I went to my first ever baseball game on Friday night. I didn’t think I’d enjoy it. It seems too similar to cricket, a game so long and boring that it feels like training for life in a nursing home.
But I was pleasantly surprised. Baseball’s a fast moving battle of nerves. When it comes down to three “balls” and two “strikes,” the guy at the bat has the world on his shoulders. If he takes another strike, his head hangs low. If he knocks it out of the park, he stands among the gods. The rules are simple and any confusion is cleared up by more beer. After two hours, I graduated from total novice to seasoned pro – shouting, “You could see the ball better if you got a haircut, hippie!” and “Hit it, don’t swat it, Zimmerman!” [That Zimmerman really bugged me. His whole technique seemed to rely on the pitcher not being able to throw. Is the man allergic to running?]
...Another, more stark, reminder of that truth is the role that military pageantry plays at a baseball game. At the start of the contest, the CIA honour guard trooped the colours and we were all invited to stand and applaud the folks serving in the US military. But nothing prepared me for the moving rendition of The Star-Spangled Banner, as sung by a female soldier in combat fatigues. The stadium stood proudly – hats clasped to chests – as she powerfully, beautifully sang the national anthem. “Does that Star-Spangled Banner yet wave/ O’er the land of the free and the home of the brave?” It sure does.
In contrast, American patriotism is sharper and more certain – and more fixedly about ideas. Its promise is individual freedom. But that freedom is guaranteed – just like victory in a baseball game – by thinking and acting as a team or a nation. One of the reasons why civil society works in the US slightly better than it does in Britain is that they understand the balance of rights and responsibilities between the individual and the group. Without the security of a welfare state, Americans are acculturated to risk and sacrifice, and so (ironically) they can be a little more charitable than us. They are certainly more free.
After the game we moved to a bar and got chatting with some young marines, who were talking excitedly about the fact that they are going to present the flag at one of the ballgames next week. After that, they will fly off to war. We are lucky to share the world with a nation that produces men like these.
Repoz
Posted: April 18, 2012 at 02:23 PM |
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Most scorpions aren't dangerous but I can say that in my living room and if I saw one I'd have the same reaction (well, I'd still wear sandals in Manhattan, because if a scorpion makes its way here it deserves to win.)
They can't afford the time off from work, first of all.
I suppose you think this is a telling point against what I've been saying.
Yes, because in 1969 no median income people got four weeks paid vacation, unless they were schoolteachers.
Even today, people who get four weeks vacation generally can't take it all at once (unless it's your honeymoon or something). I would never take four consecutive weeks, first of all b/c I wouldn't enjoy being away that longs, second b/c it would suck royally to have no days off the rest of the year, and thirdly b/c it is irresponsible to be gone from work that long in any professional/managerial capacity.
The benefit of being able to get to Disney World (to pick a typical middle class vacation spot) in three hours each way, instead of two days, means a lot more to the average vacationer than paying an extra $15 a night for a motel.
Yeah I'm probably betraying my Canadian roots with my crippling fear of scorpions.
On the other hand, Europeans are always awed by my bear encounter stories.
Snapper, that was your parents' choice, because if they could have afforded a two week beach or mountain vacation, they could have afforded to fly. Two weeks at the beach or in the mountains was not something that was within the reach of median income families back then---their beach of choice back then was Jones or Coney.
That's absolute nonsense.
It was my grandparents I was discussing, but the professions involved for my grandad and two great uncles were builder, tiler's assistant, and maintenance man at a watch factory. They all lived in half of a two family house (2BDR, 1Bath appt) in Ozone Park, Queens. You can't get more lower middle class than that.
The Jersey Shore vacations they stayed with a cousin. When they went upstate, they stayed at the same kind of motels you did.
How can you argue those motels were in reach for you, but out of reach for them? It makes no sense.
Hey, my great-grandfather took a four week cruise from Italy to the US, stopping in France, Spain and the UK, and it only cost him like $35.
different people have different ideas of fun, i know. i have like zero interest sleeping in a tent on a sleeping bag on some small uncomfortable mat. one of the very few luxuries in my life is our bed and i appreciate it.
i have no idea whether or not the kids would like it or be a gigantic pain in the ass. you think you know your kids but they have really surprised me more than a few times. i would guess they would have a great time if they just went with just their daddy.
