New York, New York!

It finally happened!!! I've waited for this for most of my life. (Before I say any more, I have to tell you that this may go down in the Guiness Book of World Records as the longest blog in the history of the world. So if you just want to skim through the pictures, or take a break in the middle, fall asleep, or even just stop looking at it, I will completely understand. Since I haven't scrapbooked in almost a year, and our wedding album isn't even done, this is basically the only thing I am doing to keep memories. So this blog is more for me than anyone else.) Back to the story... One day, Josh was talking to me and (I thought) hypothetically asked me if I would rather go to Hawaii or New York. You may think I'm crazy, but I've always wanted to go to New York, so that was my pick. Then one thing led to another, and Josh and I and my parents decided to go to New York, the biggest reason being that this is the last year in Yankee Stadium. Josh said it was also as a graduation present for himself.
These first few pictures are of us on the tour bus, which was actually one of my favorite parts of the trip, just because we got to see most of the city, and it was one of the only times on the trip that we were actually sitting down. (I think we walked an average of 5 miles a day (or it seemed like it.) in 90 degree weather with 1000 percent humidity.

Also, one of my favorite parts was Central Park, and we actually spent a good amount of time there even though I only have a couple pictures. For anyone who hasn't been there, it is AMAZING!!!! It's huge, and inside the park, there is a lake (which is not the picture below, the lake was much bigger) a water park, several playgrounds, tons and tons of trees. And the best part is there are no cars, so the whole thing is bike and running paths. I was so jealous!

This was called Shakespearan Garden, and was also inside Central Park. This picture does not even come close to doing it justice. It was completely covered in tons of flowers and was so pretty!

The first day we were there, after going to Central Park, we went to the Empire State Building, which was cool, but honestly if you've been to the top of any tall building, it was pretty much the same. The pictures make it look very hazy, and it was a little, but I didn't think it was this bad.



Then we went to FAO Schwarz, which for those who don't know is a giant toy store, and was in the movie Big with Tom Hanks.

This is Josh wearing some kind of Harry Potter hat. (I don't know the movies that well, so I don't know the significance.)
If you've ever seen Big, this is the piano that they play in the movie, and basically the biggest reason we wanted to go to the store in the first place. My mom and I tried to play Chopsticks, but there were too many dang kids around.

If you can't tell, these Harry Potter people are made entirely of Legos (again, I couldn't tell you who they are.)
Just so you know, when you go to New York, you feel like you're right in the middle of a movie, because SO much is filmed there. So this bull, you may recognize this bull from a scene in Hitch. Josh told me that the point of the bull is to signify the many years of the bull market economy that America has endured. When you see it, you know you're on Wall Street. I just know movies!

The second day we were there, we went to the Statue of Liberty, and Ellis Island. Again, it was cool, but basically exactly how you think it would be. All I could think about was how blasted hot I was.
This is the New York skyline from the ferry.

This is the Ellis Island building from the front. One of the things that I liked the most about New York, is that they don't just build buildings...everything is like an architectural masterpiece, and you'll see that more in later pictures.

Finally, on Friday, after years of waiting, I got to see Times Square!!!! Then again on Saturday, and Sunday, and Monday, and Tuesday. But I loved it! There were so many people, and it was so hot, and I thought my legs might not work by the end of the day, but I loved it. One thing that stuck out to me about Times Square is that you always hear about New Yorkers having a specific attitude and you can kind of see it in the movies, but literally in New York, no one cares about what anyone else is doing. Pedestrians cross the street whenever they dang well please whether it's in the middle of traffic or not, and drivers could care less whether they hit a pedestrian. If the light is green they go full speed ahead. And forget traffic lanes, cars move wherever they want to get where they're going. It's a very fast-paced lifestyle.

This is me saying YEA!!!! I finally arrived!!

For anyone who has traveled with me before, you may know that I love the store Brookstone, and have spent many hours there testing the massage chairs. Sadly, these ones were monitored by the employees pretty well, so we only got about 15 minutes.
On Saturday we went to see the musical Grease on broadway, which, of course, I loved! And Josh was happy because we got to see Taylor Hicks (who was the American Idol a couple years ago.) Josh doesn't like him or anything, but I think it just made it a little more entertaining for him.

And on Monday, Josh got his wish. He waited patiently all week, and was so nervous that the game was going to get rained out, but we finally got there. And Yankee Stadium didn't disappoint. The Yankees won 12 to 3 against the Twins. A Rod, Derek Jeter, and Robinson Canoe all hit homeruns, and the weather was perfect. The only bad thing was that we didn't get to see Monument Park (which is basically a memorial of all the legends in Yankee Stadium, like Babe Ruth, Lou Gehrig etc.) But I guess that just means that we'll have to go again when the new stadium is built, which is perfectly fine with me!



The All-Star was the week before we left, so throughout the city, they had Statue of Liberties dressed up in all the different teams colors. So this is the Yankee one.

Okay, this picture looks like basically nothing, I know, but it's the Brooklyn Bridge. The significance is that when I was in 8th grade, I went to Las Vegas with a couple of my friends. By then, my fetish with New York City had already begun, and when we were walking down the strip, I had to take several pictures of the hotel New York, New York. Specifically, I took a picture of me standing on the Brooklyn Bridge, and I remember thinking that someday I would be at the real one. I never actually stood on the Brooklyn Bridge, but this was close enough.
After a series of misfortunate events on Friday, we ended up in Little Italy, which was a lot of fun, so we were happy about the way things ended up.

