Four months late? Sheeeeeeeeeeesh.
Back in April, I was lucky enough to have my friends and girlfriend come visit me in New Jersey. The first five days of Spring Break were filled with tons of skateboarding, booze, savory burgers, tacos, and cheese-steaks. While the last seven days were filled with basically the same thing but with more heterosexual love.
The skateboard crew consisted of the original Darsh boys Ryan and Levi (Burns and Andy couldn’t make the trip. Bummer). Childhood friend Matty was also able to join and so was newcomer Anthony from Pueblo, Colorado.
Of course the majority of our time was spent in NYC. Thankfully the Skate Gods blessed us and only gave us one day of rain, which worked out perfectly because we had to make a trip to Philadelphia so I could purchase a new car. (Sidenote: I went from a 1999 Mercury Sable to a 2015 Toyota Corolla and it feels like I’m driving a car from the damn future).
The first night in Jersey I took the boys to eat some of the finest fish tacos Jersey has to offer at Taqueira in Jersey City. Unfortunately Matty had to fight some food poisoning and didn’t get a chance to eat the sensational tacos. He doesn’t know this, but it’s something he’ll regret for the rest of his life.
After the tacos, we proceeded to hit up some of the local bars in Jersey City, Barcade and Lucky 7’s. Lucky 7’s was particularly interesting because one of the Darsh boys got into a little altercation with the bouncers. Ryan was feeling the jams a little too much, bouncer told him to cool it, Ryan got upset and threw himself out. Yes you read correctly. He threw himself out. Now it’s important to note that Ryan was experiencing certain withdrawals and would continue to be a bit on edge the rest of the trip. We spent the rest of the night bar hopping and even migrated over to Hoboken. Next was Philly.
Despite a blown out tire on the way to Philadelphia, the mini-day trip was as successful as a rainy day on a skate trip could be. We checked out the famous skate spots in the downtown area and of course got some traditional Philly cheese-steaks. Don’t worry, we had Pat’s. Geno’s is just way more photogenic.
Skateboarding in the city went as well as we could have hoped. Of course it’s impossible to skate all of the spots in a four day span, but we definitely didn’t let that stop us from trying. We managed to skate spots in Harlem, LES, Queens and Brooklyn. The only issue we had skateboarding is that we were kicked out of fountain at Flushing Meadows as soon as Ryan had landed a perfect noseslide nollie flip fakie across the gate but all before we started filming.
Now would it be a NYC skate trip without stopping at the illustrious and iconic Max Fish? The boys enjoyed the bar, hustled at pool and had to deal with me falling asleep in the booth. For whatever reason, me falling asleep at the bars was a reoccurring event. Sorry boys, I just can’t hang anymore.
It was sad to see my friends leave, but it was also bittersweet because it meant it was my first time getting to see my wonderful girlfriend in five months, as well as her first time visiting NYC.
Upon picking her up, her first words to me were “Let’s go to Connecticut!.” Granted neither of us have ever been to Connecticut or know anything about it, but I was all in.
In Connecticut we checked out one of the coolest used bookstores I’ve had the liberty to visit. Whitlock’s Book Barn is an old barn turned bookstore ran by some lovely elderly women. Their store contains tons of fairly priced used books, collectibles, antiques, first edition printed copies, albums and vintage postcards. I managed to snag some awesome photography books and postcards, while Abigail purchased some albums. I highly recommend stopping by if you ever get the chance.
We also stopped in New Haven and visited the Yale campus and took some very mature photos. There’s also a great vintage store in New Haven called Fashionista with generous and kind workers. They had a variety of awesome knickknacks. One of the best things about the shop are the little stories written on the tag of each clothing item.
Our Connecticut day trip was concluded with a visit to an old skateboard buddy from Oklahoma. He treated us to some great local pizza and a few beers at a local pub. Thanks for the hospitality Kramer!
The rest of the time spent with Abigail consisted of walking around NYC, eating delicious food, and making up for loss time and dates. We did the two main things she wanted to do in NYC and visited the Balto statute and a filming location for the show “Doctor Who” in Central Park. Which we very well could have taken photos on the wrong rock.
Now Abigail didn’t exactly pack the most suitable clothing to help her battle the lingering winter days, so we stopped at a few thrift shops in the East Village. She bought herself a very hip letterman jacket and I left with the coolest customized Oklahoma jean jacket. The best part is that later that night we both ended up wearing our new purchases with beanies to a bar and totally looked like the biggest hipster dickheads.
One day we decided to visit the MoMA and we couldn’t have picked a worst time. UNIQLO was doing free admission Fridays and it turned the MoMA into a Wal-Mart during peak shopping hours on the first of the month. Chaos. We managed to squeeze through the crowds and see a few of the most famous and iconic paintings. However, after speaking to some friends it turns out we missed about 90% of the art that everyone should see. Oh well, I guess we’re just clueless Oklahomans.
Spring break was the most fun I’ve had since I’ve moved up here and I’m grateful I got to see my best friends and my girlfriend. I hope these get togethers become more common in the future. Thanks guys.
