« April 2006 | Main | June 2006 »
May 31, 2006
Pictures from Hawai'i 2006
NEW YORK -- Like usual after a holiday, the airlines overbooked everything, and making a connection in O'Hare proved trying. I flew into ORD at 6AM on the redeye from Kona. Every flight from ORD to New York was booked solid, and they were even taking volunteers to be bumped. In exchange for staying at ORD another 6 hours, I got a first-class upgrade and a free ticket anywhere in the Lower 48 that UAL flies. So, 20 hours after leaving, I rolled home, where I am now on the couch watching the Newlywed Game:
Host: Gentlemen, how many automatic things are in your bedroom?
Husband: One
Wife's Answer: Zero
Husband: But the vaccuum is automatic. It runs.
Wife: Not by itself!
Kim's wedding was so much fun, with fabulous music, a friendly and fascinating crowd (with many "small world" moments), delicious tropical food and drinks, and tons of Hawai'ian flowers. Friends of Kim could see her personality showing throughout the four days of events--she wasn't doing things just because the wedding planner thought it was a good idea. Most touching was the mix of Hawai'ian, Christian, and Jewish tradition at the ceremony.
Click for a full set of pictures. I didn't include wedding pictures because my camera conveniently started flashing "low battery" as soon as I arrived. You do NOT need to sign-in to view the pictures.
More pictures from other vacations - click here. Includes Europe, New Year's in Times Square, Asia, Russia, and Peru.
Posted by adrianjo at 01:22 PM
May 27, 2006
Mongooses, not mongeese
KOHALA COAST, HAWAI'I -- I've been looking up a lot of plural words today. The first is "men-of-war," plural of man-of-war. This is because CNN has a picture of Hapuna Beach on their website tonight. They didn't mention the swarm of Portugese men-of-war that arrived this afternoon, which stung a number of people today. Fortunately that didn't interrupt Kim's rehearsal dinner on the poolside, which was fabulous.
The second plural is "mongooses," the plural of mongoose. I nearly ran over several of these little critters today. They look like a dauschaund crossed with a squirrel as they scurry across the street. They were introduced to control the rat problems in Hawai'i, which they do effectively, but they also eat the eggs of birds and pushed several species into endangered status.
Other than these notable plurals, I had an interesting whale-watching experience off the far northern coast of Hawai'i, near the strait with Maui. After going through 20 miles of desert, I turned into a State Park and watched the ocean for a few minutes. A pod of whales, perhaps a dozen, was circling and attacking a very large game fish, perhaps a marlin. Whenever they got ahold of the fish, it leaped head-first into the air. A few of the whales beat the fish with their flippers, and after a half-hour, they were still chasing the thing through the water, and I left.
Posted by adrianjo at 04:41 AM
May 26, 2006
There's snow in Hawai'i
KOHALA COAST, HAWAI'I -- Hawai'i may be the only place that one can stand atop a snowy 13,700 foot mountain and an hour later touch the sea. I left yesterday at 7AM to drive the "Saddle Road" from one side of Hawai'i to the other, up to an elevation of around 6,000 ft. It's a violation of the rental car contract to drive that road, which is stupid because it's a fine road, though a sign at the entrance warns "WARNING: WINDING ROAD NEXT 41 MILES."
The road crosses lava fields that date to the past 200 years, including some very recent flows from Mauna Loa. At the midpoint of the saddle, one has the active volcano Mauna Loa (13,679 ft and growing) on one side and Mauna Kea (13,796 ft) on the other side. A road leads up to a visitor center at 9,000 ft, where one is already above the clouds. I wasn't too keane to take the rental car up the rocky road to the top, so I tried hitching a ride. That morning, I had seen two young chicks hitching on the side of the road, and sure enough, the first truck to pass slammed on the brakes and backed up. It worked for me too, as I joined two Massachusetts newlyweds with a Ford Explorer on the way up the mountainside. The summit has a fair amount of snow, quite unexpected in Hawai'i, plus a dozen or so giant telescopes housed in giant metallic domes. From there, one puts the car in neutral and coasts down almost to the sea.
At the sea, one can visit Hawai'i Volcanos National Park, which includes a giant volcanic crater (it's a 13-mile drive along the rim) at 4000 feet, plus a road leading down to the sea past a half-dozen other craters and lava flows as recent as 1974. The road abruptly ends where the September 2002 lava flows covered the road, and from there it's a treaterous 45-minute hike over a rough new lava field to a viewing platform where one can see, at a distance, new lava entering the sea. The cooled lava is brittle, sharp, and loose, so a slight misstep can cause a broken leg and a nasty cut. I stayed until after dark, when the lava lights up in brilliant orange colors. The only problem after dark is crossing that long black lava field with absolutely no light. With a small torch/flashlight, it's a tough journey involving inspecting every next step and hoping the lava-rock doesn't collapse.
