Tomorrow Is Another Day...

New York: Part Fin

So, I have been utterly exhausted this week, which is a great opener to talk about our last day in New York since it can be summed up thusly: 1) Exhausted, 2) Pumpkin Pancakes 3) Drowsy, 4) Chocolate Milkshake, 5) Really tired, 6) Rice Pudding.  Aren't you just RIVETED now?

Sunday

Go ahead and open up this picture to it's full size and look at our eyes--even given the extremely unforgiving light of the subway car, are those not some of the most exhausted eyes you've ever seen in our hollow, pale little faces?

We were up and out the door Sunday morning and on our way to stand in the TKTS line so that we could buy our cut price theater tickets and then head to Cafe Orlin for breakfast.  The part that we didn't plan for was that TKTS wouldn't be open until 11 o'clock, and that the line looked to have started forming around 9 o'clock.  It was a LONG line.  And we still had about 30 minutes until the ticket windows even opened for business.  So, we settled in for a long wait and began discussing such fascinating topics as pigeons, architecture, and why some 80 year old women still insist on tanning and wearing skin tight leopard print tops.

And then Pretend Sergeant Bitchface came along and started getting all up in my grill.  "Form a single line!" she hollered, apparently being the officer in charge of sidewalk traffic.  So, the line shuffled over toward the buildings a little bit to allow the absolute HORDES of tourists the space to walk by if they were so inclined (which they did not seem to be, as there was surprisingly little foot traffic on this particular street).  The line was still about two people wide however as we had a long wait ahead of us and were all taking the opportunity to, oh, I don't know, talk to the people with whom we were standing in line.  Well, Pretend Sergeant Bitchface didn't like that, but instead of hollering at everyone in the line in vain once again, she decided that she would target our little group, me in particular.  So, that was fun, especially when she informed me that she had told me to get in line but she "knew it was all about me".  It would have been funnier, or maybe sad since she was so clearly just trying to be important, but I was tired, and it quickly evolved from being somewhat amusing to really infuriating.  Just when I was about to start crying from annoyance, the line finally started moving, and about 30 minutes later we bought our tickets to see The Drowsy Chaperone.

With tickets in hand (well, in Brittany's wallet anyway), we headed over to the East Village for brunch at Cafe Orlin.  If you are ever in New York, looking for a great breakfast place, I implore you, go to Cafe Orlin and order the pumpkin pancakes.  They were fluffy and thick without being heavy, cinnamony and pumpkiny without being too sweet, and just overall the most amazing things I ate all weekend.  Except for maybe the cheese and herb fries--I think it's a tie.

After brunch (and a brief misadventure on the subway in which we lost Katie at the Astor Place station and no one had any cell reception since we were A ZILLION FEET UNDERGROUND) we went back to Times Square where The Drowsy Chaperone is performed at the Marriot Marquis Theater.  It was a little bizarre going to the hotel that we stayed at a few years ago to see a Broadway show, but the theater was a good size, and the show was hilarious.  I haven't become a scary fangirl like I did for Wicked, but I did love the music and spent the majority of the show laughing--except for that one time I fell asleep.  But it didn't seem like anything important was going to happen in the next five minutes, so a catnap was deemed acceptable.

We followed up the show with lunch at Ellen's Stardust Diner, which has never had awesomely great food, but is usually good for entertainment value.  We were fairly disappointed on both counts however, and eventually headed back to our apartment so that Carolyn could pack and head off back home.  Once we had her in a taxi, Brittany, Katie, and I briefly debated doing something fun, but after a quick photo op at the Permanent Mission of India to the United States (which was right around the corner, since not only were we spitting distance from the Chrysler Building, but also apparently the United Nations--how about that!), we opted to go back to the apartment and watch a marathon of Flip That House.  We discovered that we have lots of opinions on bathroom tile and glass blocks.

Eventually we dragged ourselves from our various comfortable seating arrangements and emerged from the apartment for just long enough to go to Rice to Riches, order rice pudding and then go back to the apartment and watch Friends for the rest of the evening.  And you can stick a fork in us because we are DONE with the New York recaps.  Well, except I have to tell you that Rocky Road rice pudding is pretty fan-freakin-tastic.  And also those Tide to Go pens are a gift from God.  Go buy one.  Keep in with you always.  Don't thank me, thank God.

