March Madness 2: New York, New York

As I mentioned a group of 9 went as the locals say "into the city." the city being New York. I was pretty excited. i could see part of the skyline from the arena and it just looked huge from there. We pile into two taxis and head on in. We went through the Gum drop forest and drove through the Lincoln tunnel (Thank you the movie ELF). The first thing I noticed about New York was that it likes it's porn. For about five blocks that's all I saw and then a giant comic book store, I guess that makes sense.

We finally get to time square and all of the sudden it's day light. All I kept thinking was, "Wow this place could be awesome if there were some billboards." I means this with respect, but it looked like an ad agency warehouse blew up. the interesting thing was that almost everyone where were tourists. Acting silly taking pictures, looking around in awe, well looking like me. We try and go to the ESPNZone for some basketball and dinner, but there is a 3-5 hour wait. Yes I typed that correct HOUR wait. So we said screw that and went walking around. At one point in time I felt like I should start singing like I'm in a musical, the intern from Winston Salem agreed. I felt like if I started to sing everyone around would start dancing and a huge production number would start. It didn't happen. It was the only downer of the night.

I'm starving because it's getting closer to 9 and I have not eaten since noon. We finally find some place to eat, the Bond 45. For my first New York restaurant it was pretty kick ass. It seemed a little upscale, but the prices were not as high as I thought. I still paid 30 bucks for a plate of spaghetti and meatballs with a coke, but it was Delicious. We sit and talk I get to know the guys from Winston Salem better, I met the producer from DC who was cool. The other guys were a little farther away so it was harder to hear them. I really liked the atmosphere of Bond 45, I felt like I was in New York and was expecting someone semi famous to walk in... like Screach or Wesley Snipes, but no one famous came in.

We finish up there and tried to find a bar with a TV. The ESPNZone was ridiculously packed and was not worth it. We found what we thought was an Irish bar, but it was only Irish in name and in drink. A strange mix of music was flowing. At one point it was Notorious BIG, then ABBA, Drop Kick Murphy's, Billy Ocean (yes Billy Ocean), Journey, then some hard core punk. I ignored the music the best I could and drink my reasonably priced Killian's and Smithwicks for the next three hours or so. I can't tell you how shocked I was the price of beer, 4 dollars for a pint was awesome. I can't find that in Raleigh or as a matter of fact Columbus. Pub with the name Pint in the title that's near Times Square, you were the best!

We watched Ohio State beat Tennessee in a close game, it was a weird mix of fans in our group. Three Tennessee grads and two guys that grew up in Ohio so it was a fun game to watch. Early on OSU was getting hammered and looked to be out of it by halftime. Then UT fell apart and made a bunch of bad shots. The game went to the wire and OSU won. The guys from UT took it well and I didn't cheer too loud because I know how they feel... I am a Bowling Green Alumni, I know how it feels to loose (Stupid fat punter).

Another fun moment was when intern Alissa (pronounced Ah-Lisa) started to ask where the MTV TRL studios where, we showed her the MTV logo and then the two of us started to jump around yelling "HEY TRL! Put me on TV! I love you Carson Daily!" Yes I'm a dork, but a fun dork.

The worst part of the night I thought were the taxi rides. To get to Manhattan it was just over $15 a person. As we tried to get back it was a lot more. We had asked for a taxi van to come and one was on the way, the drunkest of the group got tired of waiting and just jumped into some random taxis. The problem was that my driver did not know how to get to New Jersey. That's kind of a problem because that's where we are going. We finally arrive and this time I had to pay $25 dollars. I found out later it would have been about $11 if we waited for the van. Stupid drunk people.

I really liked New York, next time The Wife and I come into a huge amount of money we may come here, but we would have to come into a LARGE amount of money, just for cab fare.