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Wednesday
11pm Drive to Pittsburgh, arrive 2am. Check into the Radisson.

Thursday
5:30am Wake-up. Call for a cab. Leave the car in the Radisson lot and get dropped-off at the Megabus stop. Get on the bus to NYC. Read all of Allaploosa.

2:30pm Arrive in Manhattan. Subway to Harlem. Check-in at Michael Duncan’s place. Change clothes and head downtown to TKTS. Long TKTS line, at least 300 people. Discover the “plays only” line – only 8 people. No good shows available, though. Call 2nd Stage – Chad Deity tickets for $79. Acacia gets a discount code online through her magic iPhone. Call 2nd Stage – buy Chad Deity tickets for $53.

5:30 Sit down at Cafe Blossom. Eat lots of vegan food disguised as regular food. Enjoy it a lot.

7pm Get coffee at Joe the Art of Coffee. Yes. Yum.

8pm Sit down to watch The Elaborate Entrance of Chad Deity, a play about professional wrestlers. It’s bawdy.

10:30pm Hail a cab back to Harlem. Sleep.

Friday
8am Wake-up, get ready for running and coffee.

9am Acacia runs, Matt reads Eating Animals and drinks coffee.

11am Leave Harlem, check into the Four Point Sheraton in Chelsea.

1pm Lunch at John’s Pizzeria – without meat. Miss the meatballs and feel conflicted about it. Shop for cheese at Murray’s. Walk to Film Forum.

2:50pm Breathless at Film Forum. Acacia wants the Jean Seberg.

5:30pm Dine at Le Singe Vert. Order only vegan food, despite the rich French foods on the menu. Grow to like beet carpaccio. Walk to the Joyce Theatre. Pick-up will-call tickets.

7:45pm Talk to Sai, from OSU.

8pm Watch American Document (2010) with the SITI Company and the Martha Graham Dance Company. The SITI Co. look pretty thrilled. Laugh, cry, gasp, etc. Leon’s really funny. Russian guy is really cool. Enjoy the parts where the actors dance and the dancers act. Intermission.

9pm Watch sketches from Chronicle, a classic, anti-war Martha Graham piece. The dress is really cool. The dancing has verve and is viscerally affective. How do they do that? How do they move so quickly?

10pm Walk to Billy’s Bakery and take cupcakes and ice-box cake back to the hotel. Watch parts of Men in Black and eat sweets. Acacia sleeps. Matt reads, looks-up and sees that å is on TV. Watch Viggo. Sleep.

Saturday
7am Wake-up in hotel. Grumpy.

8am Wake-up in hotel. Grumpy.

9am Wake-up in hotel. What time is it? Grrrr. Grumpy.

10am Oh crap, we better get up. Acacia, get-up and take a shower. Grrrrumpy.

10:30am Get up. Shower. Pack masterfully.

11am Exit hotel. Walk through Chelsea to the Ace Hotel and Stumptown Coffee. Realize again how special Luck Bros is. (Luck Bros sometimes has Stumptown’s beans and they do a better job with them tan Stumptown. I recommend a cubano from Lucks, made with Stumptown’s Hair Bender espresso.

12pm Return to hotel for bags, take subway to the Public. Get student tickets (Don’t ask.) for the Andrew Jackson show.

1pm Off to Brooklyn.

1:30pm Check-in to Stephen Slaybaugh’s place. Drive (!) to some bar in Red Hook to watch U.S. vs England and eat pizza (without meat) and hummus. Tie.

5pm Go to the pier to see the Statue of Liberty and the fishermen.

5:30pm Stop by Baked for Josie’s free cupcake. Buy treats for the megabus-ride back to Pittsburgh.

6:30 Drive to Williamsburg and Blue Bottle Coffee. Admire their incredible, Japanese slow-drip machines. Struggle over a choice of bean. Relish the cappuccino, and even kind of like the chilled coffee that Acacia chose. Yum. Buy XXXXXX beans. Walk around Williamsburg to gawk at the hipsters and their tiny mustaches.

7pm Dinner at Lodge. Yum. Ask about local, sustainable food sources. Get a story about the tables in response. Order the free-range fried chicken (with macaroni and cheese and a tomato-cucumber salad) and cross your fingers. Order hush puppies too. Meal starts with lobster roll sliders and charcuterie plate. Great meal, great atmosphere, a great time with Steve and Josie.

8pm Exit Brooklyn to the East Village. Visit Ninth Street Espresso on 10th street. Closed. Visit å on 9th street. Closed. Visit Abraco on 7th street. Closed. Dammit. Visit Starbucks and use the bathroom.

9:30 Bloody Bloody Andrew Jackson. WOW. Great show for 60 minutes. Good show for the last 30 minutes. Marvel at Martin van Buren‘s five minute non-verbal twinkie gag. Amazing. [If you can, see this show. Seriously.]

11pm Visit Aroma Espresso. Closed. Okay, we get the picture. Back to BK.