New York: Part Three The One With All the Calories

Dear Post Office Lady,

Yes, we understand that with your big wheelie cart of mail, the stairs aren't an option for you as you so terribly politely pointed out, while cramming yourself into the elevator with four large men carrying big moving boxes and a slightly smaller girl with a skim hot chocolate no whip from Starbucks.  However, what may have been an option for you would be taking one of the elevators surrounding the one you decided to snit your way into.  Just a thought!

xoxo
Girl Who You Jabbed In the Stomach With Your Big Wheelie Cart of Mail

Saturday

Saturday was the first day that we had to deal with the dilemma of four girls and one very small bathroom.  When we got home on Friday, we agreed on what seemed to be an agreeable order of bathroom use and I set my alarm for 7:30.  I say with a great deal of pride in our efficient grooming abilities that the four of us were finished dressing and heading out the door at 10:30.  I can see how that sounds like not such a great accomplishment, but considering that it took just my sister and I about that long to get ready the day before, I was pretty proud of us.

Originally, my friend Melissa, on old college sort-of-roommate had planned to join us on Friday night and then most of the day on Saturday, however, Melissa has a very awesome and very important job that makes me very proud and braggy, and a nationwide crisis of the sort that I shall not specify here took place on Thursday, meaning that she was forced to work into the wee hours of the night on Friday, and was only able to drive down for half the day on Saturday.  After an orgy of Dunkin' Donuts deliciousness, we decided to head to Bloomingdale's for a little shoppy action, and planned to meet Melissa there.

Although our exhaustion wasn't nearly as overwhelming as it became the following day, we were all still pretty worn down from our various activities the day before, and after a few minutes of half heartedly wandering the 2nd floor shoe department and placing our eyeballs back in our heads after seeing the prices on some cute little t-shirts, we decided to wait for Melissa in one of our favorite New York haunts.

The Bloomingdale's Ladies Lounge.  You may remember it from our last NYC visit.  Sadly, time had taken it's toll on the lounge--there were fewer fresh flowers, the walls were a little peely, and the stalls a little less pristine--but all in all it still ranks as the top public restroom I've ever been in and the only one that I would voluntarily utilize for a 20 minute nap.

Around 11:30 Melissa showed up, and my quest for shoes could begin in earnest.  I'm not sure why, but for some reason, when I visit New York City my all encompassing goal is to leave with at least double the amount of shoes with which I arrived.  It's not that shoe shopping is a rare occurrence for me, it's just the sheer concentrated amount of shoe purchasing that sets NYC apart.  Anyway, within a one hour block of time, I ended up with the shoes I showed you in this post, and no one else bought a damn thing.  Which was kind of cool with me because they were then nice enough to help me lug my shoe bags around for the rest of the day.

After our shoe store encounteres, there was a brief and obligatory stop in Tiffany's, where my sister and I could have gladly spent the rest of the day.  If anyone is wondering, after much deliberation, I have decided that I will accept the following gifts:

And with our diamond viewing quota filled for the day, we set off for the lush green hills of Central Park.  Let me tell you, it is one of the most bizarre sights to go from concrete, sky scrapers, and angry drivers everywhere you look, to giant trees, horses and carriages, grass, and boulders.  It is such a stark contrast, and it really does feel like entering an oasis in the center of the concrete jungle (or should I say desert... since a jungle kind of IS a GIANT oasis...)

We spent the better part of two hours stealing swings from small children, making ourselves sick on the spinning tire swing, and riding the carousel before we decided that the sugar shock from our morning donuts had worn off, and it was time to inject more fat and cholesterol into our systems.  In other words, lunch time!

And so a wonderful lunch was had by all at the Ballpark Cafe, as recommended by some of the park janitorial staff when we asked for a place with good shakes.  I can't vouch for the shakes, but I can tell you they had one heck of a rootbeer float.  After lunch it was time to walk Melissa back to the subway and bid her a fond adieu as she headed back to work.

