June 19

Chinatown

I guess that's cheap...

June 18

My first full day in NY. Woke up around 10 and left the apartment at 11. My mom and I walked around and through central park. Eventually we ended up in Midtown and met my dad and sister for Indian food. We ate right in the park. It’s so weird being in such a quiet secluded area when you know the city just a block away.

My mom and I walked a bit more after that. Headed to Columbus Circle, a medium sized shopping area by the SW corner of the park. It’s ridiculous how much money people have. Took the subway up about 15 blocks and then hung around Broadway for a bit, eventually making it back to the apartment.

Speaking of the apartment, here’s the view from the rooftop.

Looking East, that green patch is Central Park

Looking South toward Midtown

June 17

Race day. Woke up around 10 and made it to the track by 10:45 for the second Porsche race. Nothing exciting. Hung around until 1pm when the race finally started. It was a great race, very exciting. Hamilton won his second race in a row-and ever-and it was really great to be a part of that.

It took two hours to fly into LaGuardia, got to the apartment by 8:30. Our apartment is in the Upper West Side, two blocks from central park; an amazing location. Walked around the park for a while and then came back to sleep. I’m so excited to be here!

June 16

After a nice night of practically no sleep, I got up and headed to the track. After meeting my dad we sat down and watched the end of the F1 practice session. About 2 hours later qualifying started. It was straightforward enough, Hamilton took pole with Alonso right behind him; this could decide the race tomorrow.

The Porsche GT3s were up next and it was really fun watching a race with someone we know taking part. Mark did quite well, and we got to go to his pits and talk with him afterwards. In terms of people watching, today provided the following:

• Always-excited Brazilians
• A man wearing Ferrari red with a bishop’s hat, robe and cane
• A drunk guy peeing in a garbage can
• A woman wearing a corset for a top, yes a corset.

We left the track and came back to the campsite. We found our car….with nothing next to it. “Where’s our tent?” and “I think someone stole our tent” were the next uttered words. Fortunately the wind had just blown it away and someone was kind enough to stake it down before it landed in the muddy stream. We then headed out for a snack, nothing particularly exciting.

A pick-up truck turned wading pool. Genius?

Came back and relaxed a bit before going to dinner. A man came up to us and asked us if the tent was ours. We said yes and thanked him for staking it down. “Yeah well unfortunately it hit my car before I was able to do that.” Two deep scratches in the hood and we give him our insurance info.

The plot thickens...

Went downtown for dinner to the usual place; late food=free food. Came back to the site for more Bulgarian lawnmower-techno-pop.

June 15

Travel day. Woke up at 8am, got to the airport by 10. My flight to DC was delayed an hour, that was fun. We landed in DC as my flight for Indianapolis started boarding. There was no way I would make it. Got off the plane and checked the board, my flight wasn’t listed under departures, awesome. There wasn’t a single United Airlines employee in sight even though this was the United Terminal.

I just started running hoping to either see my gate or someone to ask. I must have passed 20 United desks and all were either completely empty of extremely busy. Finally I saw a desk with no line; I asked the guy and he told me my gate was the next one over. So lucky. My flight should have departed by now but with even more luck the flight was delayed by a few minutes. I took my seat and we were in the air ten minutes later.

Landed in Indy, met up with my dad and headed to the campsite right outside the track; the same one we stay in every year. We get the tent set up around midnight and just kind of hang out and watch the drunk people. Diagonally across from our site was a huge site of Bulgarians. They had EVERYTHING. 3 huge E-Z Ups were covering lawn chairs and tables. Also, a generator powering a television, a stereo system and a medium-sized fridge. They were playing Eastern European/Middle Eastern techno-pop all night long, that’s not an exaggeration. It was playing when we pulled up around 11:45 and was nonstop until at least 3:30am, probably closer to 4. Every now and then another one of our neighbors would yell ever-so politely, “Turn that shit off you retards!” This was responded to with the starting of a lawnmower; yes, the Bulgarians brought a lawnmower to a campsite. After about 15 minutes of screaming himself horse, our now irate neighbor attempted to turn down the music himself. He got out of his tent, walked straight up to the stereo and turned the music down. The Bulgarians just watched him and cranked the volume right when he was back in his tent. This was all pretty funny until it was our turn to try and sleep. Around 2am we climbed into bed and it must have been at least an hour and a half before I fell asleep. Woke up at 9:50 making a total of 11 hours of sleep in two nights; quite a change from an average of 10 a night. Tomorrow: qualifying.

Crazy Bulgarians

June 14

Today was my last day in Washington until September. After a few hours of packing and getting ready in the morning I left to pick up Natalie at her work in Fife. We drove up to Seattle to the Theta Xi house to meet Michael, Jen and Garth. We hung out there for a bit and goofed around and decided to go out for dinner. I suggested sushi and Michael and Jen were nice enough to okay it even though they aren’t the biggest fans of raw fish.

The restaurant was about 5 miles from the UW campus but it took almost have an hour thanks to one-way roads, wrong turns and that random highway that bisects the north-end of Seattle center. We parked across the street even though there were signs saying “NO SUSHI LAND PARKING” Meh, it was an empty parking lot. Unfortunately the parking lot “enforcement” douche was watching us and planted the ticket on my car just minutes after we entered Sushi Land. We tried arguing the ticket but he really didn’t care for our excuses.

Thirty-five dollars later and an hour since we left the house, we finally sit down for dinner. The food was amazing like I expected; kinds felt bad for the non sushi-eaters but oh well. Fifty bucks is not bad at all for sushi for five people. Awesome.

Played a round of Catchphrase back at Thetaxi and after an extensive discussion of Kipp’s pubic hair–or lack thereof–I said my goodbyes and took Natalie home.

A great last day in the state of Warshington.