- blastin,
i'm dying to know how you get beds or bathrooms or showers in the jungle. where do they keep them? how do they get water for them? wind/solar generators? how do they keep the insects/snakes away? or even predator animals?
and the rest of all yall,
point is that when you are talking about traveling to europe, even for 2 people, it costs A LOT OF MONEY and is not affordable for people who don't make the kind of money yall do. which is something you don't want to believe because even 6 large is nothing to you.
we can't even afford to go to cooperstown, which is really the only place i really REALLY want to go
As has been mentioned numerous times now the cost of air travel has dropped dramatically since 1978 even with the recent price hikes because of fuel. Heck, a trip from Toronto to Miami practically costs the exact same now as it did in 1969. I'm not talking about adjsut for inflation or anything like that I'm saying that the two have almsot the exact same dollar amount price. Toronto to Miami in 1969 cost something like $1000 in today's dollars while one can do that trip today for $185. Even a puddle jumper trip like Syracuse to Providence cost $720 in today's dollar back in 1969 while only costing something like $150 nowadays.
Certainly correct. With kids it's very hard, and much more expensive b/c of the airfare.
But, it's quite likely, that, after your kids are grown, if you and your husband want to go to Europe, you could save up and afford it. It would be a once (or twice) in a lifetime thing, but you could do it.
50 years ago, a median income family literally wouldn't think of it.
It depends on your age. If you are a student, you can get all sorts of discounted fares and rail passes, particularly if you don't need to follow a fixed itinerary. One can backpack around, stay at hostels, and eat from kiosks relatively cheaply, even with current exchange rates.
I know you've already covered the "no family" angle, but my travel history is much more dictated by my lack of responsiblity than my huge salary. I'm making more money now than I ever have in my life and that's £12,000 (roughly $19,000?) and £7000 of that has to go towards tuition. So for rent, food, and travel I have about $8000 to work with in a year. My parents are cool and pay for my flight home for Christmas, but I manage my yearly trips with whatever I have left over from my own living.
My lifestyle is a matter of sacrifice (I'm 28 and have no family or prospective family of my own, but I get total freedom to move around where I like) just like yours. I don't mean to come off defensive here. We certainly have different lives, but I don't think it's because I have a ton of money and you don't. We've made different life decisions.
Except going to Europe (even for 14 days) is affordable for the average adult couple. You can have a great time in Europe on a ten day trip and with a total package starting point of $3,000 to $4,000.
Right now with less than 2 months notice travel and hotel stay from Houston to Paris for 10 days starts at $3,100 for the beginning of June. If this Houston couple wants to go in September it will cost them less than $2,500 for air travel and hotel stay.
It's part of the odd flavour of my cheapness but I refuse to accpet student discounts. I feel great pride in my cheapness, but it has to be accompanied by some element of suffering or inconvenience. I will suffer no end of inferior products, service, or wait-times to save a buck, but saving money without some kind of associated feeling of personal worthlessness defeats the purpose.
Houston to Rome in September: $2,500
Houston to Rome in March: $2,300
Are you boycotting the Astros this year? Because you're posting while Wandy is killing the Dodgers....
To be fair I think that was a full 9-man murder conspiracy.
you aren't defensive, it's just that because you don't have a house, family, job, Dogs etc, you CAN live on pennies for part of the year and spend big to travel. we can't. even taking a long weekend off takes a lot of planning especially if we can't take the Dogss. there is NO way and i mean NO way we could leave the house for 2 weeks and expect to come home and find anything. you don't want to know what kennels cost for 2 Dogss for 2 weeks, even when you supply your own Dog food. these are things you don't have to think about, which is fortunate for you. but WE do.
which reminds me - i don't know if you can take Dogss in a campground and they are not small Dogss and also this means it is very uncomfortable traveling anywheres with 3 good sized kids in the back seat - pretty much they don't even all fit any more, plus 2 Dogss.
mccoy,
you sound like cruise ads.
"starting at" - please. It's the - ending up at - part i want to know. we don't drink so there wouldn't be any alcohol cost, and i would like to know how much it costs to eat there and i have no trouble either cooking or us eating at whatever they call sandwich trucks there as long as it is cheap and they don't make me have to speak some other language to get food. oh yeah - and i am absolutely positively NOT sharing rooms or bathrooms with other people. and no smoking.
so, let's pretend that husband and i have managed to find some responsible person to stay in the house and watch the kids and feed/walk Dogss for 2 weeks and that i manage to find other grrls to do my work for me for 2 weeks. and that i manage to convince Husband that i want to go there instead of cooperstown, not sure how i would manage THAT neither.
now, i would like to see how much money you are REALLY talking about if me and Husband went to paris for 2 weeks in sept and did not eat at any restaurants on this package trip. include whatever we would have to pay the interpreter/guide (or whatever we are supposed to call them), food, how much admission to each place actually IS. the ENTIRE cost. except for seeing the louve museum and walking on that bridge that is always in all those romance movies, i am not even really sure what it is we are "supposed" to do in paris...
- i haven't missed a pitch. wandy is teh awesomeness and the dodgers looked like the astros usually do. i can watch, keep score and chat all at the same time
i am woman hear me roar
What the #@$#@? It's Paris; you're not spending two weeks with the Bushmen of the Kalahari.