There was a brief moment of sadness, and maybe a tear or two, but in our jam packed day we hadn't scheduled much time for grief, so it was back to the apartment to drop off our (my) bags, and then on to the Metropolitan Museum of Art.  Now, I realize that this makes me sound very cultural and intellectual--like I wanted to take in the great work of the masters in between dessert and cocktail stops.  While that may have been partially true, the real draw to the Met was in fact The Murder at the Met Scavenger Hunt.  I've always been a huge sucker for those murder mystery parties and a good old fashioned game of Clue, and the Murder at the Met lived up to my greatest expectations.

We were given a list of directions to clues around the museum, and two hours to answer 20 fill in the blank questions, then put our heads together and deduce who out of the list of suspects had murdered the curator and what their motive was.  We all went into the hunt with a laid back attitude, claiming that we were just in it for fun, and we really wanted to enjoy the art.  We then proceeded to get yelled at three or four separate times for 1) running in the museum, 2) getting too close to the paintings, 3) sitting on the floor in the Temple of Dendur, and 4) putting our (my) feet up on the wall, also in the Temple of Dendur.  While we had the clues answered in under an hour, the tough part was putting them together to try to come up with the who and the why.  As we batted around our ideas, I suddenly started spinning an extraordinary tale straight out of an episode of Murder She Wrote.  In an effort to not ruin the game for anyone else who may play in the future, I won't go into details, but what I will say is that we got the motive exactly--we just nailed it on the wrong person.  Oops.  Guess I won't be giving Sherlock Holmes a run for his money any time soon.

After we stopped angrily out of the Met, (I kid, I kid... I'm a good sport!  Okay, well, no I'm not, but I wasn't that mad that we didn't win.  At least not visibly.) it was once again time to eat.  With the promise of delicious and monstrous margaritas and yummy mexican food, we cabbed it up again (seriously, why did we even waste our money on those MetroCards?) and headed to Mustang, where we met up with Brittany's NYC friends again for dinner.  Oh my gracious y'all.  I have never had a more delicious and gigantic margarita than I had that night.  I drank mine.  Then I drank Carolyn's.  And then I drank Katie's.  And then I became the happiest person in the whoooooole world, and just about everything from that point in the evening on I just remember as being hilarious and rose colored.  I really need more Mustang margaritas in my life.  I will never again trash talk tequila.

Once Brittany and I were adequately sloshed, we headed a few blocks down to check out a Real Live New York Apartment (because I'm sorry, I refuse to have my dreams dashed and accept that where we were staying was an adequate representation of New York style).  Brittany's friend brought us back to her apartment, allowed us to drink her water and fall madly and desperately in love with her adorable Yorkie Poo.  I hope she doesn't mind if I put her picture up on the internet.

As God as my witness, I will own one of these dogs.  And he shall be named Oscar.  And so it was decreed.

When it was determined that we could keep our eyes open no longer than it would take us to get back to our crap ass apartment (that at least had a routinely flushed toilet at this point) we hoofed it back to the train and made our way back "home".  The exhaustion, it was immense, and yet we had one more day in that big, beautiful city, and we were going to make the most of it.

Stay tuned for Sunday--there were two solid hours where we sat quietly in a theater, and a two hour marathon of Flip That House, so fear not, the recap will be noticeably shorter!

New York: Part Two The Blister Edition

Sorry for not updating yesterday.  I got distracted by the bright and shiny fall television premieres and spent the better part of the evening updating my DVR and watching celebrities being flung around the dance floor followed up by an hour and a half of connections, soul mates, and roses plus the SEXIEST BACHELOR YET as we were told approximately 67 times throughout the course of the evening.  What does it say about the crop of bachelorettes that I find Jane Seymour, who is well into her fifties, about five frillion times more gorgeous than any of them?  My God that woman has ridiculously good genes.

