Hello Minneapolis, except only for my layover

February 29, 2020, 7:07 AM PST by Parkzer • Travel

This post is over 6 years old and may contain information that is incorrect, outdated, or no longer relevant.
My views and opinions can change, and those that are expressed in this post may not necessarily reflect the ones I hold today.

I’m in Boston, Massachusetts right now for PAX East because I was invited to be a panel speaker at the convention. On my way here, I took a flight that stopped at Minneapolis-Saint Paul International Airport because a flight with one layover was substantially cheaper than a non-stop from McCarran International Airport in Las Vegas to Boston Logan International Airport.

This wasn’t my first time in Minneapolis—I was there for X Games Minneapolis 2019 when Tempo Storm’s Apex Legends team competed in the EXP Invitational. To get to the event, I road tripped up with Jordan King from Lincoln, Nebraska, then road tripped back to Lincoln after the event was over. While I was in Minneapolis, I even had an opportunity to explore St. Paul, which was a unique and interesting experience.

One thing I didn’t get to do, though, was see the airport—obviously—seeing as we drove there. So, for the sake of seeing another new airport, I decided that a layover at MSP would be the best choice to keep my travels fresh.

Even the flight up to Minneapolis itself was an interesting experience. I had never flown at such a northward vector at this time of year before, so it was intriguing seeing such harsh and barren terrain when flying over Utah and Colorado.

I also don’t know what else I was expecting, but I was somehow slightly surprised for some reason at how much snow there was.

It was an unusually bumpy ride considering how clear the skies looked, and I nearly spilled my Diet Coca-Cola on my sandwich. The guy sitting next to me didn’t want his fruit or yogurt for some reason, and I was seriously considering asking to confirm if he wasn’t going to eat it so I could have it instead… but then the flight attendant beat me to it and took it away.

As we approached the airport for landing, I realized just how flat and spread out everything was. I imagine this would be a great place to drive a nice, big, lifted pickup truck.

Then came the true fun part. After I landed and deplaned into Minneapolis-St. Paul International Airport, I realized that it was probably one of the most unique and interesting airports I’ve ever been to. The best way for me to describe it is to call it a “lifestyle” airport, in that it was designed more as a casual get-together place than a place to efficiently move humans.

Now, my brain is all about efficiency and optimization, but I do acknowledge that different things can be “superior” for different reasons, depending on what you want to optimize for. If you want to prioritize a pleasant, comfortable, feel-good travel experience, I think MSP nailed it with their design.

The first thing I saw when I deplaned was a massive bar right in the middle of all the gates. I unfortunately didn’t capture a photo of it because I was just so confused at the fact that I had deplaned into a bar instead of a gate, but I did snap a photo later on of some interesting architectural and decorative design choices on one of the lower floors.

My layover in MSP was short so I didn’t get to see much of it (and I had a flight delay, but they were not very communicative of expected wait time, so I just sat at my next gate instead of exploring). But, if I do ever get a chance to pick where my layover is in the future, MSP is definitely going to be at the top of my list. I feel like I could spend a good hour or so just walking around the airport and taking in the sights.

Hello Disney

February 24, 2020, 8:06 AM PST by Parkzer • Tourism

Apparently this comes as a shock to most people, but even after living in Southern California for over a year and going back to visit on an extremely regular basis, I have never been to Disneyland. Either that, or I might have been there when I was an infant, but I was far too young to remember… or maybe that was Universal Studios? Not sure.

I’m not really that big of a fan of amusement parks because I don’t really understand what the “magic” is behind the environment. If anything, I feel more of a dislike of that kind of environment because it feels too forced and artificial—there is insultingly joyful music, the decor on the street is unnaturally colorful, and there are too many screaming infants in mouse ears. Yes, I do understand the irony of the “forced” and “artificial” statement coming from someone who lives on the Las Vegas Strip, but still.

While I was in Anaheim for DreamHack, I met up with a group of co-workers who wanted to go to the Downtown Disney District. Apparently there is a difference between Disneyland and Downtown Disney, where Disneyland is the amusement park where you have to pay an admission fee to get in, while Downtown Disney was open to the public for free.

Our first stop was at the Ballast Point Brewery, where I got some ahi tuna poke.

We were sitting in the outdoors area of the brewery, when Anaheim decided it would be a fantastic idea to dump a torrential downpour of rain on us. I fled back inside.

After we finished eating, we actually went back to DreamHack Anaheim to meet up with a few more staff members, and to make sure that one of our Fortnite players would make it to his press interview.

Of course, making one round trip obviously isn’t enough, so we went back to Downtown Disney again for dinner. Keep in mind that the walk from the Anaheim Convention Center to the Downtown Disney District is just shy of a mile and a half, so at this point, I’ve already walked over 3 miles back and forth and an additional 2 miles or so inside the Convention Center, and my legs are starting to hurt.

