Since You've Been Gone

It’s been about two months since I have left the frozen tundra of Boston and arrived at the tropical paradise known as DC. At this point in time, people have begun asking me which city I prefer. I find this to be a dumb question as there is no way to compare four years of living in Beantown to two months of DC. That said, if I did have to choose one in a game of Fuck-Marry-Relocate, the following would be my criteria in how I would pick my city of choice:

Local Eats

Boston – within walking distance, there was a KFC, the home of the World’s Greatest Chicken Parm, Twin Donuts, Tavern's Sunday Brunch, and plenty of bars/other eateries.

DC – within walking distance, there is a knockoff Big A and a soul food place inside a pharmacy that sells loosies. About a mile away there is a ton of other food establishments including the fanciest Boston Market I have every been to (they serve you your meal!) along with a few Thai establishments.

Winner – Boston.  Even though I prefer B-mart over KFC, the selection is just too plentiful up north.

Hair Cuts

Boston – a local Supercuts that only gave me a good haircut 75% of the time.

Fine, fresh, fierce, my hair's on lock(s of love)

DC – a local Great Clips where my old Asian hairdresser proceeded to make fun of the black people next to us. I would have been scared if she was not holding scissors.

Winner – DC. Have you seen my recent Facebook pictures? Now that’s a good haircut!

Gym

Boston – Bally’s. One or two lines cannot describe my experiences there.

DC – Bally’s. Larger, nicer, has Zumba, very serious professional staff.

Winner – Boston. I take personality over professionalism any day of the week. Plus, I’m not into that health thing much anyways.

Activities

Boston – If you like historical things, I recommend the Freedom Trail or a trolley tour. If you like a bunch of bullshit stated for fact, you would like my tour instead. At night, there are plenty of clubs (imissGypsy), some local bars I never went to, and two ice skating rinks!

DC – Don’t think there is anything worthwhile to see in DC. Plus I’ve only been around for three weekends since I’ve moved. Tune in next time to read all about those adventures.

Winner – Right now, it’s Boston. But it will probably switch over to DC. Just too many things to do in DC, Arlington, and Alexandria which are within a 10 minute cab ride. Plus DC has Happy Hours. That alone is worth the price of admission.

Sports Teams

Seriously, how can you like this?

Boston – Patriots (yucky), Red Sox (awesome), Celtics (super awesome), Bruins (okay if you like hockey. If they win the Stanley Cup, they become great).

DC – Redskins (gross), Nationals (who?), Wizards (yikes), Capitals (choke artists).

Winner – Boston. I gotta support my hometown teams, except the Patriots because I hate them.

Living Situation

Not touch this one as certain “people” read this (or I hope they do). In Boston, I had a bigger room. In DC, I have less stairs to climb in order to use the bathroom. Let’s call that a push.

I’m just kidding – Boston’s got this one though I have a good situation going in DC.

Overall Winner (Winning?)

As you can see by the above, it’s a really fucking stupid question to ask me and I am going to treat the answer to the question with sarcasm, disdain, and a pissy attitude. Like a true New Englander would.

Livin La Vida Loca

Yes, I was not going to leave you hanging for a long time. If you were wondering why I devoted an entire blog to the backstory of my trip – well, if I had combined both blogs into one post, it would have read more like a novel. Which is completely unacceptable in this blogosphere. So I split up the sections into two. In addition, two posts = twice the hits in one week! What? I’m an attention whore.

Where we last left off – oh yeah, nothing had happened.

Equipped with a silver Ford Mustang convertible, Matt and I left Miami to embark on the Florida Keys. For those unfamiliar with geography, the Keys are the southernmost parts of the United States. Even though Miami is pretty damn far south in Florida, Key West is another 3 and a half hours further south. I know, really fucking far away. Hell, you could listen to the latest Black Keys and Alicia Keys albums once in the time it would take to drive there!

In case you were wondering, I drove, which allowed me to work on my side mirror tan. I foolishly left my arm hanging out of the car so the sun’s reflection gave me a nice rectangular burn right underneath my shoulder. Matt was left to DJ the car ride down and he did a fine job. Thankfully, he did not play any songs off of Manster: the Ultimate Collection. That would have led to quite a talking to!

