Upstate NY, a wedding, and some NYC pics from last winter.

My First long weekend of the summer has officially come and gone.

Kate and I traveled to "up-state" New York near Elmira to attend the wedding of her college friends, Adam Lindquist and Sarah Meyers. It was a picturesque wedding set in Letchworth state park outside of the Glen Iris Inn. A large roaring waterfall cascades (Middle Falls) over 100 feet. The first speakers in the wedding had a little difficulty adjusting their volume to be heard over the drone of the water. Other that.. the wedding was near perfect, great weather, good food, beautiful location and a modest amount of guests.

Adam served as disc jockey for his own wedding with his ipod and a decent speaker set up which must have been rented. I was skeptical on how smoothly this would work, but it actually turned out very well. Adam and his friends performed a few of his own songs to the start of the official pre-programmed wedding mix. Adam plays guitar and writes in a style that can best be described as folk. The sound is more in the vein of Peter, Paul, & Mary than it is Dylan and contemporary folk music. Several of his old friends sang various back up parts and added some tambourine where appropriate.

When the dance floor heated up, Kate & I went out for several songs. We stayed until around 9:30, and then headed out as Kate was overtired. By this time the celebrations were winding down anyway. We saw Adam & Sarah the next day and they said the dancing was pretty much wrapping up by 10:00.

Adam suggested a small motel to Kate. The rooms were great, and at a price of $75 you couldn't go wrong. The bathrooms were old fashioned, however very clean, and the bed was comfortable. The owners are evangelicals and the office was filled with pamphlets advertising salvation, churches, becoming "Newborn" and various other propaganda. The walls were covered with "God-Themed" posters, crosses, and signs reminding us of all the rules to the room, just in case we forget. The woman told me I couldn't smoke in the rooms no less than three times before we bade her goodbye. See the sign of the motel which I snapped a picture of. I wanted to take a picture of the office however, that seemed like a bad idea. Aside from the Gideon bible placed on top of the end table rather than inside, the decor of the office did not parlay into our room itself.

Kate and I also spent a couple nights at her Mom's in Schenectady New York. It was a relaxing weekend overall. Save a speeding ticket which I received on a back road in the middle of nowhere.... the weekend was great.

Sunday night Kate and I returned to Brookline and went to the Upper Crust in Coolidge Corner for supper. The Improper Bostonian rates this pizza joint as the best pizza in town, however I would rank both Regina's and Ernesto's as having a better pie. The Upper Crust's pizza had great sauce, toppings, and fresh mozzarella however, the crust is so thin it is like a cracker or a stale Tortilla. Because it was thin, it was also VERY light and and not too filling. The Upper Crust has a buffed stainless steel interior with plasma screens at every turn. It is the type of place that frankly is too cool for its own good.

Next I thought I would post some NYC pictures from this winter that I just had developed. The poor quality of the images is really encouraging me to get that digital camera I've been talking about.

The bull had a crusty that I just had to try and pick free.

I really wanted to have a picture taken grabbing the bull's testicles, but for some reason Kate didn't want to take that one.

This picture to the right was some sort of old emergency phone with some graffiti on it. I felt it was very symbolic of the times and I decided to snap a picture of it.

To the left you can see me standing on Wall St. against the will of "The Man". I'm such a rebel.

Bottom: Kate standing in Brooklyn with Manhattan in the backdrop.