Never Too Old to Play with Toys

            About a week ago I had been driving around White Plains, NY, and as I drove by the Westchester County Center, I noticed a sign out front advertising an upcoming Toy & Train Show that was to occur this weekend. I had been at this very same venue a short time ago for a cat show and was looking forward to returning again for this toy & train show. The last show of this nature I attended must have been at least sixteen or seventeen years ago and I also enjoyed going. Most of the vendors at these events specialize in antique toys and usually Lionel Trains, which is the king of toy train manufactuers.

            Heading into the show I had no plans to buy anything, but the one toy I always wished I had that I never saw before was a replica toy car from the movie "The Blues Brothers". When I was a kid I would never see a toy car of that nature in either standard toy stores or shows like these. In fact, I wasn't sure they even made them. Parking for the event was the same as the cat show, five dollars, but entrance fee to the event was only ten dollars, which is three dollars less than the cat show was. Children aged twelve years or younger were allowed in for free, which makes sense as children will be the ones inside the place more likely to encourage their parents to buy something. Once I got in I was surprised at the overwhelming amount of tables dedicated towards Lionel Trains versus other types of antique toys. I would say trains dominated the show with a 70/30 majority. Some of the train cars in the original packaging alone went for fifty to sixty dollars, with the engine trains fetching anywhere from one hundred to four hundred dollars. There were also vintage train sets such as the Santa Fe, Union Pacific, Pennsylvania Railroad, and even replica New York City Subway trains priced around nine hundred dollars.

            Although the prices for some of these train sets were quite high, there lower costing options as well for trains that weren't as in good condition, but still ran fine, that I had to fight the impulse to buy and turn my livingroom into a rail yard. In addition to the trains themselves, there were also accessories such as towns, landscape fixtures, train tracks, train signals, and parts to fix broken trains. Growing up we had many Lionel Trains and there's boxes of them in the attic still, but seeing all the trains at this event brought back alot of memories. I saw ones we used to have and remember watching them make routes all along the insides of the house. As I mentioned before, it was only trains that were on display, there were also old toys as well. One of the most expensive I saw a rock-em-sock-em style Popeye boxing toy that had a price tag nearing three thousand dollars. Another interesting rock-em-sock-em I saw was dedicated to the infamous Joe Louis vs. Schmeling fights of the 1930's. Speaking of dated toys, there were also the Clown Hobo and Be-Bop Jigger units which I think would find protest to being sold in today's toy stores.

            Toy cars were also plentiful as in all the classic Matchbox and Hot Wheels that were on display. There too I was able to recognize some that I used to have that are up in the attic as well. One vendor had a tremendous amount of cars and on one of the racks I saw what I always wanted, a toy Bluesmobile from "The Blues Brothers". He also had the Chicago Police car to go with it as well, so I bought them both for eight dollars a piece. I ventured over to other tables and saw items I would've wanted to purchase, but almost all were more than I was willing to pay so I only ended up buying those two toy cars. I was quite amazed at myself for walking out without buying more as there were so many trains, cars, action figures, toy guns I could've easily gotten had I gone another day when my willpower wasn't as sturdy. Feelings of fond memories and delight when I first arrived transitioned into sadness as I was about to leave. Not because I wasn't getting as many toys as I wanted, but because there is a clear difference in the quality of toys made in the past compared to the garbage that passes for a toy these days. The strong die-cast metal, the attention to all the small details, things back then were built to last. What do we have now? Everything is fast, cheap, and either obsolete or broken by next week. This goes beyond toys, its about everything in our society in which quality is neglected and people seem content with mediocracy.

            Once I was finished with the show I took my Blues Brothers cars and myself across the street to the City Limits diner to have a small bite for lunch. Unfortunately, it seems everyone who attended the show had the same idea and there was a line to wait for a table. I wasn't in the mood for waiting and it would be ridiculous to take up a whole table when the place was busy, so I decided to sit at the bar. The last thing I had in mind when I entered the place was alcohol, but sitting at the bar and having the drafts displayed in front of me, when the bartender asked if I wanted anything I felt compelled to select one of the drafts, so I had a tall glass of Blue Moon. I didn't have a big appetite, so I ordered some fried calamari with marina sauce to go along with my tall glass of beer. Before eating the finger food, I wanted to wash my hands, so I made my way towards the bathroom. On the way I happened to pass by their dessert section and saw the various cakes and cookies available. I couldn't help but notice the rectangular-shaped pieces of red velvet cake which looked too good to resist. As soon as I was done with my calamari and beer, I made sure I ordered a piece of that red velvet cake and a cup of coffee to combat the possible sleepiness caused by the tall glass of beer. When I got back into my car and was ready to leave the parking lot, a real train, the Metro North, buzzed by on the local tracks.

