Day 11 (2011) - Home Sweet Hurricane

First, some pictures from yesterday at the Little League World Series:

We officially decided to end our trip a few days early and head home from Williamsport today.  While many people on Long Island are evacuating their homes, we decided to "vacuate" instead.  We slept a little later than normal, everyone was quite tired, and by the time we got on the road it was about 11:00 or so.  We figured it would be a good idea to stock up on hurricane supplies in central PA, versus trying to do it once we got home, so the first stop was an Ace Hardware store about 20 minutes from the hotel.  This storm better be worth it, because we walked out of there over $300 lighter in the wallet (or heavier on the credit card as it may be).  At the Ace store we bought many varieties of flashlights, batteries of various sizes, duct tape, hurricane tape (no idea what for, but it sounded like a good idea), some plastic tarps (which likely won't get used), bungee cords to tie down the grill and a socket wrench (not really, but I feel like I should have to make the purchase seem manlier).

Next stop was a supermarket to get jugs of water.  However, as I was walking down the water aisle, I saw a guy loading up his cart with big jugs of water, and when I got to the end of the aisle where all of the water should have been, I saw that it was now empty.  So, I hopped back in the car and we used the GPS to located a Wal-Mart in the area.  The Wal-Mart had plenty of water, and thanks to a nice phone call we had received from Ed Mangano (county executive here on Long Island), I also picked up some bleach.  Why, I have no idea.  But if Ed wants me to get it, I get it.  I think I bought a few more things at this Wal-Mart (first aid kit, batteries maybe, but as you will read, the different shopping stops kind of blur together now).
By the time I was done at this Wal-Mart it was after 1:00, and I had not eaten or had my iced coffee yet, so I once again used the GPS to find a Starbucks.  Turns out the Starbucks was on a local college campus, and was a very nice Starbucks with a fancy lounge area.  The flip side was that this might have been the worst iced coffee I had ever had.  The coffee was see-through and might have just been coffee flavored water.

Always on the lookout for a good place to eat, Debbie located a diner in the Food Book that was about 40 minutes down the road on I-80 in the direction we were headed.  So, we re-programmed the GPS (love that little thing) and headed for the diner.  We got to the diner at about 2:30, and noticed a sign that said that the diner's hours were 6 am - 3 pm.  Good thing we got there when we did, because some people tried to be seated at around 2:55 and were turned away. 

This place was as low key as you could find, with old fashioned booths and little to no decorations inside.  It was so "down-home" that it sold condoms in the bathroom.  You know, just in case the place put you in the mood.  But I wonder, if you are buying condoms in a diner, why would you want the one that costs only $0.50, when the other 2 cost $1.00?  I'm thinking if you are going to get busy in a diner you would want to "pay up" for the more expensive brand.  But that's just me.

Anyway, the diner was known for its hamburgers, so Debbie, Amanda and I ordered them, while the boys ordered chicken parm meals.  To give us a little flavor of what we would be missing, we also ordered cheese fries.  Good thing we were all hungry, because the burgers were about the size of a full cow.  And the fries did give Debbie and me a little feeling of nostalgia, and heart-burn.

After the meal, we got back on the road, but Debbie felt we needed some more supplies (hand-held radio among other things), so, you guessed it, back to the GPS and back to yet another Wal-Mart.  We found a radio (turns out it was not what we wanted and it will be returned when the weather is clear) and some other stuff (again, a little fuzzy on the details even a few hours later), and we were finally done with the hurricane shopping.  Only issue was that the car was so full that we had to use the bungee cords we bought at the Ace Hardware store and strapped Amanda to the roof rack to make room.  I kid - we really strapped Ethan up there to make even more room.

With a car full of luggage, supplies and gas-emitting children, we headed back onto I-80 for the last time.  The drive back home was uneventful, and we arrived back home in Great Neck safe and sound at around 6:45 pm.  Since we need to clear room in the garage for my car to shield it from the storm (it was moved outside when the boys came home so we could use the area for their trunks), Debbie immediately started doing loads of camp laundry (towels, bedding, etc.) that were in bags in the garage.  Tomorrow we will organize the rest of the non-washable stuff and make room for my car.

Until next year...

Day 10 (2011) - No Cinderella Story

[It's pretty late and I'm tired, so no pictures today]

We started the day off in Cleveland with an early wake up call for the kids so we could get moving for our drive to Williamsport.  The boys have been watching the Little League World Series each year, and for this trip I had planned on passing by Williamsport on the way home right near the end of this year’s World Series.  We stopped by Williamsport last year, but it was after the Series had ended.  I had looked up the schedule of games before we left on our trip, and the schedule for today called for a game at 4:00 and another at 8:00.  The 4:00 game was to be the international semi-finals, and the 8:00 game was the US semi-finals.  Most years getting into these games is no big deal.  The tickets are free and it’s just first come first served if you want to sit in the stadium.   However, this year was different. 

Turns out that a team from nearby in Pennsylvania was still alive and would be playing in the 8:00 game.  Normally, there are probably no more than 10,000 people at the games at this stage of the tournament.  But since the PA team was really a home team, they have had huge crowds at each of their games.  One game had over 41,000 people there.  I read on the Little League web site last night that they decided to change the seating policy and actually give out tickets for the stadium.  The catch was that they would be handing them out between 12-4 at the Little League Museum, which is adjacent to the stadium.  Problem was, we were about 300 miles away in Cleveland, and there was no realistic way we could be there by noon.  I figured they would sell out of the 4,000 or tickets well before we got there.

We got on the road around 9:15, and headed out on our way to Williamsport.  Like I said, the estimate was that the drive would be around 4 hours, but that assumed no traffic and no stops.  No traffic was possible, but unlikely, and no stops was not even remotely achievable.  This another of those really boring drives.  When the GPS lady says "Drive 181 miles on I-80" you know you are in for a boring ride.

With the totally expected bathroom breaks, it did in fact take us a little under 5 hours to get to the museum, and we were stunned to find out that they still had tickets available.  We drove into the parking lot, rolled down my window and told a guy we needed 5 tickets and he gave us 5 tickets.  These were not seat specific tickets, but were for Section 4, whatever that meant.  We were thrilled.

We had some time before the first game, so we decided to do a little hurricane shopping, and found a Wegmans so we could buy some water and non-fridge or freezer foods, in case we lose power during the storm.   At this point we still planned on going to Philly, at least for a day, and were not sure if we would be able to go shopping when we got back.

