Today I am home sick. Yup. Actually woke up with cramps and I needed to feel the heat from the mattress topper on my thorax. What a strange word, btw.

Shit’s been uber cray cray at work and beyond… Surprisingly, I’ve been able to resist plummeting into darkness and despair post Boston. Fucking insane world.

John and I were in SF Tuesday night– saw Beach House at the Fillmore. Last time I was there, I saw Sara Bareilles, and her show was amazing. They had the grand piano, and the acoustics were incredible (The show was even recorded and still plays regularly on the Palladium channel). But this BH concert? Wtf. Seriously. The drug use (pot smokin’) was ridiculous… I got a massive headache just off the fumes. Come on, people! Then the music– kinda Mazzy Starish– was all blown out with zippo clarity. Just an absolute drugged-out haze. Disappointing.

What the hell happened to that venue? It’s coming off my list. I mean, the audio was so bad that when the opening band introduced themselves as Holy Shit, I thought they said Holy Spirit. I didn’t even realize I had misheard until I looked at the poster at the end of the show.

Plus, fuck man, I guess we just aren’t cool enough for the scene. Oh well, it was an experience. On the drive home, we just laughed about how un-cool we are, esp in our old, pudgy, middle-age.

The good news is, the Killers concert is right around the corner. Super stoked. And I just scored tickets for OneRepublic at Mountain Winery in September. Yippee!

We got back from NYC late Sunday night. A very busy trip indeed. We hadn’t traveled with 3 of the 4 other people, so after the first day, we quickly realized that they moved at a very different pace, they didn’t like to plan things in advance, plus they had lots of dietary restrictions. P’s sister Z is super sweet (she visited last year and I took them to Napa), but she is an extremely picky eater with a very limited tolerance for different cuisines. So Hubs and I split off and just met up with them every day for dinner and post-dinner activities. It probably worked out better since my Spanish is still shite, and they didn’t have to keep translating stuff for us.

The AirBnb spot was a pretty good location around Hell’s Kitchen with lots of food options. Six people in a 1 BR/1 BA. Tight squeeze. Oddly, I got into a tiff with the owner: he taped down the deadbolt (I guess it got stuck a few times before) and basically told us to leave the apartment unlocked with all our shit in there because “the whole city of NY is very safe.” Uh, look dude, I’m not a dumbass who’s going to just invite people (in one of the largest cities in world) to burgle me by leaving my shit unprotected. Ludicrous!! As if other renters are gonna let that fly…

Also, he was gay (not that I care) and his wifi network was named Woodman (J says that’s his last name) and the pw was four sets of 69. Seriously? I mean, I know the gays are all sexually adventurous and liberated and all, but is that level of raunch really necessary? Yeah, and the apartment was arranged with two queen beds side-by-side in one bedroom. Then he made some weird comment like, “You guys all know each other, right?” I dunno, maybe I was reading too much into things, but I tell you, the apartment just felt dirty afterwards, like the place was used as some orgy meetup spot or something! Sketch.

Around town, we checked out the Empire State Building, walked the High Line, scoped out Rockefeller Center, saw the Brooklyn Bridge, caught two theater shows, did some karaoke, hit up the food scene for all the healthy stuff (pizza, burgers, bagels, challah bread, nougat, cannolis, etc…) Yeah, we clocked all-time records on FitBit. That said, I’m pretty sure even 24k steps/day aren’t enough to compensate for all the junk we crammed down our pieholes. I might need to do a detox this week.

So, the craziest thing. We went to see Mamma Mia on Broadway and lo and behold, my college roommate’s crush (one of them) played the lead male role!!! I saw him in the Playbill and immediately recognized him. Still looks the same all these years later. Fucking crazy! The Peruvian chicas were swooning big time. Btw, there are some hottie patotties in NYC. Must be the modeling/ad industry influence, because shit, they were high caliber. Just an observation. 🙂

So all in all, a good trip but very tiring. Newark airport is a total buzzkill. I have not sat in a security line for so damn long since I don’t know when. And Wrestling Mania was going on, so the city and Penn Station were especially mobbed. By the end of three days, I was ready to get back home. I so love the stimulation and hurried lifestyle of the big city, but I think living there would really turn me into a grump (well, a bigger one). Like on the subway, I have never seen so many frowning, miserable faces. Ah well, back to living in my bubble that is Silicon Valley!