Man. I need a vacation from my vacation.

Had a great week, though – started out in Toronto, where my cousin picked us up, took us back to his place to drop off our stuff, have a quick nap, then headed out to Niagara Falls. Place has gone all Atlantic City, but there’s really nothing that can diminish the sheer *majesty* of the falls. Great stuff. Then trucked up to Ottawa for the first family reunion in 25 years. So, yeah – Ei-Nyung met the whole North American Helava clan, which was cool.

Played a lot of Trivial Pursuit with the cuz and the wife. Good stuff. The original edition of Trivial Pursuit is surprisingly relevant. Lessee. After hanging out with the family (and swearing it won’t be another 25 years before the next reunion), we headed back to Toronto, then caught a plane to NYC. We’d been to NYC not long ago, so we figured we’d have plenty of time to see some new stuff. Not really.

Ate at Gordon Ramsay at the London the first night with some friends, which was great – the friends more than the food, though the food was no laughing matter. I think I am getting to the stage where French-inspired “fine dining”‘s charm is wearing thin. That is, we’ve now had dinners at three or four restaurants of similar caliber, and frankly, the difference between Manresa, Ramsay, and the French Laundry is more in the service than the food, and I don’t really care as much about service as I do the food. Not to say that I don’t enjoy eating a fantastic meal, just that the novelty has worn off, and sans novelty, the value of the food is greatly diminished.

Spent next two days going to a taping of the Daily Show (the episode with Richard Gere) (I’d recommend doing it once, but it’s probably not necessary to do twice), and meeting a bunch of Ei-Nyung’s relatives and hanging out with friends who had come in from out of town, including Roopa, which was really cool. Some of the folks we tried to get in touch with were outta town, or busy, which turned out to be good, because by Saturday, I was so wiped out, I couldn’t really do much.

Ended up going to the Home Depot with the pops to pick up some drywall for their kitchen, which is currently bare walls, then spent three hours cooking three racks of baby back ribs for dinner, which was fun. Turned out alright.

Got home today, hung out with the dog, bought some new shoes (the Merrils that I’d had for ages were really shot), and then watched Ninja Warrior. I’m beat. To work tomorrow, which will be fun, then to the airport to pick up Ei-Nyung, then home via something other than the 80-580 interchange, which no longer exists. How odd.

All in all, a great week with beloved family, good friends, and new relatives-in-law. Couldn’t ask for much more, other than a couple weeks to recuperate.