Winter Vacation 5

Please read 1-5 in order.

We made it home safe Sunday morning without coffee until we got to Smyrna. A very special thank you to Ryan who picked us up early Sunday morning. I can't say enough about our neighbors. Everyone has been so great. I can't wait to have BBQs this summer. Sunday afternoon my parents visit. We had a nice time catching up. A friend of mine from way back, about 12 years, texted me to see what this LUVSTEP was all about. I invited Amy to come out. Serena's co-worker Ashley was also trying to feel the love that night. We got to the Barbary a little after 10 PM. The place was decked out like a high school valentines dance, only this time the alcohol was legal. The Luvstep mixtape was being played as we all filed in and started drinking. They had a jungle juice fountain on stage in front of the Turntables. I also noticed a giant sub woofer box on the dance floor, w00t! Flufftronix and Lady Prowl opened up actually playing some good heavy bass. Gun$ Garcia and Dirty South Joe played a great set back and forth. I even heard Tegan and Sara. Great choice of songs, they got us dancing and having a good time. Big ups to Gun$ Garcia for playing Tegan & Sara. I don't think I have ever heard a male DJ drop some Tegan and Sara. Jackie O and Dave Nada came on next and played some great tunes. Then they all started switching back and forth with Dave ending the night with a killer set. I was dancing and hollering so hard, I can't remember all what he played. It was a great night and a long day. I ended up getting home about 4:30 AM after having been up in NYC at 5 AM the previous day.

So that was our Winter Vacation. It was most EPIC. I had a great time with my best friend and dance partner, my lovely wife Serena. <3

Winter Vacation Pt 4.5

Saturday we took it easy. Had some breakfast at a deli before heading to the Museum of Modern Art. I would recommend checking out MoMA if you visit NYC. Tim Burton had an exhibit there, but we showed up too late to purchase tickets. We had a great time looking around even though we missed out on the Burton exhibit. Our good friend Kristen Lober is a makeup artist who happened to be down the street at Bryant Park for the Mercedes Benz Fashion Week.

She does the makeup for models and celebs and people with too much money. We met up for coffee and got to catch up with her. Apparently Amtrak has been having a lot of issues with their trains running to NYC. Her train's engine died and they had to get another one. While she was waiting on the train for a new engine to show up, there was no electricity or heat. Our friend Scott had a similar problem where his train CAUGHT ON FIRE. He missed the show he was supposed to attend in NYC. I don't ever think I've heard Scott tweet so angrily in the past year I've known him.

That picture is not of the train that Scott was on. I just used it to be a little dramatic. For dinner we decided to eat at the restaurant in the hotel. It was recommended to me by a previous co-worker who frequented New York just for the dining experience. Serena and I ate a 5 course meal at Gordon Ramsay's Maze. Amazing. This was the best meal we have had this year. I highly recommend Maze, its definitely worth it. We went to bed early to catch the 7 AM bus out of Chinatown.

Winter Vacation Pt 4

I hope you are reading these in order starting with Winter Vacation Pt 1. It will make a better read, unless you like Tarantino films or "Memento". We crashed hard that night and got up some time around 10 or 11 AM. We decided to make breakfast a cheap one and ended up eating at a diner down the street. After breakfast we braved the cold bitter wind and went down Broadway towards Times Square checking out all the shops. Some of the highlights of our shopping endeavor included some ties from H&M, and a mini shopping spree at American Apparel. They were advertising that intimates were half off. When I got there I was a little disappointed when I realized they meant the price was half off. I picked up some hot intimates for myself. I was inspired by none other than my role model Jemaine.

I also got a nice helvetica tee. If you haven't seen the helvetica documentary, I suggest you check it out when you have an hour and a half.



For dinner we decided to keep it cheap again and hit up my favorite South of the Border type fast food joint, Baja Fresh. I got us 2 chicken fajita burritos enchilada style and a bucket of Coronitas.

