An Entry for Sean: The Best Worst Weekend.

I had dinner with my friend Sean last weekend who said, “What is up with you lately? You’re not updating your facebook to any acceptable standard, you tweet once a week, and your blog still says you’ve got a cold! You’ve been ‘home sick’ for the past 3 months! I thought you were dead!” Oh my dear friend, I am more than alive. I’ve got a hot, hilarious girlfriend, a challenging new job, an adorable new niece, and a life full of adventure. My girlfriend and I, both, are committed to ridding our life of boredom. When we’re relaxing, we’re committed to relaxation; but any other time, we’re going for an experience--and sometimes when we're after relaxation, we get an adventure. Last weekend was the perfect example.

Friday night we ventured uptown to a neighborhood we don’t frequent to a restaurant we’d never tried. Rosa Mexicano had the culinary complexity of a ChiChi’s (perhaps I date myself with this now defunct restaurant chain reference, but it serves so well), but the price-tag of real NY gem. And despite the guilt trip of my techno-starved bestie; we managed to have a good time drinking cocktails across the street at Aja.

Saturday, my darling girlfriend looked into getting us pool-passes at the Gansevort Hotel—one of only two hotels in the whole city with a rooftop pool. However, these bad-boys were priced at $250 per person, per day; so we decided to stay the night, enjoy all of their amenities & accommodations for the same price as a quick trip to the pool. For $500 we booked a one-night stay including free cupcakes, lunch boxes, champagne, and a Nintendo Wii in the room! It seemed as though our venue would not only accommodate but practically facilitate our peaceful weekend of fun! So, we packed up our swimsuits, grabbed the travel scrabble, got a few books, and headed over to the hotel—a mere 5 blocks from our apartment. We were determined to max and relax, sit idly by the pool and enjoy a staycation free from all the annoyance that comes with traveling on a holiday weekend.

Check-in was at 3:00. We arrived at 4:15. As we strolled through the front doors, the cool air-conditioning blessing our cheeks, relieving our heads of the heat and we approached the desk. After stating the reservation name and handing over the credit card, this dark-haired, disenchanted hipster peered over his dark-rimmed glasses and said, “You’re rooms not ready—you can wait at the bar.” He then pushed the receipt toward us and pointed to the elevators. We should have left.

But we didn’t. Instead my lady signed for the room and made him promise to call us as soon as we could get in; after all, we needed to change for the pool in order to execute our perfectly planned stay. Determined to have a lovely time despite this lack of hospitality, we headed upstairs to the bar where we were sandwiched between several out-of-town couples here for a “Real life Sex & the City Experience!” The movie premiered two nights earlier and the city was hot with suburban wannabes—boobs out & bottoms up! As the afternoon wore on, our patience wore thin. The whole point of our trip was to sit by the pool and sip drinks in our swim-suits. Instead we found ourselves in the crowded bar surrounded by the over-cologned and under-educated…harrumph! What's more, the quiet, civilized landscape of NYC's Soho House was merely a stone's throw away, mocking us with the quiet class of it's under-utilized lounge-chairs. We vowed to become members before next year.

At about 5:30, we headed back downstairs to the lobby where we pressed the reservations manager for a refund. We tried to return home; our afternoon soiled, our sunlight lost. Instead, she offered us a discount on the room and convinced us to stay. The bell-hop came from around the desk and handed us our suitcases which we carried...ourselves...to the room. Still, we shouldered on. Tossing our bags on our backs, we got back in the elevator and made our way up. No lunch, no cupcakes, no Wii—and soon-to-be no daylight. We hustled to throw on our swimsuits and get back to the rooftop pool-bar where we had just been; only this time we would cross that expensive threshold into the pool area. A teenage girl asked what room we were in as we walked through the gates to the pool. 515, my girlfriend responded, waiting for some wrist-band, some request for ID, some secret handshake, SOMETHING! Honestly, security is tighter at the bus station—where tickets are only about $30. But we found two seats in the fading sun and ordered a couple of mojitos to toast our efforts. Just as we began to breath a small sigh of relief: a bachelor party. No less than 20 drunken Irishmen burst through the pool gates, one fine specimen carrying a guitar. Then two smaller bachelorette parties follow. In a pool the size of a studio apartment, upwards of 40 messy heteros are now singing Billy Joel tunes at the top of their lungs. Our afternoon concluded.

As we raced back to our room (literally, raced like 2nd graders), my lady took a tumble—nay—a flying leap! Tripping over her own platform flip-flops, she flopped, NAY—skipped down the hall like a smooth stone across placid water. Weeping, she stood, hunched like a willow with wounds that leaked down her legs. No-joke, my speed-racer had bright red racing stripes down her slick white legs. Wearing nothing but a bikini, her skin rubbed raw, she called it a night and collapsed into bed. We awoke around 1:00. The noise from the street below crept into our room. There was a line around the block to get up to that Godforsaken bar we had crawled out of just a few hours before and the noise was deafening. Our room stunk of something awful, and there were a pair of bleeding legs in the bed. My lady moaned. “My legs!” I cried back “My nose! What the hell is that stench?!” “Oh no!” She said. “I packed us a cheese plate—in my suitcase!”

Yes, there was now one solid lump of cheese at the bottom of her bag, stinking up the room, offending our senses. The night was complete. Angered, I called down to reception requesting our cupcakes and opened our bottle of champagne. The travel scrabble stunk so bad we had to throw it out and with it, we trashed our notion of a nice relaxing weekend. We toasted our own demise, her strawberry burns and stinky cheese, my distaste for all things Meat-packing & hetero multiplied.

Sunday rolled around and we checked out and headed to GLEE Live! The concert was amazing…however…my girlfriend and I were the ONLY people in costume…people looked at my pregnant Quinn with a mixture of horror and amusement. Most folks just thought I was a dork. It should be noted that we caught the matinee—where mostly Mothers brought large groups of school-aged children in home-made Gleek T-shirts. Well, I guess we know who the real Gleeks are…


On Monday I tried a new hairdresser. I climbed the steps to her 5th floor walk-up only to get a dry-cut with homemade product (hair-gel & handlotion) to the tune of $120. I left looking like Pat Benetar and feeling defeated. When Monday night rolled around and our long weekend concluded, I covered my lady in Neosporin & wrapped her legs in cling-wrap. We would have to rely on the work-week to do the healing. Still, we had a great time. Our life is a fascinating, exhilarating, ridiculous and hilarious adventure—I feel so fortunate to have it, I don’t want to waste a moment on the outside, observing, when I could be right in the middle of it, enjoying.

So to my dear friend who finally reached out to have dinner with me instead of waiting for a written cyber-update, thanks for keeping up. In exchange for your company, a token of my affection.