MJ lives on...

Last March (2011) we were at a tennis match at Madison Sq garden and saw an electric banner ad for a Cirque du Soleil "Michael Jackson - The Immortal World Tour" in April.  Ash had not long before seen his first Cirque and really enjoyed it so we were keen and came home and booked tickets the next day. We didn't realize it was actually for April 2012 until we printed the tickets and so we knew we had to stay in NYC for another year!

Last night was the big night, and it didn't disappoint...  For me anyway ;)

Ash and I were arriving separately so planned to meet at our seats.  I was running late - and a little distracted on my crackberry - so headed up the same entrance that we have used literally every time we've been there, all the way to the nose-bleed section, thats seating level 400 and 7 escalators up!  and it turned out to be the wrong entrance...   I was on the exact opposite side of the arena to where I should be, but not wanting to miss the start of the show I thought I would be able to go all the way around the arena on the walkway behind the seats.  I came to a point where I couldn't go any further and, as I started to climb over the empty seats (behind the stage) a security guard (SG) stopped me.  "Where are you going",  in my best Aussie accent "I'm lost and am trying to get around to section X."  SG "No your not", Me "Sorry?", SG (whispering and acting like a state secret) "Shh, your going to downstairs, these tickets are for level 100, use the fire escape to level 1 - go now..."

Well it took me all of 5 seconds to start moving, calling Ash at the same time to say "trust me, leave your seat and hit the fire escape, I'll meet you at Level 1" - Comp seats, in front of the stage, on plush seats instead of plastic...  Nice!   You hear of this kind of thing happening but it never happens to me!  

So on to the show - 

For any MJ fan you couldn't help but have a great time.  It was more dance numbers than any other Cirque but there was still the acrobats, tumblers and aerial artists. There was constant giant footage/images of MJ, all the favourite songs and some moving moments with songs like 'Ben', 'Gone too Soon' and 'Will you be there'.  There were shouts from the crowd "We love you Michael", just like you were at a MJ concert. Ash laughed when I said this later, but there was one moment so electric, for a split second I thought the man himself was going to appear and make a comeback! All finished off with indoor pyrotechnics.  What a legend! 

We miss you Michael....

See video here:

http://www.cirquedusoleil.com/en/shows/michael-jackson-tour/default.aspx

Loving NYC

Another long time between blogs.  What can I say? I'm slack.  But Ash does such a great job keeping you up to date (even if he forgets the spellcheck) that he monopolizes the mac... - no, that's just another excuse.  Anyway, I had the greatest feeling last night that I want to remember so that's prompted me to write (I hope I have subscribers left to read it!).

On the weekend we changed our clocks for daylight saving and the weather seems to have changed with it!  Last night we were able to finish work earlier than usual and we came home and took Dasha to the dog run in Washington Sq park and it was still light, and even warm!  Not quite thongs and t-shirt but close!  The city feels like it has come to life again, there are daffodils sprouting in the park and all the cafe's have tables on the sidewalk and last night the whole population was out enjoying it.  It was a great feeling now that its time to pack up the puffer coat and snow shoes and we are really looking forward to another summer in the city.

Another reason for this blog is to share a fun week we had last week.  We headed to Madison Sq Garden twice in 3 days.  "The Garden" is only 2 stations for us on the subway and we have seen all sorts of different sports and concerts there including, the Rangers ice hockey, the Knicks basketball and Bon Jovi.  We are going in a few weeks to see a Cirque du Solei Michael Jackson Spectacular which should be fun too.

But back to last week, on the Saturday we saw world class gymnastics at the America Cup.   I had seen it advertised on tv only a few days earlier and thought how we don't have the chance to see this level of competition back home.  Lucky I have an open minded boyfriend who would come along, even though we had to negotiate how long we would stay :)  In an Olympic year, what an awesome opportunity to see the reigning women's world champion (Jordyn Wieber who won and outclassed all but the other American) along with an Aussie (ok, I'd never heard of her...) who did her best but after coming off the beam, came 7th out of 8.

The men's comp was also exciting, there was a really animated coach who after each apparatus danced for the crowd and we couldn't work out why because his guy (an American) was pretty middle of the group throughout.  On the final apparatus he did an unbelievably dynamic high bar and ended up winning the whole thing!