             Later in the day, fueled by flashbacks of younger days from being surrounded by all those old toys, I decided to dust off my old Nintendo unit, which I haven't touched in nearly four years, and hook it up to my large screen TV. I started out by playing the classic Super Mario Brothers, and then spent a few minutes playing some of the other games, but the machine did show the effects of being nearly thirty years old and not used over the past four years, as it kept freezing on me over and over. I'm hoping with more regular use the machine can get back into the swing of things and won't malfunction as much. I tip my cap to it for lasting as long as it had, but it came out after a transitional phase when plastic replaced metal.

              I have a feeling if the Nintendo was built in the 1950's, it would still be working fine to this day...

Scene from "The Blues Brothers"

Eating the First Hamburger Ever Made

            That would be somewhat gross, but I took the next closest step in having a freshly made hamburger at Louis Lunch in New Haven, Connecticut, credited in the food world as being the birth place of what is today known as the hamburger, back in 1895. I found out about the place around two years ago after watching a show on the History Channel that traced back the early days of hamburgers and hot dogs, and always wanted to make the trip up to New haven to have one myself.

            The day actually started out with quite a bang that awoke me from my sleep around 7am. At first I couldn't tell what was wrong, then I heard someone out on the street yelling that he was beeping his horn and another guy claiming he didn't hear it. This could only mean one thing, there must have been a traffic accident. As mentioned in my November 18th blog of 2011 titled, "Fighting Grey Hair, Dumb Australian Family, and a Motorcycle Accident", there are frequent accidents and near-crashes with vehicles near by corner all the time. It was also raining in the morning, so it was difficult to see what was going on outside my window, but I did see both drivers inspecting their cars for damage. From my vantage point it didn't seem like there was much damage at all, so I just went back to sleep. I didn't hear any further yelling or police sirens, so with little visible damage, I think both drivers just agreed to part ways without filing any reports. When I'm jolted out of my sleep like that it usually messes me up, and as a result I didn't wake up again until a little after 11am. I still felt dead tired, but figured it was almost mid-day and I couldn't keep sleeping. As I fought myself to get out of bed, something inside me made me think about the burger place in Connecticut that I always wanted to visit, and that gave me the final push to leave my warm covers.

            The weather wasn't too great as it was still raining, and according to Google Maps the drive to New Haven was about an hour and a half. I contemplated putting it off until next week, but the more I thought about it the more I wanted that hamburger today. Despite the weather conditions, the drive was very easy as I made my way north on the I-95 and the roads were quite empty. Getting off the highway, the place was only a few blocks away and I ended up parking my car in a lot since parking spaces were scarce that time of the day in downtown New Haven. For a moment I thought I would have to walk a few blocks to get to Louis Lunch, but as soon as I left the lot I parked my car at, the place was right next store. When I went inside everything looked the same as I saw it on TV a few years earlier. It was rather crowded with other people, but there were still some open seats and tables. When the inside was originally built in the remaining years of the 1800's, it wasn't meant to hold the number of tourists and hamburger enthusiasts that frequent the place. There's a counter with a few stools to sit on, one big table, a smaller table, and then these wooden chairs with their backs to the wall and a small table on the armrest for people to eat off of. Behind the counter holds the original grills that were used when the place very first opened and are still used to this day. There's the grill that cooks the hamburgers and another machine that toasts the bread.

