With a super busy fiance, I recently made up my mind to stop planning my life around softball schedules and make some plans of my own. So when a high school friend invited me to NYC for the weekend, I decided to hop on board without feeling guilty about leaving my main man behind.
We were only staying for one night so we got up super early Saturday morning and headed up so we could get the full day in the city. Five of us girls in the car, super psyched, trucking it up the New Jersey Turnpike, until....
the car breaks down. Whomp whomp.
It started with an acceleration issue and ended with me calling AAA for a tow because it wouldn’t start back up altogether. Turns out AAA wouldn’t even come because it’s a restricted road, so the patrol had to call one of their own people. Now I have tales of New Jersey Devil horror stories dancing around in my head and how my dad had me convinced that this part of New Jersey was like the freaking Bermuda Triangle where strange things happened and people disappeared without a trace for no reason. Nobody else had any idea what I was referring to, but I swear it’s an actual legend and my heart was racing in anticipation of a sighting. Anyway, the tow truck actually showed and the driver’s name was Bill. He saved us.
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| Exiting the vehicle. |
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| Boooooo :( |
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| The girls sitting in the back of the tow truck! |
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| Bill is pushing it onto the ramp. |
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| Here we are with Bill. |
After arriving at the shop and waiting for numerous 10 minute intervals (i.e. 6 hours), we got back on the road and made it to NY in time to get ready for a late dinner and the night on the town.
I have to say, I was completely amazed at how positive our group remained through the entire process. The conversation included comments such as,
“Thank goodness we had the windows rolled down when the car stopped.”
“At least it’s not raining. It’s so nice outside.”
“It could have been so much worse. We could have gotten in an accident.”
“It’s so lucky this happened when there were other people with you.”
“Nothing happens until late in the city anyway!”
“We should really send them a thank you note.”
Upon arrival, we ate brick oven pizza with a bottle of wine and then made our way over to Pod 39, an adorable rooftop bar with an amazing view. I could have stayed there all night if I wasn’t in a city with 5,391,297 other places to discover.
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| Our hotel. |
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| New friends at dinner! |
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| Pod 39. |
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| Our view. |
Next stop was Hudson Station, a sports bar that was totally un-crowded at this hour, but playing loud pump-you-up music and included several rounds of free shots. We had a blast! If you’re ever in New York for a game day, I would totally recommend this spot! Around 2:30, the owner tried to convince us to go to a club. Apparently this is what they do at this time. We totally could not hang with this schedule though and were more than excited to get into bed after our long adventure of a day.
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| Fireball. It's everywhere. |
On Sunday, we got up for an express city shopping trip. I was so relieved to make it in and out of Canal Street with everything I had come for in less than hour. We saw Central Park. We walked down 5th Avenue and were surprised to find the Pulaski Day Parade going on at the same time. I was shocked by how huge it was. Such an amazing sight to see!
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| Picking up some Italian cookies. Yum! |
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| Central Park |
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| Pulaski Day Parade |
We had to drive through Times Square to get to the tunnel, and honestly there’s nothing else to do there besides look from the outside unless you’re into buying a lifetime supply of M&Ms or a 50 lb. Hershey bar, so it worked out just fine with me.
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| Car window photo! |
After an exhausting 36 hours, I don’t think I’ve ever been more happy to see my bed and sleep for 9 straight hours. Take that as a sign of a successful trip.
Oh yea.... and there was this cat in a convenience store :)
Now, time to get back to the grind! Four days ‘til the next weekend!
haha sounds like something that would happen to me.
ReplyDeletewhat an awesome little trip!!