After a long ass car ride, we finally arrived at Key West. Unlike most of Florida, there is not much of a beach scene in Key West so the tanning was left to the hotel pool. And tanning was muy importanté. Look, I’m from Jersey. We tan. That’s what we do. Equipped with a large bottle of Maui Babe tanning oil, I was able to get my color on. Thank God I did or else my fresh chest shave would have gone in vain. (Originally, I was going to start off the last blog post with the misadventures of shaving but it probably would have been awful. You’re welcome.) Ahem, I have color now and I feel awesome.

By now, you are probably fed up with the lack of action from this blog. You are wondering why I am not talking about my drunken adventures downtown. Thankfully, you are in luck as I was just about to write about that… in my next blog post!

Just kidding.

Key West is an interesting place. Since it was not Spring Break or the summer, it was not filled with many hot co-eds. It was moreso filled with families, couples, and townies - lots of townies. To make up for the lack of scene, Key West has no open container laws. So as long as it’s in a cup, it can be out in the open. (God, why didn’t I think of a “Dick in a Cup” parody when I was down there?) This was much needed as most bars served frozen beverages similar to what you can find in New Orleans. These beverages were filled with grain alcohol, 151, and some food coloring. Yes Virginia, there were tons of drunken tomfoolery as we were left to explore the town and drink at the same time.

My favorite drunken mishap – kicking a tree with my sandals on. Yes, what the fuck is wrong with me? Instead of going around the tree to the left, I decided to try to slide past it to the right and wound up kicking it and breaking my pinky toe. The best part was I envisioned myself doing the exact thing before I did it! It was like a really shitty version of Final Destination. But hey, I will take a broken toe (or two) over a convoluted series of events that ends up with a beheading. Thank God for those frozen drinks – they made all the pain go away.

If you are wondering what Matt’s favorite drunken activity was, the answer is ordering room service at 3am Saturday night. And what did he order? Well, $20 worth of chips and beef jerky. SMH.

Other highlights of the trip include taking a ghost tour (Spooky! Scary!) and swimming with the fishes. The ghost tour was kinda cheesy except for being locked in a room with Robert the Doll. Robert is a creepy doll that was the inspiration for Child’s Play. And he’s plagued by spirits from the dead. Or whatever. He reminded me of Chucky and that’s enough to creep me out. By the way, I know this is off topic, but who the fuck sent me that Chucky doll three years ago? I’m still waiting for an answer.

Swimming with the fishes (or known in the Keys as snorkeling) was a lot more fun. Even though I was hindered by a broken toe and a water clogged ear, I was able to muster up enough strength to swim above the second largest coral reef on the Earth. I really wanted to take pictures for everyone to see but I never bought an underwater camera. And as much as I want to destroy my phone, I could not bring myself to submersing it in water. But to make things up to you, here is someone else’s picture of coral reefs.

In conclusion, Key West was a lot of fun. We went to the Waffle House a few times, got drunk a few more times, and did I mention that I got a tan?  And yes, that’s how I spent my summer vacation.

Miseria Cantare

Judging by all of my blog posts, you probably think that I am some sort of a vacation/trip aficionado. But really, that’s not the case. For instance, I am not made of money, sometimes prefer a quiet weekend, and most importantly, do not look like Denny Crane or a gnome. It just so happened that I followed up a trip to Podunk, PA with a weekend in Charlottesville which was followed by a trip to lovely Miami, Florida. Or so I thought…

But before we just jump in unprotected, let’s wrap things up with a little backstory. Normally, I am in charge of booking vacations/weekend stays/”where the fuck dinner be” activities with my friends. Some might say it is because I am a leader and am dedicated to my craft. Most will tell you it is because I am a control freak, stubborn as all hell, and whine excessively when I do not get my way. Honestly, it is a combination of both. (At least everybody can attest that I am passionate.)

This particular trip was different. Perhaps it had to do with my company – unlike, vacations past, this trip did not include high school or college friends. Rather, I ventured on my first trip with a Bostonian (we will call him Matt). For those who know Matt, my condolences. For those who do not, Matt was one of my first friends I made in Boston (I only had to pay him monthly for his services!) and is responsible for helping me meet many “interesting” people/friends at the Brighton Bally Total Fitness. Suffice to say, if I never met Matt at Bally, I have no fucking idea what my time in Boston would have been like. Probably way worse off.

(A sidenote: Matt was afraid of what I would write about him in this blog. So far it’s been pretty positive. We shall see…)

Check out my sweet 'stache!