 

Anyway, I believe when we left our fearless travelers, they had just settled down for their long winter's nap.  Except that it was summer, and I think it was about 8 hours too late in the day to be considered a nap.  Brittany and I had a lot of issues with our apartment, but not enough to keep us from getting a solid night of sleep before we made our way back out onto the bustling streets of New York to find Carolyn at Port Authority.

With the help of big wavy arms and shouts into our cell phones from opposite corners of the intersection, we eventually did all make it onto the same corner just outside Port Authority.  With the bachelorette count up to three, the weekend was officially kicked off.  And this is where our lack of picture taking starts to make me really sad, because the first thing we did was grab lunch at the Coffee-Bar Restaurant, which some of you may have recognized as the sports bar that Carrie and Co. visit in Sex and the City in hopes of discovering an untapped pool of attractive, straight men.  The Coffee-Bar Restaurant is not, in fact, a sports bar in actuality, but is a somewhat overpriced restaurant with herb cheese fries that I would possibly kill for.  They were just that good.

Since it was a party weekend we started things off with some mimosas and then hit a few stores around Union Square before heading over to Chinatown.  Chinatown is a little like Super Shuttle, except without the positive points.  I always say I'll never go back, but then the lure of cheap purses and jewelry lures me in again.  And it's not even like I actually want anything that's for sale.  Honestly, I mean it this time when I say I'm not going back.  For serious!  Unless he tells me he's really, really sorry and I can tell he means it...  Anyway, I did end up buying a cheap fake leather watch that has already lost the glass covering over the watch face, so that was exciting.

In an effort to kill time before Katie's flight came in that evening, we decided we'd head down to Little Italy to find some dessert.  Because it's not like we had just eaten 10,000 calories in cheesy herb fries less than two hours before.  So we found the same little bakery that we fell in mad, passionate love with last July, and drank hot chocolate (It was cold in there!  And we were eating ice cream!) and ate our desserts at what we thought was a leisurely pace, but in reality only killed about 30 minutes.  Why is life always like that?  If I had really needed those 30 minutes they would have flown by in a heart beat.  Stupid time.

So, we asked ourselves, what do you do when you still have hours to fill and a gaping hole in your New York City itinerary?  Visit the Guggenheim?  Head up to the top of the Empire State Building?  Take the ferry out to the Statue of Liberty?  No, my friends, you head to the Museum of Sex.

Oh yeah.

I tell you what.  I learned more about furry animal costumes, balloon popping, and the history of porn that day than I EVER wanted to know.  I also learned that there are people who get all dressed up and play Nurse and Patient, but they don't stop with the costumes.  Oh no, there are surgical implements involved.  And IV bags.  And needles.  Y'all, things stop being fun when someone wants to CUT ME OPEN.

I have titled this one, Making Mom and Dad Proud.

So, that was... an experience.  An utterly bizarre experience that still haunts me and causes me to scrutinize each person I pass on the street.  That one with the patent leather shoes likes to play Nurse.  That one with the furry coat likes to be a giant blue bunny named Luscious.  And that big guy with the bald hair likes to sit in a giant highchair and pee in a diaper.  It's really incredibly disturbing, and I can't turn it off...

Once we left the museum it was getting pretty close to the time that Katie's plane would be arriving, so we headed back to the apartment to wait for her to get in before leaving for dinner.  Except we hadn't heard from Katie yet that day.  And the cell number I had for her had been disconnected.  And all that we knew was that she was flying into JFK... at some point...   About 30 minutes passed beyond her supposed landing time.  And then another 30.  All we could do was sit in the apartment and stare at each other in complete helplessness.  We couldn't leave, because although she had the address, we had the key.  If we left the key with the doorman then she'd have to figure out how to get across the Brooklyn Bridge on her own, and that seemed cruel.  Just at the point when I was reaching the really worried mom stage, my phone rang.  And it was KATIE!!  Who was calling from PENNSYLVANIA!!

Long story short (as if I'm capable) there was a problem on the runway at JFK and they had to divert the flight and had no idea when they'd be getting into NYC.  Dude.  Not cool.  So the Bachelorette Council met and we determined that the Brooklyn Bridge would just have to wait for our next visit, and we would instead eat at an Italian restaurant in Manhattan--I think maybe this one?--that Katie would be able to locate easily on her own whenever her plane landed.