Yeah, I see we're pretty much on the same page. You don't have my freedom. But you do have a husband and kids, which I imagine is pretty cool at times. You win some, you lose some.
Travel 3,500 miles, at 35 MPG, at $4.15 per gallon: $415
Leaves $1,210 for everthing else or $40 a day. Tight but certainly doable.
While eating at restaurants for six meals a day? Only if you want to look and feel like the guy in Super Size Me by the time that the first week is up, and entertain yourselves by measuring each other's expanding waistlines and taking over/under bets on how long it'd take you to puke. I doubt if you'd have much left over for your favorite microbrews and stubhub tickets.
Or we can use the $4,000 number that more closely resembles the % of income dedicated to the 1969 trip which would leave $2,085 and $70 a day left over for everything else.
I'm not sure where you're coming from with this. We spent $500 (~$3125 in 2012 dollars) and traveled as I described for a month. That leaves what you first stated for everything else: $1210.
----------------------------------------------------------
They can't afford the time off from work, first of all.
I suppose you think this is a telling point against what I've been saying.
Yes, because in 1969 no median income people got four weeks paid vacation, unless they were schoolteachers.
Or unless they were self-employed, as we were. Not everyone comes straight out of college and heads directly into a 9-to-5, and not every self-employed couple is necessarily living on welfare supplements. Once again you show a rather amusing inability to think outside your predetermined boxes.
And it can be your ending up at point. Like I said your total package price could be around 3 to 4 grand. If you want to do more and buy more it will obviously go up. I can't give you a final price because what people want to do on their vacation is entirely up to them.
I've been to Europe 3 times in my life so far for about a total of 60 days and I did all three trips between the age of 21 and 30 when I wasn't making great money. If you don't go crazy buying clothes, artwork, furniture, and stuff like that you can have a great time doing a ton of stuff for about $1,000 a person per 10 days and that includes taking tours, visiting musuems, and eating out. You can most definitely scrimp and save on that total. For instance in Italy hotel breakfast spreads are outstanding and factored into the cost of your room already in most places. You can quite easily skip lunch by simply visiting your hotel dining room in the morning which leaves you with a light market snack at midday or so and a dinner which doesn't have to be extravagant. You could spend as little as 20 or 30 American dollars a day for two on food if you just wanted something basic and filling.
Two people from Houston if they planned their trip right could get a great deal on a hotel room and airline tickets to Europe and spend in total anywhere from 4,000 to 6,000 in total on the trip without really having to scrimp on anything.
well it's not exactly at the top of my places i want to go list. i know i'm supposed to want to but am not sure why.
where i really REALLY want to go is cooperstown. in america i mean. but even that is too much, really.
If i was single and male and had money i would want to drive all around america and go to every single ML ballpark. Also then i wouldn't be afraid of being alone and also i wouldn't be so finicky about stuff like bathrooms and sanitary stuff. i'd also really like to see the grand canyon. i'd like to go to california and see the giant trees that were alive when Christ was born. i think i'd like to see yellowstone, too, before it turns into that humongous supervolcano that will destroy most of the country. i'd like to see central park in NYC and walk up that beautiful street that goes for miles along the river up manhattan. and i'd like to go to that big plaza in chicago they show in all the movies and go to that beach and also see the chicago river from the top of the sears tower. i want to see mrs oleary's barn too. i want to drive west into kansas and nebraska and see what is like to go for hundreds of miles and all there is is grass - just like some of my ancestors did. and i want to see the grand canyon and walk along that trail down there where the colorado river runs through and imagine what it was like a million years ago before it got started. and i want to go to some of those famous passes in the rockies where the gangsters used to hide out after the civil war. i would have liked to see florida like it was 60 years ago, but not now.
And if i was gonna leave america, where i would want to go most is to jerusalem, to the Holy City. But it's not exactly a safe place or a place you can go alone.
But you see i got a Husband and a house and kidsss and Dogss and a lot of other things i got to do with my time and my life so it isn't gonna happen.
Four thousand dollars is a LOT of money to TO US and truth is that it would have to be taken away from a lot of other things that are more important...
The thing is what you consider a "restaurant" back in 1969 would either be considered a fast food restaurant or "quick-casual" nowadays and nobody goes Morgan Spurlocker on food. If you consume 2,000 calories for breakfast you are not going to consume 2,000 more for lunch and then 2,000 more for dinner.
$40 a day would require more visits to supermarkets than to prepared food places but you would still be able to eat out. It would just require some PB+J sandwich lunches and buying 2 liters of soda at supermarkets and such.
I'm not sure where you're coming from with this. We spent $500 (~$3125 in 2012 dollars) and traveled as I described for a month. That leaves what you first stated for everything else: $1210.
