NYC 2010 - Day 5

Well my trip to NYC is complete. Day 5 started out late as we had to wait to have our luggage picked up (or so we thought) to be checked with the hotel while we had a few more hours out in the big city. So after we got that taken care of, we decided to spend the rainy day inside at the Museum of Modern Art. When we first arrived there was a line around the corner...I guess everyone had our same idea...but the line actually moved quickly and we made it inside after about a 20 minute wait. We saw lots of great artwork and probably could have spent a few more hours in there.

After the museum we went and had a slice of pizza and then went back to the hotel to start getting everything together to head to the airport. So about 5pm we were finally off to the airport. Once we got there we actually made it to check in and thru security pretty quickly. Now I was incredibly surprised that there was not very many food options once you got to the gates. I mean hello...so many large flights go out of LGA and you expect people to be full on just a pretzel as they wait for 2 hours for their flight and then 4 hours in the air?! Craziness! Then as I sit at the gate and wait for the plane to arrive, I figured I would get on the laptop and go ahead and upload my pics...not so much! You have to freaking pay for wifi at the freakin airport. Are you kidding me?! You want me to pay $15 for wifi for an hour? I think not! So I start entertaining myself by playing computer games and as I do, the plane delays begin. Our plane must have been delayed from where ever it was coming in from, because it showed up to the airport an hour late. Then of course they had to de-board, clean the plane, and then we were finally able to board the plane. By this time we are 45 min past the time that we were originally scheduled to take off. We finally get on the plane and they begin to back out of the gate when we immediately stopped. We wait at the gate for another 20 min. Finally they come over the speaker and let us know that they had phone issues and finally had that fixed and we should be taking off shortly. Well of course by this time we have completely lost our place in line, so we waiting on the tarmac for about 45 min. Finally an hour and a half past the time that we were originally scheduled to leave we are up in the air. We had a pretty bumpy flight at first, and my poor mom gets really scared when there is turbulence. So I held her hand (as she pretty much ripped mine off) until we got thru it. It was smooth sailing...flying...after that! I've always loved flying and I always have so much fun looking out the window and looking at the different things in the sky. Last night I got to watch the lightening in the clouds which I thought was pretty cool. Finally 4 hours later...we are home in Dallas!!! I was so exhausted (and hungry) but so incredibly excited to be home!!!

Overall I had a wonderful trip and I had so much fun with my mom. I can't wait to go on our next trip and I can tell you I will never wait 2 years between vacations again!!!

NYC 2010 - Day 4

So we spent day 4 shopping until we dropped...literally! Manhattan Mall, Herald Square, H&M (my favorite place), and of course Macy's. We then had to hit up the souvenir shops on the way back to the hotel. After our shopping adventure we headed back to the hotel for a little R&R.

Tonight we headed to Lindy's for dinner before seeing Promises, Promises staring Sean Hays & Kristin Chenoweth. I've always liked this show and I think even though Sean is not the strongest singer, he definitely keeps the audience's attention with his wonderful comedic acting skills. Kristin looked and sang beautifully as always, and I have to admit that I love that she still mentions OCU in her bio after all of these years! I had another friend, Kristen Williams, who was in the show as well, and she did a fabulous job! This show opens tomorrow night, and I wish the entire cast the best of luck. I know it will be a show that will pack the house for quite some time!

Well we are back at the hotel and are going to watch SNL. Hope everyone had a wonderful and safe Saturday!

NYC 2010 - Day 3

Well I just ended day #3 in the big apple! Today was a quiet day, but still filled with lots to see. We didn't get up and out of the hotel until about 10:30am, so we of course had to start out with breakfast at the deli across the street, and then we headed down to buy tickets for a show tonight. We started out trying to get tickets to The Addams Family. Well they only had 2 tickets left for tonight's performance which was wonderful...but they were $300+ each...not so wonderful! So we of course immediately decided that we did not need to see that show and headed over to the St. James Theatre to get tickets for tonight's performance of American Idiot.

After getting show tickets we headed down to Chelsea to the Ground Zero Museum Workshop. All I can say is amazing! The museum is a collection of pictures from the official photographer of Ground Zero, Gary Marlon Suson. The museum itself was not much bigger than 1100 square feet, but had hundreds of photographs and artifacts from September 11th. There is a self guided tour where you can go from picture to picture (or artifact) enter the number and get the story of that piece as narrated by Mr. Suson himself. It was a very emotional tour, but one that I would definitely suggest to anyone who goes to visit NYC or anyone who currently lives there.

After the museum we headed back to the hotel for a little rest time. We then headed out to dinner at a very nice Italian restaurant (wish I could remember the name of it!). After dinner there was about an hour before the show started, so we decided to got sit in Times Square for a while. I really think I could sit in Times Square for several hours at a time. Such a great place to people watch!

