I’m in love with MaxJet
Posted by Gypsy on Apr 29, 2007
For the first time in days I’m finally feeling not only relaxed but actually excited about my trip to Europe. With all the stress from finding a job, finding a place to live and family stresses, I’ve had a lot on my mind lately. My trip started with very little sleep and a late morning flight to Las Vegas. Always a nut for being early, I caught a flight that would get me to Vegas six hours before my flight to London. Of course, this is the day that my bag is one of the first at baggage claim and I make it to the international terminal an hour before MaxJet even opened for check in. Luckily, the free Wi-Fi had me on the Internet and able to kill time.
At 4:30 p.m., my flight finally boarded and my stress for the day hit a crescendo, leaving me calling Matt practically in tears because I was so stressed about the 10-hour flight. I don’t know what I was thinking because the flight was wonderful, though I think if I were in coach on any other airline I would’ve still be freaking. But within an hour of take off, I had completely forgotten I was in an airplane and was actually enjoying myself.
The flight began with champagne and appetizers before take off. Once we were in the air, I was able to put ou the footrest, kick back and relax as the flight attendants passed out portable in-flight entertainment devices loaded with movies, TV and music. They also brought around little travel kits with toiletries, sleep shades and slippers. Very fun. Once all that was taken care of, dinner service began, starting with beverages and a bowl of mixed nuts. Like a real ceramic bowl with a real glass for my Diet Coke (a theme which continued with the rest of the food service). Before the salad portion, flight attendants came around with hot towels to clean up for dinner, which was pretty nice. The salad was your average balsamic salad with sliced apples and caramelized walnuts and garlic bread on the side. Before they brought out the salads, they even covered the tray table with a tablecloth to make it look like a real table and with the salad came a salt and pepper shaker shaped like a plane. Dinner was just amazing, especially considering it is airplane food. I had the veal t-bone, something that I was pleasantly surprised to see on the menu. The meal potion of the flight ended with dessert of mocha surprise, a pudding like thing that I enjoyed while watching The Queen on my little entertainment device.
Since it was a pretty long flight, and I was exhausted, I ended up crashing as soon as the movie was over. Usually I don’t even attempt to sleep on planes because it’s just not comfortable, but this was an exception. The seat reclines kinda like a dentist chair, leaving me almost completely laying down and able to curl up and pass out. Amazingly enough, I was actually able to sleep for about 4 hours, waking up just in time for breakfast service, which included fresh fruit and an english muffin, and still having time to spare to watch another movie, this time The Fountain. My movie finished just in time for initial descent, which was a little bumpy going into Stansted, but not awful. Customs and immigration was a bit of a pain in the ass when I got off the plane, but as soon as I made it through immigration, my bag was ready and Andrew was already there to pick me up, complete with welcome sign. And with that, my European vacation begins.
And I’m off..
Posted by Gypsy on Apr 28, 2007
Heading to the airport now for my flight to Vegas. Will have a few hours layover there during which I’ll search for the international terminal and chill until tonight’s flight to London!
Vegas vacation…with a little LA thrown in
Posted by Gypsy on Apr 27, 2007
Last week, a bunch of friends flew in from various parts of the country to meet up in Los Angeles and have a little vacation. With very little on the schedule, it turned out to be nice and relaxing. Brett, Kate, Matt and Josh were all in on Thursday and the weekend started out with Ladies Night Out at the M Bar here in LA. Fun for the girls, not so much it seems for the guys.
Shane joined us on Friday when we caught the opening of Hot Fuzz, which turned out to be fucking hilarious. Even better, we discovered when we bought the tickets that after the show would be a short Q&A with Edgar Wright, Simon Pegg and Nick Frost; the guys behind Hot Fuzz and Shaun of the Dead. As if it couldn’t get better than that, we got the added surprise of them being introduced by Quentin Tarantino. After the Q&A, we hit up an interesting restaurant called Ketchup that we’d be hearing a lot about from friends. Fairly new, the interior is all white with red lights. Even better, they have a martini cart that goes from table to table, making your drinks right there. Which, of course, I took full advantage of.
Saturday night we all went to a BBQ at the home of the same friends who told us about Ketchup. With about 30 people there, it was quite the party and I got to meet some cool new people, which is always fun, and chat up some friends I hadn’t seen in awhile, even though we all live in the same city. Since we were all out so late on Saturday, Sunday turned into a lazy day. Josh and Kate went up to Vegas a day early while Matt and I went out to meet up with a friend of his from college before crashing early to be rested up for Vegas.
While the whole trip was fun, Vegas turned out to be the best part. It had a rocky start, thanks to an extremely turbulent flight from LA to Vegas. So much so that they skipped on drink service. Luckily, Matt is good at distracting me, so I was able to make it through the whole flight without curling up into a ball and rocking back and forth while praying that I didn’t die. But once we landed, our stay was great. We ended up staying at the Wynn, which was fucking awesome. I’ve been wanting to stay there since before it was built, so it was really exciting for me to finally get a chance to. It definitely lived up to all my expectations.
Most of the time we were there was spent gambling on video poker and video blackjack, eating at all the amazing restaurants at the Wynn and relaxing. On our second night, we took a break from all that to see Spamalot, the musical based on Monty Python and the Holy Grail. I wasn’t sure what to expect, since I’d seen the movie so many times and it didn’t seem the type of movie to work as a musical, much less a 90 minute one, but it was hilarious and definitely worth it. Throw in a little shopping, and it was your average trip to Vegas, minus copious drinking since I’m not a big drinker. Oh, and to add in a fun little coincidence, while watching TV in the hotel room, we got to catch a little bit of National Lampoon’s Vegas Vacation.
Overall, it was a great week spent with awesome friends and having a ton of fun. Next up: Europe.
Panic setting in
Posted by Gypsy on Apr 27, 2007
With less than 24 hours to go before I begin my journey to Europe, I’ve been a little stressed out today. I still have a ton of packing to do, I hate to fly and I’m just worn out from my last trip to NYC and my recent trip to Vegas (more on that later). I finally have laundry done, Nicorette to get me through the flight and at this point only need to get everything in the actual suitcase. Stress relieved, right?
Well it would appear that where one stress stops another one starts. My roommate told me today that there is no way we can extend past the June 1 deadline of me moving out. Which means that once I get back from Europe, I have two weeks to find a job and an apartment or I have to head back to western NY and move back in with my parents. Which I seriously don’t want to do. Part of me thinks I should never have left the Army. I just don’t understand why I’m having such a tough time getting a job and it’s beyond frustrating.
Ugh. I’m in a bad mood so I’ll stop there. But this sucks.
