One of the secrets I’ve learned when visiting the city is to hit downtown on Sundays to avoid the crowds.  Downtown includes the financial district which is a veritable ghost town during the weekends, making me feel like I have the city all to myself.  It’s one of my favorite places to go then, particularly because I’m right near the waterfront, affording me gorgeous views of the Brooklyn Bridge and the East River.  There’s at least one secret public garden near here that also provides the perfect oasis away from the tourists and the busyness of Manhattan.

Oh, where’s that garden you ask?  Why it’s right at the mmmMMmpffpfssmgppff…

What?  Hey, you want more details you’re just gonna have to email me.  :-P

Anyway, it’s probably for these reasons that I always tend to gravitate towards going downtown instead of hitting up Times Square or Central Park.  There’s also another reason though.  How many of you have seen those gorgeous photos of the Manhattan skyline that includes all of downtown plus the Statue of Liberty?  Ever wonder what vantage point these photos were being taken from?  It should have been obvious, but for the longest time it never occurred to me that they were being taken from the Brooklyn side of the East River, until one day when I stumbled onto Brooklyn’s Promenade and saw it for myself.

OMG, I just found the worst kept secret in Brooklyn!

After downtown, this is probably the best place to go during the evenings.  My general routine is to either drive or take public transit to the financial district, then walk over the Brooklyn Bridge to visit the Promenade.  They are still renovating this area to convert it into a full fledged city park, but most of the grounds are accessible and includes one of my favorite ice cream haunts (The Brooklyn Ice Cream Factory), along with plenty of eateries to choose from (and of course, what else, Starbucks.)  The famous Grimaldi’s is also right here if you’re in the need for some luxury Brooklyn pizza, and finally the River Cafe, one of those places you only eat at if you’re looking to propose to someone (because the food is going to cost you almost as much as the diamond ring will.)

If I’m here, I usually wait for the sun to go down and I’m eventually rewarded with the kind of Christmas lights you can enjoy all year long:

It’s so Christmasy!  #LoveThisCity

See what I izz sezzinn?  :-D

So how does Mastercard fit in?  They have an attractive loyalty program called Priceless that offers generous discounts (and sometimes freebies!) for travel oriented cardholders, usually tailored for those visiting or frequenting major cities.  Though I usually check out the offers for New York, they also have intriguing offers in Chicago and Los Angeles as well (with more cities on the way, including international.)

AMEN

Some of the offers look pretty generous too, with my favorite being the cupcakes deal.  (Don’t hate.)  I’ve always liked these kind of discount offers too, and while they tend to be oriented towards business travelers, it’s still basically taking luxury items or services and price breaking them to make them more affordable for those of us in the lower upper middle class traveling on our dime.   :-D

Hey Mastercard, how about an special offer for the River Cafe so dinners don’t always cost $200? :-D

Thanks for reading.  Remember, if you ever visit New York and you want to see the best possible view of Manhattan’s skyline, the Brooklyn Promenade is where you need to be.

Merry Christmas!

Disclosure:  I am a member of the Collective Bias®  Social Fabric® Community.  This shop has been compensated as part of a social shopper insights study for Collective Bias®  and MasterCard #CBias #SocialFabric #LoveThisCity

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C&C Outfitters Dove Hunting is an agency that offers a hunting/travel package for those who enjoy dove hunting in particular, complete with guides to show you the way and opportunities to enjoy a BBQ known as “asados,” basically BBQ with an Argentinian flair that makes it a unique and tasty experience unto itself.

The tours are located in the capital province of Cordoba, with a landscape that traverses mountains, lakes, grasslands and rivers that glitter under a bright sun.  The golden fields in which the doves themselves hide could alone inspire songs and works of art due to the inherent beauty of Argentina’s landscape.

C&C are toted as one of the best organizations to open your world to the beauty and enjoyable hunting atmosphere within Argentina, with a record of customer satisfaction going back 10 years and an emphasis on personalized services and small groups to help ensure fun interaction and a rewarding experience.

The tours range from a 2 to 4 day or custom packages that include free shells (ammo), lodging and all meals, particularly the famous asados that take place out in the fields.

Watch the video below for more information, then visit the site and book your next trip to Argentina today. :-D

The post Dove Hunting in Argentina – Where the hunt is much safer than hunting for animals that could actually eat you appeared first on The Habitation of Justice.

