New York (part 2)

Alright, alright! I will finish the post since my inbox has been FLOODED with messages begging me to continue rambling about our trip in excessive detail. You people are insatiable...

Anyway, I was so mad all over again when I was writing about getting bumped from The Daily Show that I forgot to tell you about the "post-blister" part of the evening -- South Pacific!

I have watched Rogers and Hammerstein movies since I was like 4 years old, and South Pacific was one of my very favorites. So when I found out they were reviving it on Broadway this summer, I begged Boone to go. He told me if I could control myself at Target and continue being a subservient housewife he would consider it, so I was on my best behavior for about 23 minutes and then I just ordered tickets online.

We got to the theater and quickly realized we were younger than 95% of the people there which didn't bother us, but seemed to arouse suspicion around us. "You look awfully young to be here," the woman to my right said (like what, I'm really here scoping out which wealthy elderly couple to mug on their way out of Lincoln Center?)

"Thank you," I replied, "but I know every lyric to every song in this show and you'll probably be listening to me sing the whole time."

She looked at me even more suspiciously, and then her husband leaned over and said, "Well which is your favorite song, then?" I'm sure he thought he was catching me in my lie, but then I rattled off about 6 or 7 song titles while explaining what I loved about each of them, and that seemed to surprise and satisfy them.

The play was fantastic, but poor Boone had his knees pressed up against the back of the seat in front of him the whole time and spent most of the next 3 hours trying desperately to get the blood to flow back into his lower legs. I spent it listening to people make endless comments about "Well, in the ORIGINAL show (40+ years ago), they didn't focus so much on the military aspect of the story", and other comparisons that had no relevance but were stated just to brag that you had been there the first time around. Whatever, they were probably way past their bedtimes and a more than a little cranky.

Despite not knowing the story as well as I did and the seating being designed for people under 5'5", Boone had a good time too, and we high-fived each other on the way out for our total coolness in being able to hang with the elderly Jewish theater community in New York City. And this after a night at Shea Stadium sucking down hot dogs! We're versatile and awesome, we know.

So the next day was our actual anniversary, and we decided to wander around Greenich Village and go get some world famous cupcakes from Magnolia Bakery. We completely deserved it after walking over 28,000 steps the previous day, so we grabbed 4 before lunchtime and pigged out.




They were pretty great, but the frosting is piled about 2 inches deep which gets to be a little much in the way of sugar after the first, oh, 3 cupcakes or so. Boone wanted to stop after the first one and carry the rest, but I gave him the "are-you-kidding-do-you-know-me-at-all-after-10-whole-years?" look.

And hey, before you get all judgy, let me also tell you that it was about 85 degrees and super muggy, and who wants to eat cupcakes that have been humidified all day? We had no choice (that sounded better than more cupcakes in my belly), so I took one for the team and polished off the box.

After the rest stop, we ducked into several cute little shops and just meandered through the streets looking at all the cool doors and commenting on how it reminded us of the outside shots of The Cosby Show.


The other fun thing about Greenich was realizing that it was Pride Week while we were there and seeing all the rainbow flags and posters hanging in every window.


This was probably our favorite though:


***I want really badly here to use the whole rainbow theme and "We're not in Kansas/Georgia anymore!" as a brilliant segue into our anniversary evening and seeing Wicked, but then I would have to skip over our dinner at Nobu, and I just can't bring myself to do it (because it's food, duh!). Rest assured that the similarities weren't lost on me.***

So, Nobu. My friend Jeff (from high school days)(who now lives in New York) told me that this was where Boone and I HAD to go for our anniversary dinner, so I made a reservation as soon as they'd let me and we prepared ourselves to be wowed. We were not disappointed, except that Matt Damon wasn't there like he was last time Jeff went. It's not that I am in love with Matt Damon -- it's that I am in love with Jason Bourne, who is played by Matt Damon. Sigh.

