the Rockafeller center and past the fifth avenue shops. 

After killing time for a bit we went back to Moma where the line seemed long but moved fast. I knew which floors I was interested in, so we started at the very top, 6th floor. There were two special exhibits, one on Alighiero Boetta and another on design for children. Both were interested but not what I had really come to Moma for.

What I had come for was on the 5th floor: Magritte, Dali, Modigliani, Matisse, Monet, Picasso, Van Gogh, Malevich, Miro, Tanguay, and all that good stuff. We went through room after room of modern painting. I didn't use the audio track much because I didn't want to be distracted from the actual paintings.

I was familiar with many of the paintings, but nothing compares to seeing a painting in person, it just evokes a different feeling in me than seeing photographs in books or on the internet. Moma has one of my favorite Magritte paintings, Empire of Light 2, and it was like running into an old friend. I spotted a Modigliani from across the room. Salvidore Dali's Persistence of Memory was much smaller than I expected, as a lot of famous paintings have been. Andrew Wyeth's Christine's World casually hung in one corner near the elevator, as though she couldn't get herself into any of the main rooms either.

We had lunch at the mid-range cafe, discussing the art we'd seen and what famous painter we'd want hanging on our walls. I've discovered that Tart's and Quiche's and things with warm cheese are always the safe choice at museums.

We went through most of the rest of the museum at a fairly rapid pace, checking out the Warhol and etc. There was a special exhibit on the Brother's Quay which was very interesting, and we did slow down for it, but it left them as enigmatic and unknowable as ever.

Though a bit sore from all the walking we headed out to do a bit of shopping, but I didn't find anything I loved. We searched for food in the Times Square area but it was a bit too touristy, and after fussing tiredly at each other near our hotel we grabbed some snacks from a nearby convenience store for dinner. It was a marked difference from lunch.

After that we rested a bit because we were about to go see Sleep No More -- the most anticipated part of our trip. For months we weren't even sure we'd be able to see it, because it was scheduled to close before we'd get there. All my relations and friends were subjected endlessly to descriptions and eager hopeful proclamations. Nervously we'd log onto their website and watch the dates eek closer to our vacation days until finally they were extended through September. So, putting it mildly, we were very excited (and nervous) about seeing Sleep No More. 

Getting there on the subway was easy, and we found our way to the McKittrick hotel with no trouble, joining a long line of people ready to go in. It wasn't too long before we entered.

It's the kind of thing that's hard to talk about, because it feels like it should be a secret. It's hard to even describe the feeling, an adult play land of dark hallways and mysterious rooms, dancers and nudity. Trying to define it would take away the magic, and trying to leave it mysterious would make me sound like HP Lovecraft, full of indescribable and unnamable. And of course, pictures were not allowed. That would ruin the experience. The few people talking when they shouldn't annoyed me for breaking the atmosphere.

Here's what I can say:

Before even donning our masks, Tech Support and I got split up and I was terrified at being alone but also okay, because I wanted us to have separate experiences. Still, when I found him 10 minutes later I took the opportunity to startle him. We explored together for maybe an hour before I lost him in a room full of people. I kept an eye out for a tall guy in a light shirt, but there were quite a few of them. (Later he told me there were a lot of short girls too). 

I spent the next two hours or so wandering on my own until the climax of the show, when we were all shuffled out of the hotel. Tech Support and I found each other and rather than fight the crush of people, headed back out into the real world.

It was a surprisingly gentle transition. It was now after ten and dark and moody outside. We took the opportunity to walk over and sit on the high line. We felt safe even though it was late and we were in a strange neighborhood, and sat and talked about the different things we'd seen. Tired and foot-sore, I pushed us to head back to our hotel. While walking down the high line we heard a strange voice from underneath, a recording, say "Bad Animals. Tapeworm. Rats. Cockroach." And in some way it felt like we were still in a performance art piece. (Of course it was another bit of art we'd stumbled across.)

In our room, we made reservations to do Sleep No More again on Friday.

New York, New York

9/8/12

I always expect packing to take more work than it actually does. Maybe I remember too many childhood trips taken with four people, when my brother was a baby, and lugging what seemed like a dozen (although was probably more like four)  bags around.

Instead I toss as many clothes as I can into a suitcase along with Tech Support's, and it only fills one suitcase, and we're done. And I wander around the apartment trying to find what I've forgotten.

Still, I don't sleep great before flights, and the night before last was no exception. As a result I was pleasantly out of it for the ride to the airport, breakfast at McDonalds, and most of the flight too. 

