Duo to an unfortunate mix-up Barto’s pass had been separated from Horne’s (where they had previously happily travelled together) and this posed a serious conundrum at the Greyhound desk at 6 in the morning. The blame, we’ve since decided, can be mostly directed at the Pittsburgh Greyhound personnel and their complete incompetence three nights before when they put us on a bus to Washington when they really did their best to confuse and disrupt the night of two tired Aussies.

The result was that Barto, without his Greyhound superpass, was 70 bucks out of pocket as he boarded the bus to Boston – nothing a few beers and some b’ball wouldn’t fix though right? You’d think so, but true to form, Greyhound weren’t done yet, getting into Boston more than 90 minutes late causing him to miss opening night at the Garden.

Crushed, drained and feeling well and truly defeated Barto began to wander the barren streets surrounding our second “Holiday Inn” hotel of the trip and quickly realised that Boston wasn’t the thriving metropolis that he’d found in New York, Washington or perhaps even Pittsburgh.

But before he could start out drinking, Barto had to have one last shot at finding the golden ticket – his “take me everywhere” Greyhound bus pass. After emptying both his main bag and his backpack, with no luck, things looked grim. But like a beautiful gift from God himself, as Barto began repacking his backpack he picked up Wayne Bennett’s (at this point, totally untouched) autobiography to put it back when lo and behold, there, stuck on the non-smiling face of the rugby league coaching messiah is the bloody bus ticket. Barto had never loved that grumpy bastard anymore than he did right at that moment. It really was a tour highlight.

And so, to celebrate, Barto quickly made plans to find the nearest watering hole. But where? The place was absolutely dead and things looked grim even when he went back to the hotel to order a cab to “take him somewhere even slightly more populated”.

The shiela at the front desk didn’t seem to have the required passion in her job that would enable her to place a call and order a cab. Thankfully she was able to coax Miguel, the friendly but equally unenthusiastic shuttle bus driver, to drive Barto to the nearest bar.

It was the best move of the day, and saved Barto from further heartbreak on what had been a pretty soul-crushing day. The beers were cold, the sport live and the chicken wings as unhealthy as ever, so Barto decided to make a few friends and happened upon a couple of Philly fans who were boo’ing A-Rod as much as he was and they got chatting.

With the game in the balance at 2-0, Barto turned to his new Philly mates and declared that that they need not worry because the Phillies would prevail 6-1. Six innings later, with the players walking off with a 6-1 victory to their names, and Barton was the new Nostradamus according to the good folk at the Stadium Sports Bar.

Meanwhile, in New York, Horne was feeling similarly dishevelled. He got off the bus, gave his farewells to Barto and set off on his own in Gothem City for the first time. The main problem was of course, the sickening feeling that he’d been responsible for Barto’s loss bus pass, but Barto very kindly assured him that it would all work out. However, before Horne was able to properly console himself, he was set upon by a strange man at the bus station who twice tried to get him to purchase items in his presence. Horne was suspicious and left. He was accused of being scared by the man, which was pretty much true, but in the end it worked and he was alright.

Horne’s other problem was that it was absolutely hammering rain, and that $340 he’d forked out for this World Series ticket wasn’t feeling real safe, with the threat of game cancellation as real as ever. Of course the ticket would be valid for the next night, but Horne was without accommodation in New York and needed this game to play so he could get straight on the earliest bus back to Barto in Boston.

Burdened by his unnecessarily large and heavy baggage, a sodden Horne finally made it into a Starbucks (of which there are millions) and found a seat on his own next to a Russian father and son who were busy making a model train, or car or something. They kept dropping pieces off the table and apologising.

Starbucks was just what the doctor ordered however. A chance to have some food, drink, sit, send a dozen or so therapeutic emails and get things back together again. Surprisingly, every website was confident the game would go ahead that night and slowly a sense of hope came back.

It was all systems go by nightfall, the game was going ahead and Horne had the Derek Jeter jersey on and was ready to go. He went down to the subway which he thought he had mastered, only to discover you could only buy from the machine and not from a human being. Eventually, after purchasing two tickets, he go through the gate and met a lovely Yankee couple who took him under their wing.

Off they went to Stan’s (the home pub of the Yankees) for a beer, which would have been enjoyable, had he had enough space around him to lift the drink to his mouth. The place was absolutely jammed, and after one, he set off down the road for “The Stadium”.

The queue to get into the ground was spectacular. Hundreds of people back, as the security check was almost as thorough as getting on an international flight. It was to be our third encounter with the Obama family, Michelle had rocked up to help Yogi Bera throw the first pitch.

Eventually Horne was in and it was off to the bleachers. The seats are modest, and far back, and right field is partly obstructed, but this is the place to be. You’re with the true fans here – not the lawyers and judges and Spike Lee’s and Jay Z’s (although it was too wet for big Jay to perform and he didn’t show).

This was a great event. You could tell there was something special about World Series opening night – the first at the new Yankee Stadium – and the anthem at the start was moving.