12am Acacia reads Outliers while Matt empties his RSS reader. Give in and eat some of the stuff from Baked. Sleep.

Sunday

7:15am wake-up. Acacia: “What time is it?”

9am wake-up. Matt: “What time is it?”

10am Abduct Acacia and leave to get coffee. See a cab and think “Let’s have some fun!” Cab it to south Williamsburg and Oslo Coffee. Get Thor. Cab back to Red Hook.

11am Meet Stephen to go have brunch at Buttermilk Channel. OMG cheddar waffles. The tall stack is REALLY tall. (They served Gimme! coffee, too.)

12:30pm Get sandwiches at Caputo’s Fine Foods for the trip home. Speck. Walk to downtown Brooklyn. Get cannoli and twist cookies at Court Pastry.

1:30pm Return to Stephens to play FIFA World Cup and watch the World Cup (Germany vs Australia). Pack masterfully.

3pm Depart for the 2.

4pm After much confusion about lines, get on the Megabus for the ride to Pittsburgh. Worry about the car.

4:40pm Start writing this blog post.

5pm Eat the rest of the stuff from Baked.

7:15pm Eat sandwiches.

7:56pm Watch Acacia play Doodlejump.

7:57pm Realize this blog post is going to tedious pretty quickly from here on out.

12:43am Return to the car in the Radisson parking lot.

1:48am Re-enter Ohio.

3:51am Arrive at home. Set alarm. Go to sleep.

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3. Sunday/Monday Phila/NYC

made my way out of Philly on Sunday. Hallelujah. (Not that I have anything against Philly, but things have gotten pretty stressful there.) I headed to Brooklyn to visit my brother, Stephen. Took some photos on the way.

Chapterhouse again … (still in Philly)

Monday morning was raining buckets, but that didn’t stop the coffee-quest. I dropped into D’Amico Foods for some freshly roasted beans and a bagel, before settling into the decidedly Frenchy Cafe Pedlar. You know they’re serious because of the bags of Stumptown Beans (roasted just a couple of days previous) for sale at the counter.

Cafe Pedlar in Red Hook …

Later in the day we got pizza, and then Stephen drove us through some fairly industrial streets to get a glimpse of Lady Liberty from the Louis Valentino Jr. pier.

Of course, in my 48 hours in the city, I made 3 separate stops at Joe the Art of Coffee. Once, I even got a table. I sat for about an hour, reading about Joe Papp and getting inspired.

If there is a single driving force which characterizes the New York Shakespeare Festival, it is the continual confrontation with the wall that separates vast numbers of people from the arts. That wall – spawned by poverty, ignorance, historical conditions – is our principal opponent, and as we joust and engage with this “enemy” we distill and shape the nature and style of our theater.

Wow, Joe. That’s beautiful. Isn’t that just beautiful?

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Everyday I walk by this mural, which reminds me of Ezra Jack Keats.

There’s lots of good coffee here. I’m particularly enjoying Spruce Street Espresso:

… and the Chapterhouse.

I had a great lunch at a place called Supper. Check out this bib lettuce and herbs salad:

And we’re about 6 blocks from Whole Foods, so thank goodness for that.

There’s a real comic shop with a ton of very tempting back issues. About 30 feet from the theater. Bravo.

So, it’s not all bad.

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3. Getting to Know Philly a lil Bit

But just a little bit.

The first time I visited Philadelphia, I couldn’t make heads or tails of it. (Actually, it was the second time I’d been here, but I was only 12 years old for the first trip, and all I remember is the homeless man sleeping on the sidewalk as people walked over and around him. I have no idea what part of town we visited, we didn’t even see the Liberty Bell up close, as far as I recall.)

We were visiting a dear friend, and though she took us to nice places (including a coffee shop we now pass everyday) it was the dead of a very bitter winter, and no one was on the streets, and it just looked like a desolate kind of urban wasteland. Despite my best efforts, I was not impressed.

Well, this time around it’s quite different. We’re staying in a great area, and we cross through several others on our way from “home” to the theatre each day. So, I’m getting to see stuff and make sense of my very simple questions, like “Where do people actually live around here? Where do they spend their time?”

My primary issue, of course, is finding a decent coffee shop. Actually, let’s be honest, my primary issue is finding at least one of the best coffee shops in town. Lucky for me, I got a great recommendation from a local – RJD2 (whose new album, The Colossus, came out today). Spruce Street Espresso, as he told me it would be, is definitely the place. I knew I was in good hand as soon as I saw the Counter Culture logo on the door. To give you an idea … my favorite coffee place in Columbus, Luck Bros just became an authorized Counter Culture dealer, the first in Ohio, in fact. So, when I walked in and saw this …

… as was understandably relieved and excited.

So, today, after dragging myself out of bed, and through the shower and the kitchen a little bit, I packed a small bag of books and walked slowly but happily to Spruce & 11th. I spent a couple of hours sitting outside, chair-hopping and chasing the sun around the corner of the building. (I was reading Shostakovich’s Testimony, in case you’re interested. Yes, it’s for a future project, and no, I won’t talk about it.) Wonderful.