Dinner was either at Trader Sam’s Enchanted Tiki Bar, or Tangaroa Terrace Tropical Bar & Grill. Maybe we had dinner at both? Maybe they’re the same restaurant? I never found out, but I had a Hawaiian burger with pineapples in it. It was interesting.

And of course, my co-worker and I had driven from our hotel to the Convention Center, so after dinner, we had to walk back to the Convention Center parking garage. With those two three-mile round trips, as well as all the additional walking I did in and around the Convention Center, my fitness tracker clocked in at the end of the day at 22,473 steps, equaling 10.31 miles. Apparently I set a personal one-day record for distance walked.

Hello Anaheim

February 22, 2020, 7:57 PM PST by Parkzer • Tempo, Travel

Yes, I literally just got back from California earlier this week, but I went back again a few days ago for DreamHack Anaheim at the Anaheim Convention Center.

I originally wasn’t planning on attending, but one of my co-workers was making the drive up from San Diego, so I decided to join him at the convention. Anaheim is also far closer of a drive from Las Vegas than Beverly Hills, so I was more willing to make the trip over.

There were a few other conventions going on at the same time as DreamHack Anaheim, and the rest of the Convention Center was open to the public, so I managed to make my way up to the upper floor to get some good shots of the area.

DreamHack Anaheim was relatively uneventful and felt the same as any other convention I’ve been to. My co-worker and I made it there early, so it actually felt a lot emptier than it probably actually was. A lot of the popular games nowadays are games that I can’t even watch due to motion sickness (I get dizzy when watching first-person shooters), so going to events and conventions has become even more unappealing to me, as if it wasn’t monotonous enough already.

DreamHack is known for their bring-your-own-computer (BYOC) tournaments. As the name suggests, you actually literally bring your own computer into the Convention Center and use it to compete in the tournament.

Security is notoriously bad at gaming conventions and events, where it is more of a security theater than it is real security. They make you empty all your pockets, open all your bags, and go through a metal detector before you’re allowed in the secured area. This discourages already-law-abiding citizens from bringing weapons onto the convention floor, but it does nothing to actually stop someone intent on causing damage, as none of the guards were armed with lethal force to stop attackers.

What I saw at DreamHack, though, was an all-time peak in incompetency and failure. Remember the BYOC system I just told you about? Most people bring their computers, monitors, and other gaming equipment packaged in boxes. Those boxes never get opened or checked, and just get rolled through a side aisle past security. That means that someone intending on harming convention-goers can buy a BYOC admission pass, load up “computer boxes” with lethal weapons, and cause immense bodily harm.

And of course, with California gun laws, I, as an out-of-state resident, cannot carry a firearm… nor can a vast majority of in-state residents, because permits are rarely issued to begin with. Letting massive boxes of unknown equipment through security checkpoints while preventing trained individuals from carrying lethal self-defense weapons seems like a disaster waiting to happen.

🤷

Luckily, things overall weren’t as terrible as I might be making it seem, because there were a lot of Tempo Storm members in attendance, so I was with pretty good company. During the time we weren’t in the Convention Center, we went to visit the Downtown Disney District, which apparently is the “other half” of Disney that you’re able to enter without having to pay an amusement park admission fee. (Photos from Disney will be in a separate post.)

I’m basically a legendary sushi chef now

February 18, 2020, 5:24 PM PST by Parkzer • Food

Back in 2017, I tried making homemade sushi, but it didn’t turn out too well—my California roll looked more like a California taco with a developmental disorder, and my salmon nigiri looked like mounds of shredded fish sitting atop globs of rice.

Well, I have fantastic news. In the past three years, I have improved substantially, especially in the design of “exotic” sushi. … More on that later.

Anyway, while the rice was being made, I got to work cutting the fish. It was a bit difficult because I went over to a friend’s place for this sushi adventure and all of their knives were very dull, but I managed to get some clean slices after putting in some good effort.

At first, we kept it simple with just some tuna and salmon nigiri. We forgot to buy wasabi, so we used teriyaki sauce instead, which was actually surprisingly good.

… Then my friends wanted to get a bit more adventurous.

Yes, that is indeed a corn dog sushi roll.

… And that is a sushi roll containing Pocky biscuit sticks, wafer cookies, and some other cookies, topped with more Pocky and some taro powder.

After we were done making sushi, we taped the butcher knife to the PlayStation controller so we wouldn’t lose the controller in the couch.

Hello, New Jersey and New York

February 11, 2020, 9:38 PM PST by Parkzer • Travel

For the past few days, I’ve been in the New York and New Jersey area for a family event. I usually don’t really take many identifying photographs or share specific details about my family because I feel somewhat of an obligation to protect their privacy—obviously not all of them live in big city condos with dedicated security staff like I do, so I don’t really want to do anything that may put them in any sort of remote danger. So, I don’t really have too many photos from this trip like I do for my work-related trips.