We backed this up on Monday night and headed back to a tennis night where Maria Sharapova played Caroline Wozniaki and Roger Federer played Andy Roddick.  Never quite the same atmosphere or pressure of a Grand Slam but they certainly put on a show and competed hard for the win. (Sharapova and Roddick won). Check this out to see the atmosphere at the Garden

Just another week in NYC.....

Long time no blog

Hi,

This is Ash. I was just about to write a blog but Tracy was logged in and here I am posting a sneaky one on her blog. I think it's been about 8 billion years since she posted a blog so to her loyal subscriber base I think you should email her and encourage her to put something up here.

Merry Christmas.

Ash

p.s don't tell her I wrote this!

2011 Catch Up

HELLO!  I have caved to the pressure to update my blog.  I'm glad to hear that you miss my occasional updates and so I thought I would write about 2011 so far...   Ash has teased me saying 1. That its been so long my blog would have been closed down (apparently not) and 2.  That he now has more subscribers than me (I don't think so!!)...

When I look back at the photos for the year so far, winter seems a long time ago but at the time it just seemed to drag on and on.  My last blog talked about the snow storm on Boxing Day, well, the snow kept coming and everyone here says it was the coldest winter they have had in 20 years!  We thought the snow was a novelty of course but by mid April when I was still wearing my quilt (knee length puffer jacket) that had been worn every day since November - ENOUGH ALREADY!!

Spring was beautiful but brief and already this week we had weather hitting 100 deg (F) - do I sound like a local? - that is about 39 deg (c).  No, if I really wanted to sound like a local I would say "Boom!"

Here are some of our highlights of 2011 to date:

Trips

DisneyWorld
What an opportunity to escape the never-ending NY winter and join Ash while he was at a conference "working" in DisneyWorld Resort.  I have always wanted to go and it was not possible to conceive the scale of the Resort which includes 4 theme parks, 2 water parks, numerous hotel resorts and entertainment areas.  For theme parks, we only made it to Magic Kingdom and the highlight was the fireworks and laser display on Cinderella's castle in the evening.  We were so exhausted that our plans to visit Universal Park the next day were shelved for the hotel pool...

St Lucia
We enjoyed our first Caribbean getaway in May in St Lucia and it was a great break from the hustle and bustle of the city.  We were really able to relax and the highlight was definitely the plunge pool in our villa - It was hard to leave that, but we made an effort on a couple of occasions for a sailing trip and water taxi visit to other parts of the island.  Ash has many pics on his blog but here is one to give you an idea:

Other
Separately both Ash and I have been to London for work this year.  A free trip to visit Bren and boys was awesome, business class too!  I also went to Atlanta, Georgia for a client meeting so when I recap like this, it seems like a busy 6 months!

Sport

We have been back to the Yankees twice this year with our visitors but have seen some new sports too. We caught an NFL game (American football or Gridiron as we know it) at Meadowlands Stadium, albeit in the nose bleed section.  Was a great afternoon:

We also saw 2 ice hockey games, one in New Jersey and one at Madison Sq Garden, the Garden as its known.  I really enjoyed this fast paced game though it was hard to see the puck.

Also at the Garden, we saw a Legends tennis evening which we signed up for after seeing the line-up - Agassi v Sampras!  I was a big Agassi fan in his day.  The warm up match was Lendl v McEnroe so it was an entertaining evening though Agassi was smashed!

While not sport, but at the Garden, we saw Bon Jovi for the second time since being in NY.  The arena is not huge, so even though they were last minute tickets we had a great view.

Funny story, while we were waiting for the show to start, we saw an advertisement on the big screens for a show at MSG that sounded great and was coming up soon.  See:  cirquedusoleil/michael-jackson.  Ash came home and bought tickets and once bought we realised they were for April 2012!!  I guess we're staying for another year :)

Visitors
Homesickness is kept at bay with all the visitors we are lucky to have, and they bring Australian chocolate too!  Tina and Neil were here celebrating Tina's birthday staying at the Waldorf.  We enjoyed their famous Sunday all you can eat brunch which I very quickly made it through the savory to the sweet selection.