We didn't drink enough for an affective "liquid jacket". This is due to the fact that we consumed well over 2 pounds of awesome. The awesome beat out the booze in this fight. Terminal 5 is located right off the water. The wind made it so cold I contemplated starting a fire while we waited in line to get in. I liked the layout of Terminal 5. It was a large venue similar to the Electric Factory, but it had a 3rd floor. We parked ourselves next to the VIP section in hopes to get some pictures with the Ed Banger crew. By the time we got in Breakbot was already playing his set. Followed by DJ Mehdi, special guest set by A-trak, 10 minutes of Feadz and 2 songs with Uffie, Busy P (longest set), then finally Justice (DJ Set). It looked like everyone was using 2-3 CDJ's except for A-trak. DJ Mehdi's set was similar to the one he played the night before at Santos. Uffie was trashed and was slurring her speech on stage. A-trak's set was great playing our favorite remix to Heads Will Roll by the Yeah Yeah Yeah's. Then he did his robot rock bit.





I love Justice, but they are much better with their live show than as DJ's. The kids there, and I do mean kids, were probably expecting a live show. They didn't know most of the music that was played that night and only got up and danced/jumped to the popular Justice tracks or Daft Punk Tracks. A-trak had the crowd eating out of his hand when he was playing Electronic Dance Music for the first part of his set. Then he went into a hip hop set which led to his Robot Rock Juggle to end the set.

During the show I high-fived (is that still acceptable?) and got to greet/congratulate a few of the elite there. Feadz was mingling in the crowd the most and I would shake his hand or give him a high-five every time he walked by. Gaspard got another handshake from me, as well as A-trak. I congratulated A-trak on his awesome set and told him I was a big fan. After the show was over I saw Busy P in the street trying to catch a cab with the rest of the Ed Banger crew. I yelled, "Busy P!" and gave him a pat on the back. His hands were full with their enormous birthday cake. We were thinking of going to the afterparty, but at this point we were exhausted from all day walking/shopping/dancing/screaming. Apologies to DJ Cold Case, who came all the way up from DC that night to attend the afterparty, we couldn't make it.

Winter Vacation Pt 3

The amazing bus company we would be traveling on called themselves, "Double Happyness" We got to the bus stop early and saw the shuttle van we were supposed to get on. I asked the driver if we should get on. He told me he had to go to Dover and he would come back for our stop in 20 minutes. We waited about 40 minutes and when he came back the van was stuffed full of people and their luggage. What were we gonna do? We had no ride to pick up the bus in Wilmington. Luckily I got a hold of one of our neighbors, Clarissa,  who agreed to ride with us and take our car back. So we rushed to Wilmington from Smyrna, breaking about 15 laws. We made it just in time and got on board to NYC!

We were welcomed into the London with friendly smiles and suede walls. The suite was amazing and had all kinds of cool furniture and luxuries. We decided that we would go to the DIM MAK Cloak and Dagger event at Santos Party House that night. After a nice Italian dinner across the street from the MoMA, we headed south to the party. 

It is a good thing that we attended this party. I got to meet a lot of cool people there. First we saw DJ Gina Turner playing in the basement. As the night progressed it started getting French in there. We saw Gaspard from Justice. I kinda stalked him out when he went into the bathroom. We got a picture with him, then DJ Mehdi. I don't think the kids there knew who they were as they walked amongst the dancers. 

We went up stairs for a bit of Fashen's set. I saw Roxy Cottontail having a good time dancing up on stage. Someone threw a beer on Serena so we went back downstairs. Someone gave me a blackberry and a camera to take a picture of them. It was dark in there and I couldn't tell who I was photographing. Turns out it was Roxy Cottontail and P-Thugg from Chromeo. I got to talk to them and get my picture with them too. P-Thugg was really nice and down to earth. I told both of them about our little difficulty getting to New York. Roxy was appreciative we made it to her party. 

Good music, great people. I love that my wife Serena is so amazing. I hope she had a great birthday even after all the drama with the weather and the bus. 

Winter Vacation Pt 2

Wednesday was a very emotional day. As a man, I try not to let any emotions other than "manly" emotions show. I let my wife have all the emotional ups and downs while I try to keep it together, calm and confident. The whole point of this vacation was for Serena's birthday, Thursday February 11th. Weeks ago, we had booked our hotel and bus for our vacation. The plan was to take the Mega Bus out of Philadelphia on Thursday in the afternoon. My father was going to give us a ride to Philadelphia. We were going to stay at the London hotel near central park for 4 days. We also had tickets to the Ed Banger 7 Year Anniversary Party at Terminal 5 in New York City. There are no refunds at the London. You pay up front for your reservation and if you cancel or you can't make it, you already paid for it. The Mega Bus fare was only a few dollars so that wasn't the big deal.