Today was the start of Kim's wedding festivities, including a dinner and cocktail party on the beach as the sun set. Aside from this, I spent the day laying at the pool with Jeremy Seigel's new book and getting sunburned shoulders.
Posted by adrianjo at 04:31 AM
May 24, 2006
Like Iceland, but a lot warmer
KOHALA COAST, HAWAI'I -- After leaving at 3.20AM today, I am in Hawai'i for Kim's wedding. I had arranged for a car to take me to O'Hare, and the driver knocked on the neighbor's door at 3.15AM. All she could see were the car's lights, and she figured it was a police raid! Luckily enough she also knew that I was leaving for Hawai'i and directed the driver to the right house.
The weather here is great, and the landscape upon landing reminded me of the lava flats of Iceland's Reykjanes Peninsula [pic]. Like Iceland, the topography here is also quite varied, and I'm looking forward to seeing the erupting volcanoes tomorrow, Pele willing.
Pics eventually, of course!
Posted by adrianjo at 01:16 AM
May 20, 2006
I graduated!
I am officially graduated, and here are the pictures to prove it. Graduation activities spanned about two weeks, including the cluster dinner below. My folks were in town from Indiana for four days, their first visit to NYC. They learned all about such New York oddities as car services, trains that don't go where they're supposed to, the impertive of making dinner reservations, and how to pronounce "Houston Street."
Click images to enlarge.
Kerry and I, surrounded by Jenn, Sara, Fayez, Nightstick, and Martin.
We played Jeopardy at the final dinner, including a category called "Dot Not Feather", whose clues included, "The correct spelling of the last names of any three Indians in our cluster."
It took three tries (all because of KG), but we finally got this picture to come out right.
The business school holds a separate graduation ceremony here at Madison Square Garden, where they call our names and have a speaker. Unlike last year's speaker, who ended up in Business Week for her controversial comments, this year's speaker just played a video that included such typical graduation things as a blow-up sex doll. We went from here to dinner at Eleven Madison Park. The necktie I'm wearing is the same tie I wore to my high school graduation.
The main university graduation is held outside, stretching from one end of campus to the other. It's pretty boring but was mentioned in the Wall St. Journal the next day because the school gave an honor to a Cuban dissident who couldn't be there because Fidel refused his exit visa application. As for us, we had dad, mom, and Nathan there. (Kyle couldn't make it.)
Posted by adrianjo at 06:10 PM
May 17, 2006
Kennedy floorplan porn
Sometimes I get bored looking through the real estate listing and indulge in some floorplan porn. Here is the floorplan and listing for Jackie Onassis's former apartment in a Fifth Avenue co-op. It's listed at $32M, cash only, plus $10K a month in maintenance fees.
Posted by adrianjo at 07:22 PM
May 09, 2006
The latest place to visit
The city's newest rooftop opened Thursday at 230 Fifth Ave. At 14,000 sf, the place is massive and has great 270-degree views all around. It's going to be a great hang-out. Only problem might be that the place is so huge that "crowd quality" is an issue (as UrbanDaddy so obliquely says). But hey, it's not like the Gansevoort rooftop has a great crowd either.
Posted by adrianjo at 05:48 PM
May 04, 2006
Like the NASDAQ in 1998?
The art auctions started in New York on Tuesday, with Picasso's Dora Maar au Chat the biggest item to go on the block. It has been interesting to watch speculation that the art market is in bubble, with some arguing that it's crazy that a painting of Maar of moderate importance would get a pre-auction estimate of $50M.
Maar was a Paris-based photographer with whom Picasso had a stormy affair from 1936 to 1945. She often photographed him, and he painted her extensively. Much of the memorabilia from their romance was kept private by Maar until her death in 1997, and it is the subject of a fascinating exhibit at Paris's Picasso Museum.
With that pre-auction estimate of $50M, it was all the more surprising when Dora Maar au Chat sold for $95.2M yesterday. That makes it the second most expensive artwork ever sold, behind only Picaso's Garçon à la Pipe, an ugly painting of minor significance that fetched $104M last year.
Although there is widespread concern of an overheated art market, I am bullish on art, wine, and virtually any other luxury item of limited supply. Over the long term, the many new wealthy people in the world--in China, in India, in the Middle East--will push up demand for Picassos, fine Bordeaux wines, coastal real estate, etc. Meanwhile, the supply of these sort of things is fixed. There will never be more Picassos made, Bordeaux only has so many vines, and it's very expensive to make new tropical islands. If I had $100M, I'd consider art by big names to be a good long-term investment.
