THE NYC FILES - Part Two
Saturday, February 10, 2007
Hurrah! First full day of NYC adventure. Dressed in warm clothes, we patiently waited for the lift down to the lobby. And waited. And waited. As 2 of the 4 lifts were broken, they were in full demand and the man in front of us refused to get in anything resembling crowded. now, obv. I have the patience of a saint, so didn't push past him, but as the 3rd lift came and went, enough was enough and DazPushy and I bitchslapped his ass out of the way and began our day :)
Now I thought yesterday was cold! My nipples popped out so quickly when I walked out the door, that I had to check where DazPickle's fingers were ;) As we hurried to Starbucks, my warmblooded little fella (darren not the other little fella!!) was telling me I'd get used to the cold and he didn't need a scarf or hat. As we came out of starbucks with frozen snot in our noses, we bustled back to the hotel to get him a scarf and hat. It was lucky I tells ya that I was wearing my scarf wrapped round my face as I had a very smug told you so expression on my face! we decided to head towards rockafella plaza and enjoy the view from up there. Darren is not a heights man, but he was a brave little soldier and enjoyed the stunning views across NYC.
The NBC studio tour was ok, interesting to see the inner workings of tv! There was one dude on the tour who felt he knew the answers to all the questions so never gave the tour guide the opportunity to five their rehearsed answers. In retrospect, it may have soured the atmosphere a bit when after one buttinsky to many, I snapped " for gods sake no one was talking to you" but i ultimately feel they were glares of apology shooting my way. Thank heavens for the no weapons sign the guide kept pointing too...
Looking round Radio City Music Hall with a former Rockette was bloody bonza ripper. Doing those eye high kicks on an empty stage, looking at the costumes and designs and seeing the dining room where Vincent Minelli planted the seed of Liza in Judy's er .... well i'm sure they flirted there... was a great way too spend the afternoon in a gorgeously stunning art deco setting that positively crackled with theatrical history.
In the dusk of the early evening we did some more rooftop sightseeing from the top of the Empire State Building before heading home from our 11 hour day for pizza and snuggles. Marv...
Posted by Paul 11:58 pm 0 comments
THE NYC FILES - Part one
After a delicious night of romp and relaxation in our posh upgraded room, it was time to get up and kill a couple of hours in our posh upgraded bathroom robes until we needed to leave for the airport. My attempts to seduce darren by trying to make the terry towling outfit look sexy by swinging the girdle around like a baton were hopeless. But i like to think i did my part in bringing sexy back! Anyway, i perservered and I like to think that any and all sexual favours subsequently provided were because of my hotness and not to "stop any more insane behaviour"...
And then it was off to Heathrow airport to check in and hang around for a couple of hours before we can sit around the gate for half an hour or so before we are allowed to board the plane and sit around waiting for takeoff. So in all this time, naturally the starbucks card was abused but i did get to listen to just jack's new album and some new songs i hadn't gotten around to checking out so it was all good.
the plane flight to nyc was actually ok. I read my book (The Road to Inconceivable - amazon search it, but it's only ok), a couple of Entertainment Weeklys, watched The Queen which was surprisingly touching and gorge and a much better than expected John Tucker Must Die (great soundtrack). I even managed to get some stuff down for my novel. Very productive.
Of course this being me, I had to be surrounded by freaks. Behind was an elderly gentleman whose middle aged son explained everything in annoyingly minute detail to him. Except plane etiquette as he kept stretching his leg up by my arm rest so his pongy foot was right near my face :( Once it may have touched my Jack & Jones top which clearly now i will have to boil. Grrr. And in front was seizure girl. She had her chair back which i don't begrudge at all, but she moved around so much it was like sitting infront of a washing machine on full spin. I was grateful when she nodded off and just the sound of her bulldozer snoring and pungent halitosis breath filled the air....
Arrived in NYC!! It was vair vair vair nippy noddles. I thought i would die from shock from the cold but rallied by thought of three starbucks right by hotel (which is near all theatres and one block from Times Square). V tired now so zzzzzzzzz.
Posted by Paul 12:11 am 1 comments
last days in vegas nov 2005...
Saturday, February 03, 2007
LV ~ Days 4&5 Gimme Solids or Gimme Death!The mega dog did not agree with me and I awoke very early with crippling stomach pains and some urgenting toileting needs Because of this Sunday went by in a blur and blurred right into Monday. A lot of it was spent shopping and gambling and checking out the hotels. The new Wynn hotel is stunning. It has this great waterfall feature outside one its restaurants which flows into a swimming pool that has these cool looking statues of people standing looking at the cascading water. V tranquil and mystical.I also remember waiting in line at subways and in front there was this guy who was ordering for his "baby" who was sitting down. She gave him very explicit instructions on what she wanted which he promptly forgot and the following conversation ensued:
Subway: do you want 6 inch or footlong?
