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As you probably didn’t know, my new wife (Skirt On The Sideline) and I recently traveled to New York City for our honeymoon. In preparation for our trip we made flight and hotel arrangements, and booked tickets for one broadway show. Our plan was to basically play it by ear while in the city and wander around to see what we could get into. The first day we arrived, I came up with the idea of trying to use only our Android powered smartphones as research and navagation while in NYC. A number of free applicaitons were used by both my wife and I to take us all around the city while we were there.

Google Maps with Navigation.

The first, and quite possiblally the most important application we used was Google Maps with Navagation. As part of the Android operating system, Google Maps was able to pin point our location regardless what part of the city we were located in. The best feature of the application was its abllitiy to use the turn by turn directions to instruct us how to get from place to place. The program lets you select your mode of transportation, either by foot, by car, by public transportation, or by bike. The public transportation option included NYC buses and subway trains with any necessary walking (to or from stations) and any necessary train transfers. Also, as you search for businesses, Google Maps will integrate reviews and feedback.

Basically we were able to use the GPS to locate our starting point, search google for our desired destination, and Google Maps would locate the cloesest train and tell use step by step how to get there. Each search was complete with three different options of travel, and aprox travel time. The only negative that I saw with this application was that it required data to update the maps. So once we were actually underground on the subway platfom, we were not able to update the map or route. However, we found a solution to that problem.

NYC Mate

NYC Mate was discovered in the Android market by my wife. It is an electronic copy of the NYC subway map complete with train schedules and maps of the vacinity around each station. The best part about this application is that all the map data is stored locally on your SD card. So if you are in a train, or on a platform, you are still able to view the map and check the schedules. The only downside was the fact that it does not utilize any GPS data, nor will it map out your route for you. But if used in conjunction with Google Maps the two applications compliment eachother very well. The best part about having NYC Mate was that we did not appear as obvious tourists when we wanted to check the rail map, it is much more descrete than a large fold out paper map.

Yelp

My wife and I only made one dinner reservation for the 5 days we were in NYC. Seeing as I have never been to the city and she had only been once before, we were somewhat lost when it came to eating meals. The easest way out would have been looking for fast food or other chain restaurants that we reconized from home. However, while in NYC we wanted to enjoy the many different food options that the city had to offer. Yelp was very helpful when trying to select a place to eat. Yelp, which is free in the Android market, is GPS enabled and alows you to locate resturants (and other service type businesses) near you and sort them by price and by user review. Yelp also integrates well with Google Maps, which made it very simple to search for a resturant and then map the route to get there. One feature that I also expermineted with was called “Monicle”. Monicle uses the phone’s camera and GPS data to let you visably search for locations in the area by holding your phone in the direction you want to travel. We used this feature to locate a Mexican resturant (which was closed for a private party) near Grand Central Station while standing on the street corner, and also a Chineese resturant (where we ultimately had lunch). Monicle is fun, but not quite as accurate as maping the location out with Google Maps. Your mileage may vary.

Urban Spoon

In addition to Yelp, we also used Urban Spoon to find ideas for meals in the various parts of town. Urban Spoon allows you to pick the location, style, and budget for your meal and with a quick shake of the phone it suggests a location. The listings weren’t as extensive as those provided by Yelp, but we were able to get some great suggestions for food using this application. Urban Spoon is also free in the Android Market.

I’ve been helping my fiancee, Ashley, set up her own blog for the NBA playoffs. Check her out over on Skirt on the Sideline. I also talked her into a twitter page, @skirtonsideline so you can follow her updates and comments.

So near the end of last year, I was in an accident in my 2004 SRT-4. I had purchased the car new when I was 19 and drove it all of its 78,218 mile life up until that point. The damage was enough that my insurance company decided to total it, and made me a generous offer. I was pretty upset about it, but I wasn’t hurt and cars can be replaced. Here are some of the last pictures of the car before the wreck.