Then I pulled out the ol’ iPhone, typed in “book store,” and head towards South Street. Sean had already let me know that South Street was a retail paradise, and in fact it seems to be a hub of big chains (like Whole Foods) as well as local sellers. Atlantic Books was the first sizable book store I came across, so I stopped in. Of course, I always have a few things in mind, but I was willing to let the purveyors guide me as well. I walked out with a Solzhenitsyn tome that was an employee pick (vaguely related to the afore-un-mentioned project) as well as the first part of Cormac McCarthy’s Border-Trilogy, (I just read The Road, which is an absolute masterpiece.) as recommended by my dad. They also had this cute little book called eat.shop Philadelphia. It’s one of series. No, they haven’t made it to Columbus yet, but Bustown would be a great choice, it’s all about unique and local.

Okay. Coffee – found it. Books – accomplished. Next on the list? Comics. iPhone says … Atomic Comics, about 4 blocks away. Well … I don’t know if it was a name-change or just didn’t pop-up on the phone, but I came across Showcase Comics. Their window display included Crumb and Alan Moore as well as some new-ish super-hero stuff, so I jumped in.

It was glorious. They had a HUGE selection of trades, tons of good manga and a back wall of shelves of indie books of every shape and size. Did you know there’s a new Paul Hornschemeier collection? I didn’t, but boy that’s exciting. In the end, though, I didn’t get it. It was kind of expensive, and there was so much else I was dying for. They appeared to have every volume of the minx books (DC comics for teenage girls), of which I intend to collect every volume. (I know it seems counter-intuitive, but the editors did a great job of picking real-live talent and letting them do what they wanted with the stories.) I also grabbed a few issues ofWednesday Comics, which I’ve heard so much about and never seen. Blah blah blah … I bought some comics. Some are really good, and the Ultimate Avengers are horrible.

After that it was back to the homestead, back into the never-ending tech rehearsals. I’m getting to like Philly, though. I can finally see the map in my head, and see where the living is done. It’s nice.

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This is a great time in my life. Isn’t it? Let’s count the ways.

1. I’m in Philadelphia, actually getting paid decent money to direct a show I really, deeply care about (Killadelphia). And while I’m here, Sean Lewis and I are sharing a 3-story house in downtown Philly. (Right by the Italian Market.)

2. I found a couple of great coffee shops today. (Spruce Street Espresso and La Colombe Torrefaction).

3. Even though I’m out of town, my company is opening a fantastic new show (“Jane Austen’s Pride & Prejudice“) that looks destined to be our biggest hit yet.

4. Despite all this, we’re managing to turn in a big grant application tomorrow for a show I’m dying to talk about but really can’t yet.

5. My wife is starring in said Available Light show and doing fantastic work. maybe the best she’s ever done.

Well, now I’m tempted to just start listing all the stuff I love about my life right now. I won’t do that. Suffice to say, though, I’m very happy, and I’m realizing that I’m probably having one of those weeks that I’ll remember for the rest of my life. (Or maybe not. I am on only 2 hours of sleep, after all.)

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This place is great.

I’m in Chicago for the PItchfork Festival (and blogging about it here.

I’m currently at Lovely – A Bakeshop. I’m eating a buttermilk raisin scone (Not sane, right?) and drinking a frothy mochacinno. This place has just about everything I look for in a coffee shop: a great variety of seating, plenty of space, friendly service, interesting decor, just a touch of food, good location (it’s about 4 doors down from where we’re staying), and good music (currently a lite mix of the happier side of mid-80s synth-pop).

And now here’s the story of why I’m an idiot and Yelp is sometimes no help at all.

I looked-up nearby coffee places on Yelp last night (on the iphone) and it directed me to the Ark, just 4 blocks away. So, this morning I got up, showered, made a plan with Accacia, and hit the street. I stopped at a bank first, and then proceeded to not turn on Division like I was supposed to. I don’t remember what deep thoughts had me so distracted, but I just kept marching down Milwaukee, and didn’t realize it until I’d gone about 4 blocks and started wondering where the Ark was. Urgh.

So, I took a corner through some apartment complexes, and walked up 3 blocks to the corner of Division and Noble, only to discover that the Ark is closed. Paper over the windows, with the word “closed” spray-painted on the front door. Ya gotta be kidding me, right?

Okay, so I google coffee and discover a Starbucks a couple blocks past the apartment on Division. Okay, that’s a sure thing, at least. But what’s Lovely? I’ll be it’s closed. Reverse path, back through the apartments, up Milwaukee and lo and behold Lovely does exist. It’s big, and beautiful, and just about 40 steps from where I started this little Saturday-morning odyssey.

At least I’m happy to be here. It feels like I earned it.

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Man, this makes me so happy!

I know, I’m totally ridiculous.

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Oh sososo happy.

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Monon Coffee Company, Indianapolis

Full of bra-less hippies, but strong espresso, subtle foam.

Parking was a bitch, but I got lucky.

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