We stocked up some stuff, and headed to a gourmet lunch at a Subway shop.  To make it even more gourmet, we ate in the car on the 5 minute ride to the parking lot.  We parked our car and gathered our raincoats and umbrellas and hopped on the short shuttle ride to the stadium.  The security at the stadium was tougher than any professional stadium we have ever been to.  I had some water bottles in my bag, and they made me get rid of all of them.  The other day in Cleveland I brought in at least 2 bottles that we drank during the game.  Oh well.

We got in to the complex right around 4:00 when the first game was starting (Venezuela vs. Japan) and went into Section 4 to find some seats.  We didn't have to go into Section 4 for this game, since they had told us that after the first game they would clear the stadium and only then would the tickets be needed.  Turns out Section 4 only has benches, no seats.  We watched the game for a few innings, but it wasn't that exciting of a game, so we went out into the complex to see what else was there.

Outside the stadium they had a bunch of baseball skills games that the kids could play, so they did that and had fun.  We had realized that our camera battery had died, so at this point Debbie took the shuttle back to the car to charge up the battery for a short time while the kids and I stayed in the complex.  We got slushies that they boys had seen on TV while watching the games, then went back into the stadium to watch the end of the first game.  This time we went into the section that had the nice seats, and found a great, shaded spot to watch the end of the game, and Debbie joined us shortly thereafter.

At some point, Debbie looked out into the crowd and asked about what looked like a large line forming.  She wondered if this was the line we would have to wait on to get back in for the 8:00 game.  So I went out to investigate.  Unfortunately, it was the line, and it was growing like an amoeba on steroids.  I decided to go wait on the line while the first game was wrapping up, leaving the others in their seats.

To say this line was long would be like saying Manute Bol was a little tall.  It started near 1st base behind the stadium, wrapped around to center field, then snaked at least 5 times back and forth.  I got to the end of the line at around the middle of the 3rd snake.  I stood there not moving while they cleared the stadium after the game, and Debbie and the kids stayed near the stadium.  It's really hard to explain the chaos that happened next, but basically when people started moving there was confusion near the stadium, and Debbie was able to get Ethan into the stadium alone (I had given Debbie one ticket when she went back to charge the battery, but I had the other 4 with me in line, far from where they were).  Ethan went in and picked out a spot on a bench for the 5 of us, and ended up enlisting some nice people around him to help him save the seats.  Meanwhile, I started to move slowly in my line.  All the while this was going on, Debbie and I were texting back and forth, and I was texting Ethan to make sure he was OK (I could actually see him from my vantage point).  Debbie was hanging out near the entrance and evidently made friends with the guard, who told her to get me down there and we could just go in.  So she texted me to get off of the line (which I was a little nervous about) and to come down.  I followed her instructions, found the three of them at the gate and we simply walked right in.  Still not really sure what happened, or why, but we found Ethan and sat down to get ready to watch the game.

The PA fans outnumbered the CA fans probably 30-1, and since there were about 31,000 people at the game, I felt a little bad for the CA fans.  But you couldn't help but root for the local kids.  The only issue we had was that none of us had eaten dinner, and we were kind of sardined into our seats (Brian did not enjoy the game much because of the overwhelming crowds and the fact that it was hard to see from our seats.  He decided that he liked watching the games on TV much better).  So, Debbie and Brian went out to scope out the food situation, only to shortly text me that if the kids wanted souvenirs they needed to do it now since the shops were closing.  Ethan took Amanda and they met Debbie and Brian at the gift shop.  After buying their stuff (I frankly have no idea what they bought) they came back to the seats to watch the game.

The PA team was the Cinderella story in the tournament, while the CA team was the power house team that was upset in the game before and probably was mad to be in this game instead of waiting for the winner of this game.  The game itself moved pretty quickly, since both pitchers were very good.  The CA pitcher was better, and only gave up 3 hits I think in 5 1/3 innings (he had to be removed due to pitch count issues).  CA ended up winning the game 2-0, thus ending the Cinderella dreams of the local kids.

We walked back to our car this time, but due to the crazy number of cars and the small streets, it took us over 30 minutes of just sitting in the car before we even moved.  When we finally got out of there, we had about a 20 minute drive to our hotel.  Since the World Series was here, there were not any rooms in Williamsport, and the only hotel I could find was a Holiday Inn Express in New Columbia.  I feared that this would be another Red Roof Inn experience, but was pleasantly surprised to find what looks like a renovated hotel, with decent sized rooms (bigger than the Hampton we stayed in).

The issue we face now is what to do about Hurricane Irene.  It looks like it will hit Long Island late on Saturday into Sunday and Monday.  If we go to Philly, we would have to drive back through the storm, which is not a good idea.  Plus, the storm is supposed to hit Philly also.  On the other hand, it sounds kind of nuts to be driving back ONTO an island that is going to get hit by a huge storm.  I want to get home to put some things inside (chairs, grill, etc.), but I am not sure if we aren't better off driving west instead.  Problem there is how and when do we get home?  Ethan is supposed to have soccer tryouts starting on Monday, and if the storm isn't quite as bad as expected, I don't want to be in Pittsburgh or somewhere and then need to get home.  My guess is that in the morning we will head home, after stopping someplace to get some batteries and flashlights.

Thus, this may be the last blog post of this summer.  If it is, I hope you enjoyed following us on this ride.  We had a lot of fun, even though it was a shorter, and different kind of trip than last year's journey.  If we do another trip next year, stay tuned for more blogging.

Day 9 (2011) - Come On, Irene

As promised, we woke the kids up pretty early (around 7:30) to get them up and moving so we could get on the road from Ann Arbor to Cleveland so we could get there by game time at 12:05.  I used Stubhub last night and was able to buy 5 tickets about 20 rows back on the 3rd base line for $15/ticket.  We had been to a day game last year and sat in a section that was covered by an overhang sparing us from the sun.  On the Indians web site the view from the section I was looking at showed people in the shade.  However, clearly this picture was taken at a different time of year or a different time of day, because when we got to our seats just before game time we were smack-dab in the sun.  It wasn't crazy hot as far as the temperature, but in the direct sun it was toasty.  We slathered on some sun screen and settled in for the game.