Early on in the match, Horne reached for his pocket when he felt a text message vibrating. It was his good friend Joe Barton, informing him that the Greyhound bus pass they feared was lost, was actually snuggled next to Wayne Bennett’s book. What a relief – it was time to celebrate with a Dog and a commemorative Yankee Stadium beer.

However, the game itself was a little flat and it soon became apparent the Yanks were like Jay Z and couldn’t be bothered. After seeing the Yankees win twice at Yankee stadium, it was interesting to walk out of there after a loss. It was sombre, and everybody seemed in a state of shock.

Then it was time to sardine into a subway, catch a couple of hours sleep at uncle Trevor and aunty Margaret’s house, and then back to Greyhound.

The two protagonists rejoined each other the next afternoon, a little flat it must be said after three weeks of straight sport. However, they courageously braved another subway system in Boston, and set off for the Garden to see the Bruins. However, after some severe dints to our credit cards (Barto Greyhound induced and Horne World Series induced) both your protagonists agreed they would brush the ice hockey if it cost them anymore than $40 each. They got to the window and were told $85 for cheapest ticket, so it was see you later Garden and back to the pub.

Right next door to the pub, a political rally was underway. It was quite spectacular. Inside the pub, our Aussieness again made us celebrities and thankfully the Yankees got back on the bike. 1-1 in the World Series.

Our last night in Boston saw us go to our first sporting event there – the Boston Celtics taking on the Chicago Bulls. Good night out, but Boston way too good.

Final note about Boston is they have more Dunkin’ Donuts per capita than any other American City. Not an official stat, but we’re pretty sure it’s true.

Also, Boston needs to learn a few lessons about cabs. Cab drivers of Boston, if you have a passenger in your taxi, don’t put the damn light on! Everybody in the world knows that if the light is off, you are carrying passengers. If your light is on, it means you’re free and people will try and hail you! How dare you confuse people like this! Even Americans trying to hail near us couldn’t believe what was going on. The fact it was Halloween Eve is no excuse, pick up your game!

The next morning we rise early and get on our next Greyhound back to New York. We decide to get an early bus, so that we can catch the majority of the Australia v England rugby league test match at an Aussie pub. For once, things work brilliantly on Greyhound – with our Jamaican driver getting us to NYC about half an hour ahead of schedule, meaning we rock up at The Australian just minutes into the game. Matt the legendary bar manager hooks us up with pre-midday beers and we sit at the bar to watch the Aussies win comfortably.

Next move is to check into our hotel (if you can call it that). Horne maintains it’s worse than the YMCA, Barto is a little more comfortable with it. The showers are cleaner, but don’t really work. Lock on the door is questionable. And the outside noise from the road is too much.

It’s off to Madison Square Garden that evening for Opening night for the New York Knicks….very exciting. Forget out partially obstructed view, our seat is completely blocked by a huge metal screen. However, we’re assured that this is only in place for the pre-match rev up and will be removed for the start of the game. We doubted it at first, but true to form, the screen came down and we saw a good overtime match. Philadelphia were pumping the home side, before the Knicks gave their fans false hope by storming home in the last quarter, only to be smashed again in OT.

We hit the pub again that night – for the most outrageous night in the American calendar – Halloween. The guys dress up like freaks, the girls in short skirts (and in one case, just a bra) and roam the streets in the most drunken of states. We couldn’t quite get into the Halloween spirit, but at least we could get into the Yankees – who came from behind to punish Philly. 2-1 Yankees.

Farwell New York, you were great to us – the best part of our trip. But now we must leave you forever. Philly here we come – we’ve got football, baseball, ice hockey, Rocky and illicit drugs coming right up!

Again fans, we apologise for being so far behind in the blogging. We are writing the blog on our time in Washington, yet right now it’s halftime at New Orleans Arena in the Hornets v Raptors match.

Anyway a bit of catch-up writing never hurt anyone and we endeavour to be back in time by Monday when we leave NO for La La land.

Getting to Washington was another middle of the night greyhound bus effort from Pittsburgh, but thanks to a few beers with our new mate Jay, we fell to sleep pretty easily on the bus.

Thankfully our hotel the Omni Shoreham in Washington let us check in straight away. We needed showers like the Newcastle Knights needed Andrew Johns and it was just nice to be able to settle down before the big day ahead. We hit the ground running in Washington – at midday on our first day there we had a lunch to attend hosted by ESPN. We did our best to dress up, but the people at the door really didn’t want to let us in. Our names were on the list though, so begrudgingly they did, and we took our seat at the back of the room.

It was a sportsmen’s lunch which ESPN holds on Monday’s in whichever town is hosting Monday night football that week. So this lunch was a warm up to the Redskins v Philadelphia Eagles match that night. The lunch was interesting – hearing stories from commentators and former NFL stars. While sitting, our main goal was to find a man by the name of Bill Hoffeimer. He was the great man who had got us into the lunch and who had secured us media accreditation to the Monday night match – and we needed to A) get the credentials off him, and B) Thank him.

The description given to us of Bill was a tall gentleman with glasses.

Barto and Horne respectively guessed a different tall gentleman with glasses in the room, with Barto being the winner.

