Last time at Shea

My dad has a powerful jinx. The Mets have lost every game he’s been to over the last 20 years. At Shea, in Philly, in San Francisco…if my dad’s in the stands, the Mets can’t seem to win. The last time my dad saw the Mets win was in 1984 when I was a wee one. I don’t remember much of the game, but I do remember sitting at Shea eating green grapes.

I’ve seen the Mets win once since 1984; it was around 1998 at Candlestick Park in San Francisco. I feel almost as anti-Giants as I do anti-Yankees (my anti-Yankees feelings makes me pro-Red Sox…my Mets and Red Sox fandom doesn’t interfere very often so it works out), so it was exciting for me to see the Mets win.

On Tuesday, I went with my parents, cousins, and uncle to see one last game at Shea. I hadn’t been to Shea in over 10 years so I thought it was a nice idea to give it a final farewell.

Until the 9th inning, it looked like my dad’s jinx would be a thing of the past! Unfortunately, it wasn’t so. (It’s too heartbreaking to write out what happened!) Why must the Mets toy with the hearts of its fans?

Anyway, I’m glad to see the Mets have won their games since that heart-wrenching game, but it would have been nice to see them win since it was probably my last opportunity to see them at Shea!

Good-bye, Shea!!! I don’t know how they’re going to change the lyrics to “Meet the Mets” because Citi doesn’t rhyme with Shea.

My dad and I

My parents

My cousins and I

Poop on the New York Subway

The day after Christmas, I went with my dad, cousins, and Matt to The Museum of Natural History in Manhattan. We took the subway in from Queens, enjoyed a lovely pizza lunch, and spent the afternoon looking at all of the fantastic exhibits. (My favorite were the dinosaur bones…I remember that from going there on field trips!)

After transferring to the N train to get back to Queens, we were excited to find a mostly empty subway car during rush hour. And then, we were overwhelmed by a very, very foul smell. We then came to a horrible realization why the subway car was mostly empty: that smell was poop. At first I thought someone had just farted, but then the smell never went away and it was apparent that the stench was poop.

At that point, we had to decide what to do. Our choices were as follows:

1) Exit the subway car and get on one of the cramped ones.
2) Stay in the spacious, but stinky subway car and watch peoples’ reactions as they boarded.

My cousins enthusiastically opted for number 2. (No pun intended) It was like something out of “Candid Camera”…people walking in and exiting immediately, people wrapping their scarves around their noses and mouths, and taking out tissues to breathe through them.

I pulled my turtleneck over my nose and mouth and watched the horrified subway-riders. I laughed so heartily that my sides ached for hours afterwards.

Freihofer’s Cookies & Hires Root Beer

Growing up, whenever we’d go camping in Upstate NY (of course, being from NJ, anything aside from the NYC boroughs and Long Island seemed like Upstate NY) we would get two things: Freihofer’s Chocolate Chip Cookies and Hires Root Beer. To this day, sitting around a campfire makes me crave root beer.

We couldn’t get Freihofer’s Chocolate Chip Cookies in NJ, so they were a treat.

This past weekend, we camped in Saratoga Springs. There were Stewart’s Shops everywhere. At first I was excited because I thought they were the same thing as the Stewart’s Drive Ins we had in New Jersey. I’d get grilled cheese and a root beer. (Hm, I really liked root beer as a kid!) The Stewarts Shops in Upstate NY turned out to be convenience stores, not affiliated with the Stewart’s Drive Ins or Stewart’s Root Beer.

The logos do look sort of similar:

Anyway, the Stewart’s Shops had Freihofer’s chocolate chip cookies. AND they were buy one get one free for the box! So, I got two boxes. The second box was supposed to be a surprise for my dad, since my parents are coming to town on Saturday. I was so excited about the Freihofer’s that I was worried I wouldn’t be able to keep the secret for very long.