After the top of the 1st inning Debbie decided she needed a hat, so she went out to look for one.  While she was gone, it became clear to me that if we stayed in these seats for the whole game we would be as cooked and crispy as the hot dogs we ate yesterday.  So when she returned with her sexy new Indians hat, we got up and moved to shaded seats about 20 rows behind home plate. 

By the end of the game the boys were right behind home plate. 

See, this is the one advantage of going to games in cities other than NY or Boston.  We sat in seats that were better than the ones I bought, and in the shade with a nice breeze, for $15/seat.  These seats in NY or Boston would likely fetch over $400/ticket.  The flip side is that the team stinks.  Yes, I know the Indians are in the race this year, but c'mon, it's the Indians.

While the seats cost all of $87 (with Stubhub fees), I think we spent more than that by the end of the 3rd inning on food and drinks.  And it's not like we were eating anything fancy (sandwiches, pop corn, cracker jacks, nachos, etc.).  But it ended up to be a lovely day for a game, and we were able to see King Felix Hernandez pitch, and Ichiro get a few hits.  Oh, and the Indians played also.

Towards the end of the game, Ethan said he was hungry (he didn't have any of the snacks the rest of us had eaten), so Debbie went out to get him a slice of pizza.  When she went to pay, the vendor said to her "do you have a loaded ticket?"  Debbie had no idea what she was talking about, so the vendor asked for her ticket and scanned the bar code.  Turns out, we had purchased season tickets and the Indians give some credit on season tickets to use towards food or merchandise.  So, each of our tickets had $3.00 on them, and Ethan's pizza ended up costing $0.50. 

We wish someone had told us about this earlier, since the game was wrapping up and none of us was hungry any more.  But since the credit was good for merchandise, we decided to check out the team store after the game to see if there was something in the $12.00 range for the family (had we known about this when we first got there Debbie would have just used the $15.00 towards her hat).  We looked around and all they really had was an Indians pennant for $5.00.  So we bought that for the basement and also purchased two ball holders (I will withhold any impulse to make a joke here, but you can do what you want) for the souvenir balls the boys have.  Total cost with tax was about $14.00, so after the credit we only owed $2.00.  It was nice not breaking the bank for once at a team store.

The original plan for the day was to watch the game and then do something else in Cleveland afterwards.  I had checked out a few possibilities, but by the time the game ended, finished at the team store and got to the hotel it was almost 4:30 and everyone just felt like vegging.  Debbie took a nap while the boys and I watched the Little League World Series (and Amanda watched TV in the room with Debbie).  At around 7:00 we ventured out to a local sports bar, called the Winking Lizard, that was recommended by the hotel and had a delicious meal that didn't require me to sell a kidney to pay for.  We took the hotel shuttle service to the restaurant, but it wasn't far away from the hotel so we walked back.  On the way we checked out the set of a movie that is filming here where they turned a Cleveland city block into a Manhattan block, with NYC street signs and a subway entrance (the 4-5-6 lines).  The movie is the new Avengers movie, and clearly something bad happens in NYC in the movie, as the block looked like it had been hit pretty hard by something.

The plan for the rest of the trip is/was to go from here to Williamsport tomorrow to try and watch two Little League World Series games, then head to Philly for the weekend.  However, Hurricane Irene may mess that all up.  The forecast for Williamsport for tomorrow calls for 50% chance of rain, which may or may not even be related to Irene, but the bigger issue is the weekend.  As many of you probably know, the storm track is heading right for Long Island on Saturday night or Sunday, so if we spend the weekend in Philly as planned we may get stranded there.  On the other hand, I am not all that excited about heading home just to sit in our house during a hurricane.  It's quite the conundrum.

To complete my role as Al Roker, as I type this blog post the TV is on and there is now a Tornado warning for this part of Ohio overnight.  I guess if we are lucky the hotel will be picked up and transported to Kansas and we will miss the hurricane.

Day 8 (2011) - Not Sure If That Was An Eathquake or The Chili Talking

Day 8 was another busy day.  We started out by heading to Comerica Park in Detroit, home of the Detroit Tigers baseball team, for another park tour.  This makes the 8th tour we have taken, I think (NYY, Bos, SF, SD, Phi, Tor, STL, Det), so only 22 more to go!  The tour was OK, very different from the robotic tour we got the other day in Toronto, both in terms of the things the guide talked (ceiling panels and how they convert the field) about and also the way the tour guide did his thing.  In Toronto it was like the guide was reading from a script the whole time, and probably was, and here in Detroit it was like he was making it up as he went along.  The tour also took a little hit since right at the last minute about 25 5- and 6-year olds from a day care place joined the tour as part of a field trip.  These kids had about as much interest in this tour as my boys do at American Girl.  They were relatively well-behaved, but it added a layer to the tour that we didn't need.

Comerica is a pretty park, with all of the amenities of the modern parks, with things like a Ferris wheel, kids playground area, video games, etc.  At Fenway they have one thing - a field.  Not sure if that's a good thing or a bad thing, but it's just plain and simple.  We got into the visitor's clubhouse and dugout, but not onto the field.  I don't think they ever let you on the field, but it didn't matter since they were re-sodding the field while the Tigers were away because of damage done to the field from recent concerts (Paul McCartney and Kid Rock).

We finished the tour around 11:30, then headed to the Tigers store for some more stuff (kept it minimal this time - baseball, mini-bat and a key chain).  After the store we were getting a little hungry (the free breakfast at the Hampton is fair at best, and Debbie didn't even eat), so Debbie looked at the Food Book to see what was in the area.  She had read the other day about some hot dog place and it turned out that the place was basically around the corner from the park.  So, we headed over there around noon (the time is important, as you will read later), found a spot right across the street and went in.  The book had highlighted one hot dog place that served "Coney Island Hot Dogs" - with chili, mustard and onions, but also mentioned that there was a competing restaurant that was nearly as good right next door.  And when they said next door, they meant it - they shared a wall.  They were so close that when people walked by on the sidewalk in front of the restaurants, cooks from both places would bang on their windows at the same time to try and entice the potential customers to come in.  Since the one place, Lafayette Coney Island, was the one that got the official write-up, we went there.

This place was similar to the ribs place we ate at in Memphis - no real decor, just a bunch of picnic tables and benches that customers shared.  We found 5 seats and sat down to study the in depth menu.