Two white 25 year olds spent $500 in 1969. 500 dollars in 1969 was roughly 6.25% of two unmarried couples median income. 6.25% of two white 25 year old unmarried adults in 2010 is about $4,000.
Or unless they were self-employed, as we were. Not everyone comes straight out of college and heads directly into a 9-to-5, and not every self-employed couple is necessarily living on welfare supplements. Once again you show a rather amusing inability to think outside your predetermined boxes.
Most self-employed 25 year olds can't simply shutter whatever business they are running for a month and take a vacation. As I said before you are foregoing one month's worth of revenue and spending one month's worth of revenue. Most people, self-employed or otherwise, can't afford to do that. They couldn't afford to do it in 1969 and they can't afford to do it now. Like I said before, there is a reason why it is the young that takes these kind of trips.
Yeah, the typical 1969 median income family was self-employed. And if they were, could afford to close their business for a month, and still have a business when they got back. C'mon Andy, you're living in a Bohemian 60's fairy tale, that only ever existed for a tiny group of extremely privileged upper middle class people.
My Dad's choice after college in 1966 was straight to grad school, or straight into the US Army. (One of my favorite lines of his, was when he heard about kids taking "a year to find themselves" before or after college. His response: "If I took a year to find myself after college, I found myself in Vietnam. You either work, or you go to school") When he finished grad school, he had a wife and a kid.
For his parents' generation, college wasn't even a dream. Half of them didn't finish HS. It was straight to work at 12 (my Mom's Mom), 15 (my Dad's Dad) or 18, if you were really lucky. The men worked construction, or in factories, or as clerks. The women worked as housekeepers, or in factories, until they got married, and they were absolutely thrilled to give up their "careers" to be housewives.
The only box I'm thinking in was what was actually available to real lower-middle class and working class people, i.e. my entire family before my parents graduated school and got white-collar jobs, in the 1960's.
I don't know how they built it, but they did. It's cool.
As for insects, um, no, insects can get wherever they want to but they really want no part of us.
The bed have nets to keep such things away. The nets are cool.
Greg, you are in the same position as I am. I don't make a lot but I don't have any dependents so I damn well better take advantage now. This is the time!
When I have kids I'll do what my parents did and see more of this country (we did Grand Canyon, Disney, that stuff) with the occasional splurge, provided I don't find myself out of a job for an extended period of time.
Until I move on up to a more lucrative job (eyes are always open), I'll use my summer vacation to go someplace new and my winter one to see family.
sorry but i am still not understanding
you are in the middle of the jungle. where exactly IS the bed? what is it made out of? how do they keep other living creatures out of it when no person is in it? i would think that rats would just eat through plastic casings or pretty much anything else - and how would they keep mold out? where do they store them? are they the plastic blowup kind? are yall walking or is it mules like indiana jones? how do you carry supplies?
how do they get water for the shower? is it one of those bags you hang from a tree? how can they even have a toilet? where does it flush TO?
Heh, we take a boat from the city down the river to the entrance of the national park and then we get situated. And every day we have hikes and tours etc.
I have been in places with the bags, but I think this one has straight up normal showers. You pay more for hot showers and less for cold ones. It's so hot it doesn't much matter though.
I have no idea where the toilet flushes to.
I've stayed in similar places in Zambia and in Malaysia, and each is slightly different.
If you think about it it actually doubles the cost of the trip. If the average 1969 couple took a month off they would see their annual income drop to $5,500 and then they would spend $500 on the vacation. So now they have $5,000 for the year. So a month long $500 trip would have a real cost of $1,000 or roughly $6,300 in today's dollars.
Now then nowadays most can't take a 30 day vacation but a lot of can take a 2 week vacation and ton of us will get that paid so we don't have the double dip.
that makes sense
i thought you were actually in an actual jungle - like in the movies...
But I'm not going camping in the jungle, no.
Flights for a weekend in July are about $900 for two (into Binghamton). Car is around $50 (no insurance, but fees are included). Hotel is $150 per night (taxes included).
Total cost with food comes in under $1,500. It's more if you take the kids, of course.
If you drive, you save money on flights, but it's 1,700 miles, so at least two heavy days of driving, so you'd have to make it a week long trip.
Well, I'm with BBC here, I think this IS expensive. And "starting at" is really not ever ending at.
Flights for a weekend in July are about $900 for two (into Binghamton). Car is around $50 (no insurance, but fees are included). Hotel is $150 per night (taxes included).
If you got the car you can stay farther away from Cooperstown and cut the cost of your hotel bill at least in half.
Geezus christ. Starting at was an ending price! I said you can go and in total spend 3 or 4,000 dollars for two people. If you want to do more things it will cost more thus "starting at" but if you are on a budget such as $3,500 you could still go to Europe and have a wonderful time over 10 days on that budget.