Guy: baby do you want 6 inch or footlong?Baby: 6 inch
baby, i tolutha already
Guy: Sorry baby. She wants 6 inch
Subway: Do you want onions jalepenos peppers?
Guy: Baby do you want onions jalepenos peppers?
Baby: Eew baby you know i thinks onions is nasty
Guy: Sorry baby. No onions
(this goes on for a while and couple leave only for Baby to say "ooo baby why is there no onions on this. it is so bland!" Sheesh)
WE went to a mile long all you can eat buffet later that evening awhich totally killed me off. There should be a law against unlimited carrot cake! We got back pretty late but I was wide awake so I caught up on the oc and prison break on my archos...
OOO - scary. The Stratosphere hotel was plunged into darkness tonight after a power outage and left 6 Japanese tourists dangling 900ft abover the strip on one of the towers thrill rides. I can't imagine how scary that must have been as they were trapped on a see saw ride that tips over the edge of the building They were up there for 90 minutes! I hope they went for some emotional stress damages...
Most of the days were spent gambling and exploring the massive variety of hotels, but I also shopped for Britain and depleted a large amount of my funds at a variety of stores:
Gap~ a cord balzer and chunky knit zip up top
Target~ socks, a scarf and some holiday themed candy, oh and a stocking
CDs~ Madonna, Il Divo christmas cd, carrie underwood, mariah carey christmas cd 10 year anniversary edition, Cyndi Lauper body acoustic cd
DVDs~ Gilmore Girls season 3, Veronica Mars season 1, Edward Scissorhands, The Nightmare Before Christmas
Books~ Son of A Witch, Lost, The It Girl - from gossip girl author, Pendragon 2 (I bought Pendragon 1 when i was at DGIF day ) Wicked - A Grimmerie
I listened to the Madonna cd straight away in the car and both Darren and I really liked it. My first fave songs that stood out were Hung Up, Sorry, Jump and I New York Madonna is back! Although i feel she never went away as I really liked American Life. I'm drinking a soy latte...
Celebrated our last night by packing (booo) and going to see Zathura, which is kind of a sequel to Jumanji but don't call it a sequel. I had low expectations and ended up enjoying most of it. A few real laugh out loud moments So sad to be going home - its been a great holiday and its back to the real world now Still we have only been in our new apartment for 2 weeks before we came away and it would be nice to get back and sort all our stuff out
Posted by Paul 9:27 pm 0 comments
Return To Los Angeles/Las Vegas - Nov 2005 Day 7/8/9
Thursday, February 01, 2007
Day 7 - entering vegas
So we bid adieu to a rather rainy and grey LA and zoomed down the freeway to Las Vegas. We made pretty good time and I now know the bette midler sings peggy lee cd pretty well now too We arrived at Mandalay Bay and instantly got upgraded to a premium room with a stunning view of the strip. I like to think it was beause of my cool LV band The Killers t shirt and the way I gently batted my eye lids at the check in guy, but more likely it was because they were out of non smoking rooms...
The room is absolutely cavenous - with a huge bathroom and sunken bath with lots of gorgeous little toiletries that will so end up in our guest bathroom. I don't usually care what my hotel room is like but this one is pretty stunning :)
FIND! Darren and I were looking around and found this charming little bookstore and the woman behind the counter and I were chatting about Wicked and she showed me a ltd edition coffee table book on the making of the musical. I so have to buy... rest of evening spent gambling and not doing particularly well...
Day 8...
Darren and I love to shop Its a big part of our reason for coming here so we get all excited about going to the Ceasars Palace Forum Shops. The toy store there is brilliant - it is so huge you can get lost in it for ages. And we did...
There were these particularly brilliant and slightly lavendar two young men dance playing the giant floor piano with their feet. I have to say it made me alittle jealous and I have now added foot playing piano dancer to my list of dream professions (others include working at the gap, owning a book store and published author ) ;) Sadly, Darren's fave shoe shop is no longer and the best Virgin Megastore in the world is no more which is particularly tragic cos they had every dvd and cd you can think of. Now i will have to hope i can find somewhere else that will stock the new madonna cd ;)
Can i just comment on how festive Starbucks is right now? they have these adorable little chrismukwanzamas cups, the loveliest gift sets and an adorable reusable wooden advent calendar. Comment over!
We spent the evening at a gay bar called Gipsys which was rather brilliant until i almost simultaneously strained my groin and punched someone in the ear whilst trying to dance like in the last part of the Hung Up video. oops and ow! my groin!
Day 9...