While I plan to unwind in my hot tub pretty much 18 hours out of the day, taking the time to forget about the horrific, sucky balls events that occurred in April, I do plan to explore the area a little and do a leisurely drive on the scenic byways known as Trail Ridge Road/Beaver Meadow Road.

Oh, and also visit the Stanley Hotel. But of course.

Heeeeeeeeeere's Lincoln!

Hence the need for an axe.  Or if I really want to be true to Spielberg’s novel, a roque mallet will suit me just fine.

I checked the map, and I may also do an extended loop further south covering Georgetown (where I can take the train ride) and snaking through Idaho Springs so I can enjoy me some Beau Jo’s Pizza.  Go on, be jealous, it’s ok.

The great thing is that after this trip I will have pretty much covered all the major areas of Colorado except for Vail, Aspen and the Steamboat Springs area, which I’m hoping to visit another time.  I’ve always wanted to live close to the Rockies, or at least somewhere in the Northwest, and once I visit Montana, Idaho, Oregon and Washington State next fall I’ll have a better idea of what state to zero in on for a permanent move.  I can’t imagine them topping Colorado though, which to me easily beat out Wyoming and Utah in terms of pure awesomesauce, but ya never know.

I’ll tell you one thing though, I am DONE with New York.  My heart has already left this place, it’s only a matter of time before the rest of my body follows suit.

The post Visiting Estes Park next week! Can anyone loan me an axe? appeared first on The Habitation of Justice.

Anyhoo, I do hope to make this a habit of some sort, any time life really has me down (which is pretty much every day), it’d be good to know there’s a little cabin out there, nestled deep in the mountains that I can escape to where I can recharge and feel like myself again.  Not to mention it’d also help reduce the urge to want to blow this planet up with a doomsday weapon of some sort.

After the extensive research I’ve done learning about the areas surrounding Denver (such as Summit County, the Front Range, and so on), I was able to see distinctions in the type of specialty lodging available based on region.  Rocky Mountain National Park, particularly Estes Park seems to be ground zero for log cabin rentals, a sizable amount of which are maintained by commercial properties rather than private owners.  Areas such as Vail, Keystone, Breckenridge and so on are more ski resort oriented, most of the nontraditional lodging in these areas appear to be condos rather than log cabins.  It’s still possible to find a log cabin rental sprinkled here and there throughout these regions, but they tend to be rented out by private owners rather than a commercial property.  Interesting.  I was able to find a few of them via Homeaway.com and VRBO.com, and drew up a list of the most attractive ( and cheapest rentals) I could find.  Hopefully I’ll be able to settle on one while it’s still available for the weekend I’m planning.

Unfiltered, there are a TON of vacation rentals to choose from, so it helps that my needs were particularly specific.  The cabin must have:

• A)  A REAL mountain view
• B)  High speed internet access
• C)  A PRIVATE outdoor hot tub (none of this community sharing with people who have cooties nonsense)
• D)  A fireplace
• E)  Somewhat secluded from nearby neighbors
• F) Within driving distance of civilization so I can enjoy tasty boigas and ice cream

See, I have such simple needs.  :-D

Cabin rentals that have all that are a dime a dozen in Tennessee’s mountains, but for some reason it’s harder to  pick them out in Colorado, I’m guessing because so many are run by private owners rather than a centralized rental agency.

It also makes me wonder: maybe I should consider saving up to not merely rent a cabin in Colorado, but BUY one.  Or at least a condo with all the amenities I like.  Give myself some kind of foothold in the state that would allow me a chance to move there permanently.  It’s a thought.

The post I’m so loaded I can afford a semi-luxury weekend getaway to Colorado once a month appeared first on The Habitation of Justice.

And then, (and this is why I hate Pinterest’s estrogen powered popularity and wish they would just DIE), Springpad decides, without beta testing, without any warning at all, to completely make their service more like… well, Pinterest.  Because that’s innovation, or something, ripping off somebody else’s design.

In the same way Firefox developers decided to mimic Chrome instead of simply improving on Firefox code, turning their once awesome browser into a bloated pile of horse fecal matter, Springpad completely upended and destroyed my daily workflow of keeping notes and checklists of things I needed to keep track of or get done.

