Sunday, September 27, 2009

Thoughts on LA

I was in LA last week for work and fun.  I had a great time, but LA always gives me mixed emotions.  There is no better place in the world to feel totally inadequate.  The people are beautiful, but that's true in SF as well.  It's more that everyone is trendy and expensive and well put together.  It's exhausting and I cannot keep up.  When I get home, I know that I don't want to keep up and that's one reason I left.  But even a visit is enough to make me burn my wardrobe and max out my credit cards somewhere swanky.  I never would, hence the reason I cannot live there.  No one wants to feel dumpy and frumpy all the time.

That said, I adore my LA friends and we had a great time.  San Francisco is sadly lacking in private room karaoke joints that nicely look aside while you drag in a case of 40 ozs from the mini-mart. ;)  I can do a few days of 90+ degree weather as well, it was almost like lying by the pool all day long.



I also got to fly my favorite airline - Virgin America.  If you're not lucky enough to live in one of their cities, promptly drive to the closest one, fly somewhere and then fly right back.  They rock.  The planes are new, clean, sassy and everything works.  Lovely flight attendants and even funny in-flight safety videos.  The best part is they are cheap!  Through Sept 30 they have one-way fares as low as $29 at virginamerica.com.  A quick round trip is definitely in order.  (BONUS: In San Francisco, Virgin America flies out of the fancy-pants international terminal.)


Tuesday, September 22, 2009

High Season in Mexico, for under $500

Justin and I have booked an 8-night trip to Mexico from January 15-23.  I've never been, and we're both taking Spanish classes, so we are pretty excited!  I have to dust of my scuba gear before then, but I have a few months.

The best part is the trip is costing us less than $500 each for airfare and hotel.  Here's how you can do it too:




1) Book now.
Is the recession really over?  You'll find out on Black Friday (11/27).  If it is, by then  all the good rates will be long gone and you'll be pouring over all-inclusive resorts for hundreds of dollars a night.  If it's not over, a tropical vacation in the middle of winter has never been less than we're paying now.

2) Shop around.
On Saturday, I found $283 round-trip airfares (SFO-CUN) on Kayak.com, which kicked me over to Expedia.com.  No one else had these fares.  Before I could check with Justin, the fares were gone from Expedia, but I found them Sunday on Travelocity.com.  Travelocity still has a few seats left at this price!  Know the options for airfare deals and check them all twice before clicking to buy. 

3) Package deals.
Sites like Travelocity and Hotels.com can have great hotel deals, in everything from 2 to 5 star spots.  Especially check for vacation packages that include flights. 

4) Get Budget.
Consider other hotel options too, and don't be afraid to look outside the big search engines.  I used Hostelworld.com to book 5 nights in a budget hotel/guesthouse in Playa del Carmen for $40/night.  It's not the Ritz, but it's on the beach, has a bar and over 50 reviewers have rated it 85%+.  That's good enough for me!

5) Pay now.
When January rolls around, this vacation will be long since paid.  More money for snorkeling and umbrella drinks.

A final word of advice:
Do your homework.  We're staying 1 night on Cozumel, which can be positively overrun by up to 3 cruise ships docking per day.  If I wanted to spend my vacation with 9,000 Americans, I'd take a nap in Union Square.  So I researched the Cozumel docking schedules and picked Sunday (no ships) and Monday (1 ship).  A little bit goes a long way.  LonelyPlanet.com, LetsGo.com and even good old Google.com are great resources.

Hasta luego!

Monday, September 21, 2009

one particular harbor

Welcome to my home! (I say in the voice of the homless man sleeping in the London laundrymat who let Cynthia in to retrieve a dryer full of forgotten clothes.)

I have really been slacking on the writing lately, which I blame on Facebook and Twitter. My thoughts are limited to status updates, or worse to 140 character, comically abbreviated blips. I have TinyURL’d my brain. Alas, all those lost words have piled up to make me a bit mental. I’m talking to myself way more than normal (which is a LOT) and even had a telephatic conversation with a wide-eyed and definitely English-speaking miniature greyhound in a backpack. Time to write again.

I’m starting fresh, leaving behind the LiveJournal that felt super-dated and cost $20/year. This is recession blogging, baby.  It's not easy to think of a blogspot address that's not taken, though.  I went through about 50, finally getting lucky with one of my favorite Jimmy Buffett song titles.  Thanks again, sir.

What am I going to do with this blog? I’d love to have a theme – travel, money, eating… but they’ve all been done. I’m not qualified to be a mommyblogger and my brain wilts long before I can hack it with the smartyasses at Jezebel. So this is my tiny corner, my phone booth from the train station in Adventures in Babysitting. Welcome to my home.