The Monday night football match was exciting. We took the train there – and as we have made habit on this trip, managed to botch up the train system. We had to call a man over to help us buy tickets, and then when we got down to the platform, we got on a train heading the wrong way. Anyhow, we got to the game, and fluked the right entrance to go through.

We were directed and directed by the good staff at the Redskins to the media area, which turned out to be a private box. We had number 6 written on our ticket (which stood for round 6 of the NFL) but the staff there thought it meant box number 6. So next thing we know we’re sitting in a luxury box with a 50 year old tycoon and his daughter. He didn’t care we were there, in fact he offered us food and beers. We had the best seat in the house here, but again, because we needed to seek out the tall gentleman with glasses, we begrudgingly left the private box and sought out the real media box.

Once we sat down, Horne (unbeknownst to him) was seated next to ESPN commentator Sal “Sal Pal” Palantonio , who was a good bloke. Although slightly in love with himself we worked out, when he recommended Horne buy  a book to teach him everything he needed to know about the NFL’s place in American culture. A google search later that night revealed that Sal Pal was in fact the author of the book. Good bloke though, and a glistening smile.

Post match, Barto and Horne ventured into the Philadelphia Eagles locker room (Barto is an Eagles fan, so he was reasonably happy about this). We headed into the Eagles nest, looking for one man – Sav Rocca – the team’s punter who also happens to be Australian, well Victorian at least.

Despite being the lowest profile player in the Eagles team, Sav had already cleared off, even though we got into the locker room as soon as it opened. I guess when you just punt the ball two times, you don’t really need a shower.

However, while Sav had already got his ass out of there, Barto and Horne were given their welcome to the NFL, when superstar quarterback Donovan McNabb came out of the showers and mooned them right in the face with his big, black behind. Convicted dog fighting activist Michael Vick was getting changed close by as well, so it was definitely time to leave the Eagles to their male bonding.

We hunted down our cab and got the most gangster cab driver in Washington. He had absolutely no idea where he was going, before pulling into a “bad neighbourhood”, locking us in the car and filling up petrol. He then told us he was driving cabs because a reverend had sacked him from his former employment. “Bitch ass mutherfucker,” he said. “He’s just like you and me, he just wears a collar. I’ll put a hole in his head. Shit.”

We were quite scared at this point, and unfortunately it was to be another hour or so until we got back to the hotel. It was a combination of him having absolutely no clue where he was going (he called and pulled over to ask for directions several times) and his decision to give us an impromptu tour of the town and it’s worst neighbourhoods. He turned out to be a devoted family man though, and he was spewing that he was going to get back too late to “lie down next to” his wife.

It’s our second day in Washington, and we decide it’s time to see the sights. Apparently it’s the capital or something. So we head out on a bus tour, and jump off to see various sights including Abe and his various statues, grassy knolls and water fountains. At Starbucks Horne made a last minute decision to buy tickets to the Yankees v Phillies World Series game at Yankee Stadium and then it was last stop The White House.

Rumour has it that we had our second encounter with Barak. When we were in New York he was apparently at Madison Square Garden with us (although he never came to say hi) and then people on the street were saying that he’d just driven past us outside the White House. Either way, once we realised that what we at first thought was the White House was in fact some sort of financial building or something (although Barto knew all along that it wasn’t the President’s house) we eventually saw the historic pad. We had to squint and look through a fence and trees, but we saw the top right hand corner of the White House. We passed a lego building of the white house in a shop window soon after, and took a photo of that, because it was a far better representation of Obama’s town house than what we’d seen in real life.

That night we hit up the ice hockey to see Barto’s favourite player – Ovechkin (Dallas Johnson lookalike) skate around for the Washington Capitals against the Philly Flyers.

Barto was instantly annoyed by the crowd, because they advocated the banging of cow bells inside the arena. The constant banging drove him insane and brought back nightmares from when Steve Bell used to play for Manly and fans brought the bells to Brookvale.

It was a great crowd here…very abusive. Someone rocked up with a ‘Fuck Philly’ t shirt and almost started a huge brawl with the notoriously psycho Philadelphian phans. It was far from good-natured banter.

Anyway, after the hockey it was back to the hotel and to bed…for the next day we’re off on the next leg of the journey.

Your two handsome and witty protagonists will split at this point (Horne off to Yankee Stadium NYC and Barto to see the Celtics opening night in Boston) but never fear friends, they will be back in each other’s company soon enough provided greyhound buses don’t tear them apart.

It’s been a great adventure so far, although some worries are now kicking in about the bank balance.

Our last night in NYC was spent at our new home Madison Square garden where we watched local rivals the New York Rangers take on the New Jersey Devils. Here we witnessed one of the greatest moments in sport we have ever seen.

