Thanksgiving in New York

Steve and I took a trip to New York City for Thanksgiving. (Thanks Alison and Curtis parents for watching Blackjack!). We spent a week there, staying with our awesome friends Sabrina and Jose. They have an apartment in Manhattan with an amazing view, it was so great! I don't know who's going to read all this as it's going to be long, but I'm posting it more for our own memories than anything. Blogging is my only journaling!

View from their 20th floor apartment.


View from the rooftop terrace.

Tuesday morning, we got up early and made our way to the NBC studio audience for Who Wants to be a Millionaire with Meredith Vieira. It was fun to be in the audience, this time without the pressure of having Steve as a contestant! And Meredith is SO much nicer than Regis, I love her.

After the show we booked it over to Rockefeller Center where we had tickets to Late Night with Jimmy Fallon. The guests were Claire Danes and Chad Ochocinco. Not a huge fan of either really but Jimmy Fallon was really fun to watch. Being an audience member is so interesting, you get to see some of the behind-the-scenes and all the work that goes into producing a show, it's really neat.

The famous Rockefeller Center Christmas tree. They didn't light the tree until the next week so we just got to see it with all the scaffolding. It's huge!

Wednesday morning we were out the door long before the sun came up to make it to Good Morning America. Steve surprsed me once for my birthday a few years back and took me to New York and we were in the GMA audience which was so fun! This time the guests on the show were the final three couples from Dancing with the Stars (Donny Osmond, Mya, and Kelly Osbourne). We don't watch the show so it wasn't a big deal to us, but we happened to be one of a handful of people they pulled to the sidelines of the "red carpet" where the finalists ran in. The woman next to us kept asking us to shield her from the cameras. Apparently she'd called in sick to work and was worried she'd be on national television. And she was, haha, too funny!



We didn't stay for the taping, I was bored and mad that both Robin Roberts (my favorite anchor) and Diane Sawyer were out of town. I got to meet Diane last time but Robin was out of town that time too, sad. Chris Cuomo just doesn't do it for me.

Then it was off to do the . . .
. . . Sex and the City bus tour! I know, I know, you're all thinking I'm such an idiot. But seriously, the tour gets great reviews and I just had to see what it was all about. Not only was it way fun and entertaining, but it was a perfect basic overview tour of NYC. Steve even enjoyed himself, as much as he and the other husbands and boyfriends dragged along tried to pretend they didn't ; ) How could they not when they're on a bus full of hot women?!

That night we went to dinner at this really great French restaurant and saw the broadway musical "In the Heights" with Sabrina and Jose. I hadn't heard of it previously but it was really quite entertaining.

After the show at Times Square.


Awesome picture of 30 Rockefeller Center disappearing into the fog.

Thursday morning was the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade of course. We didn't feel like getting up early to stake out a good spot so we just meandered over and stood at the back of the crowd for a while. The balloons really are gigantic!

Sabrina and Jose enjoying the parade.

Then it was back home to start cooking Thanksgiving dinner. And by "cooking" I mean taking the plastic wrap off our pre-ordered feast and heating everything up in the oven. Such hard work :) It was delicious! Then the obligatory Thanksgiving nap and Christmas movies.

Black Friday we joined the crowd at Macy's to take advantage of some good shopping. Yes, it was really THAT crowded on the main level!

Saturday we met up with my sister Becca and her husband Jay. We tried out a couple fun food hot spots, including Magnolia Bakery. They are best known for their cupcakes, but better than their cupcakes is their banana cream pudding! Oh wow, we made a second trip to Magnolia's just for the banana pudding it was that good.

Me and Becca at Magnolia's.


The good thing about vacationing with others is we had someone to take our picture and document we were both at the same place at the same time.

On the subway.

We stopped by Dylan's Candy Bar to check out the candy displays.

The snozberries taste like snozberries!

That night we went to the holiday Cirque du Soleil production of Wintuk at Madison Square Garden. It was cute, very family-friendly.