Kel and Chris came, and that was a real treat.  Of all my friends, I thought they were the least likely to visit, in fact it had never entered my head as a possibility, so when I received Chris's email I was very excited.  Then we had Dionne, an old friend of mine from Melbourne.  It was great to share time with them all and show them the real NY.  A great bonus for me when visitors are here is that they can usually be talked into going to the theatre.  With Kel and Chris we saw "War Horse" which was awesome - how I cried!  The story of the journey of a horse in WWI, I highly recommend it.  With Dionne we saw Jersey Boys which has been on my list for ages as it was a musical I had never seen and I thoroughly enjoyed the show.  It seemed really authentic with those Jersey accents and the NY audience is always ready to have fun, applauding loudly and singing along.

The day after Kel arrived we introduced them to the unique Manhattan dog world with a Dachshund Parade in Washington Sq Park.  Kel is not a dog person (though Dash almost converted her by the end of their stay) so thank you Kel, for indulging me and even taking photos on the day!  We decked Dash out in his bandanna (yes I'm one of those people now) though that was nothing on the dogs that were in hawaiian shirts and sunglasses!  There would have been over 100 dachshunds of all shapes and sizes there and Dasha was a hit...

On weekends in warmer weather NY comes alive with street markets, art stalls and parades and on one of our regular walks from the West to East Village you usually come across something.  But I couldn't have prepared Dionne for the parade we saw on their first day here.  It was the 5th annual NY Dance Parade - and what a sight.  I tell you, the Sydney Mardi Gras would teach them a thing or two!!  There were cheerleaders (yes, just like the cliche), hoola hoops, roller-skates, belly dancers, Bolivian cultural groups, dancers that were overweight or middle aged.  The thing that struck me, and its something I see regularly, is the confidence Americans have. I'm not sure if it is for better or worse but I think Australians are much more self conscious and wouldn't have been seen dead in some of these groups!

We are looking forward to Ash's family arriving in 2 weeks and we have been saving some of our to-do list to share with them including the Statue of Liberty climb and Niagra Falls so I should have some more inspired content.

I hope everyone at home is well and I miss you all!  Can't believe how quickly this last year has gone.

Finally, this update would not be complete without some pics of our gorgeous, now 9months old, Dasha:

More Broadway

Adding to the list of shows that I have enjoyed since being here, over the holidays I saw another musical and a play.

Loving having a fellow musical fan with me I went with Mum to see “A Little Night Music” starring Bernadette Peters. She brought a tear to the eye with her rendition of “Send in the Clowns” (see on you tube) but the rest of the show was lively and quite funny with an unexpected Twelfth Night type of farcical storyline.

This weekend gone, with some friends staying, I used gentle encouragement to get to the theatre - “you can’t spend time in New York and not go to Broadway” - but wanting the boys to come as well I didn’t subject them to a musical (I would never have heard the end of it) but I had heard of a play starring Laura Linney (of “Love Actually” and most recently “the Big C” tv show) and Christina Ricci, plus a guy you would recognize from Law and Order. Called “Time Stands Still” it is the story of a photo journalist who returns to Brooklyn from war torn Afghanistan / Iraq and the relationships she has with those closest to her. It was very intense and great to see this level of talent perform live, we all enjoyed the show.

Christmas in New York

Christmas is a lovely time to be in New York, the city spares no expense on buildings, streets and parks with beautiful decorations and lights. There are Christmas markets and ice skating rinks in the local parks and the usually hard mood of the city softens, albeit slightly.