Also something that you think is expensive doesn't mean it isn't affordable. Affordable in this sense isn't defined as being able to do it every month or even every year but the average American household (and especailly one without kids) can afford to take a trip to Europe.
Not trying to make trouble, but wondering where you are getting those prices in #415. Absolute dead cheapest I can do on Orbitz for flight and hotel for 10 (random, 12th to 22nd) days in September is $4141, not $2500. I admit fully mine is probably the internet rube search, I suppose, so let me know the non-rube place to find them? (Or were those prices not for 10 days? Maybe I misunderstood?)
I did this with two other guys in the summer of 2010. We only made it out west to KC, but it was a lark nonetheless. The trip was 2 weeks long, we bought the cheapest seats we could, split gas and, wherever possible, stayed with friends. It came out to about 900 bucks, IIRC (and I kind of want to say that's a little high.)
The trip turned into something of a foodventure. It was pretty incredible. The big regrets:
a) WTF is that stuff Cinci calls chili? Ugh.
b) We didn't go to Papi's in STL.
c) We spent an extra day in Iowa for no particular reason.
Man, that was fun.
Now then nowadays most can't take a 30 day vacation but a lot of can take a 2 week vacation and ton of us will get that paid so we don't have the double dip.
I would say the cost is more than one month's income. Very few small businesses can be closed for a month, and not have some kind of hangover effect. Once customer's find another option, some won't come back.
But your second point is spot on. And, because we don't have to drive to California, we can do in two weeks what would have taken a month in 1969.
(Not to hijack, but Simpsons first episode was just on... I haven't seen that one in many years. Fun stuff. Fox is 25, making it a few months younger than I am.)
you can't go to cooperstown from houston for just a weekend and because you won't have like any time THERE. you spend all day friday and sunday just flying and driving which means you get in very late fri night and you have saturday and spend all day sunday driving out and flying back. which is silly.
the hotel is NOT 150 a night - the cheapest hotel room available in july is $240 a NIGHT in cooperstown - and we'd have to find one in albany or something and drive back and forth. car rental in binghamton is over 300 bucks a week and it's barely cheaper in syracuse or albany - and this is not counting gas and food.
i've checked it out before.
I have absolutely zero desire to go to Asia.
A big part of that is I have a sensitive stomach. I doubt I'd make it out of the hotel most days.
For a trivia buff you are an incredibly incurious fellow.
Strong enough for (grass) pizza in Cambodia. Now that was an adventure. It led me to be so hungry I ate a solid 3 or 4 tarantulas at a rest stop (we were on a long bus ride).
the hotel is NOT 150 a night - the cheapest hotel room available in july is $240 a NIGHT in cooperstown - and we'd have to find one in albany or something and drive back and forth. car rental in binghamton is over 300 bucks a week and it's barely cheaper in syracuse or albany - and this is not counting gas and food.
I've done it before and it can be really cheap. For instance right now for a weekend at the end of July you can book a room in a Budget Inn 30 miles north of the Hall for 63 dollars a night. When I went I think I was 20 or so miles away and it was 80 bucks. They are not the greatest rooms by any stretch of the imagination.
So that is 189 dollars
Houston to Albany is about $1100 for two people.
Houston to Binghamton is $800 for two people.
Cheapest rental option out of Binghamton is $19 a day so that is $79 with taxes and fees include. Binghamton is 90 miles away from the motel. I don't know what their per mile rate is. But for probably $1,200 you can leave Friday night from Houston and return on Monday car and room included. Factor in tickets to the Hall, food, and other entertainment and the whole trip should be around $1,500 if you are on a budget.
I'll accept that. I also have no desire to go to Hawaii, or anywhere in the Caribbean (hate beaches). I know what I like, and there are already more things in the world I want to see than I will ever have time.
For example, this summer's trip is shaping up to be eastern France; Champagne, Alsace and Lorraine. Never seen any of it. Other itineraries I want to hit (just in Europe) include Scotland, Ireland, Spain, Southern Italy, Sicily, Bavaria and the Rhineland, Greece, Istanbul, Norway, Sweden, Finland, Russia. I'd also like to do Australia, New Zealand, the Holy Land, Argentina, and Egypt.
I did this with two other guys in the summer of 2010. We only made it out west to KC, but it was a lark nonetheless. The trip was 2 weeks long, we bought the cheapest seats we could, split gas and, wherever possible, stayed with friends. It came out to about 900 bucks, IIRC (and I kind of want to say that's a little high.)