But then we saw these big posters outside the stadium . . . Nadia Comaneci! How could Beck and I NOT get our picture in front of that?!

Me with my "Perfect 10."

Sunday morning, after brunch we headed to Central Park. It was the first completely sunny day with not a cloud in the sky, beautiful!




Sabrina and Jose also got us in for free at the Museum of Modern Art. Interesting, but I just am not into the artsy museums. I guess most of the time I just don't "get" it.

For instance, this is supposed to be some kind of chair. ???

Monday we had tickets to go up to the crown of the Statue of Liberty and Ellis Island. It was the only really bad weather day of course. Rainy, drizzly, windy, and COLD. On a ferry, fun stuff. But we hiked up the Statue of Liberty which was really neat, especially getting to look up into the body of the statue from inside, so cool. Then we headed over to Ellis Island. They have some really great displays set up there, very ineresting statistics and information that's been gathered over the years. I could have spent more time in there but we were in a hurry.



Ellis Island


Steve told me to stand in front of this picture . . . of what he thinks I should do all day every day. No honey, I blog all day, not wash floors!

We raced from the Ellis Island ferry back to the subway, grabbed a slice of NY style pizza and ran to catch the New York Public Library tour. We couldn't hear the little old man from our spot in the back of the crowd so we broke out on our own. What a beautiful building! I wish we had more pictures.

The main lobby entrance of the library.


One of the intricate ceilings.

We wandered the city a while in the rain, running in and out of Starbucks locations and trying to find shelter. We ended up at the "Charmin - Enjoy the Go" restrooms in Times Square. So fun! Normally there is a huge line, but that rainy afternoon there were just a few of us. Charmin pulls out all the stops for this "experience" each year and it's very cool. They set up 20 private restrooms, each with 6 different types of Charmin toilet paper, an iPod or TV, and someone comes around and cleans each restroom between EVERY person! How cool! I still put tp on the seat before going, can't get over that habit. Anyway, so while you stand in line to "go," the MC guy is up front entertaining all of us as we wait. It was hilarious, he goes around asking people on the mic if they plan to go #1 or #2. Then he tells the men we'll know if they went #2 because their coats will be off. It was too funny! Such a normal thing to do, and yet when confronted about it in public people get so weirded out. I thought it was great.




Can't spare a square.

When we left Charmin we saw the Broadway discount tickets booth and decided to go see another show spur of the moment. We found cheap tickets to a comedy off-broadway show called "Newsical." It was in this tiny little theatre, very cozy. And it was pretty funny, singing and a little dancing, but mostly comedy sketches on recent political and entertainment issues. Before the show we had dinner at this cute little restaurant called Sweet Emily's. Yum!

Tuesday morning we got up and wandered the city, hitting the last of the hot spots we wanted to see before heading back to the airport.

Helpful tip for future NYC visitors: Many of the subway stations do not have escalators or elevators for your luggage. In fact, even if a station does have one, there is no guarantee it will be working! We got a good workout dragging our huge suitcases up and down flights of stairs through the subway system. But it was all so worth it.

We ate at tons of great places, saw lots of interesting sites, walked miles and miles through the city, and came away with many wonderful memories of our Thanksgiving in New York City. Thanks Sabrina and Jose!

Double Trouble!

Our new foster, Holly, is almost Blackjack's twin! Holly is an adorable and very playful little Puggle. She’s about one year old and loves to chase and play with Blackjack. She also loves playing with her toys and dragging her blanket around with her. Holly likes to play hide and seek, and hides under chairs, tables, and benches and then pounces on Blackjack when he comes by. She’s very sweet and likes to sit by my feet or cuddle on the couch after playtime. She already knows some commands like “sit” and “up” and is anxious to please. She does well on walks and knows her potty spot outside. This sweet happy girl’s curly tail is always wagging! She's looking for her forever home, let me know if you are interested . . .
http://www.tvar.org/RP_AdoptMe.asp?aid=7961

Sunday Mornings at Our Place

Even Blackjack is a spooner.