I didn’t really go public with this right away, but now I’m ready to move on and get to work on my next project. I bought my wrecked SRT-4 back from the insurance company for $750 and began to disassemble it. I searched around for a replacement and found one for sale on SRTforums for $8300. Totally bone stock, 2004 EBlue Neon SRT-4 with a sunroof and vipers…sounds familiar, huh?

Now, this new car was for sale in West Virgina and I live in Las Vegas. I am originally from Ohio so I asked my Dad to drive and meet the seller, look over the car, and make the purchase. Once the deal was done, he took the car to the body shop where he works for some minor bumper repair to damage the previous owner told me about.

I then paid a transport company to deliver the car to me in Las Vegas. It cost about $650 bucks and took about a week.

And this is how “2NDTRY” was born…

I will continue to update my blog with my build progress. I’m transferring most everything over from my old car, in addition to some new goodies. Its going to be fun doing this knowing what I do now about the car.

I want to take a second to thank all my friends in The Las Vegas SRT Club that have helped me through this and turned wrenches late into the evening getting the old car ready for the scrap yard and will be turning future wrenches getting this car to a higher lever than my last.

So back in September I applied for a new program called the “SEMA Enthusiast Program”, which was looking for participants for a market research project at the 2009 SEMA Show. A few weeks later I got an email saying I had been selected. Tomorrow (11/4/09) I will be attending the show all day, for free. While I’m there, my task is to tweet about things I see and review them. The most active people will win prizes. It should be an interesting experience, and will be my second time attending the show. There is a link to my twitter feed at the top of my blog, follow me if you’d like to get my updates live from the show. I’ll be sure to comment about my experience tomorrow on here when its all over. Wish me luck!

So after last night’s meet, I decided to take surface streets home instead of the highway. To get to my neighborhood, I usually take Sahara to Rancho to Decatur.

I’m driving down Sahara, when I get to the light to turn on to Rancho. A cop pulls up behind the car next to me, and the light turns green. I slowly make my turn, so the exhaust doesn’t make too much noise, and he pulls behind me and hits the lights.

Great.

There’s a bus stop a few feet ahead of me so I head that direction, and as he’s pulling me over I roll down my windows and turn off my car. I hopes that he doesn’t hassle me for tint or for the exhaust. My headlights are still on. After a minute or so he comes up to my window. Its a younger cop, maybe a couple years older than me. He says he pulled me over because the light above my license plate was out. He then mentions that I could be sited for modifying the exhaust, but he probably won’t do that tonight. He asks for my info, so I start digging around in the glove box. Its been a while since I’ve been pulled over so I’m not sure where all my stuff is. As I’m digging he says “So, have you ever been arrested?” “Um…No”. I find all my docs and hand them over. As he goes back to his car, another Metro car flips a U-Turn and pulls up behind him with his lights on.

After a while the original cop comes back to the window and hands my docs back and tells me to have a good night. I ask him if I can check out the burnt out light, and he turns off his headlights to show me. Sure enough, its out, shame on me. So I tell them good night and I get back in the car. I flip the key to the on position as I buckle my seat belt, as I always do to prime the pump, and try to turn it over. “Click Click Click Click”. The damn PC680 died from having my headlights on while he was doing his thing. I wave and tell them the car is dead, and the first cop informs me that he can’t jump me from the cruiser. As I’m taking my phone out to try and get a hold of someone to give me a jump the other cop suggests we push start the car.

So here we are, at the corner of Sahara and Rancho, and two Metro cops are pushing my car up to a jogging pace. I pop the clutch as I try and turn it over and it fires up. At the next traffic light I give them both a thank you wave and they wave back.

Boost, Bytes, and Brews is now mobile enabled. The website and all its content has been optimized for mobile browsers. Visit it from your iPhone, BlackBerry, or other smart phone and check it out!

I’m very new at this, just wanted to test the site…

Real content is coming soon