We went to this Spiegeltent cabaret as part of a surprise birthday party, but we were the ones who got a surprise when we found ourselves enjoying this performance oh so much. Filled with truly mind blowing feats of physical strength and agility, the show's silly after life plot and sometimes awkward sexual innuendo is totally forgivable and becomes thoroughly charming by the end. Lots of sexy ladies: blonde, brunette, and crazy so everyone's fantasy is covered. The performance is perfect for the opulent in-the-round tent. Performances continue through September. Go!
Spend a Couple Hours »La Vie
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Spend a Couple Hours »Picking Peaches
I've been wanting to pick my own anything for a couple years now and for some reason it's been the toughest thing to organize. So imagine my delight when, on our way to a hike, we came across Lewin Farms which was hosting pick your own peaches!
We grabbed a bag and began down the orchard lanes, at first struggling to find a good one: ripe but not too squishy and not too hard; but we persevered and came home with 6 good peaches for $2. Be forewarned, the ground is literary littered with peaches in varying degrees of rot, so sandals are an absolute no no but, on the plus side, the air smells of peaches and if you're like my cat I-Hop and will eat anything and everything, there's plenty on the ground for munching (though I don't really recommend it).
Lewin starts apples soon and peaches continue for a few more weeks. Check in with their website for updates.
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Posted on August 27, 2007
Spend a Couple Hours »Rocks Off Cruise Concert
Rocks Off concert series, which runs through September and part of October is an ingenious idea. Rent a party boat, sell beer, then get bands and performers to play. Much like their logo (a unicorn humping a dolphin) would suggest, this is not a fancy, fussy affair, but welcoming and laid back, and the performers they booked are as varied as a Guns 'n' Roses Tribute band, Lee Scratch Perry, and Jollyship the Whizbang – the pirate puppet troupe band we saw play.
This lively, dashing group and their foul mouthed puppets were entertaining but suffered (understandably) from the limited space. From their website, I gather more sets and costumes are utilized and based on their looser, more adlibbed performance on the boat, I can, with confidence, say the full experience will be well worth your time.
The opening band was somewhat forgettable, but they certainly had a blast playing, maybe just a tad more than we had listening. A fog machine on a boat quickly becomes suffocating so we ventured out onto the small deck, where everyone else was, to get some air. The deck was packed all night, imagine one of those terrible shoulder to shoulder bars crowded tighter than the Tokyo Metro… now imagine the floor moves in an undulating motion.
The experience was intense, particularly if you don't have some rail space to hold onto. We managed to snag some rail on the return trip and got to experience the upside to the popular venue – the truly amazing views, from right next to the Statue of Liberty, to grand vistas of the city at night that really make you feel in awe and in love with such a great town. So make sure to take advantage of this singular experience with your favorite of the available bands, they should have something for everyone.
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Posted on August 20, 2007
Spend a Couple Hours »Hudson Valley Rib Fest
This coming weekend we're headed north to the “HVRF“, which is how I imagine locals refer to it, which runs from August 17-19. The festival features five local and national rib masters and I plan to try every one.
There will be entertainment, including a fairly frightening band called the Gitfiddle, BBQ demonstrations and contests. This will be my first year attending, so I can't tell you if it's fantastic, but with a short drive, $5 admission and tons of BBQ, I can't believe it could be anything less.
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Posted on August 13, 2007
Spend a Couple Hours »Get Your Photo Taken With Spike From Buffy the Vampire Slayer
Sometimes the stars align and magic happens. I had been wanting to attend a horror convention and was browsing the internet for options and there it was: a dream come true!
Months ago I had said to Jim “If Spike is ever at a dork convention, I AM GOING” and go I did to the Fangoria Weekend of Horrors. I carried the flier around with me for weeks and tried to get friends excited to go, but only got one taker (thanks Laura).
There were horrors to be had, but not the ones I expected. The first was the terrible realization that the convention was miles from the Meadowlands, at the dismal Crowne Plaza hotel, a fact we at first refused to believe. It was my own fault for having expectations of dorks in costumes, rows and rows of merchandise and semi famous people around every corner signing glossies.
It was more like a Magic Shop opened their basement with pity to fifteen friends to sell their shit. The makeup artists that were there to peddle their wares didn't even have someone in makeup to show off their skills! They had lumps of plastic flesh just strewn across their fold-out card tables to represent various wounds.
Not all sellers were so terrible, we purchased a three sheet original Blood Beach poster from a guy with a really decent collection.
We attended one panel of current young independent horror movie makers and, in an attempt to avoid being rude, I'll just say it made me realize that anyone can make a movie and it inspired us to start a new one.
The town of Secaucus itself is a cruel labyrinth of roads that go nowhere except depressing condos or back to the highway you just got off of. We got lost both on the way to and from a god awful Chili's (we should have gone to Hoolihan's). The stress almost caused me to cry, as I thought we would be too late for the real highlight of the trip, the photo with Spike. We waited near the end of a very long line, compromised of giants and middle aged women who wore pantyhose with sandals.