If the three of you hit every ballpark from Boston to KC and didn't even spend $900, that's one impressive trip, even if you stayed with friends in all 17 cities** from KC eastward. In fact if you made it to 20 parks in 2 weeks, that's a hell of a feat if you'd spent 3 times that amount. What games did you see in that short time? You must have been driving night and day to make them all, and how many speeding tickets did you accumulate? What was your itinerary?
**Cities from Kansas City on eastward
Boston
New York (2 parks)
Philadelphia
Baltimore / Washington (2 parks)
Atlanta
Tampa Bay
Miami
Pittsburgh
Cincinnati
Cleveland
Detroit
Toronto
Chicago (2 parks)
Milwaukee
Minneapolis
St. Louis
Kansas City
We didn't hit every park, sadly. Starting out from NYC (really just outside the City), it went:
Day 1: Pittsburgh (Rockies, split a Primanti's at the park)
Day 2: Cleveland (Twins - some vietnamese place)
Day 3: Detroit (don't remember opponent, but I remember SLOW'S BBQ very, very well.)
Day 4: Chicago (NL) (I think they played the Marlins?)
Day 5: Milwaukee (day trip)
Day 6: Chicago (AL)
Day 7: ####### IOWA
Day 8: Iowa State Fair + Kansas City (CC Sabathia threw about 100 that night and we ate at Arthur Bryant's) - http://www.baseball-reference.com/boxes/KCA/KCA201008120.shtml
Day 9: St. Louis (Cubs)
Day 10: Cinci (We left early to get chili in Cinci, thereby eschewing Papi's. I was saddened.)
Day 11: rest day - we stayed in Morgantown, WV and drank heavily and cheaply. I had wanted to go straight through to catch a Strasburg start in DC.
Day 12: Baltimore (Obrycki's, great game against the Mariners.)
Day 13: Philly (Giants, cheesesteaks) + Return
We three split a room in Detroit, Cinci, and Morgantown. Otherwise, we got by with a little help from our friends. And yes, we spent a LOT of time in my friend's dad's Jeep Grand Cherokee. Once you get out past Chicago, roads get very straight and very long and you can go very fast.
EDIT: @ Blastin, at least you didn't have to spend an extra day in Iowa so Fish could reminisce about his days at Grinnell.
Cooperstown is not in rural Texas- or Kansas-type middle of nowhere, there are a LOT, and I mean a LOT of small motels with a half-hour drive. Move it up to 45 minutes and there will definitely be something cheap and workable (if not closer). There are even cheap bed and breakfasts.
I would love you to come to Cooperstown, BBC, because a.) I personally love the HOF and b.) I grew up in this area (an hour from the hall) and it's lovely country. I hope you find a way to do so, and one of the places you should look into flying is Syracuse vs. Albany.
That was my experience with Cooperstown, too, since upstate New York in general is always kind of a low rent area outside of the tourist towns. The biggest problem there is trying to find a parking space during induction weekend or Summer weekends in general. What we need to get is an extension of the A train up there to eliminate that concern, financed by taxing Yankee Stadium and CitiField luxury boxes at 91%.
I think you're selling the hygiene in the area short. You can easily and profitably spend a week in HKG, eat in amazing places every night and stay at amazing hotels.
Hong Kong is the second or third best hotel market in the world after Paris and maybe New York or London. The best hotels in the world are located in Hong Kong. I think it's worth going just to see the hotels, but that's me.
The same is true of Bangkok, Tokyo or Singapore. And really? You've no desire to visit Chiang Mai and ride an elephant? Stay in a luxury tented camp? That tented camp is the best property FS operates. If I had the means, I would be on a plane tomorrow. By far my first choice.
Oh, well, first of all, I ###### up the city. Brilliant work.
Houston to Albany is about $1100 for two people.
Houston to Binghamton is $800 for two people.
Syracuse is $900, probably easier/cheaper to rent a car there, only a bit farther than Albany, cheaper places to stay on that side of the drive, too, as the other side has people coming from the city.
I don't understand this. You want to go to Cooperstown. It's relatively affordable if you do it over a weekend, and easy to do. Instead of making plans to do so, you prefer to throw up obstacles. Aren't two days at Cooperstown better than zero days? Why let the perfect be the enemy of the good?
Money is always an obstacle that I respect. I don't begrudge anyone that. I don't mind making it clear, though, that you really, REALLY don't have to stay in Cooperstown. That's going to cut your expenses down immediately and substantially.
Yeah, I didn't understand this comment either. Snapper could stay at nice places and eat nothing but boring, overpriced continental food if he wished. It would make him an idiot, of course, but it's an option. You drink bottled water. I refuse to believe that anyone's belly is so weak that the sights and smells of Singapore or Tokyo would cause gastrointestinal discomfort ... that's not a health issue, it's just being a #####.