Delaware had declared a STATE OF EMERGENCY (everybody panic!) Tuesday night and it was in effect still on Wednesday. We called the London and found out that because of the circumstances with the weather they would allow us to change our reservations but they needed to know by 6:30 PM that night. Our Mega Bus was cancelled and we had to re-book a later ride. Then we decided that we were going to go no matter what. We kept our original plans and decided to invite the neighbors over to relieve some cabin fever.

One of our neighbors, Rachel, has a boyfriend who lives about a mile down our road. I offered to come pick him up since the Forester did so well in the snow the past weekend. Ryan and I jump in the Forester and tear off through the frozen tundra we call Smyrna. We were making good progress until we came to the end of the neighborhoods. The area used to be all farmland, meaning we have flat fields that the wind got some good speed across. The snow drift that filled the road was so deep it was up to the doors on the Forester. We were pushing through it and had about 15 more feet to go when the car came to a stop. The snow was so deep we had bottomed out on it. The wheels weren't touching the ground. We were only in our sneakers and didn't have a snow shovel. Ryan and I tried digging the car out, but it was no use. Brian, Rachel's boyfriend, called me and said he was suited up and he's coming with a shovel. I called Serena and asked her to go to our neighbor who had a farm tractor and ask him to come get us. Serena was so angry at this point that I was so big headed and got stuck. In the process of trying to dig ourselves out, Ryan had lost his iPhone. 

Ryan and I are waiting in the car trying to stay warm, it was below freezing and the winds were about 40 MPH. We see in the headlights something running towards us that looked like a space man with a snow shovel. 

Brian showed up with a snow shovel and started trying to dig us out. He found Ryan's iPhone underneath a foot of snow. By this point the wind had blown so much snow onto the car that we had difficulty opening the doors and getting out. Our neighbor showed up with a Suburban, but about 20 ft behind us he got stuck. After 20 minutes of trying to dig him out the tractor shows up.

This giant tractor pulled the heavy Suburban out with a fight. It seemed like the end was in sight. Our neighbor in the Suburban yelled out, "We'll be back for you!" This felt like it was straight out of a movie. Serena calls me about ten minutes later telling me they showed up at my front door saying there is no way they are gonna get us out because of the difficulty of getting their Suburban out. They said they had to go plow some other people out and didn't have time to come back and try and get me. I was then instructed to leave the vehicle and run down to where the drift wasn't as bad. The Suburban was waiting for us to take us back to my house. Luckily, the guy with the tractor wanted to try and get us out. So we ran back to the Forester and hooked it up with some chains and the tractor pulled us right out. It seems it was easier because my SUV was lighter than the Suburban. 

So the rest of the night was fun, we had a bunch of neighbors over and had dinner and played Apples to Apples. DJ Bis decided to do another live Session which we streamed as the music for our get together with the neighbors. Our neighbor Alvin asked us if we were taking the bus out of Smyrna to go to NYC. We had no idea there was a direct route from our little red neck town to the Big Apple. He gave us a flyer that was poorly designed with bad Engrish. We called the number on the flyer at 1 AM and within 30 minutes a guy with a heavy Asian accent called us back. He let us know that the buses were running on Thursday. This was great news and we decided to leave on their afternoon route. 

Ed Banger turns 7

This Friday, the wife and I will be dancing our faces off to the Ed Banger crew. We are super excited for this weekend. We are taking a mega bus from Philly to NYC and back. We're staying at the London Hotel. This weekend is also Serena's birthday and of course the LUVSTEP CD Release Party. The flyer says to dress up as cowboys/girls. I guess the Western theme is the "hip" thing to do this winter. I can't wait to yell, "BUSY P!" at the top of my lungs. Anyone know anything else going on that weekend? If you'll be in NYC hit me up.