Trick or Treat!

Blackjack was a fireman for Halloween. We took him out trick or treating with my brother Ben's kids. He had fun doing his duty and putting out "fires" on every bush with his built-in fire hose.

Our Little Conehead

Poor little Blackjack has an infected toe and must wear the dreaded cone for a few days to keep him from chewing and licking his feet. Needless to say, he's not liking it. The vet put the Halloween handkerchief on him, I would never do that!

Here's Blackjack barking at his reflection in the fireplace. "Who IS that with that big weird looking plastic thing on his head?!"

8 Years and Counting!

Today is our 8th anniversary. We've done a lot in our 8 years of marriage. According to my calculations we've lived in 4 different states and 6 different homes. We've driven accross the country together twice and we've taken trips all over the U.S. (from California to Vegas to Colorado to New York, etc.) but only recently did we finally take our first trip together out of the country (Cancun, Mexico counts, right?).

But for our anniversary we decided to stay local and spend the night in San Francisco to do some touristy site seeing and to see Wicked! I very much enjoyed the show, it was fabulous. Steve's reaction . . . "It was weird." But he seemed to enjoy it enough while we were there, enough so that I'm hoping we'll go again when we're in New York for Thanksgiving.

The amazing view of the Bay Bridge from our hotel window! We NEVER have good views from our hotel rooms, we always end up with a view of the building next door or the alley or parking lot, this was such an awesome surprise!

The view from the other window. The Ferry Building and the Bay Bridge.


Our hotel, the Hyatt Regency. I love this hotel, so strange but so interesting.

I thought this "Les Croissants" place looked like a fun place to grab some breakfast . . . until I saw the last part of the sign, take a look. "Pastries, Donuts, Espresso, and VIETNAMESE SANDWICHES." Um, no. I mean, I'm not saying Vietnamese sandwiches aren't good, I'm just saying I'm not eating a donut at the same place that specializes in Vietnamese sandwiches, that's too weird!

Street view of two things San Francisco is famous for: the cable car and the insanely steep hills.

The high voltage cables just above our heads on the touristy open-top bus tour.

The Transamerica Pyramid.

Chinatown. I didn't know it is the largest Chinatown outside of Asia. The things you learn as locals on these tours.

Happy Anniversary babe! We've made it 8 years, what's another 60 or 70 more? ; )

Labor Day in Hollywood

For Labor Day weekend we decided to make a trip down to southern California. Despite growing up in the state neither of us had been to the L.A. Universal Studios or done any of the Hollywood/L.A. scenes other than Disney. So we drove down and stayed in a really cute hotel in Burbank. I had yelped good places to eat in the area and we restaurant-hopped the entire weekend. Such fun! What can I say, sometimes the best part about vacation is getting to eat out and try new places. We ate the most delicious chocolate coconut cupcake ever at this little place http://www.joansonthird.com/. I'd seen it on the Food Network's "Best Thing I Ever Ate" series. It lived up to the hype, I was craving them the rest of the weekend! We also frequented a cuban bakery called Porto's more than once. Yummy. Really, everything there was so delicious, it just makes me sad there are only two locations and they're both in L.A.

The first afternoon we took one of those Hollywood Star Homes tours and I have to say, I really enjoyed myself. I thought it would be creepy and weird but it was actually very interesting and a very good time. Even if it was 3 in the afternoon with no top on the van.

The tour took us down Hollywood Blvd, Sunset Blvd, Rodeo Drive, Santa Monica Blvd, through Beverly Hills, Bel Air, etc. We drove by lots of celebrity homes, including Courtney Cox, Tom Cruise, Jennifer Aniston, Christina Aguilera, the Playboy Mansion, Simon Cowell's new home, the old homes of Lucille Ball and Jimmy Stewart, etc.

