Schmitz Mobile Chaos Unit: NYC Vaca 2023 - Day 1

Well, here we are on a vaca that I've kind of been dreading... I have a very limited tolerance for large groups of people and I was fairly certain that NYC was going to test this limit daily, if not by the hour!

That being said, NYC is the birthplace of KISS and since I grew up a huge fan and still kinda like them, I had that excitement going and you'll see in one post where I was absolutely giddy. That'll come in time.

Our morning started with us waking up at 5:42am when we had planned to be at the Des Moines airport at 5:15am, so it was a bit of mind-screw getting out of the house but, everything worked out fine and the extra time sitting in the airport was NOT missed!

Our flight, arrival, luggage, and pick-up all went about as perfect as you could hope for with the exception of the fact that I, Ted, wasn't feeling great. I didn't feel good at home but it wasn't bad. It was ok until the plane started to taxi to the tarmac. As soon as it moved, I thought I was going to puke and my stomach was queasy thru the whole flight. When the pilot came on and announced about 30 minutes to touchdown, it got worse immediately and I wasn't sure what to do about it. Turns out that I did nothing and was fine until we got to our hotel room. Let's get on with some pics and we'll pick up the tale from there...

After Izzy from Bizzy's cab service (I can't remember what they're technical name is...) picked us up, I started taking pictures from his SUV. These first several are just that. He was playing NY related songs by some rapper, Frank Sinatra, Elvis and others. He gave us bottled water and snacks for the drive. He also did trivia with the rewards being key chains and such and he gifted us 3 comic books. It was super fun and we were excited for him to pick us up 7 days later to take us back to LaGaurdia.

Manhattan Center for Science and Mathematics.

The United Nations building.

same...

Yep...

And finally the end of it.

One of the Trump buildings that he no longer owns. I took the pick due to the window washers suspended about 2/3 the way up! Yikes!

We arrived safely at our Hotel with Izzy in the foreground!

Ghost Busters! The Chrysler building from the front of our hotel. You can barely see the gargoyles.

Once we got settled and indoctrinated to the sound of construction in our hotel room (they don't tell you that when you book it, but rather as you're checking in...), we decided to go to Sarge's Deli which is a brief walk from our hotel. Why Sarges? Well, it may have something to do with a KISS related post coming up in the near future. You'll have to check back.

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The first thing that comes out is plates of coleslaw and two differnet (but very large!) pickles. I wasn't feeling good but I'm a coleslaw nut and I also have a thing for pickles, so I ate some of this.

This is my chicken pot pie, which was fantastic, but again, I didn't eat much as I was very scared of my situation.

This was the winner! Lesley ordered the Rueben and it was STUPID GOOD!!!

Rob's Philly cheese steak-y thing with some great fries. This was good, but the pepper flavore was overwhelming, even for me, who LOVES peppers.

And finally Caleb's Triple Decker Club Sammy. If you're wondering how thick that turkey is, I will tell you that it was about 1 1/4 inches thick. Super good sammy but impossible to eat as it was served.

Will we be back??? Time will tell, but man, did we leave there happy!!!

This place will figure into the story later too, but Tudor was popular in this area as they had a bar and market in our hotel. The bar SUCKED for beer tho, as did NYC in total... No respect for good beer.

Leftever kibble from Sarge's in the bag as we head back to the hotel to game plan the rest of the day.

After a short rest, we decided to head out and try to get acclimated to our surroundings and the buses or subway.

Just another shot on our walk to Grand Central Station.

Inside GCS...

REALLY inside GCS!!

It's huge!

Birdies!

Food area below...

In the piss soaked subway system! Not all of it reeked like urine, but a LOT of it did and it was friggin' HOT down there, sometimes 4 stories below the city!

And then we popped up by Columbia Circle near Central Park. There may have been urine smells here too, but if there were, it was covered up by the smell of Mary Jane. It seems that they made it legal to smoke marijauna in public and hoooooo-boy, do people take advantage of that! You'd think that crime would be WAY down shortly after this laws passage...

Heading into Times Square...

Notice the pot shop on the right...

I'm fat, but here? I'm tiny!

We couldn't get up to the top of the Summit due to tickets being sold out. So we headed to the Empire State Building instead. There was indeed a bathroom break before this as I was feeling somewhere well South of terrible at this point.

These next photos are all from the deck of the ESB.

I have to comment on this pic as there is another related KISS 'thing' to be seen that will show up later in the KISS post, but if you know where to look, you can see the 10 W. 23rd St building where the original members of KISS rehearsed and had the first band photo taken (before make-up was involved). You can also see the 1-World Trade Center in upper middle and if you squint just right, the Statue of Liberty is there as well.

This is yet another KISS related thingy-ma-bob as in 1976, they were allowed to climb up a service ladder, in full costume, out onto one of the ledges to have some iconic photos taken. More on that in? You guessed it. The KISS post that is coming up.