We were trying to act all casual at first, like we regularly eat meals that are this upscale in Grovetown, GA. But then we just starting laughing at ourselves and our sheer panic when we realized there were only chopsticks on the table and nobody else was using silverware. Oh, and we had no clue what to order, which is a little more of a concern when you are facing a menu with $32 appetizers -- you can't afford to make mistakes. So we swallowed our pride and said to our server, "Look, we haven't ever been here before, but we love to eat. What would you get if you were eating here?"

Having the server order for us turned out to be a great plan more than once on our trip. We got 5 dishes and a dessert, and they were all absolutely outstanding. I think I could eat the rock shrimp tempura and the black cod in miso every day for the rest of my life. Seriously, everything just melted in our mouths and Boone and I struggled to not look too stunned by the deliciousness of what we were eating and the miracle of our adequate chopsticks use -- you know, to keep the whole casual thing going. We had someone take a picture of us in front of the restaurant after we finished, but I look about 5 months pregnant in it (can you say food baby?) so I refuse to post it.

After Nobu we hopped on a subway up to the theater district to see Wicked, which I had heard was life-changingly good from several people. I snapped this contraband photo before the show began since my theme this trip seemed to be "Break the law!"


It was fan-freaking-tastic, and I'm glad this photo is far enough away that you can't see how splotchy my face is from sobbing my head off at the end. I would recommend avoiding Wicked if you are a girl who has had one of your best friends move away within a week of the show (thanks alot, Emma). Other than that, beg, borrow, or steal to get there. That's all I'm gonna say. Okay, that and "Sorry I told you the entire plot and made you watch bootlegged YouTube videos of my favorite numbers, Mom".

Moving on, we grabbed cheesecake after the show and scarfed down as much of it as we could back in the hotel room. The pieces are ginormous enough that they cost something like $9 a piece, so we couldn't finish our second dessert in one sitting.


We were okay with eating it again the next day, maybe right after working out in the morning.

Alright, and maybe after the cheesecake we went down to Little Italy and got gelato at Ferraro's, which apparently has been there since 1890. That's what the napkin said, so it must be true.



We were too full from cheesecake and gelato to eat real food in Little Italy, so we just wandered around until we found our appetites again. We happened to be back up in Little India by then so we popped into some crazy Bollywood themed Indian place that had Bollywood movie stars plastered on the wall and a Bollywood movie blaring on the flat screen in the corner. Boone made sure to ask the server, "Hey, which of these chicks is the one Richard Gere kissed?" (She pointed, and Boone nodded approvingly.)


Now that you know what it HAD (Bollywood everything), let me tell you what it didn't have: Diet Coke syrup in palatable amounts. When we told them politely that the Diet Coke was mostly soda water, the owner sent our waitress across the street to buy us individual cans! We felt kind of bad, but we hadn't been demanding or anything, so we chugged it down gratefully. Once again, we had our server pick our food, which still worked out but not quite as well as it had at Nobu. She seemed to think this was cool though and ran across the street a second time for more cans when our Cokes got low. When we told her we were in New York celebrating our anniversary, she brought out a dessert on the house. It was a good thing too, as we had only had two desserts so far that day, and it WAS nearly 4:00 pm.

We went back to the hotel and changed since our clothes now smelled like sweat, curry, and... well...like you need a third reason to change after those two?

Anyway, we had tickets to see Eddie Izzard (a comedian, if you don't know) at Radio City Music Hall.

It was extremely funny (especially if you aren't all that impressed with President Bush:) and we had another great night hanging out together kid-free. (Am I seriously still typing about New York?)

The next day we had just a few hours to kill before heading back to real life, so we wandered around Central Park for a bit...

...grabbed some fat New York pizza for lunch...


...and walked back to the hotel for the last time to grab our bags and hail a cab to LaGuardia. On the way to the airport, we flipped through all our pictures, told ourselves how totally awesome we are, and made a date to come back for our 15th anniversary. I know, I know, how will you survive 5 whole years?


P.S. Big huge thanks to my wonderful mom who stayed with our rugrats for 5 whole days while we were gone! She did a great job and only managed to get locked out of the house once! I can't even describe how rewarding it is to watch other people struggle with your kids -- probably about as rewarding as watching your grown children come unglued about their own kids, eh Mom?