Then we were off to see American Idiot. I thought it was a fabulous show! Of course I loved the music of Green Day, but thought it had a great storyline as well. The cast was extremely energetic and has to be so incredibly tired after running and jumping around that stage for an little over an hour and a half. I really think this show can really bring out a whole new following to Broadway.

On our way back to the hotel, we had to stop and get some dessert, so we stopped at Crumbs. Can we say yummy?! Highly recommend these tasty treats if you're ever here. We hit the one at 8th & 53rd.

Well I think I'm going to try to catch up on some sleep. Thanks for checking in, and make sure to check in again tomorrow night!

NYC 2010 - Day 2

Ok, so I'm finally getting to blog about Day 2. We had a pretty fun day yesterday. Started out with breakfast at this little deli across the street from our hotel, we of course had to have a bagel with cream cheese...I mean you can't come to NY and not! We then decided to go ahead and do one of those double decker bus tours thru downtown. I haven't done one of these since I was a sophomore in high school, so it was actually pretty entertaining. (Side note: When I came here as a sophomore I came with my HS choir. It was my first trip to NYC and I of course took a ton of pics. Well when I came home to get them developed...let us not forget, that was pre digital camera days...I took them to Eckerds and they freakin lost them! So I felt like this bus tour was my opportunity to make up not ever getting those pics.) We went past Macy's, Madison Square Garden, The Empire State Building, Flat Iron Building, Greenwich Village, SoHo, NoHo, China Town, Battery Park, Little Italy, the Brooklyn Bridge...etc etc. This was one of those tours where you can hop on hop off...but we decided just to sit along for the ride since we have actually seen/walked thru all of these places before. It was perfect weather outside, and we had a very entertaining tour guide. He definitely gave us the typical "forget about it" and "only in NY" lines several times. We hit some traffic heading down Broadway past the Empire State building due to the President being in town speaking to some of the folks on wall street, and unfortunately mom and I had to listen to these two annoying ladies sitting behind us for about 45 minutes. Luckily they got off at Battery Park because I was about ready to turn around and slap them if I heard them say "what did he say" one more time. Shut up ladies and you will hear what he has to say!!!

After our bus tour we had lunch just down the street from the hotel, then mom came back to the hotel to rest, while I waited in line at tkts. Now my adventure at tkts was one that was definitely enjoyable. I love the people that get hired to hand out flyer's to the tourists about the Broadway shows as they stand in line at tkts. They walk around giving their last pitch to try to convince you to go see the show that they are promoting as you wait to buy your tickets for whatever show you plan to go see that night. You have the promo people who are loud and are absolutely perfect for the part, then the ones who walk by and you would not even know they were there unless you were looking at them (side note: I would fire these people because they are worthless at promoting the shows) and then you have those who want to be in the show so badly that they start busting out in to song and dance. These are the most entertaining for many reasons, one...they have obviously seen the show so many times that they have memorized the choreography, two...they think they have amazing voices, and three...they are clearly not in the show yet everyone in line thinks they are because they are "in costume". NO THEY ARE NOT! Do you seriously think someone that is performing in a Broadway show would stand outside for 5 hours prior to the show to hand out flyer's?! NO!!! Not to mention, do you think a true dancer would wear their character shoes out in Times Square?! NO!!! (Side note: obviously the dancers wear them outside during the Macy's Thanksgiving Day parade...but I sure as hell wouldn't wear my expensive dance shoes outside just for the fun of it!) So after standing in line for a little over an hour, watching the fun promo people, and crazy foreign tourists taking pictures of people they don't even know, I got our tickets to In the Heights!

After my tkts adventure, I felt the need to walk down to Radio City Music Hall to see the set up for the NFL Draft. Now most people going over that way were actually interested in the draft itself...me on the other hand, I am interested in the set up/behind the scenes stuff. I walked right up to the step and repeat area, looked around, and took some pictures for about 20 minutes before people started to realize that I didn't have any credentials on me. Whoops! (HA!!!) So after they shooed me away, I headed back to the hotel to freshen up for the show.

Then we headed to see In the Heights. I knew the background on the show and have the soundtrack, but I was still so excited to see the show. It's a pretty fun upbeat show with some reality of what goes on in Washington Heights. I was very happy with the show and thought that the cast did a wonderful job. It is always fun to see an OCU alumni up on the stage as well! (Congrats Gabrielle Ruiz!)

So that's it in a nutshell folks! 3 more days of NYC blogging to come!

NYC 2010 - Day 1

OK, so I'm going to give this blogging thing a try. I figure no better time to start than when you're on vacation!

