New York, Day 2

After not sleeping a wink, we hit the ground... dragging.

Starbuck's helped that a bit.

First thing's first. Right across the street from our hotel was "New York's best slice of pizza", so we took a picture for our favorite Kendra Michelle, who loves "The Office".

Our hotel was a block off Time Square.

When I saw this subway sign I thought it was the fanciest Subway sandwich sign I had ever seen!

That first day I missed the kids a ton, so I took pictures for them constantly. At the Lego store in Rockefeller Center I had to take a picture of this Lego mosaic for them.

St. Patrick's.

Brad figuring out what to do next.

Me waiting.

 

Okay, so here's more pictures for the kids. I told you I missed them.

Being from Southern California where the majority of the weather is spring or slightly warmer, we don't usually see flowers like daffodils and crocuses. I took a lot of pictures of daffodils for the nature-loving Nathan. 

Brad guided us on the subway with ease. I think we only got on the wrong train once. I loved the subway experience. Brad was a little disappointed he never spotted a subway rat.

We traveled to SoHo. Lisa, the friend watching the kids, said she loved Dean & Deluca, so we were total tourists and took pictures of everything while buying nothing.

One of my favorite thing about New York City was the buildings. I could not get enough of the colorful fire escapes. But everything about the city fascinated us: constantly working construction crews, trash bags on the sidewalk, old buildings squished between the brand new, and the dozens of accents and cultures that lived on this one skinny island. I loved it.

I had to take a picture of this sad little park for my girl, Melanie, who leads us all over lower California to tour the lovely "local" parks.

Thanks to a friend's recommendation, we ate at the first pizzeria in the United States, Lomardi's. Our exhausted bodies were a still confused about routine meal times, so we ate earlier than most and missed the lunch rush. That being said, we were still ushered down into their 15'x20' basement to eat. But you know, for being a small basement with lots of tables, they didn't do too bad. Brad and I shared a basic pizza and a picture of cola (come on, caffeine!) and we enjoyed our experience thoroughly.

More colorful fire escapes.

More old squished between the new.

Have I mentioned that I loved the fire escapes?

We took a town car into the city and experienced firsthand how drivers would take the one-lane "suggestion" and turn it into a three-lane per necessity. The constant honking at each other was different than the Los Angeles honking. Here at home, I feel in general, the honking is linked with "I hate how you drive; I want to kill you" attitude. Somehow the honking in New York seemed more friendly. I did see some angry reactions and a few fingers, but for the most part the crazy drivers had more grace for each other.

Also, as the above picture shows, we learned quickly that locals ignore traffic signals and instead briskly walk whenever they could walk faster than the oncoming traffic, so there we were walking between buses and taxis. Thankfully that wasn't the last picture I ever took.

After walking and eating and walking even more, we were able to check into the hotel and take a nap! 

Then we got back on the train and headed to Chelsea Market for dinner.

Well, that narrows down the choices, right?

I had to take a picture of the lamb's head for the kids. 

We saw the dozens of choices available to us and finally sat down at a cozy pasta restaurant. Then we saw the price and we quietly left. We settled on a pasta counter that made your order right in front of you. It was delicious!

And since we hadn't already eaten enough, I ended the day with a cookie and latte from Magnolia Bakery.

Then we had the best night's sleep ever.