Went down to visit the Aladdin and Paris hotels (so hurrah Nick Carter not the only one to be in Paris ). Ho ho. I had slept funny on my arm so it was totally dead all day and it flailed around independently of what I wanted it to do. Boooo! And it was kinda painful. Luckily I was a brave little soldier and only mentioned that it still hurt to Darren every few minutes. And then i got a cup full of bitterness added to that when I asked some woman to take a picture of us. AND SHE SAID NO!! I mean I guess its perfectly ok for someone to say no in rudesville but how rude is it to not take someones pic in a tourist spot!?! I would have taken her pic if i hadn't been scared of the camera lens cracking Thats just the bitterness talking - she seemed perfectly lovely except for the rudeness and some weird spot thing on her chin, but i digress...
The Aladdin and Paris are lovely inside and the themed areas are really pretty. The Aladdin even has an indoor thunderstorm over the the fountain area. We found a really good game store and bought this game called Blokus which is kinda like tetris if it were a board game and if it were two people competing to get the shapes on a board with only touching the corners of their own shapes. So nothing like tetris then... We were really tired so grabbed a megadog (there is something so gay about putting that much meat in your mouth!! ) and decided to order a Jerry Springer show on the hotel tv. I haven't watched in a while and it was hilarious "I hate your bridesmaids dress" (takes it off) "And my bra is itchy too" (takes it off) So lots of girls getting naked to beat the crap out of each other! Jerry must be so proud It made me want to watch Oprah...
Posted by Paul 4:43 am 0 comments
Return To Los Angeles/Las Vegas - Nov 2005 Day 5/6
Tues and Weds just sort of went by in a blur of LA traffic and theme parks so here are some key magic moments...
*Darren singing solid as a cock instead of Rock at starbucks and being completely oblivious to how loud he was or what he was singing
*Seeing a Maury show where a woman tested 9 men to see who was the father of her baby daddy and then me being completely bewildered when the audience booed the guy for not being the father
*Seeing Aladdin The Musical at disney - seriously get this on broadway now. The Genie manages to be hilarious despite his somewhat hackneyed quips: "Snap! Oh no you di'n't gurrl"; "You're Fired!" and my personal fave "Jasmines not the only one to marry a street rat - look at Britney Spears!"
*Darren nipping to the bathroom only to be driven out by the loud explosive gases from the cubicle next door! Too many churros?
*Getting soaked on the grizzly rapids but laughing my arse off at Darren who got bitchslapped by a wall of water before it drenched him
*Leaving Disney for the last time and feeling quite sad
*An all new episode of Lost. RIP Shannon
Posted by Paul 4:38 am 0 comments
Return To Los Angeles/Las Vegas - Nov 2005 Day 3/4
Sunday, January 21, 2007
Day Three
After waking up at 4.30am we decided that we needed to reset out body clocks and have a nice relaxing day so we thought we would do some shopping around the upmarket boutiques of LA...
- Discovery1 ~ the walmart in anaheim is rubbish
- discovery2 ~ the target opposite our hotel is brilliant and if you look past the crap had a few really nice and fashionable clothes
- Discovery3 ~ Discovery 2 makes me sound really shallow. But its true. As is the fact that Gap, American Eagle, Banana Rep and A&F also had some great finds in there!
- Discovery4 ~ the American Eagle at Brea Mall stank of burnt popcorn which curtailed our vist but not before thrifty daz had rifled through the sales section!
- Discovery5 ~ if Daz and I were ever to live in LA it would have to be somewhere utterly charming like the incredibly pretty town of Fullerton
- Discovery6 ~ Wicked may be one of my favourite books of all time and so I was delighted that a follow up called Son Of A Witch has just been released. And even more overjoyed that after some searching found a first edition
- Discovery7 ~ Darren's floppy fringe/bangs looks really hot without any gel in it!
- Discovery8 ~ People magazine has Ellen on the front and I had forgotten how much I love la Degeneres!
- Discovery9 ~ Almost like being in love is a great book
- Discovery10 ~ I woke up at 4.30am again
Day Four
Lets face it - even though Disney's CAlifornia Adventure is a pretty good representation of beach front california, its just not as magical as Disneyland itself. It's like the older brother who no longer believes in Father Christmas. That doesn't mean we didn't have a great time. The Tower of Terror is brilliant as is Soaring Over California, The Grizzly Bear Rapids and the rollercoaster. And the difference between British theme parks and American ones is that at Disney the lines become part of the rides so you don't feel like you are waiting as long! Genius!