What is it with coders’ obsessive need to change around the interface of their software applications every five minutes?  Would the design of a car dramatically be better if the engineers decided, “Hey. let’s put the steering wheel in the trunk!  WINNING!”  Because that’s in essence what these schmucky, schmuck headed, schmuck balled developers are doing.

I’m sticking with the basic note-taking app on my iPhone/iPad now, you know, an app that I can rest in the knowledge won’t drastically change every five minutes.  Up yours, Springpad.

The post The complete and utter stupidity of Springpad developers appeared first on The Habitation of Justice.

Because I’m a guy, I like to keep my spare change in a sophisticated and completely hi-tech manner: my jean pockets.  None of those dweeby man purses or pouches for me thank you very much.  I am HARDCORE.

So on the occasion that I pull out some greens to pay for something, I usually jam whatever spare change I get from the purchase into my pockets, then unload them into a pouch inside my suitcase when I’m back at the hotel, and ultimately into my coin bank when I return home from another crazy traveling adventure.  My coin bank, true to my awesomeness, is cleverly designed to be completely undetectable to the naked eye.

State of the art, undetectable coin bank. For realsies.

That’s generally been my habit since I graduated college, though usually when I’m ready to cash in I head over to the credit union.  I’ve tried the Coinstar machine once before at Stop & Shop but lost nearly $8 from the fee I had to pay just to redeem my cash, so I never bothered to use it again, at least until now, when they got smart and introduced a NO FEE option.

"Seriously, you expect me to believe this is a real soda can?"

With my coin bank now at capacity, there was no better time to give Coinstar another try, so I grabbed up my *ahem* soda can, and headed over to my favorite Stop & Shop. (BTW, check out Coinstar at Facebook and Twitter.)

For whatever reason Stop & Shop just has that vibe that makes me prefer going there for groceries over other supermarkets, and particularly because their self checkouts are blazing fast and usually don’t have a line to them.  Anything that allows me to run in and run out with bags full of food in as little time as possible is WINNING in my book. (Check out Stop and Shop’s Facebook page for more info about their supermarkets.)

Now that's a slot machine I can work with.

The Coinstar here was located next to Redbox and their customer support/lotto center, right by the entrance. About as convenient a place as you could hope for.  Long Island being what it is though (as in, filled with rancid, uncouth human beings such as myself), I basically got shoved aside by some battle axe of an old lady who wanted to use the Coinstar machine, not to redeem coins mind you, but to scratch off an instant lotto game she had just purchased.  Sigh.

While I waited I decided to go over and get myself a ticket of my own, for the Mega Millions (which was $640 million at last count.)  My Lord, I could buy like, another MacBook with that kind of money.

The battle axe finally left, so I finally had the machine to myself, and started sifting through the NO FEE options.  As it turned out you can select from a variety of different gift certificates, but I was surprised to find out that despite touting the option of redeeming your coins for a Stop & Shop gift card, there weren’t any gift card choices that you could actually use at Stop & Shop itself.  Weird.

Why u no hav Stop & Shop gift option Coinstar?

Ultimately I picked Amazon.com as it has the widest range of goods, though I might have picked a Stop & Shop card instead had that option been available.  I slowly dumped my coins in, and watched and listened as the machine chirped and beeped away while tallying my coins.  Net total:  $77.28.  BOOYAH.

And Mommy said I didn't know how to save. HA!

The machine then gave me a second chance to turn my coins to cash instead, but the fee was nearly 10 cents to a dollar.  Seriously?  Still, I balked at the decision for so long that it timed out and went to the default Amazon.com gift payout.   I guess I just like having options instead of being limited to some degree, even if Amazon.com does offer just about anything you could be looking for (except true love, and the meaning of life, and all that.)  I like being a free spirit after all.

I cropped out the gift code. Yeah, y'all ain't gonna get freebies from me THAT easy.

That said, this was pretty convenient, as long as the NO FEE options offer a nice library of gift cards to choose from I’ll likely continue to use this in the future than go to the credit union (where I have to wait in line and then stand there like an idiot while they slooooooowly tally the coins.)  Plus I rarely visit my credit union anyway, so this kinda works out perfectly.

Now if you’ll excuse me, there’s a few chocolatey goods and a video game I’d like to buy off of Amazon.com now…  :-D

Oh and if you have a moment check out my Coinstar Google+ album and share!