The tour guide also took us down what he called "any street" which is where the outsides of homes in many Hollywood films have been filmed. The home the Halloween films were filmed at is below, creepy! I'm sure the current occupants just love these tour buses that come by every 30 minutes!



The outside of the home Michael Jackson was living in most recently. Recognize this view from the media?





View of Los Angeles. Nice smog.



The postcard view of an L.A. sky.



Friday night we were on the waiting list to see Jimmy Kimmel Live but didn't quite make it in. Gerard Butler was the celebrity guest for his new movie The Gamer.

Saturday we headed to Universal Studios.



Our favorite ride was by far the Simpson's simulator ride, really great fun. And because the lines were so short we were able to go on it several times.



The Mummy ride was also pretty fun, although what is it now with simulated rides now trying to scare us by installing little feather things they blow air on during certain parts of the rides to simulate spiders or scorpions or whatever, freaky!!!

Normally there are huge lines at amusement parks on weekends, especially on holiday weekends. But for some reason the park had practically no lines. I don't remember waiting longer than 5 or 10 minutes for any ride, other than the Simpson's. And that was only like 20 minutes. We got through the park in record time and didn't even have to stay until closing to try everything. And we did every single show/attraction they had.

We went on the Universal Studios park tour which took us through sets from different films and showed us how they do some of the special effects. Very neat.

Gabrielle's house on Desperate Housewives.



Sunday morning we drove back to Beverly Hills to visit the Greystone Manor, which is where many famous Hollywood films have been filmed, such as Batman and X-Men. These are the actual gates the batmobile drove out of in the movie.





We headed for a bite to eat and tried a fun little cafeteria-style restaurant that had blueberry mint lemonade that was so tart and delicious. Then it was off to Venice Beach. Traffic. Oh yes, let's talk about traffic, shall we? Our hotel was within a few miles of pretty much everything we went to go see. And yet somehow it seemed it took us an hour to get there! The freeways are ridiculously crowded and there are fender benders around every corner. And there are just not enough lanes to support the population, very frustrating.

We got to Venice Beach and waited for a spot in the packed parking lot. After 45 minutes of just waiting we finally got in, paid our fees, and set off for the sand. Perfect day on the beach. Perfect clear skies, perfect sun, and a light breeze, just enough to keep you cool while reading a good book in the sun. I'm reading "Wicked" by the way. Different and somewhat odd as I'm not much of a sci-fi reader, but a fascinating book. My review for that will be on GoodReads soon.

Once we were sufficiently baked, we took a stroll down the famous Venice Beach trail. Such interesting people watching.





And that was our Labor Day. Lots of driving, lots of site seeing, lots of good food, good company, and over all just a fun weekend getaway.

PEPPER (Blackjack's new foster sister)

We hadn't been planning to start fostering for a few weeks (once we'd been to training) but when the shelter called desperate for a home for this little puppy that was on "the list" I couldn't say no. I picked her up yesterday and she is doing really well. We've named her Pepper. She and Blackjack get along great, they chase each other in circles and tug on toys together. I think she's a good influence on Blackjack! They follow each other everywhere and copy everything. I finally had to separate them last night when Pepper was tired and wanted a break and Blackjack wouldn't leave her alone. They sat on opposite sides of the couch staring at each other, pretty funny.

If anyone is interested in adopting her, or knows anyone that might be, she's cute as can be. She's about 1 and is a black terrier mix with white speckled feet. When she's with Blackjack or has toys she's very playful and prances around the room. ("very girly-like" says Steve). But when she's by herself she's cute and snuggly and likes attention. She slept through the night last night without a peep in her crate and she seems to be house-trained, but time will tell. No accidents yet and she's really good at going right outside on the grass.

She'll be at the Pleasanton Famers Market Dog Adoptions on Saturday from 10-1.

Now I just need to learn how to walk two dogs at the same time . . .