I was so clumsy today - i was enjoying a Nestle Tollhouse Ice Cream Sandwich while walking around one of the many many many ~ you get the drift ~ many gift stores. I was briefly enchanted by a Beauty And The Beast snowglobe when I managed to walk into the wall and smack my ice cream right into my ltd. edition Salt Lake Polo Shirt. Boooo! Luckily it wasn't wrecked - the ice cream not the polo shirt - until i tried to pick the wrapping from the mushed up ice cream and dropped the whole thing on the floor. Boy, did my bottom lip tremble :(
And later while I was buying USA Today, i turned around from the till and walked straight into a postcard rack, which hurt a lot more than i let on at the time :( :(
I heard the cutest thing today. Dazpanteloons and I were walking behind some 8 year old kids and two guys passed who were all over each other One kid said UGH! HOW GAY! But then this other kid who i now want to adpot said 'so, there's nothing wrong with being gay. And just because two men kiss doesn't mean they are gay. They might be bisexual'. AWWWWWWWWWWWWWW
Posted by Paul 5:08 am 0 comments
Return to LA/Las Vegas Nov 2005 - Day two
Friday, January 19, 2007
It occurred to me after a quick spin on the mummy returns rollercoaster at Universal that movie rides are a lot like the films they are based on... EG: Disney's Indiana Jones ride and the aforementioned Mummy ride are both breathtaking thrilling and quite satisfying once done. Pirates of The Caribbean at Disney is slightly too long, only gets good half way through and sadly the lacks the surprise twist the movie has. Worst of the lot is Universal's Van Helsing - it looks good but once you're there you wish you hadn't bothered even if there is a Hugh Jackman look a like there to greet you
The studio tour at Universal has been updated to show the external sets of Wisteria Lane (marvel at Bree's perfectly trimmed bush! ) and the jaw dropping plane crash of War Of The Worlds that is so creepy and realistic you feel a little bit sording being there. Still nothing like meeting an animated puppet Donkey from Shrek to cheer you up. Daz took pics while i lined up with the 5 year olds to meet him - and he couldn't have been more gracious He said I was tall and had super hair (and nice hair is hard to maintain after so many thrill rides ) so I complimented him on his teeth. He then did an uncanny impression of the Queen which made me laugh my arse off
In the distance i saw a sign that i thought said Debheads but sadly it was dance heads. Not to worry ~ this brilliant idea gets you to wiggle your head to the music and puts it on an animated body for you. Genius! Panteloons and I did two songs and got a dvd of it to humiliate ourselves for many parties to come
The whole day at Universal was lovely but exhausting so we went to see Chicken Little before looking around the shops and bars. It was... schizophrenic. Is it a fairy tale? Is it war of the worlds? Everwood? And thus a little bit rubbish Although there was a lovely version of All I know (originally by Art - no simon - Garfunkel and featured in the brilliant season two finale of Nip Tuck) that i later found out was by Five for Fighting. Plus! The place was like a creche. Screaming babies and puking toddlers. No wonder Entertainment Weekly did a piece on what is wrong with theatres!! While shopping a 20 ft high poster of of semi naked and toned Matt Ratliff drew us myeteriously into A&F. Seriously how gay is that store. If details is the gayest non gay magazine, A&F must take it for the shops! Saw some killer jeans but decided to hold off til Vegas. Was in bed for 10pm. Tragic
Posted by Paul 11:54 pm 0 comments
Return to LA/Las Vegas Nov 2005 Day One
Thursday, January 18, 2007
A lovely 4am start was brilliant and I was soon on the coach to the airport looking forward to landing in LA in 19 hours time Check in was a breeze until i noticed that the labels on the luggage said Kevin and Susan Dowd heading to JFK and then they disappeared down the chute where baggage goes to be filmed for Toy Story 2. I quickly explained to the check in clerk that My Name Is Not Susan and she dutifully dived down the chute after them to rescue them from NYC and send them on their little way to LA. Bless her.
Once we were back to being Paul and Darren we mosied round the airport until our fight was called. Isn't it weird how people cannot wait to get on the plane, but once its landed they'd slap their frail grandma's ass out of the way to be the first off? Anyway, got all settled in my seat, magazines at the ready and once the seatbelt sign was off put my chair back only to be poked in the head and told by the "charming" (in this context charming obviously means rude, aggressive and lacking any likeable qualities whatsoever) woman behind to put it back up as she wasn't standing for that all flight. i explained that everyone was entitled to put their seats back and thought that was the end of it. Until I heard her complain and use a very derogatory homophobic comment! I may have lost my temper a little bit (air rage alert) and told her that she was obviously more used to using her free bus pass the her pass port and if she could get all the 9 rows in front of me to put their seats up then i'd consider it. She then told me to talk to the hand! The hand! Goodbye credibility!!! Luckily, a rather lovely stewardess called Brenda intevened and explained reclining seats to the "charming" lady. And after that it was a surprisingly pleasant flight ~ I watched 3 films i haven't seen and then had a nice nap. Plus our hotel room in LA ~ the Anaheim Hilton was totally lovely
Posted by Paul 9:10 am 0 comments
