THe Intrepid and the Museum of Sex

In case you couldn't tell by the title, today I went to the Intrepid Sea, Air, and Space Museum and the Museum of Sex. As with the other museums, I'll do a separate post with all of the photos from each.

The Intrepid so far is my favorite museum I've been to on this trip, if not my favorite museum of all time. It's a retired aircraft carrier that originally served in WWII, the Cold War, and the Vietnam War, and was part of the NASA space craft recovery program. The ship has a beautiful history, and the museum staff do her and her past crew great honor with the program they've created.

You can tour almost the entire ship, which as been preserved to almost the exact condition that it served in. Glass panels are the only thing that separate you from the crew's quarters, the galley, and the satellite equipment. The flight deck is covered in restored war planes, and there is a covered space pavilion that houses the Enterprise space shuttle. You can also tour a submarine and ride on several different flight simulators. There is a heavy focus on education, as well as honoring our veterans, which kept it from feeling too touristy or gimmicky.

The day that I went honored the Fire Department of NY, so they had some special extra exhibits going on featuring and honoring firefighters. They had all of the different emergency response vehicles, CPR training, and best of all, an all-firefighter battle of the bands.

I stopped for lunch/dinner at an amazing mac and cheese place called S'Mac. Literally all they serve is mac and cheese, albeit some daring and gourmet varieties. They also have a decent beer selection, although I opted for their draft root beer instead. There were simply too many good options, so I tried their sampler platter, which comes with a small scoop of 8 different kinds of mac and cheese. I couldn't even eat half of it, so I boxed up the rest and took it home with me.

I also happen to spy the Empire State building on my walk about.

I ended my day at the Museum of Sex. I was sort of sent here on a mission by a good friend of mine to track down a limited edition lipstick, but the museum was very well done. It was comically small after visiting the MET and the AMNH (it's only 2 floors, and more of a art gallery), but it was worth the price of admission. It's definitely not for prudes - lots of penises and vaginas and porn everywhere, albeit tastefully done.

I was successful in my hunt for lipstick, and I took home a delightfully useful but inappropriate souvenir for myself.

(It's a mug, you bunch of pervs! A mug that says "Sex makes me thirsty", but just a mug)

All in all, a very fun weekend. Back to the grindstone tomorrow!

Saturday Preview: AMNH, the MET, Central Park, and Beer

I had an amazingly busy day today! It is still SUPER SUPER HOT in NYC, so decided I would take advantage of the air conditions in some of the museums. 

After sleeping in (I didn't get home until quite late because of Sleep No More), I headed back into NYC with three things in mind: the American Museum of Natural History, the MET, and Central Park. I'll be doing separate posts with all of my photos from the museums, but in the meantime here is a little sampler of my adventure!

First up was the American Museum of Natural History, or as I like to refer to it, the house of bones. They do have a lot of cool non-fossil/stuffed animal exhibits, but the main focus (and my favorite part) was the very, very large collection of bones, ranging from before dinosaurs up to today. They also have some special exhibits which you have to pay extra for. I was planning on going to see the Whale exhibit, but it was unfortunately sold out by the time I got there. 

Once I was done with the AMNH, I cut through Central Park and got to sneak a peek at the public shakespeare stage. They also have statues of some of the more famous plays.

I also caught a glimpse of the obelisk.

I then went to the Metropolitan Museum of Art, commonly referred to as the Met. This is the largest museum I have ever been too. This picture doesn't do it it justice on how BIG this building is. I managed to see maybe about 1/3 of the exhibits in the 5 hours I was there. Granted, I got to see all of the exhibits I wanted to see so I wasn't disappointed, but you could spend an entire weekend in here and probably not see everything.

Cool fact about most of the museums: there is no set price for admission. There's a recommended amount to pay, but you technically can pay as little as you want and still get to see all of the exhibits.

The special costuming exhibit at the MET was called PUNK: chaos to couture. It was very well done, and was unfortunately a camera free zone so I have no photos of it. Thankfully I remember all the cool techniques I want to apply to my costuming.

When I was finally done (I stayed until close), I met up with a classmate of mine at Kinsale Irish Tavern on 3rd Ave. The drinks were cheap, the potato skins were delicious, and the music was excellent. I'll definitely be returning here. Pictured below is my drink of choice for the evening, a concoction called a Snakebite: half Harp, half hard cider. Very good, and very potent.

Tomorrow I plan on heading back into the city (still much cheaper to ride the train in every day than get a hotel room - we'll see what happens in the next few weekends though) and visiting the Intrepid Sea and Space Museum and the Museum of Sex.