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Lately I'm spending a lot of time traveling between Pittsburgh and New York, and that trend is set to continue through the end of 2009. I went out to Pittsburgh for an ultra-long weekend 11-16 February, in celebration of my birthday, Valentine's Day and Presidents' Day. It was a very festive weekend, from start to finish. On Friday night we went out with friends for Ethiopian food--which is not done as well in Pittsburgh as in New York, unsurprisingly. Saturday we had a marathon of activity: we got up in the morning and ate English muffins with approximately one pound of butter per muffin. At noon we went to the Pittsburgh Opera's brown bag opera series, where you get 30 minutes of songs in the Pittsburgh Opera's office-cum-performance-space in a converted Westinghouse Air Brake factory building two blocks from our apartment. For free. And you can eat your lunch during the performance. It's amazing and combines many of my favorite things, including (1) opera (2) lunch (3) industrial spaces and (4) proximity to home (or at least one of my two homes). Sam went again this weekend, and we'll both go next weekend because it's so great. After the opera, we took the bus to the Pittsburgh Auto Show at the convention center downtown. On a nice day we would have walked, because it's only a mile from our apartment, but it was cold and snowing so we climbed aboard the 86B bus. The auto show was a lot of fun and we looked at a nice M3 that perhaps we'll consider when it's time to retire the 328i. In, you know, twenty years. But if our dream of an M3 doesn't come true, we could always consider a restored Isetta. Who needs four wheels anyway?    We also sat in a new MINI Cooper Clubman, which is definitely roomier than our MINI Cooper, but still not quite a family car. We couldn't drive the Clubman at the MINI display, of course, but there was a MINI Cooper available for test driving elsewhere at the auto show and Sam did drive it. Under competitive racing conditions, no less!  Here he is, all lined up with the other racers. The MINI isn't visible in this shot. (Please note the 25-year age gap between Sam and the next oldest competitor.)  The MINI Cooper, blazing by at such high speeds that the iPhone couldn't capture it!  The MINI in a bit of a pile-up at the bend. It was a pretty fun adventure at the Pittsburgh Auto Show, but all the more so because we scored two free tickets because I (tried) to donate blood at the blood mobile outside the auto show. Unfortunately my attempt resulted in only about a quarter of a pint of blood because I have "delicate" veins and it's kinda tough to bleed me properly. But the two free tickets come from giving it an honest try, so we had a great time for no cash-money outlay. After the auto show we took the bus back home and got ready for our Valentine's Dinner out at a fancy Pittsburgh restaurant. (We drove that time.) And then, obviously, we went to Target to buy a toaster oven and then home to eat Twizzlers and watch The Sopranos. Couldn't have been nicer! I'm back in New York, er Connecticut, this weekend, but I'm going back to Pittsburgh on Thursday for another long weekend. I'm racking up those jetBlue TrueBlue points, let me tell you!
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