Avery from the Rangers and an unidentified Devils player engaged in one of the best one on one fights in the history of ice hockey. It was amazing to watch. The decide they want to fight each other – lose the gloves and helmets and punch on one on one. In rugby league, and any other sport in civilisation, when a fight breaks out on the pitch, team mates and referees will rush in an effort to look after their mates or break up the fight. However, in ice hockey as we got to see first hand, team mates and refs sit back have a cup of tea and watch the action unfold. Avery and his adversary seriously punched on for a minute or two before one of them hit the ice and then the refs decided it was time to get back to the game. Otherwise the match was a little flat with the Devils winning. The only other notable moment of the night was we were sitting in the very back back seats next to two people (mum and daughter) from Melbourne, Australia. We decided they must be shoving the Aussies in the back row. Big crowd and big atmosphere to farewell New York for the first time (we’re coming back).

So after the hockey we go back to the YMCA, thank god it’s for the last time and pack our bags. Horne folds the Derek Jeter 2 jersey in carefully, although his girlfriend did a much better job of packing the bag, and Barto puts his free New York Jets T-shirt and beanie on for the long, 3am bus trip to Pittsburgh.

The wait at the bus station was horrific as pretty much every dealing with Greyhound is, but the worst was to come when we got on board. The bus driver decided that the passengers didn’t want to sleep a great deal, despite it being the middle of the night, and talked his head off. He had a ridiculous sense of humour which had spawned from his hatred of his job. He talked to the travellers as though they were idiots and demanded we call him Dave and not Mr Bus Driver. Get Fucked Dave.

Upon arriving in Pittsburgh we realised how damn far away our hotel was from the city. There were no buses, no trains out there…just a $30 cab ride. Granted the place was a massive improvement on the YMCA – but it was going to be an expensive little stay. Not only was the hotel $30 from the city, but our room was about 30km from the front office…so once we got back to the hotel each night, it took us a further 15 minutes to actually walk through the threshold of our room.

The other problem with our location was that you couldn’t get a cab back into the city from the hotel…you had to pay $40 up front to get a private shuttle bus.

Dennis was our driver and we got to know him well. He had a piercing laugh and loved talking about girls. We passed a limo on our first trip into town and he told us you pay a lot of money but it’s worth it because you get to watch pornos in there and have girls “rubbing up against you.”

The saving grace for Pittsburgh was that the joint loves sports (that is why we went there) and we had a full schedule coming up there.

On the Friday night we went and watched the Stanley Cup champions Pittsburgh Penguins play against the Florida Panthers…the Panthers were huge underdogs but really stuck it to the Penguins, who were lethargic. Anyway the Penguins came back from 2-0 down to force the match into penalty shootout time – which was awesome. Pens win!

We finally managed to get a cab driver willing to drive us back into the outback. You’d have to be crazy to agree to that trip, and he was crazy. To anything we said, and even when there was complete silence, he would punctuate it with the phrase, “Yuh” (like “yeah”, but more…”yuh”. He would pump out back to back “yuh’s” like you wouldn’t believe. His “Yuh” count was up to at least 20 (no exaggeration) before we’d left the vicinity of the stadium. “Yuh, yuh, yuh, yuh”.

Next day we were off to College Football in the day and Penguins again in the night. We came out at 10am sharp for Dennis to drive us in. However we were shocked when we walked outside to find Dennis next to a limo and not the shuttle!

Turns out he probably does know exactly what happens in the back of a limo given he owns one! There was a girl in the back of the limo when he hopped in but she didn’t seem like the porno type and she certainly wasn’t keen on rubbing up against us. She was just hell bent on getting to the Pittsburgh National Avery. To which Dennis said something like, “she’s off to see birds, and you guys off to see some different kinds of birds at the College game, right.” Not everything is about sex Dennis!

College Football was a great atmosphere…outside they had all kinds of jumping castles and games. Horne arguably came second in a remote controlled car race. (I’m not sure who the argument would be with, he came second last – he was about 15 laps behind the winner, who looked like a bit of a geek).

After the College Football game we set out to find the fabled ‘South Side’ – apparently the young, hip, going off part of Pittsburgh which apparently is home to exactly ’80 pubs’ we were told by our ‘yuh, yuh, yuh’ cabbie the night before.

It took us about two hours to finally reach South Side, and when we got there we couldn’t find any pubs. When we finally found some hole in the wall place we decided we couldn’t risk going any further. The drowning man grabs a straw.

‘Brewskies’ was stuck in the 1980s. It was falling apart, you could still smoke at the front bar and there was a sign in there saying no bikie colours. Not the friendliest place in the world. But the beers were 23 ounce, cost 2.50 each and were served by the hottest chick in Pittsburgh. She was stunning, although we later found out that she was 22 years and already twice divorced. Not the best track record.

Despite it’s questionable appearance from the outside, Brewskies ended up being a turning point in our trip to Pittsburgh. We started talking to a couple of Pens fans (the least violent looking people in the place, and probably the only three people there who didn’t have leather jackets and white beards), and they offered to give us a lift to the game (only after we all did a Jagerbomb though….including the driver….).

The game itself was forgettable, the NJ Devils (again!) beat the home team, but we caught up with our Pittsburgh mates once more for a few more beers and a better tour of the cities nightspots, including a rugby bar. Many beers, midgets (Pittsburgh is the midget capital of the world), and poor Aussie accents later, we were making our decision on how the hell we were getting home to our middle-of-nowhere abode. In steps Pittsburgh Jay.

