Scattered Thoughts . . .

A fter our short visit to Manhattan this past Saturday, we rode on the Long Island Railroad from Grand Central Madison to Rockville Centre then walked the few short blocks back to the hotel.  I have to say that, as a tourist wanting easy and quick access to midtown Manhattan, the new Madison extension to Grand Central is very convenient! I needed to make a short stop at a pharmacy so we stopped at a pharmacy that was next to the hotel.  While we were there, we picked up a few additional drinks for the hotel.  Below, we are waiting for Sheila to come out of the pharmacy...  we somehow got separated in the store so checked out separately... Six hours of sleep the previous night was now taking its toll on Kenzie.  She laid down to take a short nap with her new stuffed animal but I don't think she got more than a few minutes of sleep, if at all.  I managed to capture a photo of her lying with her stuffed animal though... Before long, it was time to drive to my ...

S heila and I were talking about hotels along the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade route this morning as we watched the parade on television.  We were agreeing that if we ever did venture to Manhattan for the parade, for a few very good reasons, we would want to have a hotel with a room overlooking the parade route.  So, out of curiosity, we opened up Google Maps to see what hotels would be preferable.  We found that there are actually a few options that look quite good and which were reasonably priced.  That got us talking about checking the prices of these hotels for our upcoming Christmas trip to Manhattan with Lukey and Kenzie.  We already have a hotel booked for this trip but it never hurts to check options and check for a better deal. This parade route location where a few nice hotels are located was still a good central location for what we were planning to do on our Christmas trip with the kids.  First we looked into the Warwick Hotel, however and un...

A lmost all the hotels in mid-town Manhattan are a bit beyond our budget so we always stay in the area just south of the Empire State Building which happens to be Koreatown.  The prices seem to be the lowest in this area but, regardless of the budget prices, some of the hotels are quite nice.  For this next trip to Manhattan this coming Christmas with Lukey and Kenzie, we had already made reservations to stay at the Life Hotel on 31st Street just a block or two from the Empire State Building. The Life Hotel was just recently reopened and is actually quite nice.  This building used to be the headquarters for Life magazine but it more recently had been converted to a hotel.  We were really excited to be staying in a hotel that used to be the headquarters for Life magazine. Since I will be our tour guide and this is Lukey and Kenzie's first trip to Manhattan, I was familiarizing myself with Grand Central Terminal late last night in preparation of this upcoming Christmas...

Throughout various points over the course of our train show weekend, I shot a few video clips in different places while everyone was doing different things.  Naturally, I included a few short clips from the train show itself...  a few minutes of Maggie the Clown's show...  a couple of short video clips of the pool at the hotel...  and, a few short clips from The Munich Haus German restaurant.   Lukey was lucky enough to be chosen to be part of Maggie and Clown's magic act.  He spent a few minutes on stage with Maggie and another child from the audience.  Naturally, Papa shot video of the whole thing so that Lukey could view the video any time he wants while visiting us.  Unfortunately, when we arrived home and I transferred the photos and video clips to my desktop computer, I immediately noticed that I screwed up the entire video of Lukey being on stage!  I wasn't paying attention to the camera as I watched Lukey and I paid the price.....

The first thing the kids wanted to do when they arrived at the hotel was jump in the pool!  Mom and John had to check them into their room first though.  I was sitting in the lobby lounge area and had a chance to re-introduce Lukey and Kenzie to the rest of our train show group...  particularly to Jake and Dylan.  While everyone was swimming in the pool, I secured the two big tables in the lounge area so we could all relax with a few drinks and dinner.  After a short swim session, everyone congregated in the lounge area for our first night of the extended weekend... On Saturday, after the train show, we had time to squeeze in some pool time before needing to head to dinner.  Personally, I could have used a short nap but I wanted to capture a few shots of the kids in the pool so I fought with my eyelid actuators and managed to keep my eyes open (partly open but open enough) so I could shoot some photos in the pool house... ...

The first time we ventured down to the Amherst Railway Society's train show eight years ago, we simply drove the three hours down there, visited the show, and drove back home that night... completely exhausted.  Once we arrived at this show that year, we immediately realized that there was no possible way to see all of the show in just one eight hour day so we decided it would be wiser to stay overnight the following year so we could attend the show both days. This would also allow us to avoid six hours of driving in one day. The following year (our third year), we decided to start heading down to Springfield on Friday and stay an extra night. This allowed us to settle in and relax a bit before heading to the hectic, crowded show on Saturday. We would use the pool, hot tub, have a few drinks and have food delivered to the hotel on that first night. This plan seemed to work out much better for a train show that is spread out over eight acres! Over the years, more and more...

Sheila, talking with one of our newest train show fanatics... He went home with a new train set and a few other toys. Sheila and I had a great time at our annual train show extended weekend. It sounds as though everyone who joined us had a great time as well!  My spinal injuries were putting a painful crimp in our time at the show but, overall, we had a great time and are glad we ventured to the show regardless of my spinal injuries. I couldn't walk at all in the days before we left for the show so it was a bit iffy whether I would make it to the show at all. We still probably would have traveled down to see everyone but being able to walk around the show didn't look promising in the preceding days. After having problems getting around the show on my own this year... as well as some problems last year which weren't as bad as this year... and even some problems the year before that were milder (I see the pattern and it isn't a pretty pattern)... I have de...

View from our room upon arrival... This year was the first year that we were able to leave home for the train show by lunchtime, or even whenever we wanted, so we could arrive by check-in time. In the past, we always had to wait for Adam to get out of school before heading out of town.  We are now empty-nesters so we have the freedom to leave home whenever we desire!  Liza, however, had to wait until she was finished with her teaching school day which meant that Liza and the grandchildren would not arrive at the hotel until later in the evening. When the kids arrived at the hotel for their first train show, we were all in the lobby lounge area enjoying a few beverages and waiting for them to arrive so we could order some pizza. The hotel lobby with some of our party at the front desk... Liza tells us that the kids were a bit confused when they left home... and understandably so. All of us had been reminding them all week long that we will be going to a train show f...