We settled on the basic Coney Island hot dog, but with a few variations - Ethan went all-in, Debbie and I passed on the onions, Brian went with just chili and Amanda went for the simple plain hot dog (possibly her first hot dog ever - not sure).  We also decided to spice up the meal with an order of chili-cheese fries to share.  After we gave the waiter the order, he had to use a very sophisticated system to place the order with the kitchen.  He just turned away from us and shouted out the order, seemingly to no one.  Leisurely dining this place wasn't, as I believe it took about 52 seconds for the waiter to come back with our meals.  The place lived up to its hype as the hot dogs were delicious - the outside had a little "crunch" to it, and the chili went well with the dog. 

Before we even finished, we decided that we needed to do a taste test and go next door when we were done and order the same thing and compare!  We finished at Lafayette and I settled the bill (all of $20, with tax and tip) as the others went next door.  Next door (American Coney Island) was like the Four Seasons inside as compared with Lafayette.  They had decorations inside and the waiters had outfits that might even be called uniforms.  The menu was way more diverse, with maybe 3 more things on there than the first place.  Plus, the boys got a kick ouf of the beer they served at this place.

We all had the exact same thing, other than Amanda who wasn't thrilled with the hot dog and just ordered fries.  The service here was so much slower.  They took a little over 2 minutes to bring the meal.  Once we had devoured our second meal in about 15 minutes (again, $20 total), it was hard to decide which place was better.  If we had more time we would have had to do it all over again to do a second comparison.

When we came outside at around 12:45, we noticed that we had a ticket on the window. When we parked the car around noon Debbie went over to one of those pay machines and put in her credit card for one hour of parking. The ticket was time stamped at 12:39. The cost of the ticket is $20, but if we pay within 10 days it is only $10. Still, we have already hired Gloria Allred to defend us on this travesty of justice.

Right around the time that we were finishing our second lunch, there was evidently a pretty large earthquake on the East Coast, that could be felt as far west as Detroit (we heard people on the radio in Detroit describing the shaking).  I am not sure if we felt the earthquake, since after two meals of chili dogs there was enough seismic activity in our car that we may have actually had something to do with the quake.

As I mentioned in yesterday's post, we had decided to check out an auto factory tour after the stadium tour, so we headed to Dearborn to do just that.  However, it turns out that the tour was at the Henry Ford Museum in Dearborn, which is connected to this massive complex of other things to see.  When we inquired about the tour, we were told that even though it was a self-guided tour it could take 3 hours for the tour.  Not since the USS Minnow went out to sea with Gilligan and the gang had a 3 hour tour seemed less appealing to the troops, so we passed on it.

So instead we headed back to Ann Arbor to check out the University of Michigan.  Before we left, I got a list of things to do in Ann Arbor from Matt, and I have to say that we almost did all of them.  We checked out the Michigan Union (a place for students to hang out, study, eat, etc.), the kids spun the big cube thingy, we drove by the Big House (we tried to get in but could not), we walked along State Street and bought the kids Michigan t-shirts (took 3 stores to get 3 t-shirts - one kid for each store), we walked into the Diag (I assume this is short for Diagonal) and looked for the "M" in the center (found it, but a preacher was standing on it so we couldn't take a picture there) and we walked into the Law Quad (very nice).

I have to say, as my back-up school :) the University of Michigan's campus and area was kid of nice and I am sure I would have been quite happy at Michigan.  I know my closet would have been much more maize and blue than it is now.  But, for obvious reasons, I am very glad it worked out the way it did.

After touring the campus, we headed back to the hotel at around 5:30 for a little R&R before dinner.  Debbie napped (not sure she made it into the room before falling asleep), the kids read their books and I caught up on orders that needed to be invoiced (thankfully I picked up some coffee in the lobby before heading to the room).  I woke Debbie (for the final time) at around 7:00 and we headed back to Zingerman's for dinner.  We all switched it up a little this time, and once again it was very good.  Debbie and I shared two sandwiches, one with corned beef, Swiss and cole slaw and the other with pastrami, Swiss and cole slaw.  We both decided that we liked the corned beef better, you know, for the record.

We headed back to the hotel after dinner and did some laundry.  It was not as easy at it should have been since the washing machine broke after Debbie loaded the second load with detergent.  So, she and Amanda decided to hand wash the items in the bathtub and Debbie would dry them in the dryer later.  Fun times.

The kids finally went to sleep around 10:45, which is not good since the plan is to get up early and head to Cleveland to catch the 12:05 Indians game (I need to finish this and go on Stubhub to get tickets).  Since we have already been to Cleveland, we will need to find some other things to do after the game.  I have a few ideas, but it might be a play it by ear kind of afternoon.

Day 7 (2011) - It Ain't Tuna on White Bread, But It Will Do

We started the day in Toronto by getting $38 taken off our bill, which was for 2 days of parking, thanks to Debbie complaining about all of the crappy service we got while at the hotel.  Frankly, they should have comped us the room, but we will take what we can get.  We have never written a review on Tripadvisor.com, but I have a feeling one of us might do just that when we return home next week.

Today was pretty much a travel day, so once we escaped the Grand Ripoff Hotel, we headed out for a 5+ hour trip to Ann Arbor, home of some college, so I hear.  We cruised along through a sparsely populated area of Canada for most of the way, making good time even though Dudley Do-Right was in a car a little ahead of me for a good 50 miles (or 6,826 kilometers, but my math may be off on this - I never got the hang of the metric system, like why do you have to multiply to go from Celsius to Fahrenheit, but divide to go from kilometers to miles?).  That is, until we got to about 5 miles from the border and then WHAM, not moving.  After about 20 minutes of going 6 feet or so, I was able to get off an exit and hit some back roads that I noticed on the GPS.  This seemed to save me a little time as I came back onto the highway right at the toll booth, and right at a bathroom. 

The bathroom was a godsend.  Had I not gone then I might have either had to get out on the bridge to the US and go in Lake Ontario or use the mostly empty iced coffee cup in the car, because once we got through the tolls (after waiting 10-15 minutes when they decided to hold up all traffic for some reason before the toll), we still had to wait another 45 minutes or so in traffic to get across the bridge to go through the customs guy.  And just my luck I got Niedermeyer in the line I chose, as this guy was the only one out of about 7 lines that was actually checking cars and trunks.  Every other line seemed to be OK letting every Tom, Dick and Guy into the US, but my guard had to ask how much I spent on my fancy schmancy Canada hat.  Once we passed his test we were finally officially back in the good ole U S of A.