We took off a little late and Tech Support and I were sitting in a front area with massive amount of legroom and no place for our bags. The single window was covered up by our third row-mate, so the entire time I kept pretending that we weren't actually in the air, but in a strange vibrating room. Frigid air was blasting from the emergency exit, making our poor row-mate who sat next to it miserable, as well as bewildered and upset that no one could do anything about it mid-air.

So for about 5 hours we read, fussed, got hungry but didn't pay for expensive food, dozed, and then landed.

It was raining in Jamaica (where JFK is, which did confuse me). We actually were late getting in because of a "weather system" which we later discovered to our extreme surprise were tornados in Brooklyn. We missed all of it, and took a cab into Manhattan. Traffic was slow at first but eventually we saw the bright lights.

After checking in and changing we headed out to meet up with Erica. Not sure how to get a cab Tech Support kinda flailed in the air until a driver took pity on us. We met up with Erica and her beau and enjoyed good company, good conversation and chianti. Afterwards we split up, tried to find the subway, gave up, and took the taxi back to the hotel.

9/9/12

Neither of us slept too great. In the morning I dozed poorly, my body bewildered by the way the sun blasted through the windows at 5am (it didn't know about the time change). Eventually we dragged ourselves up and out to breakfast.

We enjoyed our breakfast thoroughly, and almost as much enjoyed watching about two dozen well dressed New Yorkers poured into the restaurant. There was a lot of hugging and chatting and near as we could figure a large group of family and friends had just come from service and were enjoying some kind of occasion together for breakfast. Envelopes kept being passed to one member of the party. Tech Support and I speculated on what was happening.

After that we figured out the subway system without too much pain and took two short jaunts to get from near our hotel up to a corner of Central Park. 

Of course we had to go to the Apple Store there. Tech Support got himself a diminutive magic gizmo for taking credit cards which seemed to make him happy about a future of charging people. Rather than going to the park we went further down 5th street, checking out all the fancy stores. We found Uni Qlo and checked out the clothes but weren't ready to shop yet, so turned and headed back to Central Park.

Under orders from my mother to go to Strawberry Fields we went entered the park. We'd been discussing Law and Order and the high chances of finding a dead body in the area, so I took every opportunity to go under bridges (the best place to find a body). Unfortunately my zeal lead us far afield of our actual goal, and even took us directly under Strawberry Fields. Thanks to Tech Support we finally ended up in the right area, where dozens of tourists were gathered around the imagine mosaic. A man with a guitar kept singing "Let It Be" over and over again, possibly not even using any other lyrics. I wondered why he didn't sing Imagine.

After that we meandered through the park a bit more, enjoying a perfect day too much because suddenly we were out of time and rushing back into the city to meet with Erica on time. I almost got us lost but then we found her and her guy in time for "Avenue Q".

"Avenue Q" made me feel very different about puppets. It was also an excellent way to relax after walking all over the city. Afterwards we had a few more minutes to catch up with Erica, though it didn't really feel like enough, as they walked us back to our hotel. We shared awkward hugs and waved goodbye. Unfortunately, it wasn't until later that day I realized I'd failed to take any pictures of us together.

Tech Support and I weren't really ready to retire to our room, but since we were at the hotel we went inside only to discover the hotel wasn't ready for us either -- the elevators weren't moving. We left and went down the street to a restaurant in our guidebook where we enjoyed a long romantic dinner together.

Tech Support had some romantic New-York-Notion of staying out late doing more things, but by the time we were done and it was nearly 8pm we instead were ready to collapse into our bed. Luckily this time the elevators were working and we got to our room without trouble.

Ghost Real Estate

I think we both slept better in Barstow, due in no small part to not being freezing cold all night. Since we'd gone to bed early we both woke up fairly early and after consulting the internet on various important issues, packed up and said good-bye to the tiny little pool. We were bound -- for IHOP!


Theo had the evening previous stated that he wanted a real breakfast, not Sara's 'eat something, whatever, come-on, let's go!' routine. Our choices in Barstow and the surrounding area seemed to be between Denny's and IHOP so -- there we went to enjoy pancakes and hashbrowns. Theo got a crepe with fresh fruit, one of the few non-fried things he'd had in the past few days.


Next we got onto the 58 freeway and started out for California City. The sky was dark and ominous in most directions, and we saw lightening in the distance. There really wasn't much else to see except for broken old houses doing imitations of Stone Henge.




We came upon California City boulevard and turned right, traveling through more nothing. Another ten minutes and we'd reached our ultimate goal.