With that being said, I do have a small collection, most of which are from New York City, which is where I spent my final day before flying back home to Las Vegas.

On the way to the East Coast, I noticed that we had flown over the very edge of Canada on our way to John F. Kennedy International Airport in New York. Of course, I pointed at Canada and proudly took a picture of the flight map, then sent it to one of my Canadian friends.

Now, if you’ve ever spoken with me in-person about real estate (or about just life in general), you will know that there are three places that I regularly flame as being terrible places to live: San Francisco, Los Angeles, and… New York City. I’ve been to New York before, but my past encounters haven’t really been too memorable or eventful, so I didn’t really have many personal anecdotes to back up my hatred for New York City, just the statistics of how expensive it is… and how impossible it is to find parking.

I am concerned to announce that the New York portion of my trip seems to have gone just a little bit too well, and now I feel weird continuing to flame NYC when it seems to have treated me quite well.

For lunch, I met up with one of our broadcast personalities, and out of sheer luck, there was street parking available DIRECTLY IN FRONT OF THE RESTAURANT where we were meeting. Better yet, it wasn’t just a normal street parking spot… it was a street parking spot that would normally fit 1.5 regular cars, which meant it was absolutely perfect in length for my RAM 1500 rental (yes, I rented a full-size pickup truck again). To top it all off, apparently street parking was free in that area on Sundays.

Due to my loyalty to Marriott, I stayed at the Courtyard New York JFK Airport. There was no self parking lot, and valet parking was $25 per day, but street parking around the hotel was free. Miraculously, I ended up finding a street parking spot for my truck by taking only two laps around the block, when I very literally expected to be hunting for a good 15 minutes.

Upon check-in, I got a complimentary upgrade to the 11th floor and received a little gift baggie with a bottle of water, two cookies, and a discount coupon for the convenience shop in the lobby.

Now, being in management is great and all, but one of the things that gets old fast is having to take care of your employees and contractors’ travel logistics. Luckily, we have mid-level managers now who take care of that for me, but I spent a long time doing most of it myself, so I’m “burnt out” of planning events at this point (if that can even be a thing), and always seize every opportunity I can for other people to plan my day for me.

(Yes, this does indeed mean that, sometimes, your boss might appreciate it when you think on his behalf tell him what to do so he doesn’t have to worry about it.)

Anyway, dinner ended up being an absolute dream come true, because the person I went with literally selected the restaurant, picked me up from my hotel (which she offered to do without me even asking), whisked me through New York City traffic like an absolute god, did all the ordering from the menu, and even cooked most of the meat.

The restaurant was similar to one of those all-you-can-eat restaurants where the grill is in the center of the table, except this restaurant wasn’t actually all-you-can-eat, so I was able to turn off the “get the most value for your money” switch in my brain, take it slow, and actually enjoy all the food.

… I actually enjoyed it so much that I forgot to take a picture until I was done and the busboy had already cleared off our table.

Now if my trip had just ended there, I would’ve probably just wanted to stay in New York City forever, but luckily, my airport experience was just barely bad enough that my signature phrase of “the best part of traveling is coming back home” still applied.

Upon arriving in Terminal 4 at JFK, I couldn’t find the Wingtips Lounge (the instructions were to “turn right out of security and walk forward 100 meters,” but doing so would have just walked me straight through the information desk), so instead, I went to the Air India Maharaja Lounge, which was unusually and uncomfortably colorful, and only had Indian food and a mountain of alcohol.

As I was preparing to get out of the lounge, I got a notification that my flight had been delayed by an hour and a half. I had actually been getting amazing travel luck lately, so I think this might have broken about a 20-or-so streak of on-time flights for me.

Apparently, something had happened to the pilot and they had to fly someone else in from Baltimore, Maryland to operate our aircraft. After an almost six-hour flight, I made it back home to McCarran International Airport in Las Vegas just before 7:30 PM PST, stopped by the Club at LAS on my way out for some non-Indian food, and made it back home about an hour later.

Only three days to rest—my next trip is on February 14.

Tinkerbell the 20(?)-year-old dog

February 9, 2020, 8:33 AM PST by Parkzer • General

I’m in New Jersey at my cousin’s house for a family event, and when I arrived, I was greeted quite aggressively by their dog, Tinkerbell. She had quite the ferocious yip-yap, but you could easily tell that she was an old dog who had already lived a long life.

When I asked my aunt how old Tinkerbell was, my aunt said that when she moved in with my cousins in New Jersey about ten years ago, Tinkerbell was already about ten, so she suspects Tinkerbell to be about 20 now. I think there might be a miscalculation somewhere in there, because 20 in dog years is astronomically high, but Tinkerbell also looks like she has a good amount of chihuahua in her, and healthy chihuahuas can live to get pretty old.

As you might be able to tell, she wasn’t really the biggest fan of having a camera in her face.