Jay may well be the best person in America. He is like Father Theresa. Jay offered to drive us to our door on the condition that we caught up for another drink after the Steelers game the next day.  It seemed like a fair deal at the time, especially considering he had just saved us 30 bucks.

Quick thoughts on the Steelers game – best game of NFL we’ve seen over here. It was an absolute ripper. A 60 yard fumble recovery touchdown (very rare) was followed by a kick-off return touchdown from the Vikings (pretty rare as well) and the game was iced by the Steelers with a 70 yard interception touchdown. Our seats were (again) at the absolute back of the stadium, but the game was of such quality that it didn’t even matter. We are starting to become accustomed to what it is like to be a poor American sports fan – we know the last row of seats of half the stadiums on the East coast! (Quick note to the great folk at Heinz Field – sell water outside the fucking stadium you idiots, we needed to work off some monster hangovers and no water on a stinking hot day damn near killed us…)

Anyway, post match we are battling with hangovers and wondering what the best way to get back to our hotels will be as we nervously await yet another midnight bus….when Father Teresa gets on the phone and tells us he’ll make sure we get back to the hotel with plenty of time to get ready for the bus and that he’s coming to meet us for a beer. Firstly, we kill some time at a crazy pub which deadest had strippers serving all the beers and somehow had encouraged random sheilas to strip on poles. They didn’t work there, they just felt like getting down to their unmentionables at 4 in the afternoon. God Bless America (as the song goes…)

Then our boy Jay rocks up and first takes us to a bar with a top rated bathroom (the pisser is a double-sided mirror, so you’re basically pissing on people who are checking themselves out on the other side of the mirror). Although it needs to be said that this pub was directly across the road from the stadium and probably hadn’t brought it’s a-game after servicing the 65,000 strong crowd…

And then we stumbled down to Calico Jacks. What an incredible place that is. Now, we’re aware people get stumbling drunk and do stupid things like take their clothes off – but in our experience it usually only happens after midnight and typically at the seediest places Australia has to offer. At Calico Jacks, the time to get your clothes off seems to be around 5.00pm. We briefly wondered whether this chick would be embarrassed when she woke up. And after it all, Jay drove us back to our hotel and stayed for a couple more beers at the hotel bar before we bid farewell (and told him to come to Vegas, which he is considering), snuck in a quick nap, packed in a rush, got to Greyhound central and got ready for another painful bus trip, this time to Washington…

We’ll get back to you all ASAP to recap our times in Washington – a lovely joint – and Boston – a bit more bleak. Hope you enjoyed Pittsburgh as much as we did.

Wow. What a crazy few days, all with no blogs – sorry about that, apparently there are one or two of you who actually want to read these things.

Well, since our last update we’ve seen the following: Yankees v LA Angels in Game Two of the ALCS, New York Jets v Buffalo Bills (NFL), Rangers v San Jose Sharks (ice hockey), Knicks v Celtics (b’ball, obviously) and tonight was Knicks v New Jersey Jets in jersey….….and we went to bloody Connecticut to tour the ESPN studios (which was awesome, but geeeez it’s a long way away, but more on that later).

Before we get crackin onto the sports and all of that shit, it really needs to be said that for all the YMCA-bashing we’ve been doing over the past week, they really know how to step it up. Because just when you thought they couldn’t dip any lower….they drop the ball massively. When we first got here, the nice man at the desk informed us that on Sunday we would have to change rooms. We didn’t really care, we were cool with it.

So on Sunday morning we got up early and packed our bags. We didn’t have a shower, because that would have required getting up earlier and we were sure we would be shifting into our new room stat. WRONG.

The dick face downstairs told us that we wouldn’t be able to check into our new room at the hotel we’d already paid to stay at four months ago until 2.30pm. It was 11.00am at the time.

So then we had to smash out a shower and other ablutions and check out.

Even though we had paid for this room four months ago, we had to PAY THEM to hold our bags for the day while they changed us into another room in the hotel, WHICH WAS THEIR FAULT.

Even though the guy at the desk was a total dick about the whole thing, we refrained about complaining, mainly because we didn’t want the laptop to get stolen.

Overall, the rush wasn’t appreciated. Then we went and freezed our arses off at Giants stadium at the worst NFL game in history. Then we decided against hitting the town straight up so we could get our bags out of storage. We come back to find our bags fine but alone in the room.

We go to the check in desk, where the nice guy from the first day we checked in, checks the facts only to find that we’re back in the SAME ROOM WE WERE ORIGINALLY IN!!!!!!

The nice guy behind the desk summed it up best….“Somebody fucked up” …before apologising for his language. We told him the apology for the language wasn’t necessary because we thought they were the biggest f#@$#@#$#@#@ c@$@@##$@@ in history.

Anyway, it was nice to check back into good old 1034…gee it looked familiar.