So today my mom and I made our way to NYC! Our day started out extremely early...about 2:30am central time. Got up and ready, last minute packing, and made our way to the airport. Our flight was scheduled to leave at 6:05am, so of course they request that you get there two hours early. Well just a little heads up for anyone who takes early morning flights...the ticket counters do not open until 4:30am! That would have been nice to know ahead of time...I mean hello...I could have used that extra 30 minutes of sleep! (Side note: I actually only had about one hour of sleep last night. I wasn't tired at all and finally feel asleep around 1:30am!) So here we are at the airport getting ready to check in at the self check ticket area and we realize that this Sharon Carr travel group that we are with...well they didn't put any reservation number in our paperwork, so that of course makes it a little difficult to check in. Luckily, you can also swipe your credit card on the machine and it will pull up your name and then pull up your reservation. Well this is good for all of you who are lucky enough to actually go by your first name. For those of us like myself who have had the difficulties of going by their middle name (if you only knew how many times I've had to say...well that is my first name, but I go by Rachel. And then they stand there and look at you like you're stupid. Yes dude...I realize Rachel is not short for *insert first name here*!) this whole swiping your credit card doesn't really work for me. My credit card has Rachel on it and my reservation has my first name since it has to match your id. Well needless to say, I then learn that the American Airlines is now requiring that you have that reservation number and they will not pull up your reservation by just having your id. So, since mom and I were on the same reservation, I was able to take the reservation number off of her boarding pass and finally pull up my reservation that way. Craziness happening all before 5am! So we get checked in, make it thru security, and chill at the gate for a while. Finally board the plane and by 6:05am we are off to NYC!

We arrive in NYC around 10:15am eastern time. I am so freaking excited to be back in this city! I don't think I could ever live here, but I definitely can not go 8 years between visits ever again. So once we arrive at LGA, we grab out luggage and wait for the rest of the group, and then we wait for this so called "group leader" to call for the bus to the hotel. OK, now let me give a little warning about this "group leader". This lady apparently does not work for Sharon Carr, however she has been put in charge of the group to get everyone to and from the airport to the hotel and then checked in at the hotel. Well let me just say that I am going to make an educated guess that this lady has never been to NYC before, so needless to say this causes a little more drama. She apparently has called for the bus, but like a true tourist, has no idea where to pick it up at. So mom and I are standing at the back of the group and me staying true to my nature I'm standing there telling my mom that we are not standing in the right spot at all. After standing there for about 20 min (side note: we could have already been half way to the hotel by this time if I was in charge!) they finally figure out that we are standing in the taxi and hotel shuttle line and that the bus that we need is not going to come thru there. (NO SHIT!) So we finally get on the bus and start heading to the hotel. Now this "group leader" gets even more stupid as we keep going. Now most people who travel in groups know that it is always a good idea that while you are on your way to the hotel, to go ahead and call them to let them know that you are on your way there to check in. Yeah no...not this lady! We arrive at the hotel un-load the bus and the "group leader" gets off and just goes right in side before grabbing her luggage. She just leaves it there! Hello lady...in NYC that means you are just begging for someone to come and steal it! Luckily there was another lady in the group that was way nicer than I and took the "group leader's" bag in to the hotel with her. So now we are in the hotel lobby waiting to get checked in. Reminder: "group leader" did not call ahead of time. So here we are around lunch time in NYC, one of the busiest times of day at a hotel in general with event groups letting out for lunch and several other people checking in and out of the hotel...we wait there for a good 30 minutes before we finally get our room keys. Needless to say as soon as mom and I grabbed our keys we were off and we haven't seen the "group leader" or group since! (This is not a full guided group trip, so we got the group price for airfare and hotel, but luckily we are on our own while we are actually in NYC.)

So then mom and I head up to our room throw everything down and immediately head to the closest deli for lunch...we were starving! We walked across the street and went to the Stage Delicatessen & Restaurant for an amazing half sandwich and mom also had some soup. After we finally ate and were no longer potentially dying from starvation, we walked around the Times Square area. Since we had such an early morning today, we decided to come back to the hotel, take a little nap (it is vacation after all!), then we got up went to dinner at Ellen's Stardust Diner. A cute 50's themed diner complete with the wait staff dressed in 50's attire and they entertain you with their singing talents while you eat. Pretty cute little dinner and show...especially when you're just to tired to even want to think about doing anything else. Oh and we had this amazing Strawberry Shortcake dessert...huge...but the perfect way to end a nice meal. After dinner we walked around Times Square, went to the Hershey's store (you smell the chocolate as soon as you walk in!) bought some Hershey's Kisses with Mauna Loa Macadamia Nuts...ummm why don't they have these at home?!

So now we are calling it an early night! We have our day planned for tomorrow (I would tell you now, but I don't want to spoil tomorrow's blog! HA!) and have agreed to set no alarms while we are here. Just wake up and fly by the seat of our pants...perfect way to spend 5 days in NYC!

I am extremely excited to spend these 5 days with my mom and hoping that we will get to have lots of fun and no thoughts about work until we return!

Hope everyone has enjoyed this first entry to my blog, and I can see lots of crazy blogging madness in the future!