            Their menu is quite simple, either hamburger or cheeseburger, and its garnished with onions and a tomato. The original owner back in the day felt those are the only items worth putting on a burger. For sides there are just two choices, potato salad, served in a cup with a spoon, or a bag of potato chips. There's Snapple and other type of bottles of soft drinks to go with the burger as well. The order is taken from the person behind the counter, they ask for your name, and you pay before getting the food. It was a difficult decision whether to have cheese on the burger or not, but in order to get the pure taste from those hundred year old plus grills, I figured cheese would be a distraction and opted for a standard hamburger. I passed on any sides and had a Snapple iced tea to go along with it. The total for everything only came out to $7.25, which means the landmark hamburger only costs about five dollars, which is very reasonable. All burgers are cooked to medium-rare, there's no option to pick and choose how cooked a person wants it to be. I sat down at one of the wooden chairs that made me feel like King Arthur in King Arthur's Court and noticed all the names and marks scratched into the wood over the decades. This too was highlighted on the television show, that people who visit Louis Lunch are encouraged to scratch their mark into the wooden areas inside the place, without being too obvious about it. While I waited for my burger to be ready, I took my house keys out and made sure to make my mark into Louis Lunch eternity on my table.

             I'm guessing its due to the old fashion process in which they cooks the hamburgers, but the wait for mine was nearly twenty-minutes. In most diners or resturants, burgers are cooked and served within ten minutes. As I waited and two old ladies where standing near me on line for the bathroom, I found it ironic the 70's hit "Brother Louie" by Stories started to play from the radio. The radio was playing music from a local rock station, so it wasn't planned, just a funny coincidence. Finally my hamburger was ready and I couldn't wait to have a bite of history. I immediately removed the tomato, but left the onion. Instead of a hamburger bun, the burgers are served on toasted slices of white bread. If it took me twenty-minutes to wait for the burger, it only took me about three-minutes to eat it. Overall I can't say its the best tasting burger I ever had, but the manner in which its cooked gives it a softer texture than the typical grilled burger at a diner or resturant. If anything, its the nostaglia and history of the place more than the burger itself. It was certainly worth the drive and I would be open to having it again in the future. The last thing that was on my mind was the bathroom, was it modern or old fashion as well. Once I got inside the bathroom I saw everything was quite modern, except for the door. This too had a bunch of scratch marks and writing on it, so I took out my keys once again and initialized my girlfriend and mine's names with a heart in the middle. It was either going to be that or the word "fart" by itself.

            This was my first time in New Haven, so instead of immediately heading for home, I decided to walk around some and get to know the town. I first passed a old-looking smoke shop and cigar lounge that made me wish I knew how to smoke a pipe. Then next I came upon a small public park, and inside the park were about a dozen or so tents, it reminded me of Haiti. I walked closer to see what it was and it turns out it was the last standing participants of the Occupy New Haven movement that must have started a couple of months ago, spurred on by the original Occupy Wall Street movement of the fall. As I moved on I realized most of the people walking on the sidewalks were in their early-twenties or late teens, plus there were very old buildings and churches all over, then it struck me that I must be in  the midst of a college community. When I took a closer look at one of the signs in front of a church I saw I was on the grounds of the prestigious Yale University. There was one section were a gate was open for students or people to get across campus from the street entrance, so seeing this would be the only way I could get accepted into Yale University, I went in to have a look. I'm sure the old architecture and rainy weather had something to do with it, but frankly the place was depressing and the students walking around looked miserable robots. Instead of taking in more of the building around Yale University, I just wanted to get out of there.

           As I was heading for the exit, there was a tour for possible incoming students looking to apply to Yale, so as a real Yale student gave them the tour, I saw some of the people had their attention towards me, so I strutted by as if I too as a Yale student. When I was off the grounds it gave me thoughts that I had zero jealously for ivy league students and I was so happy I was finished with college year ago. The only attraction the town had for me was the numerous amount of bars and resturants. The bars near a college is understandable and expected, but there were wonderful options to eat such as Turkish, Ethiopian, Mediterranean, Japanese, and all sorts of fancy fusion combos. In addition, there were alot of nice coffee houses and lounges which cater to the Yale students to have a place to study, or copy a term paper off of someone else. I went inside one of the coffee spots to get myself a rich cup of hot chocolate. It came out just right were it wasn't too hot and I was able to start sipping on it right away. With the old buildings and the grey skies, the town as a whole had a very European look to it. I passed by my friends again at Occupy New Haven as well as Louis Lunch and went to the lot to retrieve my car.

             The best thing about the day was the two hours of parking only cost two dollars...