We then stopped shortly for a late lunch at a Jimmy John's (Debbie's favorite) and were back on the road.  I had seen that the Motown Museum was kind of on the way, so we stopped there at around 4:30 for a tour.  None of us is really a big Motown fan, but this was one of the best museum tours we have been on during our journeys.  The tour guide did a very good job of explaining things, and I think we all, kids included, learned a little about the Motown history.

After the Motown tour (no souvenirs!) we headed to Ann Arbor.  We are staying in a Hampton Inn, and while the room is much smaller than the one we left in Toronto at the Hotel de Snobby, we are happy to be here.  We didn't hang out in the hotel too long, and instead headed for dinner on the Michigan campus. 

A little background is needed here.  Earlier in the summer, we took the Tuckers to our favorite hoagie place in Philly, Lee's Hoagies, when on the way to Delaware.  We were excited to go there, as both Debbie and I had many meals from there when we were at Penn, especially since we lived right around the corner, each of us for 2 of the 4 years at Penn.  Most of the time when I was in school I ordered the tuna hoagie, and still have very fond memories of all of the tuna hoagies I ate (I'm still working off some of them today).  But in hindsight, a tuna hoagie really isn't much more than tuna on a white bread roll.  Sure, I jazzed it up with lettuce, provolone and hot peppers (in my younger days), but when it really comes down to it, it's tuna on a white bread roll.  Matt Tucker was especially disappointed in the tuna hoagie I ate, and has been very quick to tease me about it since.  He understands that the tuna hoagie has emotional significance to me, but that doesn't stop him from giving me the business about it.

So, to make things even, we decided to have dinner tonight at the famous Zingerman's Deli.  This was the first time that we have actually been able to eat at any place that is in our Food Book that we lived on last summer.  When we got to the deli, the help there was very accommodating, and explained how it works there very well.  Brian was fond of the idea that you could sample anything you wanted, and tried out a few cheeses.  Other than Amanda, we all opted for some version of a Reuben (Amanda went with Matzo ball soup and a latke).  And to be fair, it was much tastier than a tuna hoagie.  It still doesn't have the significance, but I will admit it was very good (although I still prefer the sandwich at Primanti Brothers in Pittsburgh).  Anyway, it was good enough that we may end up back there tomorrow night so we can try something else.

After dinner we found a Barnes & Noble so we could get Brian a book to read (he finished the book he was reading) and headed back to the hotel to do some backlogged work (since we were on radio silence all weekend) and some laundry.

Tomorrow we have another busy day ahead of us, as the plan calls for us to head to Comerica Park to do a tour of the Tigers' baseball stadium at 10 a.m. and then we will try and do a tour of a Ford manufacturing facility in Dearborn.  Debbie had the thought to see if there was such a thing, and it turns out there is one not far from Comerica.  I am sure the kids will be thrilled when we wake them up early.

Day 6 (2011) - Busy Day in Toronto

Today started with a complimentary breakfast at the hotel, during which I kept looking out for the hotel police to come and take me away for having an extra person with us.  This was also the first hotel where they came by with a bill for a complimentary breakfast, showing how much the breakfast was worth and with a line for a tip.  To explain the breakfast fully, it's a buffet, with no waiter/waitress service AT ALL.  Yet, I felt I had to leave a tip to avoid detection.  But who got the tip?  Anyway, we ate quickly and were on our way for the day in Toronto.

As explained yesterday, the hotel is really not in walking distance to the CN Tower or the Hockey Hall of Fame, but in fairness the hotel is relatively close to a subway stop located in the square where we ate last night.  The square is called Dundas Square, and for all of you Americans reading this I am sure you are pronouncing this as "DONE-dus" like I did.  That is, until I was corrected by a subway worker.  The correct pronunciation is "dun-DUSS."  So, now you know.

We bought a day-pass for the subway and street cars, which at $10 for the family was easily the best deal in Canada.  Our first stop was the CN Tower, which for many years was the tallest building on Earth.  It has since been surpassed, and if I wasn't a little tired right now I would look up what building(s) beat it. 

We had heard and read that the lines for the tower can be quite long (2-3 hours) so we had decided to get there pretty close to its opening today in the hopes of beating the crowd.  Well, either because it was a Sunday morning or because it was a little hazy out, there were no lines at all.  We got our tickets and headed right to the elevator.

The tower was built for television and radio transmissions, and the main observation deck is about 1100 feet up.  We bought an extra pass that enabled us to go another 300-400 feet up.  We got off at the main deck, and went right to another elevator that took us up higher.  The views, even though a bit hazy, were quite impressive.  It was a little too bad that the visibility wasn't the best, because it would have been cool to see all the way to Niagara Falls or Buffalo (where is says you can see on a clear day).  But if the haze kept people away, I guess it was a good trade.

The CN Tower recently added a feature that allowed people to go outside of the main observation deck while strapped in and then let them lean over the edge.  My mother actually heard about this before we left and called me to alert me to this possibility.  I was so excited about the chance to do this that I signed right up, told them I didn't need no stinkin' harness and just walked right to the edge and leaned over.  And if you believe that I have a tall tower in Canada to sell you.  Although, some lunatics were actually doing it while we were there.

After checking out the views, we bought our obligatory crap/souvenirs and headed next door to the Rogers Centre (I will be calling it by its original name from here out - Skydome) for the 11:00 tour.  We have done a lot of tours of stadiums over the years, and some tours were really in depth.  Skydome, not so much.  They were busy converting the field back from football to baseball, so we were not allowed on the field.  And they don't let you into the clubhouses like other parks do.  So, most of this tour revolved around how they convert the field to and from baseball and football and also how they retract the roof.  Not quite the glory stories of the Red Sox or Yankees.  Also a pale comparison is the fact that while the Red Sox have retired the numbers of players like Williams, Yaz, Fisk and Rice, and the Yankees have retired jerseys of players like Ruth, Gehrig, DiMaggio and Mantle, the Blue Jays have retired the numbers worn by Joe Carter, Dave Steib and the immortal Tony Fernandez.  The only way any of these players are getting into the Baseball Hall of Fame is with a ticket.

After our one hour Skydome tour, we (again) bought a few useless items, and headed for a bite to eat before hitting the Hockey Hall of Fame.  Quick recap of lunch - OK food, too much money.  That wraps up lunch.