Yesterday, on the phone with my dad:

KrissyInBoston: I got you a surprise.
Dad: A surprise? Is it edible?
KrissyInBoston: I don’t know…
Dad: OK, so it’s edible. Is it cheesecake?
KrissyInBoston: No…
Dad: Boston Cream Pie?
KrissyInBoston: No…
Dad: Oh, wait! You just came back from Upstate NY! Freihofer’s Chocolate Chip Cookies!

I just ate a few cookies and they were delightful. I have to keep them in a really high cabinet so I don’t have easy access to them. It’s really difficult to contain myself, but I don’t want to gain 5 pounds two weeks before my wedding!

Beautiful Mount Airy Lodge

Now’s the perfect time
The season is just right
You can play all day and dance into the night
All you have to bring
Is your love of everyt-thiiing
BEAUTIFUL MOUNT AIRY LODGE!!!!!

OK, anyone who lived in the NYC Metro area in the 70s-90s remembers the commercials and ads for BEAUTIFUL MOUNT AIRY LODGE. They were on constantly. I always thought it looked like such a fun place to go. I couldn’t wait until I was old enough to “play all day and dance into the night”…in fact, it sounded like my version of paradise! Maybe one day I’d be a grown up with a husband and get to go to BEAUTIFUL MOUNT AIRY LODGE. All I had to bring was my love of everything? I could do that.

Here’s an older version of the commercial:

My wedding to Matt is rapidly approaching, and due to a large family trip to China, our honeymoon is going to be put on the backburner. But, I thought in the meantime we could do a little mini-trip somewhere. (We’ll probably end up going to The Woodstock Inn in NH…we love that place.) But then I had a thought: what about BEAUTIFUL MOUNT AIRY LODGE?

We could drive out to the Poconos and play all day and dance into the night! Cheesy enough to be fun, I’d say!

And then I Googled “Mt. Airy Lodge.”

Beautiful Mount Airy Lodge has ceased to exist. I haven’t lived in New Jersey for ten years and what happens? Mt. Airy Lodge disappears. But before it disappeared, the once grand resort sat abandoned. You can view pictures of the vacant shell of Mt. Airy Lodge here and here.

Upon seeing the sad story, I felt like a piece of my childhood had died. It’s bad enough that Crazy Eddie went out of business (in spite of his prices being IN-SAAANE) and that Elmo has hijacked “Sesame Street”…now I find this out?!

Matt has asked me to stop singing “Beautiful Mount Airy Lodge.” :-(

ShopRite and Always Save!

Today I saw a ShopRite truck while going down Route 9 with Matt. I wonder what a ShopRite truck was doing around here…we’re probably at least 150 miles from a ShopRite.

ShopRite is one of the supermarkets I grew up going to. (Others includes: A&P, Grand Union, and Foodtown, as well as Keyfood and Waldbaums in Brooklyn)

I’ve had the old ShopRite can-can commercial stuck in my head ever since!

By the way…

Let’s go Mets!!

No, Bostonians, just because I’m from Metro New York that doesn’t make me a Yankees fan! Being brought up as a Mets fan, I was brought up to hate the Yankees, and since I hate the Yankees it means I like the Red Sox! I’m not a HUGE baseball fan, but the Mets are my numero uno. (The Sox are my numero dos, and the Oakland A’s can be numero tres because I used to enjoy their $2 games when I lived in California)

Growing up, few things were cooler than my dad taking us to Shea Stadium where we’d watch the Mets (although I’d primarily people-watch…still my favorite thing to do at sporting events) and eat Carvel out of a fake plastic baseball cap. So…let’s go Mets!

Sliding Pon(d)

I wanted to find a picture of a slide to accompany this post, but the only photos are of those crazy plastic new-fangled slides usually as part of a jungle gym with mulch on the ground. I wanted a picture of the kind of slide I used to use…a free standing metal slide on a black-top. I don’t even think they have those anymore. Do see-saws exist anymore either? I have fond memories of see-saws.