The idea that someone would have "zero desire to go to Asia" is so insanely foreign to my thinking that I almost don't know how to handle it. Why the #### not? I just don't understand it.
that is very interesting. i thought it was in the middle of nowhere with nothing anywheres near because that is how it has been described to me right here on this board.
it would make it better to not have to pay for really expensive hotels
and we can't go this summer because we have to move, but i AM going to make it there before i die
tshipman
going for a weekend is beyond silly because the entire day of friday would be spent traveling - to the airport, waiting, changing planes, getting in, driving 90 minutes to a hotel, getting in after midnight. so saturday, you get up, you're already tired from a whole day's worth of traveling. and then sunday morning you are driving 90 minutes back to the airport, waiting, and getting home at around 9 at night.
that is not MY idea of a fun weekend. it would need to be longer than that.
but it would be easier if we didn't have to stay in albany or cooperstown.
as for hygeine in asia,
well, what you see on TV doesn't look very hygenic.
Some of you people are real babies.
Yes, travel involves inconvenience. Sometimes it isn't comfortable. So what? You don't remember that stuff. You remember Cooperstown for the rest of your life.
Asia is a big place. Bangladesh is a steamy pestilent hell hole. Singapore is built almost entirely out of gleaming antiseptic subterranean malls. There's a lot of different hygiene levels in between.
No and why the hell would I want to stay in a tent?
The problem with Asia is European cities are better, and I couldn't care less about nature. So I'm with snapper, it has no appeal to me.
If somebody said to me, "Free trip to Asia!," I'm not going to turn it down. But there's so many other places I want to go to above Asia, so it's very low on my list.
Well, for city-dwellers and suburbanites, it IS nothing. Lots of farmland, lots of small towns; but not a great plains or desert type of nothing. For example, I grew up in a place with one stoplight and 1500 people in town, but the next exact same small town was 8 miles, and utica - which has 60,000 people - was 15. Northern New York is like that all over. Call up a google map when you have a bit and you can look around and see. Even if there's no Utica in the immediate vicinity of Cooperstown (feature, not bug), there are lots of communities.
Correct me if I'm wrong, but didn't you say you hadn't been to Asia? So you could know this how? I don't talk about how much better Asian cities are than Australian ones because I haven't been there.
As for not caring about nature, well, yeah, that #### cray. As a born and bred NYer, I love cities but I love the opposite too. However that's just a (very very weird) preference.
Edit: I'm agreeing with you and adding to your point, btw.
Trust, Tokyo's a lot lot lot lot lot lot lot lot (x40) cleaner than any city in Texas. And I'm not dissing Texas, it's far cleaner than NYC, too.
Tokyo's super expensive though but I found a way to do it.
Seoul's mostly clean too.
Asia has half the world's population. Yeah, we make them look bad on TV, but that's us being myopic, not them.
I'm a bit embarrassed to say this, since I've flown all over the place, but, since I don't know, and you're here, how far a drive from NYC is the Coop? That's a weekend trip I need to actually do someday soon while my dad's still around.
Because the things about cities which interest me aren't to be found in Asia.
It's a freaking miracle. Screw you infertility. We won!
Objectivity fail.
I'm a bit embarrassed to say this, since I've flown all over the place, but, since I don't know, and you're here, how far a drive from NYC is the Coop? That's a weekend trip I need to actually do someday soon while my dad's still around.
Top of head, 3.5 hours. Google maps, from Times Square.... 3 hours, 54 minutes. Depending on how fast you drive and route and departure traffic, that's probably a decent range, maybe less. Haven't done that specific drive myself in awhile. I can get to NYC from Utica in 4 or so.
I can follow this up to a certain point. I love European history, which Europe tends to have a lot of. But I'm told stuff happened in Asia too, and I would like to see it. My Euro-centric travel is mostly a function of me living in Europe. If I could pop over to India for a weekend for £100 or so I'd definitely do that. But since I can't, it's Spain and Germany and so on.
Congratulations, and cheers for the restaurant tip.
Grotty little bars, hole in the wall restaurants, old churches, massive train stations, trams, football grounds, gig venues, crumbling little houses that don't sit up straight. Little tiny alleys, rivers and canals, shipyards, and so on.
A lot of that stuff is universal to cities but Europe has those things like no other continent, so that's what I'm most interested in.
As WJ said, thinking that the entirety of Asia has none of this is pure unadulterated nonsense. Feel free to have preferences, and Europe is certainly easier to get to, but lord this is just not true.
It is. Different vibe, different food, different customs, but pretty damn amazing in its own way.
To a point, yeah. But Taipei gets pretty damn grody once you leave certain areas. It's still, mostly, people going to school, home and work. I've been to all three and there's plenty of normal non-futuristic fun to be had in all three.
Thanks. That's extremely doable especially the way my dad drives.
