Blog of Sam Fox

(Not page 3, popstar, politician, pornstar, or phoenix professional)

Category

USA

Grand Canyon at sunset
USA

Vegas? Casinos, no. Road Trip, yes.

Back in June, we found ourselves somewhere neither of us really wanted to be. Las Vegas. So we hired a car and took a mini road trip from Vegas, west to the Grand Canyon.

I had flown into Las Vegas to join Danielle who had already been there for a few days with work. Her team were representing a new hotel/casino, Resorts World, which was opening on the strip. I’ve never had much interest in visiting Vegas, nowhere close to the top of the list of places to visit, but when opportunity strikes…

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USA

England raised, New England engaged

The beating Mediterranean sun, golden beaches, rugged hiking trails, French wine, and fresh seafood. That was the idea. We’d celebrate a friend’s wedding in Toulouse then travel onto Corsica to enjoy a summer holiday…and our engagement. Unfortunately, all plans got postponed.

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mountains in the catskills new york
New York, NYC coronavirus lockdown, USA

An upstate retreat for some ‘normalcy’

  1. First day working remote
  2. We stay home and wait
  3. Stretching the legs & (some) social distancing
  4. Confirmation arrives, stocking up
  5. Finding routine in irregular times
  6. New challenges with the remote working
  7. Noticeable changes
  8. Finding a pattern
  9. COVID-19 Lock Down
  10. First week, check
  11. Weekend plans? You know stay away from people as much as possible.
  12. Game night as the pause begins
  13. Streets empty as everyone builds furniture and plays games
  14. Staying sane
  15. Keeping date night going
  16. Socializing remote
  17. Friday feeling? TGIF?
  18. House Parties not Street Parties
  19. Running in the rain
  20. Betting on unknowns
  21. Optimizing the lockdown life
  22. Community Support
  23. Virtual Social Closeness
  24. Friday night: Virtual Happy Hours & Games
  25. Four Weeks In
  26. Discovering the new exciting
  27. A Weekend Getaway in Quarantine
  28. Rain and games
  29. Looking for escapes
  30. Escape to the Country
  31. An upstate retreat for some ‘normalcy’
  32. Rediscovering New York as lockdown eases

We’ve been back three of weeks now, a weird few weeks. When we left the city as still firmly in lockdown, the streets were deserted, and we were getting groceries delivered and left outside our door. A lot of things changed while we were upstate: cases went down a lot, the state started reopening in certain areas, summer arrived and George Floyd was killed. I’ve already reflected a bit on that first week back with the protests, riots and curfew. My next post will be a chance to reflect more on what the city is like now we’re back but I’ll look back at our couple of weeks upstate here.

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New York, USA

A Pandemic in a Pandemic

This is something I wrote late on Monday, was going to post on Tuesday but #blackouttuesday needed a voice of silence. Now I’m posting on Thursday evening. Protests continue, the curfew has been moved up to 8pm, some looting and rioting continues across New York and the country. Several shops near us were broken into and now boarded up, but unlike earlier this week I don’t hear any sirens or people outside right now (11.30pm).

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USA

Long weekend in Nashville – don’t think twice, just go

It was a chilly 40 degrees (just above freezing) in New York, winter coat, woolly hat and gloves weather. The good news: it was Presidents Day, a public holiday. More good news, we weren’t wearing coats either. In-fact, with iced coffee in hand, we were meandering our way to the start of a walking food tour. It was the last day of our three day long weekend escape to Nashville and it was beautiful and sunny.

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USA

A bit of sun and history in the South

I got my first taste of the ‘south’ with my trip to Austin last fall, with Australia, England and Dublin coming after that, President’s Day in February presented the next great ‘excuse’ to explore more of it. While New York was freezing its ass off,  South Carolina should be a good few degrees warmer even in the winter and perfect for a three day weekend in Charleston.

Having left it a little late to book, direct flights to Charleston SC were a tad on the extortionate side (ranking just below brokers who try to charge a fee on non-fee apartments). So..we had to get a bit creative with our travel.

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Everest Base Camp, London, New York, USA

Twenty Nine Not Out

Walking in Berkshire, Lumineers, Work174 days. The number of days that have passed since I last posted a blog update. During that time, a lot has happened including turning twenty-nine. As I contemplate retirement and with it hearing aids, Zimmer frames and taking 10 minutes to usher food from my fork to my mouth, I felt it was the right time to prove I’m not completely gone by updating this blog.

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New York, USA

(Better than Buzzfeed) Top 5 gigs seen in New York by an Englishman

Live music in New YorkI mentioned in my last post how I saw 43 bands last year, obviously a record I want to beat this year. While so far I’m not off to the best of starts – we’re now at the end of February and I have yet to get my gig on, I have just acquired Bruce Springsteen tickets for his last New York date on his current River tour (note I have a spare if you’re interested!). A couple of weeks ago I also stumbled on another impressive busking performance, a group called ‘Cover Story’. So, with gigs top of mind at the moment it seems like a good time to do a post on my top gigs in New York so far.

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New York, USA

2015 in numbers

Infographic of 2015

With 2015 well wrapped up and my unsuccessful attempts to keep this blog upto date, I am changing tact to come back to course. So, here is a wrap up of the last year in one blogpost, in numbers. Therefore in appropriate analytics esque fashion, click through for 2015 by numbers…

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