Ok, a small break from normality here, but this is Barto talking exclusively about the NFL. Now, I’ll start by saying that yes, I do absolutely love watching the NFL but the game we went to may go down as one of the worst I will ever watch. For starters, it should be borderline illegal to play at that temperature. It was like minus 65 degrees, before the windchill factor sets in. Then you add in that we had to sit in arguably the worst seats in the history of sport (as close to the back row as you want to get, right in the middle of the coldest winds this side of Siberia and surrounded by the rudest, most abusive, angry, drunk fans I’ve ever come across). In as quick a summary as I can come up with the following happened: we saw five-quarters of football (yep, it went into overtime because neither team wanted to win), we saw about 36 fights (yep, Jets fans get drunk, lose fights and start fights) and I lost three toes (frostbites a bitch). Other than that, I just want to say that I hope this remains the worst game I will ever see because good god it was awful. Oh, and Jets fans turn on their team (and in particular, their rookie quarterback Mark Sanchez) more quickly than any team I’ve ever come across in professional sport before. God bless ‘em.

Horne here. This is all I will say about the NFL. I had to buy Jets socks to wear as gloves. That’s how cold it was. It was absolutely awful. God it was hard to open up the Big League while wearing socks on your hands.

Monday morning, and WOW, but the YMCA is on fire yet again. Yes. Fire. 6 am rolls around after they’ve absolutely killed it by fucking up our room transfer, and what should happen? 7 false fire alarms in a row. There’s only so many times you can hear “Can I have you attention please, can I have your attention please, this is your fire safety warden here, the fire department are on their way, please stay alert and be ready to leave your rooms” before you start to get the shits. We estimated that number was somewhere around two before you want to start stabbing the bloke with the loudspeaker in his hands. Either way, the false alarm allowed us to get back into the groove about half an hour later when the firies cleverly established that no smoke, no flames and no fucking fire means everything is sweet for us all to get back to sleep. Cheers. No idea why the YMCA couldn’t work that one out…. Also, this happened again the next morning. Seriously….And then the morning after that there was three fire engines out the front of the building.

Ok, we’re at Tuesday. This is Connecticut day. We’re off to ESPN headquarters in Bristol? If you don’t know where that is, you’re not alone. Because no one in America even knows where it is! Even though it’s the home of the biggest sports network in the world, no one had a clue.

We woke up at 5, off 3 hours sleep, after being out in the Village the night before…we were dying. Then we get to Grand Central train station and get a train to Waterberry…Waterberry is the closest we can get to Bristol…10 miles away….We walk up the main street of Bristol, get our second croissents for the day and see a man get arrested. We literally saw a police officer put hand and ankle cuffs on this guy as we tried to calmly walk past. Full on. Then we found out we couldn’t get a bus to Bristol, we had to get a $40 cab! Anyway, all good we’re good.

At this time we weren’t appreciating how BIG ESPN was until the security guards told us we couldn’t sit down outside and eat our croissents. We had to throw them in the bin before they finally escorted us to where we needed to go.

The tour was awesome, we met some great people and learnt some neat stuff. We got to sit on the sets of a few different shows and it was a really awesome day. Only problem was we were both working off hangovers and lack of sleep.

Thankfully a cab turned up for the return journey and we got the two trains back to NYC in time to get to the Garden for the Knicks, Celtics pre season b’ball game. After getting poor advice from three people, we eventually made it to the media entrance. Missed Barak Obama getting presented to the crowd and the anthem, but we were there into the first quarter.

Nate Robinson was smoking it for New York and they somehow beat the Celtics.

Tonight we just went to our second Knicks game…this time one on the road in New Jersey to play the Nets. It was incredible. We were courtside, literally one row behind the Nets bench. Such a good experience up close.

During the game Barto made chat with a bloke next to him… and basically my boy Vernon was an absolute champ. We talked about footy, bastketball, rugby (league) and all sorts of other shit. But basically, he hooked a brother up about how quality the basketball was. I got the feeling he’d never sat courtside either. We were all crazy excited. It was brilliant.…. But sensing Barto’s great chat with his NBA brother, Horne felt like he should make friends too. He turned to the journo next to him, although, unfortunately there was a major language barrier involved and it was really tough work. Horne may not have known quite enough about Yi Jianlian (the Chinese born Nets centre…)

Post match, Barto hit the Nets sheds and talked to his old Orlando Magic rookie superstar Coutney Lee (cruelly traded at the end of last season, but a quality player nonetheless), and another guy Rafer Alston (another ex-Magic dude, but was never one to stick around) but the most memorable moment came when Barto was casually leaving the sheds and saying his thanks to the Nets media fella. After explaining the great journeys this trip will involve, the media guy called out “well, enjoy your trip Joe!” to which Barto replied “yeah, no worries mate” with as much Aussie twang as he could muster. At this point, Barto exited the rooms pretty pleased with his efforts…as one of the Nets players walked up to his media boss and loudly exclaimed – “yo, where the hell was that guy from?”. It was amusing, but crushing. We’re from Australia buddy, fucking talk to us!!

In the Knicks shed, Horne chatted to a rookie (but good player) Jordan Hill…and then the star of the Knicks, Nate Robinson. He was cool, he’s only a bit taller than Horne!!! Great, great night.