And so with a decision made (yay!) we got ourselves all tarted up and treated ourselves to a cab ride in an effort to protect our delicate little well-heeled feet.  Which turned out to be a good move considering the treatment they would receive later--ah, but no skipping ahead!  We met up with some of Brittany's NYC resident friends and had dinner and wine, but still no Katie.  So we moved on to our next stop, cupcakes at the Sugar Sweet Sunshine bakery.  And still no pictures!  So mad at myself!  This was the cutest little place, and the cupcakes definitely rivaled Magnolia's.  I highly recommend it, and just wish you could bear witness to the sheer joy on my face when I bit into my Ooey Gooey cupcake... sigh...  And this is where Katie at long last entered the picture.

Once we had her in tow, and she'd eaten a Lemon Yummy cupcake that may have possibly been better than my chocolate one (sacrilege!!) we departed for a martini bar that was "just a short walk away."

Ha.  HA I say! 

I think I am not exaggerating a smidge bit when I say that we walked for at least 20 minutes, with a little moment of panic thrown in when we thought we were going the wrong way, before we finally reached our final destination for the night, the Pegu Club.  Oh, and vindication!  I just looked it up on Google Maps--if we walked directly from the bakery to the club in the shortest line possible (which we did not) we would have walked 1.1 miles.  IN THREE INCH STILETTOS!!!   See, no exaggeration.  Zero.  Carrie Bradshaw, my hat is off to you, but if that's what it takes to be a stylish New York woman I do not want to BE you.

Thank the good lord that although there was a $300 bottle minimum to sit at a table, our hostess took pity on us and found a little sofa tucked away that we all crowded around to order our obscenely overpriced drinks and attempt to stay awake.  The drinks were damn good though, I'll give them that much.

And that's how I spent Day 1 of my New York Bachelorette party.  Still having fun?  I'll have the next installment up tomorrow evening, so if you want to hear more about how I ate and drank my way through Manhattan, check back then.  Root beer floats, margaritas, and chocolate brownies with Neopolitan ice cream--plus the Metropolitan Museum of Art tossed in for a little dash of culture!

New York: Part One of Many

Ah New York.  Once upon a time, way back at the end of August, a young bachelorette packed her bags and  traveled to a far off land, full of bright lights, delicious food, expensive drinks, and good friends.  The four days spent in this magical land were packed with laughter and excitement, and even as she became exhausted and her pocket book grew thinner, she still longed to stay forever in this land of Big Apples.  (Though she remained just as perplexed as ever as to how it had come to be known as this "Big Apple" as she did not see one solitary apple in all of her adventures.) Eventually, she returned home, full of stories and new experiences to share, but there was always something more pressing to do, something more important that needed to be taken care of.  Now that nearly a month has passed, this same young bachelorette is cursing herself for not writing down the events of the weekend at a much sooner date and in much greater detail than she could possibly remember now.  And so she decided to sit down and do the best she could and told herself (just as usual) that next time she would do better!

Thursday

After a slight delay, due to packed runways at LaGuardia, my plane touched down in New York around 10:30 at night.  I had decided to come in on Thursday night, since apparently flying all the way across the country and losing three hours to the Time Zone monster takes up most of a day.  I wanted to get started as soon as possible on Friday and this seemed like the best option.  My sister made similar plans and since our planes were landing around the same time we agreed to meet at LaGuardia and split the Super Shuttle to the apartment we'd rented out for the weekend.

Once off the plane, I went to baggage claim to wait for my bag and my sister's phone call... and I waited... and waited...  Eventually Brittany called, and I told her to get her bags, put our names on the list for the shuttle and I'd meet her when my bag arrived.  I waited for the longest, most nerve wracking 45 minutes that I've experienced in quite some time, but finally I saw my lone red bag coming around on the luggage belt, the last little soldier to be deployed.  As my luggage and I were reunited, I took my first non-queasy breath and proceeded to call Brittany to find out where she was waiting.  Of course, the one thing that hadn't occurred to us was that we would be landing in different terminals.  And that LaGuardia is very big.  And you can't just stroll over from Terminal D to Terminal B.