California City was strange. Very strange. We'd read about it in an article some month's ago and both been determined to come out and see the endless empty lots that made up the third largest city in CA -- geographically. At first all we saw was the actual city -- but something wasn't quite right. Street signs marked streets that weren't there. There were strange, double, one-way streets and we made a wrong turn and went down one going the wrong way, not that it mattered because no one was there. At one point in the middle of the city, only a dozen yards from a Rite Aid, we drove around a winding street with dead-ended off shoots, ending in a circular spot of asphalt. There were no buildings being served by this road.





We got out to the edge of town and found the lots. Debris and motorcycle tracks littered the ground. Weeds had forced their way up through the cracked roads that led past dozens and dozens of empty real estate signs. Others still sat in the weeds, hopeful that maybe someone would be interested in some local property. Strange metal pipes stuck up at even intervals and we found a fire-hydrant parked out in nowhere. Here and there we caught sight of houses and trailers without any nearby neighbors.





I looked at Theo and around where we stood and knew these empty lots went on and on and on. It was strange, and surreal. I dubbed it standing amidst ruins that had never come to be. Really, it was the ruins of one mans fantasy. We'd come out here to look at nothing, and it was pretty creepy.



After a little while we'd had enough, and got back onto one of the main roads to take us out. Even out here we caught sight of a few more strange, endless roads going nowhere and some of the strange, naive charm of California City. We drove on out through all the empty lots.




After that we made a pretty straight/circuitous trip back home. We'd talked about going through Angeles National Forest but it was raining so hard and we were pretty tired, so we took the 14 down to the Los Angeles Area, and were home in time for a sushi lunch.

The Happiest Ghost Town on Earth

Theo and I spent the night miserably shivering under our thin sheets, each worried about shutting off the air conditioning and bothering the other person. We got some sleep, but not of the highest quality.


Since we'd gone to bed early, we got up fairly early anyway. We packed up and set out, driving through Needles on our way out. There were some quaint leftovers of time gone past, and to add to the atmosphere, trains going by. But in the end there wasn't a whole lot to see, and we got on the freeway.




After a few minutes on the 40 and then the 95, we got ourselves onto historic Route 66. If I'd ever been on this road, I don't remember. The first part of the road wasn't so bad, with parts that had been recently paved. There weren't too many other people driving it, so we slowed down and took pictures of the ghost-houses and structures that we'd pass from time to time. When we couldn't see any signs of life in the area we questioned the even meager population count of a few of the signs.





I have a soft spot for modern ruins, and they kept the desert interesting.



We stopped at Roy's Motel Cafe in Amboy and filled up. According to wikipedia Amboy has a population somewhere between 4 and 8, and we saw a few lively looking palm trees in the area. At the cafe we each picked up an unabashedly tourist, and amusing, Route Beer, as a souvenir from our trip.


Next stop was the Amboy Crater. In theory we could go climb it. But it was hot, and the two Ravens hovering nearby were looking a little too eager. We got back into the car and traveled further along.




Next stop was Calico. I didn't have high expectations for Calico. I'd read up and knew that most of it was reproductions build by Walter Knott (of Knott's berry farm). We paid our fee and walked up the paved road through the scattering of shack like buildings, and since we were hungry, went to the restaurant. We sat outside swatting flies, and when I saw the little train go by, I pretty much knew that my low expectations would be met.


I don't want to be mean to the theme-park like ghost town. For certain people, those who are actually afraid of ghost towns, and those that need to entertain small children, Calico might be just right. But it was cute. And I don't like my ghost towns cute. I want to be creeped out. And having already been to Bodie, which I would return to in a heartbeat, Calico didn't have great chances of usurping it's place in my heart anyway.


But the food was very good, though we worried about what it would do to our insides. After wards we made a brief trek through the little town, but didn't linger too long. We noted with amusement that we seemed to be the only people who spoke english, a majority of the visitors were from tour buses.



Luckily the car wasn't too boiling hot when we got inside and headed for Barstow. It was still early afternoon but we decided to take it easy. Theo had been talking about taking a dip in the swimming pool, but two things got in the way of that. One, it was the size of an enlarged kiddy pool. Two, it's location as centerpiece to the parking lot.


Still, we decided to go in anyway. But Theo's days of gleefully jumping into frigidly cold water are apparently over, and he daintily sat with his feet in the water for a few minutes. I made it up to my belly. We'd had enough.

We relaxed for the rest of afternoon, knitting and listening to Penny Arcade's D&D podcasts, letting our legs relax. Though somewhat traumatized by the heavy meals we'd indulged in, Barstow didn't have a lot to offer in the way of light, salad dining. We opted to go to a local place well-reviewed on Yelp, Lola's Kitchen. After feasting on delicious and cheap tacos and quesadillas, we went back to the hotel to take it easy for the rest of the evening.


We made a vow that if either of us were freezing in the night, they were allowed to turn the air conditioning off.