Growing up, we refered to a slide (as in a slide at a playground) as a sliding pon. I couldn’t seem to find other people who called it that once I left the NYC-Metro area. In fact, I started wondering if the term had existed at all because I couldn’t find anyone else who called it that! I thought I was going crazy!

So I did a little bit of research. Googling “sliding pon” did not yield many results…although I did find it on a page of Brooklynisms.

I also found a discussion about it on a word forum. It seems that sliding pon and also sliding ponD are New York terms. Nobody can figure out the origin of it. There’s even an article about it on RandomHouse.com:

The origin of sliding pond is obscure. One problem with tracking down a source is that, like many words for children’s games, sliding pond is not recorded in print until rather recently. Scholars are forced to work with memories of older people, since even common expressions or practices weren’t regarded as important enough to study and record.

I feel relieved to find that other people are familiar with the term sliding pon(d). I used to enjoy the sliding pon at Astoria Park

Nothing’s finer than a cute little diner in the morning!!

Yesterday Matt and I did a little day trip to Wilton, Connecticut to visit some family.

We travel down to the Tri-State Area regularly to visit family and friends. Connecticut has a surprisingly high amount of cute diners. Being from the diner capitol of the world, I love a good diner. Watertown’s got a few good diners but aside from those and The South Street Diner, Greater Boston doesn’t have a whole lot in the diner department.

My criteria for a diner:

1. It should be CHEAP. I should be able to spend less than $7 and leave feeling stuffed.
2. It should serve breakfast all day.
3. It should have fantastic grilled cheese.
4. It should have a rotating display case with desserts in it.
5. It should have frappes/milkshakes.
6. The waitress should be spunky, maybe a little rude, but will always call you “hun” or “sweetie”.
7. There is always Sweet-N-Lo at the tables.
8. They should be ready to fill Matt up with lots of coffee.

Jukeboxes at the tables are a plus.

On Saturday we found a very nice little diner in Milford called Kimberly Diner. It was crowded, cozy, and cheap. Matt got eggs and I got grilled cheese and a shockingly tasty cup of Manhattan clam chowder. The service was a little slow, but the food hit the spot and the total was only about $10.

And howdy from Manhattan!

Good morning! I write to you from the Hilton Hotel in Midtown Manhattan.

Matt and I went to the Princeton Record Exchange yesterday, and then I took NJ Transit up to Penn Station. When I gave Matt directions to go home, I accidentally sent him over the George Washington Bridge instead of the Tappan Zee, so he got stuck in a bit of traffic. :-( :-( :-( Sorry, Matt!!!!!!!!!!!

Last night we went to Puglia in Little Italy. Puglia is delicious. Everything I’ve had there is delicious. Admittedly, I don’t get too adventurous when dining there because I know how well they make simpler, traditional Italian dishes like spaghetti & meatballs and lasagna. Yum!!!

Puglia Restaurant also features Jorge, who sings songs like “That’s Amore!” Going to Puglia’s is always a good time.

In fact, it’s only 8:30 AM and I’m kind of craving lasagna from Puglia again!!! Yes, it’s THAT good!

We’re back!

Hola! Here we are, back from the Tri-State Area.

Downtown Manhattan was a ZOO on Saturday, which I don’t think I was quite prepared for. We never did see the Christmas tree. We mostly just walked around and we got to spend some time with my friend Charmaine, who recently moved to Brooklyn.

We ate lunch at Channel 4 Irish Pub and I had a black & white cookie at a Pax..mmmm…black and white cookies…easy to come by in New York, but not quite as easy to find here in Massachusetts (but not impossible; the only place I’ve seen in California that has them is Saul’s in Berkeley. I love a good black & white cookie. Delicious.

Then we headed up to Carmel (Putnam County, upstate) to spend time with some friends before coming back up this afternoon. We hit traffic almost immediately after crossing the Connecticut-Massachusetts border, adding 45 minutes on to our trip. Grrr. Holiday traffic. >:-\

Anyway, we made it home safe and sound. Hope everyone had a holiday weekend as wonderful as ours! :-)