It was already approaching midnight at this point, and the adrenaline rush I'd been counting on, after 4 hours of sleep the night before and traveling for 14 hours, wasn't kicking in yet.  In a dazed state I stood outside of the terminal, asking every bus driver who stopped near me if they were going to Terminal B.  Since the majority did not speak English as a first, or possibly even second language, it was a bit slow going, but eventually I got on the right bus and was dropped off at the proper terminal where my sister was waiting near Ground Transportation.  We later realized that we didn't bother to say hello or have any sort of emotional reunion--we just collapsed in our seats, compared the hellish experiences our various flights were, and waited for the Super Shuttle guy to call our names.

What I've learned after two experiences with the Super Shuttle is that one can only consider the twenty bucks saved, when compared to a cab ride, a bonus if one has 2-3 hours at their disposal and doesn't mind an up close and personal encounter of that length with a city full of irate New York city cabbies and bus drivers.  I feel like I'm stuck in an abusive relationship.  I always say I'm never going back, and then they lure me in with their low fares and classic good looks.

Our tricksy apartment door and the luxurious interior.  (Katie and I had apparently not had our V8 that day)

Anyway, we finally arrived at our apartment in the wee hours of the morning, around 1:30, and got the key from our doorman.  (Ha!  "Our" doorman.)  The lobby seemed nice enough, the elevators were decent, and then we stepped out on the fifth floor and were greeted with a smell somewhere between cat food and sweaty feet.  For those of you who are keeping track, that would be red flag number one.  As utterly exhausted as I was, I didn't have the energy to worry about it at that point, and Brittany stuck the key in the lock and we prepared to enter our humble abode.  Except the key didn't seem to do anything.  Red flag number two.  We tried again, turning the key the other way.  Nothing.  After a few more futile attempts with the key, we moved to a credit card, thinking that maybe the lock was broken.  Proving that our careers would go nowhere on the B&E track, we succeeded only in bending my New York & Company credit card (the most action it's gotten in years) and we were still stuck out in the hallway.  Reaching levels of desperation we proceeded to ring the doorbell and pound on the door, thinking that... okay, I have no idea what we thought that would accomplish, but we were tired.

At some point reason took hold again, and Brittany went downstairs to ask the doorman how the heck we were supposed to actually gain entrance into the apartment.  It was revealed that the trick was to turn the key and push--the knob on the door actually had nothing to do with the door opening process.  See, these are things you should TELL people who have never stayed in your apartment!

I shall digress for a moment to explain that the reason we decided to rent out an apartment for the weekend, rather than staying in a hotel was three-fold.  One, the rate seemed to be much lower than a standard New York hotel, and then when split four ways seemed like an absolute steal.  Two, we also figured that with four to five girls staying in one room, we'd need the extra space, and this apartment was billed as a "Spacious, luxury New York apartment!" and claimed that it could sleep 6-8 people.  And three, it just seemed way more awesome to stay in an apartment than a hotel. Except it turns out the apartment was decorated by a blind donkey with a penchant for quilts, and the "spacious" studio was approximately the size of my living room.  Also, the toilet wasn't flushed when we got there and the furniture was covered in dust.  Consider yourself warned, future New York tourists--the internet is a lying, misleading piece of crap!  Just get yourself a room at the DoubleTree and eat a delicious chocolate chip cookie for me.

Once the excitement of entering the apartment was over, we briefly batted around the idea of going to get something to eat, but instead opted to get some sleep since it was already after two and my alarm was set for 7:30 the next morning.

And I'll pick back up again with Friday morning, and the arrival of the lovely Carolyn in the morning, and the somewhat more entertaining and suspense-filled arrival of Katie that evening.  I'll leave you with this picture of me grinning maniacally by the Bryant Park sign in the subway.  Because as many times as Brittany tried to tell me about all of the other culturally significant events that take place there throughout the year, all I could do anytime I saw this sign was shriek "Project Runway!  Ooooh, I love that show!"