The post Digitizing my cold hard cash at Coinstar for a gift card and a woman (but mostly a gift card) #NOFEECoinstar #CBias appeared first on The Habitation of Justice.

When I’m feeling like this, only the mountains really help me feel better.  Not the beach, mind you, partly I think because as a result of living on Long Island even the mere thought of anything remotely resembling a beach sends me into a fit of unhinged rage, so nope, gotta be the mountains.  Always has been, and always where my heart will be.

So I thought about my work schedule and the feasibility of getting away somewhere on a semi-regular basis when I get my extended weekend off.  (Every other week I get 4 days off from work.  Don’t you just hate me now?  :-D)  Anyhoo, I basically have two options: either flying, or saving the cost of airfare and a car rental by taking a short trip to one of the nearby mountain ranges within driving distance of New York.

I do love driving on the open road though, so I’ve considered a few possibilities:

White Mountains in New Hampshire:  they’re easily the highest mountain range in New England, and I always have a blast every time I visit New Hampshire, so it’s definitely a strong possibility.  But when I think “getaway” I’m thinking luxury cabin rental, complete with fireplace, jacuzzi, wi-fi, and neatly snuggled somewhere on the mountainside with a glorious view.  New Hampshire seems to be more of a Bed and Breakfast hotspot than a log cabin destination though, so I probably won’t go that route.

Where's the log cabins???

Adirondacks in New York:  I know this region like the back of my hand now.  And while I love Lake George, it’s a bit too commercial for my tastes, so I’m considering Lake Placid instead, which is nestled more deeply in the epicenter of the Adirondacks and has just the right balance of rustic and civilization that I tend to favor.

Only problem, it's still New York.

Catskills in New York:  I’m not sure why I continue to blow right past this area on my way to the Adirondacks, despite its convenient proximity to New York City and Long Island, but I do.  Could be a bad experience I once had as a kid when my father dragged me and momsie up there to go fishing, only to spend the whole time there futilely looking for a fishing spot that WASN’T declared illegal by the state or required a permit.  Dweeb.  I haven’t been back since, but maybe I should give it a second look.

Mount Greylock in Massachusetts:  Imagine my surprise when I discovered that Massachusetts actually had mountains.  Greylock though is virtually a solitary mountain surrounded by land flat as a pancake.  It’s actually pretty weird to look at, particularly from Williamstown, but it’s a mountain.  The area that intrigues me though is the Route 2 byway that snakes through North Adams and Williamstown.  It offered some breathtakingly sweeping views of the northwestern valleys of Massachusetts, and I remember passing by a hotel/restaurant while I was there that was perched on a cliffside and thinking, “Man, I’d love to stay there for a night or two.”  I would probably get too bored after the first night though.

Off the Mohawk Trail (Route 2) . But is it mountainy enough?

Finally, I’ve thought of the Smokies in Tennessee too, but it’s just too far for a weekend getaway thing, even if they are THE place to go for luxury log cabin rentals.

If I decide to fly however, I have only one destination in mind:  COLORADO.  OH YEAH.

AMERICA, #$%^ YEAH

In fact, despite the added costs I’m really surprised just how easy it was for me to hop on a Frontier plane and head off to Denver, then bus to downtown and pick up a rental for cheap.  It’s actually worth the added costs that I’d do this every month at the sacrifice of visiting other areas in the country (and world.)  Yeah, I really loved Colorado that much.  The only unknown is where to go after I land and grab my car.

If you’re experts on getaways in Colorado within driving distance of Denver hit me up with some knowledge.  I need the inside scoop on cabin rentals that offer the same amenities I enjoyed when I was renting one in Tennessee, complete with jacuzzis (both inside AND out, tee hee), fireplace, LCD TVs, semi-secluded, yet with unobstructed views of sweet, gloriously purple mountains crowning my good with some brotherhood, youknowwhatimsayin?

Right now I’m checking out Estes Park as a possibility, though I like what I’m reading about Breckenridge too, which is close enough that I could revisit Pikes Peak near Colorado Springs if I have the time.  Mostly though, I think I just want to soak in a jacuzzi and watch the mountains put on a show and forget about the world.  Guess I’ll just have to keep researching and see what I come up with.

If you have some ideas or you have a favorite mountain getaway of your own you’d like to share, let me know in the comments.  :-)

The post I have decided to be a man about things and run away (to the mountains) appeared first on The Habitation of Justice.