Posted by adrianjo at 07:00 PM
May 03, 2006
2004 was a quiet year
Tiffany and I went to look at a condo project today. I've been thinking it might be time to buy a place over the next year or so, and this place is a truly remarkable bargain. For example, the elevators are private and keyed, meaning that the elevator stops and opens directly into your apartment. It also has the granite counters and a built-in flat-screen TV in the kitchen.
The big problem with this project that it's in a far corner of Spanish Harlem a full three avenues from the nearest subway. Tiffany's "unsafe neighborhood" instincts immediately were activated, and she declared the area "even more unsafe than where you live right now."
Is it?
The New York Times website has a convenient google map listing all the homocides committed in New York City from 2003-2005. Select a boro, then zoom in and click the balloons for details on the homocide.
Here in Harlem, the council estates (i.e. high-rise housing projects) are quite obviously dangerous. The MLK projects on Malcolm X Blvd between 113th and 116th, where there was a murder last month, have at least a murder or two each year. There have been two murders within 800 feet of my current apartment over those three years, and they were both domestic disputes, so they're not too worrisome. My initial suspicions--that the Mt Morris Historic District is a relatively safe pocket of Harlem--seem reasonable, at least as a far as murders go. (knock on wood)
What about this new condo project?
- In 2005, a 27-year-old black male was shot and killed within a block.
- In 2005, a 38-year-old hispanic male was shot and killed 6 houses away
- In 2005, a 33-year-old hispanic female was stabbed to death about 200 feet away
- In 2005, a 30-year-old hispanic male was shot and killed near the subway stop I would use
- In 2003, a 27-year-old hispanic male was shot and killed near the subway stop I would use
- In 2003, an 18-year-old hispanic male was shot and killed near the subway stop I would use
At least 2004 was a quiet year.
Posted by adrianjo at 11:24 PM
May 01, 2006
Foie gras doesn't fly in Chicago
The Chicago City Council has been on a tear lately. First they banned urchins from banging on buckets outside my old apartment. Now the ban foie gras. Every one of my French friends thinks I'm crazy for supporting foie gras bans, but it's a barbaric practice. Called the "rich man's chopped liver," foie gras was discovered when some French people noticed that the liver of a goose tastes really good when the goose has fattened-up before the migration. It's produced today by force-feeding geese or ducks, often to the point that their stomachs burst. It also has some wonderful wine pairings.
Chicago joins over a dozen countries in banning foie gras. When the Chicago City Council finally bans right turns on red and smoking in public and on sidewalks, I might be ready to move back.
Posted by adrianjo at 11:47 PM
Feels like the Beetles' first American concert
Some folks waited in line for four hours at last night’s Tribeca Film Festival to see the North American premier of Driving Lessons. For fans of Rupert Grint (the redhead of Harry Potter fame), it was probably worth it.
The screening was a giant teeny-bopper convention, and when Rupert entered the screening hall, I though maybe I was in the wrong place—was this a Justin Trousersnake concert? Even my girlfriend had to restrain herself.
Rupert Grint arrives at the screening [more pics]
I’d never heard of this Grint fellow; I figured it was an interesting movie. Director Jerry Brock put together a semi-autobiographical plot that goes something like this: Grint’s character is a shy and awkward boy of 17 living in London with a needy, over-sheltering, over-religious mother (Laura Linney) and an aloof father. He goes to work as a personal assistant for a salty, washed-up, impulsive, alcoholic actress named Evie. She is played by Julie Walters, who played Molly Weasly in the Harry Potter series.
Walters exposes Grint to a brave new world when she tricks him into going to a literary festival in Edinburgh. She convinces Grint to drive—he had suffered three accidents under his mother’s tutelage—and they end up at a camp site, where Walters exclaims, “I understand now why the working classes have kept camping a secret so long.” Still within his mother’s close orbit, Grint insists on getting home. Walters promptly swallows the car key, leading Grint to call his parents to explain that “I can’t come home until Evie poos the key.” By the time he returns, Grint has lost his virginity, drank large volumes of alcohol, gone to nightclubs, and learned to dance. Most importantly, he has learned to be “my own man,” no longer existing to satisfy the desires his parents.
Walters’s performance steals the show, as she develops a character of extraordinary complexity, at once needy and boldly assertive, childish and old-fashioned, angry and warm. Tiffany even said it was the best screen acting she had ever seen. Grint certainly holds his own, playing a character much like he is in real life, quiet and awkward.
Q&A after the show. [enlarge]
The Q&A after the show, a hallmark of Tribeca shows, allowed the teenyboppers to ask Rupert for hugs, though he stayed after for autographs and pictures too.
It will be interesting to see if Driving Lessons gets distributed nationally. If yesterday’s premier was any indication, it will find a willing market and, according the LA Times, is "obvious Oscar bait."
Posted by adrianjo at 05:49 PM