Posts Tagged ‘NYC’

Putting the Vacate in Vacation

Sunday, August 16th, 2009

If you’ve been following me on Twitter this week, you know my kids and I did our version of the Griswolds go to NYC.

We had loud behaviour.

We had lewd behaviour.

We had fighting, feuding, farting and freaking right out.

And that was just in the driveway.

We forgot a watch at Liberty Island Security, a sweater in a Macy’s changeroom, and for the large part, our manners while dining in public.

We coined new phrases “Hey Mom I gotta take a New Jersey”, learned to translate (when they say it will feed 2-4 they actually mean 8-10), and agreed with hotel clerks that we must be missing the snow.

Personally I was slightly disappointed to discover that there aren’t actually gravy dispensers on every corner, but pleased to discover that it is possible to find a deli sandwich as big as your head.

My kids told me I was boring. I told them they were annoying. We all at one point used the words “stupid”, “get lost” and “never again”.

In other words, the perfect Family Vacation.

Which I’m now going to recover from (and tell my version of), during my BlackBerry Diaries book tour, which kicks off on Tuesday in Boston, at the Cambridgeside Galleria Mall. (Did I mention you could win one of TEN BlackBerrys from RIM? You can Twitter from your next family vacation “live” too!)

Maybe I’ll be able to find a Baked Beans dispenser…

And, if you had any random learnings, or questions from your kids this week you’d like to share, please do via a comment on the blog.

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A Different Kind of Road Kill

Tuesday, May 26th, 2009

“Road Trip!!!”

When I was in my twenties, my friends and I shouted these words with wild abandon. Often the trip was from our residence at York University, down the 401 to Montreal. For breakfast. We didn’t care about packing the right stuff, staying at the right places or even getting the right directions.

It was about the journey, the fun, the adventures, the greasy hangover meals…sigh.

Now, when we utter the words “Road Trip”, my husband and I often look at each other with resignation and start compiling lists, spreadsheets, folders, binders, maps, statistics…and that’s just to make sure we have placed our four children at minimal fighting distance in our vehicle.

Which lasts about five minutes.

Family travel takes a WHOLE lot of planning and a WHOLE lot of patience, and as I start organizing us for a road trip which will take us through New York City and Boston this summer, my left eye is slowly starting to twitch.

The only good thing is likely to be that Seamus will have no trouble communicating with me on this trip – I have US coverage. As long as I can get out of the driver’s seat once in a while, it’s all good.

For some other tips on travelling with your family, read this article I wrote for Calgary’s Child Magazine. And start planning for it NOW.

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Brevity is the soul of lingerie

Friday, July 4th, 2008

So says Dorothy Parker, my favourite writer, poet, and all round cynic.

I often like to end the week reading one of her short stories and marvel in the way that her works are just as relevant today as they were when they were written in the 20’s and 30’s. Most of her work deals with her disappointments (with men, her work, and life in general) but I really wish she’d had children…I think mine will need therapy one day. Just imagine.

I generally don’t like the word “feminist” (mostly because there is no male equivalent so we’re really not that much further ahead if we have to use it), but if ever there were one, she’s it baby.

One of the coolest things I’ve ever done is hang out in the Algonquin Hotel, where she and her Vanity Fair contemporaries made up the now infamous “Vicious Circle”. If you get to NYC stop in for at least one cocktail. If you haven’t seen the movie of this part of her life, starring Jennifer Jason Leigh, I suggest you do.

This basically sums it up for Dorothy:

“Ducking for apples. Change one word and it’s the story of my life.”

Right on sister.

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