Monday, February 27, 2006
Travel Log - Day 4 (What is the deal with "New" York anyway?)
... it's almost 400 years old (yes, I butchered a Family Guy joke)
Thankfully day 4 wasn't quite as cold as the day before, but it still wasn't toasty. On our way to the Internet Cafe (single dirtiest mouse I've ever touched) we got our first taste of American star-spotting. We actually saw one of my favourite actors - Samuel L. Jackson. He was just standing out the front of Madame Tussauds - but wasn't overly animated. I guess the stars are different in real-life then they are in the movies.
Sam Jackson - didn't seem too impressed when I offered him some triple-thick milkshake though
After picking up our tickets for the Phantom of the Opera for later that night we started "Kramer's Reality Tour". For those that don't know the story, Kenny Kramer lived across the hall from Larry David, co-creator of Seinfeld. When Jerry Seinfeld was offered a pilot for NBC he and David came up with "The Seinfeld Chronicles", named Seinfeld when picked up. One of the characters was based on Larry's neighbour Kenny Kramer, and he was actually hesitant to use Kramer's real name because he figured Kenny would try to profit off it. Sure enough, Kenny oragnised a bus tour around New York pointing out the real sites that were shown in Seinfeld (which was later parodied on the show with the J. Peterman Reality Tour).
It's chocolate, it's peppermint -- it's delicious!
The tour was definitely watered down, as a lot of the sites were things like "although this is a hotel now, it used to be ..." - but it was still great. The best bit about it, in my opinion, was the 20 minute introduction that Kenny did, which was mainly describing Larry David and his "brand" of comedy. I found it all quite amusing - and I think I might give Curb Your Enthusiam another shot (saw 1 episode and didn't really like it).
Some of the highlights of the actual tour were Monk's Restaurant (or Tom's), old footage of Larry David's standup, and The Soup Kitchen. Kramer showed some footage on the bus of him informally interviewing the "Soup Guy" (he doesn't like the whole Nazi thing) which was very funny. He said that Seinfeld ruined his life, and now only idiots came to his soup store. Didn't seem to ruin it too much - as he's now starting to franchise.
No witty photo comment for you!
Bell did some nice cropping for the full Seinfeld effect
Over half of the people on the tour were Australians - quite a few from Melbourne
"His struggle is man's struggle...he's a loathsome, offensive, brute, yet I can't look away." - and I bought the T-shirt!
After the tour we had dinner in an "authentic diner" in the middle of Times Square. It was actually quite good, but I was almost getting sick of cheese (almost). The cherry soda with chocolate icecream was very nice - and I've just realised that most of this Travel Log is just around what I was eating. Anyway...
A bit of a compromise for my (our) hockey tickets was that we would see a Broadway show. While I could be interested in a few different options, Belinda wanted to see The Phantom of the Opera. I was a little surprised - but I loved it. I especially liked the way they changed the sets "on the fly" and the music wasn't that bad.
Believe me, I didn't pick out that hat for Bell!
The Majestic from when we picked up the tickets
I haven't spoken about food for a while!
Thankfully day 4 wasn't quite as cold as the day before, but it still wasn't toasty. On our way to the Internet Cafe (single dirtiest mouse I've ever touched) we got our first taste of American star-spotting. We actually saw one of my favourite actors - Samuel L. Jackson. He was just standing out the front of Madame Tussauds - but wasn't overly animated. I guess the stars are different in real-life then they are in the movies.
Sam Jackson - didn't seem too impressed when I offered him some triple-thick milkshake though
After picking up our tickets for the Phantom of the Opera for later that night we started "Kramer's Reality Tour". For those that don't know the story, Kenny Kramer lived across the hall from Larry David, co-creator of Seinfeld. When Jerry Seinfeld was offered a pilot for NBC he and David came up with "The Seinfeld Chronicles", named Seinfeld when picked up. One of the characters was based on Larry's neighbour Kenny Kramer, and he was actually hesitant to use Kramer's real name because he figured Kenny would try to profit off it. Sure enough, Kenny oragnised a bus tour around New York pointing out the real sites that were shown in Seinfeld (which was later parodied on the show with the J. Peterman Reality Tour).
It's chocolate, it's peppermint -- it's delicious!
The tour was definitely watered down, as a lot of the sites were things like "although this is a hotel now, it used to be ..." - but it was still great. The best bit about it, in my opinion, was the 20 minute introduction that Kenny did, which was mainly describing Larry David and his "brand" of comedy. I found it all quite amusing - and I think I might give Curb Your Enthusiam another shot (saw 1 episode and didn't really like it).
Some of the highlights of the actual tour were Monk's Restaurant (or Tom's), old footage of Larry David's standup, and The Soup Kitchen. Kramer showed some footage on the bus of him informally interviewing the "Soup Guy" (he doesn't like the whole Nazi thing) which was very funny. He said that Seinfeld ruined his life, and now only idiots came to his soup store. Didn't seem to ruin it too much - as he's now starting to franchise.
No witty photo comment for you!
Bell did some nice cropping for the full Seinfeld effect
Over half of the people on the tour were Australians - quite a few from Melbourne
"His struggle is man's struggle...he's a loathsome, offensive, brute, yet I can't look away." - and I bought the T-shirt!
After the tour we had dinner in an "authentic diner" in the middle of Times Square. It was actually quite good, but I was almost getting sick of cheese (almost). The cherry soda with chocolate icecream was very nice - and I've just realised that most of this Travel Log is just around what I was eating. Anyway...
A bit of a compromise for my (our) hockey tickets was that we would see a Broadway show. While I could be interested in a few different options, Belinda wanted to see The Phantom of the Opera. I was a little surprised - but I loved it. I especially liked the way they changed the sets "on the fly" and the music wasn't that bad.
Believe me, I didn't pick out that hat for Bell!
The Majestic from when we picked up the tickets
I haven't spoken about food for a while!
# posted by Joel Dixon @ 10:37 PM 