These next pictures are just things that we saw as we went around the city. Again, the architecture is amazing.

The Metropolitan Museum of Art. We spared Josh the agony of ever going inside a museum of modern art while we were there.
The Guggenheim, built by Frank Lloyd Wright.
Madison Square Garden where the Knicks play.

The Flatiron building.
Rockefeller Center where they ice skate in all the movies.
Radio City Music Hall
Ground Zero
Ground Zero again


Warning: The next pictures illustrate what too many hours on mass transit may do to you. We stayed in Newark, New Jersey because it was cheaper than staying in New York, and only about 6 miles from the city. However, what we didn't know was that it is very expensive to go from Newark to the city, so we had to be very creative. If you can believe it, this is what our daily routine ended up being... Take the shuttle from the hotel to the airport, get on the air train at the airport to get to the right terminal, from the terminal we took a New Jersey bus to the New Jersey transit station. At the station we got on a train to a New York station, from there we could get on the subway and go to our final destination. That process ended up taking anywhere from 1 1/2 to 2 1/2 hours depending on the day, but it saved us money.

These last two, are more pictures of really cool architecture.

And that completes the longest blog ever! You should just be happy that I limited it only to the pictures that Josh and I took, and not the ones on my mom's camera like I thought about doing. The moral of this blog is that I absolutely loved New York City! It was even better than I thought it was going to be, even though it was so hot, we spent too many hours on mass transit with strangers, I've never been crowded by so many people in my life, and heard so many different languages spoken at the same time. But I loved it! I can't wait to go back, and I'm trying to talk Josh into moving there (not forever, just for a couple years), but at the time, it doesn't seem that he can be convinced. (But I can be pretty persistant when I want to be.)

Happy 4th of July (cont.)

Okay, I had to stop my posting in the middle, because I was so frustrated, and it wasn't working, so sorry that the last one was kind of random, and now I have a lot of the same pictures again, but I don't care. If this doesn't work this time, I think I might swear off blogging forever! (And these are out of order, I know that you don't care, but it bugs me). Like I said, I'm still kind of testing this whole blogging thing out.
The picture in front of the statue is in the Sculptor's Studio at Mount Rushmore. This is what Mount Rushmore was supposed to end up looking like, but the guy who was doing it died before it was completely finished. I thought it was cool though because this statue has down to like their stomachs and the mountain just has their faces. Some of you may ask who is standing next to me... That's Josh's brother. He's single so he was my stand-in husband for this picture!




This is a picture of Josh and I at the walkway leading to Mount Rushmore. You can't tell but the mountain is behind us.


















Mount Rushmore itself.














I said this on the last blog, but these are pictures of Josh and I pushing handcarts at Martin's Cove. We stopped there on the way to South Dakota, the day before we went to Mount Rushmore. (Like I said, the pictures are out of order.)
Ah! I just deleted the picture of Josh and I, and I don't know how to get it back. (You can look at the other blog for that.)








This is me wearing a Junior Ranger's hat at this windcaves National Park we went to AFTER we went to Mount Rushmore.
We went to Crazy Horse right after we went to Mount Rushmore, and it was pretty much a huge disappointment. We felt like we got ripped off because we paid like 3 times as much to get in, but the carving isn't even close to being done. But here's a picture of the whole fam at Crazy Horse. (For all those who don't know, (because I didn't) Crazy Horse is a carving that an indian tribe is doing in honor of Chief Crazy Horse. They started it like 60 years ago, and it's still not finished yet. Just for the record, it took 14 years to complete Mount Rushmore.)
This is me standing next to a statue of what Crazy Horse will look like eventually. (Probably not in our lifetimes, but maybe someday.) You can barely see the mountain in the background, and so far, they've carved his head, and started his arm-no horse yet.
There's the closest picture that we got of Crazy Horse, because you had to PAY to ride a bus to get any closer, and since we already felt that we had been taken, we weren't about to give them even more money!
Oops! And here's the whole family at Mount Rushmore again!
On Saturday night, we went to Sturgis, South Dakota, which, (I learned) is where the biggest motorcycle rally in the world is held every year. Josh and his brothers were pretty excited, but for me there pretty much wasn't anything worth taking pictures of. It's a pretty old, run down town, and a lot of the stores and stuff are closed all year except during the rally. So we went for long enough for Josh's family to spend about $600 on motorcycle leather, and then we left. At least we can say we've been there!

On Sunday before leaving we stopped at a Mammoth exhibit. In the 70's a man was digging holes because he was going to start building a subdivision, and noticed some bones. As it turns out, there was a sink hole a long, long, long, long time ago, and some Mammoths got stuck in it, couldn't get out, and now there's an exhibit with a bunch of Woolly and Columbian Mammoth bones. They're not done digging-they work on it about 7 weeks a year, and the rest of the time tourists can go through the exhibit. It sounds random, but it was actually pretty cool.



They had several groups going through the exhibit at a time, so the tour guides talk to their group on individual phones-thus, the picture with me on the phone. The picture with Josh and his mom shows how big a Columbian Mammoth is compared to Josh. (Josh is 6 feet.)

Then we drove home, and it was a very long drive, but it was a lot of fun, and I don't know if we ever would have planned a trip to see Mount Rushmore, so I was glad that we took this opportunity! Happy 4th!