NEW YORK, NEW YORK – A Wonderful Town!

I tried posting pictures from yesterday’s outing, but Blogger isn’t downloading them for some reason. Also, spell check isn’t working so read at your own risk (all you editor types).

The girl and I went to New York yesterday. Just got up and went. How great that we live close enough to do something like that.

We drove up the New Jersey Turnpike to Weehawken, NJ, and caught the ferry over to mid-town Manhattan. Just like we knew what we were doing. One of the highlights of the entire day was when the Manhattan skyline came into view and Katie glimpsed it for the very first time. I wish I could have gotten a picture.

The beauty of the ferry is that it only costs $12.00 round trip for an adult and $6.00 round trip for a 12-year-old. When you land in Manhattan they then have free busses that take you just about anywhere in the city you’re wanting to go. So it’s very economical.

We got off the bus near Rockefeller Center. They’ve put up the tree, but it hasn’t been decorated yet. There’s scaffolding all around it and it looks more like a giant, crated tree right now. They won’t light it until the 29th of November.

After that we went to the American Girl Store. That place is a trip! It’s four stories with not only all their products for sale, but a doll hospital, a theater, a cafe and coat check. It’s the kind of place a girl could easily spend the entire day at.

From there we went to the Disney Store. Katie, being the good sister she is, bought Taylor a magnet. I, being the selfish person I am, bought myself a CD. An Aly and AJ CD. There. I admitted it. I bought myself a teenybopper CD. And I thoroughly enjoyed it on the way home.

Then it was on to FAO Schwarz. Are you starting to sense a theme here? The piano show had just started when we walked in. What a treat. If you don’t know, that’s the big piano Tom Hanks and Robert Loggia danced on in the movie BIG. The show we saw included Chopsticks; Heart and Soul; Jesu, Joy of Man’s Desiring; and The Entertainer. How they didn’t trip all over themselves is beyond me.

By this time we were hungry so we headed into Central Park and bought scrumptuals from a vendor so we could keep going. We wandered and meandered and traipsed and ambled and made it as far up as Bethesda Terrace. Getting a bit pooped and knowing we still had Toys R Us to hit, we decided to cut for the subway. But before we did, we saw a hubbub on a nearby hill. So we went to see what was going on. They were filming a movie!! Factory Girl with Sienna Miller and Guy Pierce – both of whom we saw from a distance!! Jimmy Fallon was supposed to show up any minute, but Katie doesn’t have a clue who he is and wasn’t interested. Besides, we had cheesecake on our minds.

We made it out of the park and down to the subway. I had to figure out which way we were supposed to go so I started singing that song from “On the Town”. You know the one. “The Bronx us up and the Battery’s down and New Yorkers ride in a hole in the ground.” Then I knew we didn’t want to go toward the Bronx. Hey. Whatever works.

The next stop was Maxie’s for real New York Cheesecake. It was quite a nice respite from the cold for our achy feet!

After a bit of reviving sustinence we headed down a few more blocks to Toys R Us Timesquare. Holy Moly! The place was like Disneyland. What a fun store.

Finally, we headed back to American Girl so Katie could make a purchase. She bought two dresses for one of her dolls and that was that. We popped through Rockefeller Plaza again – this time it was lit up nicely – and out onto 47th Street where a ferry bus just happened to be pulling out. So I jumped into the middle of the street and flagged it down before it could get too far. Felt just like a real New Yorker at that moment.

By the time we got home, about 8:45 or so, walking was a definite chore. But it was so worth it. And since we can go back at any time, we only saw the stores Katie wanted to see. Such fun!