When we finally had our 30 seconds with the man, life was perfect. He's a bit older, but looks amazing–he's like a strong imp with boundless energy, the kind of energy that makes you wonder if he was on drugs, but I refuse to believe it.
He kept calling Jim 'brother' and said this chapter in his life was awesome. He was more than happy to create a scenario for our photo and insisted Jim choke him “for real”. As we parted, glowing in his aura, we said: “Take it easy”. His response: “I never take it easy, I take it good”. He also liked my dress and said we were some of the coolest people he'd met all day. Well, James Marsters, you made up one of the coolest thirty seconds of my life.
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Posted on August 6, 2007
Spend a Couple Hours »AMNH
The much talked about Mythic Creatures show is up at the AMNH and sold out constantly (get your tickets before heading down or you will be turned out of the exhibit). It's all the spectacle and pizzazz you could imagine (well, for a museum show) and well worth the admission, but all the glitter of the show also feels a bit tacky and convoluted.
Some of the statues are great looking, and the actual information buried beneath the theme park stylings can be quite interesting. For example, did you know there are birds big enough to be a threat to young children? There are also a couple hands-on displays, like a computer program that lets you build a dragon of your own design which a bunch of kids were very excited about.
You'll feel excited too after such an entertaining show, but I still had a much more awe-inspired time in the old school Hall of Forestry and in the silent Hall of Audubon paintings and with the breathtaking full scale panoramas of taxidermy animals. These quieter parts of the museum, displaying hand made scenes, intricately rendered wildlife studies, and taxidermy are so special and I hope they stay in place forever.
The new exhibits are fun and entertaining, but personally, they could never take the place of such beautiful work and such engaging education.
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Posted on July 30, 2007
Spend a Couple Hours »Summer Play Festival
We love the idea of theater, it makes me laugh. I never see very much of it though, so when I heard about the Summer Play Festival, or SPF as it's called, a two week play extravaganza with ten dollar tickets to every show, I was thrilled.
With those prices, I was finding that shows were already getting sold out at decent show times after work (like many things in the city, the festival seems to forget the huge working population who can not do anything at 6pm on a weekday).
We opted for a matinee show of a comic/serious romp (what else could be better for the stage) called The Nightshade Family (see photo) about a dentist and her estranged brother. I have no idea how good any of these plays will be, but for only ten dollars, it's a great chance to claim an atypical evening experience and take advantage of the city's on stage offerings.
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Posted on July 23, 2007
Spend a Couple Hours »Os Mutantes
The super duper awesome tropicalia, psychedelic, classic band that I recommended a while back is playing one night at Lincoln Center's Rose Hall this coming Tuesday (the 17th). Not many tickets left, especially since I snagged some for Jim and I, so act quick and enjoy a (hopefully) amazing night of music.
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Posted on July 16, 2007
Spend a Couple Hours »Wii
Nintendo is always trying to revolutionize the way we play games and they've done it again with their ultra-interactive Wii system and its tubular controls. The accuracy is pretty impressive and getting a minor workout while playing video games is a added bonus.
I personally enjoy the boxing and bowling games, mostly because I'm actually kind of good at them (thanks Tae Bo). The Mario Party 8 game is also really fun and can be played by trading turns if you only have two controllers like my friends do. Nintendo's cute and quirky take on games has always made them my console of choice and the weird Japanese-y kooky style is still present.
A great feature are the Miis: little avatars you can customize to look like you and all your friends (or enemies). As you play games, non player's avatars sit in as your teammates and fans. It's been a long time since people brought their system over to play video games (I mean 'long time' as in at least a decade and a half), but the system is so new and so fun, it makes sense all us adults are acting like tweens again.
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Posted on July 9, 2007
Spend a Couple Hours »Murray’s Cheese and Beer Class
Murrays is an independent purveyor of cheese that has been owned by the same guy for 14 years. He's weathered all the market changes with aplomb. From being a simple mom and pop store, to riding the gourmet foodie wave with a selection of rare and hard to find fine cheeses, whatever the neighborhood called for he provided.
His staff is equally passionate, Nora Singley who ran the cheese side of our tasting was great: informative, excited and interesting. In our class, called “Beer and Cheese”, her picks included, among my favorites, Goot Essa Mountain Valley Cheddar, Abbaye de Citeaux, and Hoch Ybrig. The inspired beer pairings came from Six Point Craft Ales (see drink).
The set up is nice, a u-shaped table sits in a windowed room that over looks the store. Vocalizationis encouraged, although we were a quiet bunch and mostly let the experts do the talking (and talking and taking and talking and talking in the case of brew master Shane). It's not a cheap experience at $60 dollars, but none of us felt that it wasn't worth it. Some of the cheeses were so expensive and rare, that to be able just to have a taste was a worthwhile expense. They offer all sorts of courses all year.