Bryant Park Tree and Ice Skating Rink:

It is the busiest time of the year for tourists and you can tell because the stores are all more crowded than usual, if that’s possible! Macy’s was an experience, lining up for 15mins to buy anything and attendants standing at the bottom of each escalator assisting everyone coming off in an orderly manner. All the department stores (I saw Saks 5th Ave, Bloomingdales and Macy’s) have beautiful Christmas window displays that you join the crowds to wander from one to the next.  Inside Macy's, you can just see their holiday season slogan "Believe":

In Rockefeller Center a lane with an orchestra of angels leads to the famous Christmas tree which stands high above their ice skating rink. Even though it was magnificent, I never really got over my shock in early Dec to learn that they chop down a 300 year old tree for the occasion each year and it ends up as compost in Central Park. I always liked the fake one in Martin Place. Sydney and with a few updated decorations it would do just as well :)

As an aside - I found it somewhat contradictory that no one says “Merry Christmas” in this city but the phrase Happy Holidays is more frequently used which is politically correct due to the diverse religious mix here but yet; the whole place is decked out for Christmas. Anyway…

Mum was here for the holidays and one of the highlights of her visit was the Christmas Spectacular at Radio City Music Hall starring the “world famous Rockettes”. (eHow.com says: As the largest indoor theater in the world, Radio City Music Hall boasts a Great Stage that is almost 150 feet wide, and it has 5,933 seats) On its massive stage, we saw Santa in 3d fly around the sights of New York, there was a Nativity scene with live camels, goats and sheep, an ice skating rink came up from the bowels of the stage for one scene and the Rockettes high kicked their way through the show. Mum could only describe the show with one word “spectacular” and we thoroughly enjoyed the light hearted show. Click here for a brief clip of the show so you can get the idea.

Ash was keen to have a real tree for Christmas and at the start of December many street vendors began popping up around the city. The old guy near our place has been coming from Vermont every December for 30 years to sell trees on the same corner, he brings his whole family down for a month and they live in a small campervan next to the trees. We were talked into a “premium” tree but we didn’t regret it - it was perfect.

The first thing we did was add the lights and because the tree was so huge we needed 500 fairy lights to cover it! I was in charge of decorations and having to start from scratch, and with a premium tree, and inspired by my friend Tina’s yearly masterpiece, I went to the Macy’s level that was just a Christmas shop and, would you know it, they were having a massive sale: 75% off most things so I was able to decorate our tree with some lovely baubles and New York mementos. We placed our tree at the front window with a timer switch so as we came home at night we would see it already lit up in the window. We really enjoyed our tree for the month, as did Dasha who we had to keep from drinking the water!

Christmas Day was a great day spent with Ash, my mum and some friends from Aus. There were 6 of us altogether and with no worries about it being to hot to roast, Ash cooked up a feast for us all.

On Boxing Day many of you would have heard we had a blizzard, the 6th worst snow storm in New York history. We were brave (or stupid?) and went out early in the day to enjoy Central Park. It was actually very pleasant while we were in the park with delicate snow falling as we wandered through the paths, but after a coffee and crème brulee stop at the Plaza Hotel, the storm turned ferocious. Mum and I had an adventure coming home from the theatre in thigh deep virgin snow at 11pm at night, there was no one else to be seen on the streets as we fought the blowing wind and snow to reach our front door. We must have been a sight!!

See Ash’s blog for more great photos of snow covered New York.

Skating in Central Park was on my to-do list as a tourist here and it didn’t disappoint. On a beautiful, not too cold evening after work we made it to the park for a skate. Think of the movie Serendipity… Then add a few thousand people (literally). A few laps around was enough to fulfil my list, the skates were hard plastic and not really comfortable and the crowds were more of a danger than my rough skating skills but we had fun…

All year we talked about being in Times Square for the party on New Year’s Eve but there was a late decision to do something more low key because the thought of standing with a million plus people for 7 plus hours in the cold just seemed less appealing as the day approached. I talked with my colleagues to get some ideas and it seemed even those that had lived in the city all their lives have never been to Times Square for the famous ball drop so that was enough of a reason for us to act like a local and find somewhere within walking distance of home! We ended up enjoying a lovely meal at a French Restaurant and ringing in 2011 with some party poppers, tacky hats and lots of red wine.

Our new addition - Dasha

We are feeling like real New Yorkers now, joining more than a million other dog owners that live in apartments across the city.  Here are some pics of our boy:

When we collected Dasha, we also bought a taxi load of things home with him for house training, the most important one is the wee wee pad, also known as the poo poo pad :)  We have mastered the potty training (most of the time) but our little friend is a barker and needs 120% attention if we are in the house.  We are not getting much else done at the moment.

Now I can't wait for Mum to get here and start training him!