We walked from lunch to the HHOF, which, similar to the Basketball Hall of Fame, is not its own stand alone building but is in the basement of an office building.  I will readily admit that my knowledge of hockey is limited, and the knowledge of the rest of my family is minimal at best.  So as expected the kids only really got into the HOF when they came across a handful of interactive exhibits where you could play goalie against both computerized and real pucks and another one where you try to score against a computer goalie.

Other than these activities, the exhibits of over 100 years of hockey was mostly wasted on them (sorry, Jack).  But we did get a picture with the Stanley Cup.

We wrapped up at the HHOF (finishing it off with even more clutter to bring home) around 4:30 and then tried to figure out what to do.  Most other places to visit were either closed or closing soon, plus the kids were tired, so we opted to go swimming in the hotel pool.  So we headed back on the subway to the hotel.

When we got back to our room to change for the pool, we discovered that the room had not been made up yet.  Here it was, 5:00 on Sunday, after spending the whole day out and they could not find time to clean our room and give us new towels?  What if we needed to get ready for the night?  We can't leave this hotel fast enough.

The kids had a nice time in the pool and made some friends from VA (while I took a power nap in anticipation of the 5+ hour drive to Michigan tomorrow), then we headed back up to the room around 6:45.  Miraculously, the room was made up and we had new towels (although she didn't leave us the sheets we had asked for, but we let it go).  The kids showered and we headed out for dinner.  I had looked up some family friendly places to eat in the area, and found a sports bar near Dundas Square.  We hopped on a street car to avoid walking through Little Beirut, and then walked a few blocks to the restaurant (passing on the establishment that advertised "Cold Beer.  Naked Men.").  The sports bar/restaurant wasn't quite as advertised online, but the food was good (and overpriced for what we ate - not helped at all by the 13% sales tax in Canada - no wonder they can afford to have universal health care).  Amanda took a little nap at the table and woke up to eat her hamburger (maybe the 324th of the trip). 

We skipped dessert tonight and headed back to the hotel to get some rest.  We would have gotten everyone to bed earlier, but I had to go down to the lobby to try and borrow a plunger to fix an issue that arose after we got back to the room.  Names will be withheld to protect the innocent, but anyone that knows our family can guess pretty easily what happened.  When I got to the lobby to ask for the plunger - I didn't want anyone coming to the room because we had already set up the air bed - I had to ask the same Ms. Snooty that checked me in yesterday.  At first she was going to call for the maintenance man to come up, but I asked if I could just take as I told her my family was sleeping.  She looked at me like I asked to take the Stanley Cup up to my room and had to ask the manager.  After getting the OK from the manager, the maintenance man gave me his coveted plunger and I was able to fix the problem pretty quickly.  We then got everyone to bed, Debbie and I did a little work and called it a night.

Like I said, Debbie and I have never been so excited to leave a hotel as we are with this one.  Oh well.  Tomorrow we will be back in the U.S., and back online with our cell phones and mifi (we turned them all off for the weekend to avoid the nutty international charges).  Tomorrow - Michigan (sorry, Jack).

Day 5 (2011) - Dave says "Thanks, but can you fix the typo?"

We started the day at Niagara Falls with a free breakfast at the Embassy Suites. We have stayed at a bunch of Embassy Suites, and this was the biggest breakfast operation we have ever encountered. We had to be seated by a hostess, then a waitress came and took our drink order before we hit the buffet. This place had three lines to order hot food, where every other Embassy had one. Anyway, the size of the breakfast place really isn’t all that interesting, but I just thought I would mention it.

We decided to hit one more Falls-based attraction before we left town, so we once again spent $12.50 to take the incline down the huge hill (biggest scam of all time – all they had to do was build stairs and a lot of people, including us, would have at least walked one way), and bought tickets to the Journey Behind The Falls. For this attraction you take an elevator down to tunnels behind the Horseshoe Falls. There is an observation deck right near the Falls, and once again we needed ponchos, but still got wet. The strength of the water is intense and amazing to feel so close to the Falls. We checked out two tunnels that got you “behind” the Falls, but these were kind of like the old Jungle Cruise joke where the boat driver makes a big deal about seeing “the back side of water.”

We said our goodbyes to the Falls (by buying more t-shirts and other stuff – including a new hat for me) and checked out of the hotel to start our ride to Toronto. The original plan was to head right to Toronto and go to the Hockey Hall of Fame. But somewhere along the line in Niagara Falls, someone had mentioned a cute town nearby called Niagara-On-The-Lake, and when we saw a sign on the highway for that town we decided to take a detour and check it out and grab some lunch. We thought, based on what we were told or thought we were told, that the town was right off the highway, but it turns out that it was probably 20 minutes off the road. Nonetheless, we made it to Niagara-On-The-Lake and after a little bit of driving around found a place to park. It was a very cute, Hamptons-type town with nice shops and restaurants. We strolled the main street for a little bit then settled on a casual Greek place for lunch. The food there was quite good, but once again not exactly a memorable meal, so I won’t get into the details on who had what.

After lunch and a quick photo op at a park that is on what I believe to be Lake Ontario, we were on our way to Toronto.

But before we got back on the highway we needed to take a picture of something that we saw on the way into town. We passed a cemetery at the corner of a side road that had a sign right at the corner with the name of the cemetery, and a personalized message. The message read “Welcome Dave Lewis.” Well, actually it read “Welome Dave Lewis.” Evidently poor Dave Lewis was a new tenant at the cemetery, but must not have been quite important enough of a new resident to warrant a spell-check.

We had seen the sign on the way in, and it cracked us up and we decided to take a picture on the way out. But we took a slightly different way out of town and got all the way to the highway without seeing the sign. Since it was already kind of late and by the time we got to Toronto we would not have had time for the Hall of Fame anyway, we decided to turn around to find the sign. Turns out it was about one block from where we got back on the road out of town. It may have added 30 minutes or so to the trip, but it was worth it.

Over the past two years I have booked a lot of hotels basically sight unseen and, if I give myself a mulligan for the Syracuse Red Roof Inn, I have batted 1.000. All of the hotels have been in good or strategic locations and have been perfectly fine. Well, my streak ended today. I booked a hotel called The Grand Hotel & Suites for a few reasons. The description said it was in walking distance to the places we were likely to visit (HOF, Rogers Center, CN Tower). However, in driving through the city to get to the hotel, it became clear that this hotel was not exactly close to the places we would visit, and it is not in the most appealing part of town.