So where was I? Oh yes, booking the vacation. Well, outside of the airfare, the entire trip was booked the first night we were in Florida. While we had ideas of what to do, very little was set in stone. Even the first night had some mystery to it. You see, Matt’s parents rented this mansion in South Beach for a week. I thought we were staying at a townhouse but nope, it was much bigger (and nicer). And this mansion was next door to a home owned by Ricky Martin! Unfortunately, I did not see Ricky Martin or even Pretty Ricky. Then again, I am not even sure if I would recognize even him as the last time I saw him was in the Nobody Wants to Be Lonely music video (which was awesome). And that song came out ten years ago! Hell, I am not even sure if I would even recognize myself from ten years ago. Luckily for you, I keep all my yearbooks!

Now why would we venture out to the Keys if we could have been “Livin’ La Vida Loca”? Simple, we weren’t the only house guests in Miami. Rather Matt’s entire family was there. And let’s just say they are quite the eccentric bunch. Especially at birthday parties as they like to roast the birthday boy/girl. Considering Comedy Central’s roasts are normally hit or miss and I’d give you a guess at the quality of the roast. Yup, somewhere between rump roast and filet mignon. As you can probably guess, it would not have been ideal for us to spend the weekend in Miami.

So what are boys to do? It’s now midnight Saturday and nothing is booked for the weekend. Well, if you are like me, you grab a computer and commence to shoppin’! Thanks to the lovely Naomi Pryce (yes, that’s the correct spelling – I Wiki’d it), we were able to get a great deal at the Sheraton Suites Key West. And thanks to Royal Rent A Car, we got an even better deal on Ford Mustangs for the weekend. Not always do things work out in the last minute – but this time, it did!

Saturday morning, after a brief sleep, we embarked on a trip to the Florida Keys. As you will soon learn, it was splendid. Which you will soon learn about… in the next blog post!

White America

Avid fans of my Youtube videos might remember a prophetic remark that I made at the end of my 24^th Birthday video – “White People Suck”. Now while I was heavily waisted when I made that statement, there is some validity to it. And there is a ton of invalidity too. If I had to go back in time to that epic night, I would have told myself to do a few things differently – do not become emotionally attached to “Snakes on a Plane”, invent Twitter, and most importantly, change my statement to “White People Are Strange.” That statement became apparent over the weekend when I trekked out to Charlottesville, VA to watch the lovely horse race known as Foxfields.

A disclaimer: I hate Charlottesville. Okay, maybe hate is a tad strong, but the town definitely ranks towards the bottom of my favorite places to visit (right alongside Mechanicsburg, PA). And no, that has nothing to do with not getting into UVA for college (sshhhh - don't tell my dad). That would be petty. And y’all know I don’t hold grudges. Ahem…

According to their website, “For over 30 years The Foxfield Racing Association has provided a beautiful setting for the equestrian sport of steeplechasing.  The alluring but challenging Foxfield course was designed to attract Thoroughbred owners and trainers, and to provide the jockey and his mount with a beautiful ride over rolling lush green turf.” (Works Cite that shit, bitch.) White people not only love horse races, but this event also allows them to dress up in the most ridiculous clothes this side of Halloween. Or perhaps a Baptist Church Easter Celebration.

If I could only use one-word to describe their clothes, it would have to be pastelmania. Seriously, thousands of people dressed up in seersucker or their favorite Easter Egg color just because they could. I was hoping that a little child would start plucking them from the sky, but alas, that could only happen in my imagination (sadly I left my cough syrup at home). It’s probably a good thing because plastic grass would make a turrible green turf.

You might be asking yourself – “Well Jeff, if you hate UVA and you hate fashion, then why did you go to Foxfields?” Too easy! It’s because I hate sobriety and thanks to my ridiculously white Indian friend, Aashish (now known as Roger), I had free passes for the all-day open bar. (I do need to give Aashish some credit for putting up with my “Yo man, you are so white” jokes all weekend. That said, I will not give him credit for wearing boat shoes.)

Alcohol definitely helped me enjoy my Foxfields Adventure as seen by my super silly “look how high I can jump picture.” And since I was neither in pastels nor wearing a straw hat, I felt foreign enough to pose for pictures with a peace sign. Those should hit Facebook soon. Let’s just hope the privacy settings don’t keep them away from you people.

I know, not the best choice of words to end the post. Ahem…