The only downer of the night was Horne’s realisation that the North Sydney Bears sticker on his bag had come unstuck…unfortunately as the Bears have done far too often.

However, whence we got back to the hotel, Horne glanced down and saw that the Bears sticker was stuck to his leg. They’re with him forever.

Anyway back in the hotel now and we need to watch Arrested Development, so see you next time!!

It’s just another chapter in Horne’s ongoing fight with doors in America. The first and most notable, and in Barto’s opinion the most hilarious, came when Horne lost by TKO to the automatic doors at the Greyhound Bus terminal. Horne went to the only section where they wouldn’t open automatically. Then when he finally managed to pull the door open, about five people from the other side took it as an opportunity to walk through. Horne ended up holding the door for other people for an unreasonable amount of time.

“Mr Candy Cane hat” was how a lady on the subway dissed Barto’s Manly Sea Eagles beanie (which is a strange piece of clothing) after he unintentionally stole her seat on the train. The hilarious thing about the situation was we had a really friendly, touristy chat with the girl up at the top of the station about 10 minutes earlier. But when we boarded the train, and seats were up for grabs, everything was fair game. Barto and her went for the same seat from an opposite direction. Barto and the girl both began to back into the seat and their arses bumped into each other inches above the seat. Barto’s was bigger and he won. Then she bagged him by saying that “Mr Candy Cane hat” stole her seat.

During the day we went for a walk to do some administrative tasks like buying an American phone and getting our greyhound bus pass sorted. We stumbled on Time Square which was pretty cool.

In the night we hit the town to eat, drink and watch the LA Dodgers v Philly baseball game. We went to a joint called Tonic, which was a sports bar recommended to us by the barman at the ESPN sports bar we ate at earlier in the day. At Tonic we perched ourselves at the bar and we were starting to really enjoy ourselves. However, things weren’t quite perfect. The huge screen in front of us was on a different channel, so we moved up the bar and sat in front of a huge screen that was showing the baseball. Things were great…

Until the sonic boom of spillages almost ruined Barto’s night. Some idiots weren’t watching where they were going and ran straight into a bar lady who was carrying three or four drinks on a tray. The drinks went everywhere – and covered Barto’s back, jeans, undies and primarily the jacket that was resting on the back of his chair. The guys laughed, didn’t apologise and neither did the bar lady. This is the kind of thing that normally happens to Horne, but unfortunately it was Barto who copped it. The tragic irony was that minutes later they changed the middle screen to the baseball too – so if we had stayed put we would have been high and dry!

Barto was understandably filthy, and was geeing himself up to ask the bar for the dry cleaning bill for the jacket…he even snapped at the bar man who was a bald man (slight Andre Agassi lookalike Horne thought) and tremendous host. But to Barto’s credit, he snapped back into a happy mood soon after and let bygones be bygones.

The baseball was great. Then we moved onto a place called the mean fiddler, probably a bit better than the one in Rouse Hill, but still not great. The Irish girl at the door made a stereotypical joke about if we wanted to throw a shrimp on the barbie…which wasn’t really appreciated. In the bar we watched a rugby game, where we got to see Jonny Wilkinson and Luke Rooney strut their stuff for Toulon. Barto went and tried to use a Kate Ritchie pick up line on the Irish girl and her friend after they showed an interest in Home and Away. And Horne found his way to the other side of the bar where he got in an epic conversation with a guy who claimed to have been a minor league picture for the Houston Astros. He was a Tennessee Titans NFL fan so Horne promised him a Scott Prince Gold Coast Titans jersey – he even got the guy’s address. It remains to be seen whether Horne will ever go through with this promise.

We went to the Yankees v Angels ALCS game at Yankee Stadium. We got an express subway there which was awesome. We had disgusting McDonalds at the Yankees Maccas – and cried into our quarter pounders when our Phillies spectacularly choked against LA in game two of the NLCS. It’s now 1-1 between the Phills and Dodgers – we are desperately hoping the Phillies, because if they make the world series we will be in Philly for it!

Yankee Stadium is unbelievable. The interior is massive, and it isn’t hard to understand why they are one of the biggest sports teams in the world.

The game itself was average – 4-1 Yankees…but the atmosphere was sensational. Barto was dying of the cold and the lovely lady next to him lent him hand warmers and at the end of the game gave him gloves! Such generosity!

The crowd was awesome, very unique atmosphere. We had a hot dog, although Horne forgot to get sauce., so perhaps didn’t get the full experience. Going back again tomorrow – so hopefully round two goes smoother!

Horne, having dutifully carried his set of binoculars many thousands of miles from one side of the world to the other decided to use them. Now, binoculars at sporting events are a borderline necessity – but these binoculars not only proved pretty ineffective and didn’t really zoom in that much (although it isn’t all that hard to spot CC Sabbathia’s sizeable frame) but they are also yet to be closed. They really are the most complex binoculars in the history of mankind.