From the pictures it also looked like a nice high-class hotel. Well, it considers itself a high-class hotel, based on the cavity search I had to endure just to check in (OK, not a cavity search, but they did spend way too much time trying to “verify my address” – no idea what that meant). When they finally got permission from the Prime Minister to give me my room keys, I had to ask two bell-men to help me load up the luggage cart, as there were about 15 steps between the street and the entrance to the hotel, so I could not just load up the cart from the back of the car.

Then, since I opted for self-parking, I had to maneuver my mini-van into and around a parking garage that was clearly made for Smart Cars only. I wasn’t 100% sure that I would make the height clearance, then to get around a turn I had to lube the car up with butter. I finally parked my car (about 3 inches from the car next to me) and headed upstairs where more fun awaited.

Let me list the room’s transgressions:

• Hair on the bed
• Hair in the tub
• A clearly used towel on the back of the bathroom door
• Two hangars in the closet for robes, but only one robe
• The TV in the living room area maxxed out a volume that only dogs could hear
• The toilet didn’t flush (and we hadn’t used it yet)
• The room has free wifi and also advertizes that it has a highspeed internet service by connecting with an Ethernet cord, but there is no Ethernet jack in the room

Based on the first 4 items above, Debbie headed down to the lobby to complain. On her way, she ran into a hotel employee and asked him about whether it was customary to leave a towel hanging behind the bathroom door. He looked at her like she had three heads, and said “can I see your room?” He came in and confirmed that this was not normal, and told us to call the manager to send up housekeeping. The manager sent someone right away and she grabbed the towel immediately and looked at the hair in the tub and called housekeeping. Two housekeepers then showed up to completely re-do the room.

The other issue came right when we entered the room. We always call for more towels, pillows and sheets (to use as an extra blanket for the kids, to cover the blanket on our bed and to use beneath the air bed), and I did the same today. When I asked for these things she asked me to confirm how many people were staying in the room. For almost all of the hotels I book, I book it as 2 adults and 2 kids because a lot of hotels now don’t allow 5 people in a standard room. So when I said 2 adults and 2 kids, she didn’t even leave it at that. She then asked me the ages of the kids. Only when I had passed her little test did she agree to send the stuff. Only problem is that now Amanda has to stay in the car (just kidding – but every time someone came to the room to fix something I thought that they would go back and compare the people here to the reservation and I would get a call – could still happen).

Once the room was clean, we headed a few blocks away to what could be described as Toronto’s version of Times Square, or at least something close to it. We grabbed dinner at a brew-pub, with Debbie, Ethan and I sharing two thin-crusted pizza-type things called Farfegnugens or Hassenpfeffer or something like that (they are actually called Flammekueche).

We then walked around for a little bit, found an ice cream store that mixed in a topping by hand (tasty) and stopped for a few minutes to watch a street show. The street show’s theme was playing with fire, but after they kind of set their equipment on fire by mistake, we didn’t think it was a great idea to stick around too long.

We walked back through Beirut to our hotel, called for the toilet to be plunged, and got the kids ready for bed. Tomorrow the plan is to go to the CN Tower early before it gets too crowded, then do a tour of the Rogers Center (Blue Jays stadium) and then go to the Hockey Hall of Fame. That all assumes we don’t get thrown out of the hotel for having 5 people here.

Day 4 (2011) - O, Canada!

[Editor's Notes:  This really isn't a funny entry (but you can still read it), as the day didn't present any truly funny, ironic or sarcastic moments.  Also, once again having issues uploading photos, so they may be part of a different post if I get it to work.]

The day started out for us with a very nice, complimentary, breakfast at the Embassy Suites (not sure what the people at the Red Roof Inn had, but frankly, I don't care).  We then headed towards Syracuse University to check it out.  Since we had a few hours drive ahead of us, we didn't really spend too much time on campus.  We spent more time picking out t-shirts for the boys (which we probably could have gotten for half the price at Modells), and a little Orange guy for Amanda.  At around noon, after a pit stop at a local post office to mail a package for a More Than Paper client, we headed off towards Niagara Falls.

The drive was about 2.5 hours, and we stopped for lunch at a Subway a little bit before the border.  On a side note, for those of you that read last year's blog, I spent a lot of time writing about all of the outstanding meals we ate along the way.  This year the food has been average at best.  The food was tasty at Quincy Market, but other than that I am not sure we have had anything that we would call memorable.  Maybe it's just that the food in the South was so different that it made an impact, but I also think the choices were just better and more interesting.  There are still a bunch of days left this summer, so maybe it will turn around.  I hope so.

We finally made it into Canada around 4:00, after waiting about 30 minutes to cross the border.  I had decided to stay on the Canadian side, which in looking over at the US side seems to have been the right call.  I had always kind of assumed that visiting Niagara Falls was like that scene from "Vacation" where Chevy Chase takes about 3 seconds to look at the Grand Canyon.  Water.  Check.  OK, let's move on.  But it turned out to surprise me.  It is quite an impressive display.  There are a bunch of things you can do in connection with seeing the Falls, but the one that seemed the most fun was the Maid of the Mist boat ride.  It was a ton of fun.  Debbie absolutely loved the ride, and her quote was "Now the trip begins!"  They give you ponchos before you board, then slowly head towards the Horseshoe Falls and actually get pretty close.  Even with the ponchos we all got wet and it was really cool being that close.

After the boat ride, we headed to the hotel (another Embassy Suites, same kind of room as Syracuse), then once again took advantage of the Manager's Reception for a drink and some snacks.  We then headed for a walk by the Falls, and were able to get really close to the top of the Horseshoe Falls.  Again, cool.

By now the troops were getting hungry (and cranky) and we headed back up to the hotel.  To get there we took a short incline ride to avoid a very long uphill walk.  After spending more than we had planned on the night before at dinner, and also having spent more than we needed to on Syracuse t-shirts, we kind of wanted something quick and cheap.  We got a recommendation for a pizza/pasta place near the hotel and went there.  Again, not a memorable meal at all, but it served its purpose.

At night at The Falls, they light up the falls (my mother would appreciate that, getting to see The Falls all lit up), and on Friday and Sunday nights they also have fireworks over The Falls.   Our room overlooks The Falls, so we were able to see it all from the comfort of our room.

Everyone bathed (adults showered, kids used Jacuzzi) and we called it a night.  Tomorrow we head to Toronto for 2 days.

