Scott Bradford: Off on a Tangent

New York Trip: Day 3

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Another good day today. First we went to Mass at the nearby St. Patrick’s Cathedral, which was pretty cool. It’s a beautiful church with ornate shrines and statues and gorgeous architecture. I also had a pleasant and unexpected surprise; the Our Lady of Czestochowa Shrine (which is in the St. Patrick’s sanctuary) has relics from six Polish saints, including my patron: St. Maximilian Kolbe!

We also got some emergency umbrellas from a street vendor; stupid rain!

After changing out of church clothes, we made our way by subway to the ferry terminal in lower Manhattan for an afternoon out at Liberty and Ellis Islands. That was a lot of fun too. That’s one big statue. Unfortunately we couldn’t go up in the crown, but we were able to go up to the top of the base.

We headed back uptown to Times Square (with a nice musical intercession along the way) where we had dinner at the Hard Rock Cafe. As I had heard, the food was overpriced and mediocre . . . but the atmosphere was awesome, and there was all kinds of cool rock & roll memorabilia around. After a bit more walking around Times Square, we headed back to the hotel. Here are my pics:

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Random Subway Music

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We were riding on the New York City subway system, heading up toward Times Square from the ferry terminals in lower Manhattan . . . when all of a sudden, these guys hopped onto the train, played a song, and disappeared. I missed the first ten or twenty seconds of the performance as I fumbled to get my phone out and start recording. I wish I’d had some warning!

New York Trip: Day 2

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Had a great day yesterday . . . so great that I had to go to sleep instead of posting my pictures. We went to Central Park (and biked), the Central Park Zoo, Ground Zero (the World Trade Center Site), Chinatown, and the Empire State Building.

We had meant to go to Times Square but it got late and we were tired. We’ll probably swing by today (it’s near to the hotel) after some of the other stuff we’re doing.

The Empire State Building photos suck, I know. I’m just shooting off some cell phone camera pics; not doing a serious photographic trip or anything. Enjoy!

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New York Trip: Day 1

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So, we are in New York, New York, safe and sound. Riding Amtrak was an interesting experience; in some ways it’s inferior to flying or driving, and in others it’s superior. I’ll write up some more details about it later.

There were some delays—we lost close to an hour for breakdowns and whatever—but we got here safe and relatively quickly. Here’s a bunch of photos:

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Big Travel Weekend

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Obviously I’ve been slacking on the posting; I apologize for that. The last week has been busy at work, busy at home, and . . . well just busy in general.

This weekend is our big travel weekend: Melissa and I are going to New York, NY. Lots of you might be surprised to learn that, while I’ve traveled all over the United States, I’ve never been to New York City. It should be an interesting experience. I hate crowds of people, and I don’t like rudeness, so it should be a great time ;-).

Melissa has a thing up there, which is why we’re going now, but we’re also making a long weekend of it as an early anniversary trip. We’re taking the train up this afternoon (so it’ll also be my first time on Amtrak) and staying until Tuesday.

I will try to post some stuff now and then. I’m not sure if the hotel has Internet access or not, but Verizon has kindly made mobile hot-spot free for Palm Pre Plus owners with a standard data plan . . . so up to five computers can surf over the phone’s 3G connection. Now I can be online anywhere without having to pay for access at hotels that aren’t enlightened enough to offer free Internet. Nice.

Scott Bradford is a writer and technologist who has been putting his opinions online since 1995. He believes in three inviolable human rights: life, liberty, and property. He is a Catholic Christian who worships the trinitarian God described in the Nicene Creed. Scott is a husband, nerd, pet lover, and AMC/Jeep enthusiast with a B.S. degree in public administration from George Mason University.