And finally, went up Empire State Building today. Lots of fucking around and waiting in lines, but it was pretty impressive once you got to the top. Lowlights included: lots, and lots, of waiting in line and one of the biggest wastes of money of all time – the NY Skyline. Basically it is one of those old school virtual reality machines where you sit in a car area and they pretend that you’re in a helicopter flying around New York. Lame. Kevin Bacon did the voiceover and made like seventeen Footloose references. That basically sums it up.

Highlights of the Empire State Building visit though were meeting Brian (a funny Asian fella from Melbourne who thinks Sydney airport is “fucking amazing”) and the hilariously aggressive pigeons that charged at Horne when he tried to take a photo of one of them. He fair dinkum crapped his pants. But to be fair, the pigeon had pure hatred in its eyes.

Actually, one last thing. We’re getting ready to head to the Yankees v Angels game two tonight. Sure, it was cold last night. But I don’t think that justifies how much Horne is wearing right now. He has seven god damn layers of clothing. It’s utterly ridiculous. And he just put on a scarf! Yep, that just about tops it off. Brilliant.

Till next time…

The following will simply be some key points of reference of our trip from sunny Sydney to an overcast New York. Thankfully it didn’t take as long as expected….so without further ado, here is blog numero uno in all it’s glory.

While waiting for our flight from San Fran to New York we sat and waited for a while. Everytime the name Lee was called out by the announcer (which was several times) this Asian couple opposite us got up ready to go. But it was always a different Lee.

Jamie Durie – Barto isn’t one to say something unless he really believes it. He doesn’t agree with you on something unless he actually does agree. He doesn’t suffer fools – so that means 90 per cent of the time he doesn’t suffer Horne But when Horne pointed out that our flight host on United Airlines was a Jamie Durie lookalike, Barto backed him 100 per cent. This guy was exactly what Durie will look like in 10 years – especially if he takes being dumped by Oprah badly….and becomes an air hostess… Anyway, Horne covered his eyes at one point when he thought “Aussie Jamie” was starting up a Manpower routine. And Barto accidentally called the slightly over weight flight host, Scott Cam.

Shitty Blinking Light on the internal flight to New York…..yes, thanks United Airline! As if being served by 60 year olds and told to pay for lunch wasn’t enough, you also treat us with a fucking techno light show to read with…. They really think of everything.

Corner store = beers plus awesome sandwiches at midnight. I love that shit.

The accommodation here is as poor as you will ever see. Bathrooms. Awful. To put this as nicely as possible for those who haven’t visited New York before….the toilet levels are very high. And New Yorkers seem to abide by the “if it’s yellow, let it mellow” policy. This results some pretty foul smelling situations. The showers are no better. Seriously. Bathurst has better facilities (this is obviously coming from Barto, as Horne has never left Oatley).

Music = as shitty as it is in Australia. Brilliant. Sadly, the talkback is even worse. FYI – Delilah from 106.7, famous for the love song dedication hour, is as worse than getting beaten up in Detroit. I’m fairly sure of that. We don’t care about your six kids back home, or that your nephew had swine flu, or your thoughts on the vaccination! (“I don’t care for that vaccination thing….it scares me” – we don’t care about you Delilah! Keep your thoughts to yourself and keep pumping out the shitty romance-charged tunes!)

Tv = Seinfeld and the Simpsons on basically every channel. It’s very comforting, On the flight Barto and Horne pumped out so many arrested development episodes it was ridiculous.

Dress sense… Barton wore Manly trakkies (as they were fantastically comfortable and looked quite brilliant as well) and Horne had a Bears sticker on his backpack. This resulted in him being a part of the American inquisition. He was nearly deported before we even got through Customs in San Fran. Barto survived a little better in his Silvertail trakkies, although he did get bomb checked at Sydney Airport, mainly because Horne took about 20 minutes to come through the metal detector.

Despite getting to the airport three hours before the flight, Horne nearly managed to miss the plane to San Francisco. He went to try and claim money from the TRS on his laptop. There were just three people in the line, everything seemed like it would go smoothly. However one of the two attendants spent the entire time on the phone and Horne eventually had to bolt to the flight. This was a great start to the trip. Horne had almost missed a flight and Barto had given up on his “mate” deciding to get on the plane anyway.

We have met some fantastic people. For example. The cool fella who helped our bags through to the next check point at San Francisco – brother, you aight! To the other dude who helped us get from airport in NY to our hotel (who is best known for his intro of “yo, wassup fellas?”) yeah mate, you’re tops too. And to the two people who made the connecting flight from San Fran to New York that much easier (mainly old mate who finished every sentence with “sure…sure…”), you guys basically got us to the end of the road.

And finally, we got an airport shuttle into NYC. After a somewhat enjoyable, but mostly terrifying race through the streets of NYC, we got off and made small talk with the driver which was enjoyable and Barto paid up. Then the driver paused and waited…there was an awkward silence, and then he said, “any tip for the driver?” Barto then gave him three dollars. Welcome to New York, right? Every fucker expects a tip.

Stay tuned for blog number two – which will include Horne’s borderline hilarious struggle with the automatic door at the Greyhound Bus terminal. America really does hate him at this stage.

Cheers!

Horne and Barto.