Day 3 (2011) - You Get What You Pay (or don't pay) For

Today was a relatively uneventful day, at least until towards the end of the day. We started out by leaving the hotel in Boston around 10:00. The original plan was to hit the Bed, Bath & Beyond near Fenway on the way out of town, with the possible addition of Staples to get some office supplies. However, we looked up Bed, Bath & Beyond store locations in the Syracuse area, and instead decided to get on the road and pick up the air bed in Syracuse. We left the hotel without eating, so at the first rest stop we pulled in for a gourmet breakfast of bagels. Some of us jazzed it up with cream cheese, with the others went with butter. And Debbie had a banana. She may have splurged and had two. I know, thrilling.

I had estimated that the trip to the Boxing Hall of Fame would be a little under 5 hours, and the daunting thing for me was that the ride essentially consisted of all of one road, I-90. Driving itself is pretty boring, but at least when there are decisions to make and roads to change it keeps me interested. This time, it would be about 300 miles of Mass Pike. And the ride did not disappoint. There are some roads that are fun or at least interesting to drive – Taconic, Merritt. Then there are others that I dread – NJ Turnpike, Rt. 84 in CT. I think today’s ride was in the latter category. But, to get from Point A to Point B, you have to get there somehow, and this was the only way to get there. So, I sucked it up and stared ahead for 300 miles.

At around 1:00 the troops were getting hungry, and I saw that there was a Panera Bread restaurant at the next exit. So I got off to head for lunch. Turns out this was a somewhat populated area, and there was also a Walmart next to the restaurant. This would kill three birds with one stop. Lunch, get the Air Bed and get the office supplies. The day was looking up.

After lunch we did the Walmart shop and got back on the road, now equipped with a new handy-dandy air bed that we really didn’t need in the long run, but did need in the short run (this trip). Finally at around 4:00 we got off of I-90 and looked for the Boxing Hall of Fame. Didn’t take much effort to find it, as the HOF was literally next to the exit. Once inside, we read a little about why the Boxing Hall of Fame was where it was (Canastota, NY). It’s not that boxing was invented there, or that there were a ton of champions from there. Nope, the reason given was basically that no one else had come up with a place for a Boxing Hall of Fame, and this place was as good as any. At least that’s how I read it.

This Hall of Fame was a little different than other Halls we have visited. At the Baseball Hall of Fame you get a plaque with your face displayed on it. At the Football Hall of Fame you get a bust. Here, you get a playing card with a little photo on it. Or that’s what they looked like.

 We have been at a lot of Halls of Fame by now, and most take some time to get around. This one could have fit in my living room. And for those of you that know my house, you know that my living room is not large ($0.75 in a cab all the way across, we’re talking small – ba dum bum).

Shortly after starting to look around, one of the proprietors came up to me and asked me who my favorite boxer was. Now, I like boxing a little, or did when it mattered and everyone knew the champs, but I am not a huge boxing guy and the only reason we even stopped there was because it was on the way. So, I did some quick thinking and tried not to just go with the obvious (Ali) and instead said Marvin Hagler. Big mistake. Turns out they had a whole slew of Hagler-signed things in the gift shop, and he then spent the next 5 minutes or so telling me all about them and what great deals they were. In hindsight I should have said Boom Boom Mancini or someone else. I nodded nicely, as if there was a 1% chance I might buy some of the Marvelous Marvin Hagler items, then excused myself to look around. Some of the displays were pretty interesting (Primo Carnera had HUGE hands), but after about 15 minutes of so we headed over to the gift shop, where they housed the original ring from Madison Square Garden (in which they held the 1st Ali-Frazier fight, among many, many other famous fights.

We looked around for a while, and after once again getting the hard sell on the Hagler items, we headed out at around 5:00. We could have stuck around for the evening, because it turns out they were going to have a concert there tonight. Who was it? Was it worth staying? Ah, nope. It was an Elvis impersonator. Evidently he must be very good, because when we left there were a bunch of people that had already set up their chairs to make sure they had a good view of the Fake King.

After turning down the chance to see the would-be King, we headed to the hotel in Syracuse. Actually, it was East Syracuse where we would be staying. See, we were going to have a free hotel room tonight thanks to a raffle that my mother-in-law won. The free night was at a Red Roof Inn, and I had booked it knowing we would only be in the area for a short time. We got to the hotel, and the first sign of trouble was the exterior doors. Second sign of trouble was the lobby/check-in area that was even smaller than the Boxing Hall of Fame. Third, and perhaps scariest, sign was the two-ton woman who came out of her room with a cigarette dangling from her mouth holding the leashes of two monster-sized dogs.  The final sign was the 2-by-nothing room. To give it credit, the room was clean and smelled fine. We could have stayed there. But the way Debbie and I operate is that at night when the kids go to sleep we process the More Than Paper orders for the day, and Debbie answers emails. Debbie has to print things, and we need light to work, so it would have been hard to work there. Did I mention it was tiny?

This area had a lot of other hotels, and I had seen an Embassy Suites on the way in, so we decided to check it out. On the way to the Embassy Suites, we saw a Hampton, so I went in to see about rooms. They did have a room, but I wanted to see about the Embassy. After entering the lobby at the Embassy it took me all of about 2 seconds to decide that we were not staying at the Red Roof Inn. What a difference! The lobby is large and beautiful, they had a Manager’s Cocktail Hour going on with free drinks and snacks and they have a free breakfast in the morning. Plus, we opted for the room with a separate king bed with the kids in the living room area on a pull-pout couch and our new funky air bed. Now we were living baby!

We unloaded all of our crap, er, luggage, and headed down for the free drinks/snacks and afterwards went to a local restaurant for dinner. The dinner place served good Italian food, but it was a mistake because it took too long to get the food after such a long day in the car, and it was a little more expensive than we really needed. On the flip side, when we were done eating the waitress came to the table with this ginormous plate of cotton candy.

After settling up at the restaurant, we headed back to the Red Roof Inn to take a picture of the room that we rejected.

The cleaning lady will like us in the morning, as nothing will be disturbed. We then headed back to the Embassy where we got the kids ready for bed, stared our nightly work and decided to take this chance to do some laundry. The laundry might have been a mistake also, since there is only one washer and dryer in the hotel, and they are a little old. Plus, we have had to jockey our way around two other people trying to do their laundry, so we lost a lot of time. But at least we will have clean stuff as we head to Niagara Falls, and Canada, tomorrow.