And congrats to WJ. Funny we've been having this long discussion about being kidless and gallivanting right at this time then, eh?
Read better.
Congrats WJ!
Even reading better doesn't mean you are being accurate, simply preferential.
I think Americans are accustomed to certain things and Europe gives them the closest approximation to that, especially on a "normal" vacation. You can reasonably live like a normal European and while it would be different its still somewhat familiar. In Asia its impossible to get that.
Also, American tourists have dropped a peg on the "most despised" list. Mainland Chinese tourists are the loudest, rudest groups of people ever.
You don't really spend a day traveling and it isn't like this is the Oregon Trail where you have to walk thousands of miles to get to your destination. You take a mid afternoon flight. It would be just two people and for the weekend so it isn't like you're bringing the whole herd and a thousand pieces of luggage. At most you leave 2 hours before the flight. It's a 5 hour flight plus 1 hour for time zone change so you'll get in late at night. Figure hour and half to two hours for gathering your car and getting to your motel. So it is probably around midnight when you get in. 8 hours of sleep later an hour or two to get ready and it is 10 or so in the morning. You now have a wonderful Saturday to putter around Cooperstown and the hall. At this point you have two options. You could leave Sunday afternoon or you could leave Monday morning or so. The trip I detailed earlier was for leaving Monday morning. If that is the case you then also have all of Sunday to play around as well. Even if you don't you can still have a few hours on Sunday to putter Cooperstown before you head back to the airport.
So perhaps you have about 16 or so hours dedicated to travel but so what? About 99% of that travel involves you sitting down and listening to music or reading a book or watching a TV.
You're perilously close to reopening the airline seat reclining discussion.
No kidding.
Also, do you really need more than two days for Cooperstown? I love baseball, but it's not the Louvre.
That sounds awesome. It must have been pretty incredible to see Maris on his way to 61. That musta been a heckuva week for you. My closest analogue is my high school Senior Cut Day. A bunch of us took advantage of a 1:05 Mets start and a 7:05 Yankees start (it's rare that they're both in town on the same day). That came out to a lot more than 9.10, though.
My big question: how did DiMaggio look during the old timer's game? He strikes me as someone who would *look* the same, even if he wasn't.
Europe is absolutely wonderful, don't get me wrong. But most people that go to Europe are more or less trying to live their own versions of moments that they find on postcards. Flynn's list in #483 is the ideal example. In Florence you stay at your comfy hotel, you go to the museum, you wander and "get lost" in the attractive little streets, you ask your concierge where the locals eat and hope it's a romantic little spot with great pasta. Repeat tomorrow in Venice.
Asia has its own postcard moments, of course. But the sights of Asia are, for a Westerner, considerably more foreign and in my opinion more exciting. You see things that blow your mind, that will stay with you forever.
No, but for a real baseball fan ("casual fans" can leave now), the HoF library has enough to keep your attention for a week. Of course getting access to its full holdings can be a problem if you're not credentialed, but if you ever can get the magic key, it'll be like nothing you can even imagine.
Well, pricing in those days wasn't based on our current auction model, and was geared much more towards the average income fan, so that explains the prices. I still have the filled-in scorecards for most of those 9 games.
My big question: how did DiMaggio look during the old timer's game? He strikes me as someone who would *look* the same, even if he wasn't.
Unfortunately without a Jumbotron, it was kind of hard to see Dimaggio's face from the upper reaches of the upper deck. I don't remember much about that old-timers' day at all other than that it was the only one of the four Orioles' games that the Yanks won. The last game ended with the Yanks wasting a ninth inning no outs / bases loaded / 3-0 count on Clete Boyer while trailing by a run, a horrific climax which pretty much wiped out all memories of that series before the last of the ninth. I can still see Boyer taking three straight strikes down the middle and Hector Lopez hitting a one-hopper to short on the next pitch and falling down while running out of the batters' box. At the time it seemed worse than a one-two punch of Podres and Mazeroski.
Much like Krusty, I've done a pretty massive, 14+ day road trip to several parks. In fact, while in college a decade ago, I and a couple of friends did two such trips - a shorter version and a longer one. I'll look for the details when I get home, but over the course of those two trips I'm pretty sure we saw the following parks :
County Stadium
Miller Park
Wrigley
Comiskey
Busch Stadium (II)
Kauffman
Jacobs Field
Cinergy/Riverfront
Great American Ball Park
PNC Park
Veterans Stadium
Camden Yards
Shea
Old Yankee Stadium
Fenway
Olympic Stadium
SkyDome/Rogers Centre
Comerica
We were also able to squeeze in visits to the Louisville Slugger museum and Cooperstown. They were absolutely fantastic trips. Of course, now there are new parks in New York and Washington that I have to get to that weren't there the first time...
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