I learned this week that I’m obsessed with Cuba and that the interwebs are conspiring to push me over the edge. The primary catalyst for this little obsession is Lauren who insists on posting these brilliant and captivating pieces on the real pre-post-embargo Cuba. This mixed with those rad car photos on GoBackpacking that I mentioned a few weeks ago plus TravelZoo keeps emailing me super cheap fares to Havana. I fully suspect that there’s a consortium of Cuban masterminds co-ordinating this entire effort. They loiter on a Havana street corner in the afternoons, bellies full of China town bean sprouts, enjoying a good laugh at my expense. That said, I decided that if I can get well ahead of schedule with flogging my apartment stuff then I can go for a week. I have to fit it in before I leave for Japan, so it’ll be a long shot.

I learned that my favourite night out in Austin is still the Alamo Drafthouse. I don’t understand how there isn’t a swarm of copycat theaters everywhere. It’s such a perfect setup. A great menu, plus a great beer list (they have Fat Tire on tap!), all served to you while you watch your movie. What the hell else do you want? Hilarious clips, commercials and trailers before your movie? Oh yea, they have that too. That place is seriously the cat’s meow.

I learned that my “sleeping-in satisfaction” test is still accurate. When visiting a city I purposely sleep-in late just to see how satisfying it is to waste away the day in a cool place. It seems that the cooler the place, the more satisfying it is to sleep late. New York measured really quite high on the scale, so it is obviously a great place. I was only there for two days, but I can easily see why there’s so many unattractive I ♥ NY shirts in the world.

I learned that Bolivian prisons are seriously weird from reading Jason’s account of his dodgy visit. I wonder though if that prison model might not be a better system. It’s almost the same idea as colonial prison islands I guess.

I learned this week that if a batshit crazy man holding a severed head offers you a tooth you should accept it. I’d probably recommend a “thank you, sir” also for good measure.

Okay, so the aforementioned Vegas schwag . I’m not really certain why I find these naked lady pens so hilarious, but I always have. I had one when I was like 13 or so, and it was the greatest damn thing. So when I saw them in Vegas a couple weeks ago, I had to buy them. Unfortunately for me they only came in packs of 3. Which means I have 2 extra pens to give away. If you would like a naked lady pen to dazzle your classy friends with just let me know – rerunaround [at] gmail [dot] com. If you’ll feel better about it, you’re welcome to work for your free pen with poems about insensitive souvenirs or pictures of your current unsatisfying pen or whatever you want. All three pens write in black, but you’re welcome to indicate your preferred pen colour from the pic.

I know Americans read this, and I know how sensitive some of you folks can be to things that are not violence, so I won’t say what happens when you turn the pen upside down. Let’s just say it would be a big hit during recess for sixth graders. I would have bought some men pens also, just to be fair, but they don’t seem to make them. I assume because most women know that “tacky” doesn’t just refer to duct tape and sweaty backs.

That pretty much wraps up this week. Back to the grind of replying to insane craigslist people. If you miraculously happen to want a furnished apartment in downtown Montreal, let me know. Here’s a few pics from the last week for the illiterate folks.

I liked the little water thingies on top of so many buildings in NYC. So when I saw three together like this it was a kodak moment. Clicky for the bigger version.

The capitol building in Austin, where all that crazy Texas government business goes down.

A really bad resolution shot of a mesquite tree in Tucson. My dad is the BBQ master, and he’s so hardcore that he hand picks his own mesquite out of the desert. Kinda shames your crappy little bag of briquettes doesn’t it?

..

// shawn

Thanks for subscribing to my RSS feed, I appreciate it! Please be sure to stop by the site sometimes and leave a comment so I know you're still alive. I worry about you. Are you eating okay? Ok, see ya! -- Week Sauce: Vegas Schwag Edition is a post from: Rerunaround

Well, is the Driskill haunted? Or for that matter, was it even a nice place to stay?

Haunted? Beats the hell out of me. By which I mean that my experience was sort of inconclusive. The whole building is a perfect haunted setting. High ceilings, giant windows, and loads of unique character make it the ideal place to get spooked out. Even though the building is very well maintained there’s still plenty of random creaks and bumps that are surely just from age. While sitting in my room at night waiting to experience something supernatural I heard loads of weird little noises that I attributed to it being an old building.

That said, I’ll tell you about the one sort of strange moment I experienced. My room was one large bedroom plus a bathroom. The bedroom had one large 15 foot high window, and the bathroom had two windows, one 15 feet by 10 feet and the other a smaller stain glass window. I was taking an afternoon nap (it’s not my fault, the bed was super comfy), so I had the heavy curtains drawn in the bedroom. With the curtains drawn it was very dark in the bedroom. However, with two windows in the bathroom, quite a bit of natural sunlight came in through the bathroom door. While lying on the bed I suddenly noticed the light coming through the bathroom door was blocked. I looked over to see almost the entire bathroom doorway blacked out. Except for a little bit of sunlight at the top and bottom of the doorway. About as suddenly, it was back to normal. Logically, there was nothing that could block both large bathroom windows, and also account for the bits of light at the top and bottom of the doorway. Were I to say it looked like something, it looked like the silhouette of a person standing in the doorway. Take from that what you will.

Was it a nice place to stay? Totally. The Driskill is an absolutely lovely hotel. Brilliant architecture and great decor, all of which perfectly display its storied history. Many historical hotels are nice in appearance, but are a pain in the ass with old plumbing and electrics. Fortunately, all of the amenities here are high quality and in great working order. Plus, the icing on the cake – the bed in my room was quite possibly the most comfortable I’ve ever experienced. I can’t imagine a way to say that I’ve tried tons of beds that doesn’t make me sound like the whore of Babylon, but I’ve just moved a lot and stayed in a lot of hotels. Okay? So anyways, altogether a great hotel and a great piece of history.

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// shawn

ps: The bed was much tidier when I arrived, but I wasn’t in love with it then, so it didn’t occur to me to take a photo.

Thanks for subscribing to my RSS feed, I appreciate it! Please be sure to stop by the site sometimes and leave a comment so I know you're still alive. I worry about you. Are you eating okay? Ok, see ya! -- The Driskill Hotel, Austin: Haunted or Not? is a post from: Rerunaround