Christmas in NYC: Day 1

The day started VERY early. I went to bed last night around 1:00 am this morning. About 10 minutes after that (which the prep for going to bed included completely changing suitcases at the last minute) my mom comes in and has decided that her hanging bag is not going to work and, in true Newton fashion, is going to Walmart to get a new suitcase. Needless to say I did not go.

My alarm went off promptly at 4:30 am...I hit snooze until just after 5:00. We headed to the airport around 5:30 for our 7:30 flight. After driving in circles in the parking garage we finally found a parking place and inside Will Rogers World Airport I figured out how to "check in" on facebook. I may be abusing that privilege now. :)

We get checked in and get boarding passes and make it to Security. Oh the good ol' TSA. I was nice as can be and very friendly and made it through with flying colors. My mom, on the other hand, was stuck in "the pit." She had a wrist brace with a metal insert and got stuck. So I hung out and met a nice man from Long Island and chatted until she got back.

Onto the plane. Our flight left at 7:30, or that's what it said on the ticket. We were in the air promptly at 7:20. At least we were early. The flight from OKC to DFW was only about 30 minutes, so not too much time to have anything happen. When we touched down in Dallas and were getting off the plane I saw the guy in front of me was reading a book:

I am as liberal and progressive as the next person, but I would be lying if I said that this didn't kind of sort of freak me out, just a little bit. No idea what the book is actually about, but I just saw the cover and read it and well, if ti was me, I wouldn't have read it on a US flight, but, again, that's just me.

In Dallas it became rapidly clear that my little cough from yesterday is developing into bronchitis. Yay! I swear I just want to take a vacation one time when I don't get sick! We get on the plane in Dallas, with plenty of time (and no Security to go through) and there is a lovely family behind us. By lovely I mean they had two small children, both screaming, and one kicking the back of my seat. I was going to type up a few blogs on the three hour flight, however I have a large laptop and when the lovey dovey couple in front of me decided they needed to lean the seats back and cuddle I realized quickly that typing was not in my future.

I decided to read. My flight book of choice is:

A nice memoir of a delusional girl who thought she was going to marry a prince. She has moved to England for grad school at this point in the book and I'm pretty sure she's nuts. I made it through two chapters and couldn't keep my eyes open, so I tried to nap. Napping when you are in an upright position with a small child kicking your seat and screaming is kind of a challenge; however, it was a challenge I rose to. I put on a nice playlist of my favorite NYC soundtracks (Serendipity and One Fine Day) and crashed.

The end of the flight was rocky, to say the least, worst I've ever been on. We didn't check bags, so we didn't have to deal with baggage claim. We went to find our car, which should have been waiting on us. Yeah...no. We walked all over Laguardia to no avail. Finally a nice driver without passengers took pity on us (by this point it is snowing and I am inhaling cold air, which is not good on my pre-bronchitis lungs), and took us to Manhattan.

When we crossed over to Manhattan I saw this sign, it made me laugh:




Notice the top: No honking: $350 fine (pretty sure there are A LOT of cab drivers owing
enough money for me to live in NYC for the rest of my life).


All of a sudden we crossed Lexington Avenue. I know you hear people say they love New York, but I REALLY love New York. I mean, really. I could really make some nice (and very rich) Park Avenue man very, very, very happy.

We turned and were on Fifth Avenue and then I saw mecca:

The heavens opened up and the angels sang: 727 Fifth Avenue: Tiffany and Company. Call me crazy, but I love Tiffany's, though it is my second favorite place in the world (second only to Strawberry Fields, which will come up in the next few days).

We saw all the standard sights down Fifth: St. Patrick's, Saks Fifth Avenue, NBC Studios, the giant Christmas balls and skating rink and tree at Rockefeller Center. Oh how I love this place.

We are staying at the Mayfair Hotel on 49th, where my mom and I have stayed every time we've come to New York.

It is really cute. We got to our room. For those of you that have been to my house you know that I have a little room off my bedroom. Our room here is smaller than that. Oh well, just sleeping.

After all that excitement we were hungry. The guys at the front of the hotel suggested an Italian restaurant three doors down: D A Marino's. OH MY GOSH. Number one I fell in love with a man from Milan that I could barely understand. I think me going to Italy would probably be a bad plan. :) For dinner we had a cocoa fettuccine with shrimp in a vodka cream sauce. Seriously, I would have bathed in this stuff. It was SO good.

We then made a trip to Duane Read, the local (and plentiful) drug store for medicine to keep me from dying. Then off to the Broadway Theater for Promises, Promises.

To say the show was wonderful would be an understatement. It was phenomenal! Not only did this show star Sean Hayes, Kristin Chenoweth and Molly Shannon, it also had my friend Allison's beautiful sister Kristen Beth Williams in it! We got to go backstage to meet Miss Kristen, after fighting through the mean people who didn't want to let us through. It was quite nice to walk up to the bouncer and say we were on "the list" and be led into the back of the theater. Stupid mean people. Got to hang out on stage with Sean Hayes, you know, no big deal, just a normal Thursday night. Kristen showed us the track system that electronically places all the set pieces on the stage. So cool! A little bit different than my days in theater when we shoved everything on with out muscles.

Overall day one was a good one, besides a few little rough spots. I'm not sure exactly what we are going to do tomorrow. I know Christmas Eve service is on the agenda, probably at John Street Church, the oldest United Methodist Church in America. There will also be the viewing of the awesome snowflakes on Saks (one of my favorite things...there will be video of that!).

Now off to bed! In my postage stamp room. :)