New York, New York

So after an eventful day of train travelin' and running out of restaurants, we woke up on Monday morning at our Hotel on the Hudson. This is the view from our hotel! Pretty neat huh? Anyway, I saw these guys fishing on the boardwalk so I went out there to talk to them and see if they had caught anything. While I was talking, one of the guys hooked onto this 30lb. striped bass!! (This picture was taken on the subway! how many times have you seen a guy with fishing rods and a 30pound rockfish on a subway!!)Awesome...who would have thought that I should have brought my rod and reel to NY. During the day on Monday we went to Times Square. Here are a few pictures:Monday night we went to see Phantom of the Opera on Broadway. When we got into the theatre(?) Helga the Barmaid yelled at us to show her our tickets. We thought it was just us but she yelled at everybody. "I need to see your ticket. I work here, show me your ticket!"The next day Wally arrived around 11:30 from Greenville. We went back across the river to New York. While my mom, Wally, Jimmy, and Barbara went to FAO Shwartz, my dad and I went up the Empire State Building. Here are some pictures from up there.After this we went to Yankee Stadium, which was our main purpose for this trip. Here are some pictures from the game.

After the game I told Steinbrenner he now had my permission to tear down the stadium.

Without Kelly there to take my picture I had to do a lot of self portraits!!

Train Travelin'

Kelly and Maddie dropped me off at the train depot in Greensboro. It was Maddie's 1st Birthday! Isn't she cute? The train was a few minutes late but we ended up leaving around 9:45pm. I took along my little black book and wrote notes throughout the day. Here they are, straight from the book:

9:45am--Amtrak train to NYC, sitting next to orange lady. Left G'boro at 9:45am.

9:46am--Orange lady's name is Nyga.

10:30am--In Durham. I'm listening to the Counting Crows new album. I will be sitting next to Nyga for the next 10 hours! Nothing interesting has happened yet.

12:00--I found the dining car! I bought a $4 cheese pizza and a pepsi. There is a lot of room here in the dining car so I think I'll spend some time here. There are two amtrak security guards who are straight off of Reno 911. They are sitting two tables away from me and are talking non-stop about a guy they kicked off the train for smoking--on the train! Seriously one of the guys looks like Donnie from New Kids on the Block. I guess there's not much action on these trains so when something does happen, its exciting to them.

1:24pm--We are in Virginia. 8 hours to go. A guy just sat down at my table. He's going to DC to visit his dad. He said, "Yeah my dad lives down there." I don't why it bothers me but if you're going north, don't say DOWN there.

1:06pm--Ok I was wrong, now we're in Virginia

1:24pm--!!! Reno 911 boy just asked the other guy if allow has two "L"s or one.

1:35pm--Just passed Emporia Country Club--goat ranch!

1:58pm--this old lady in a green coat just sat down at the table next to me and is playing solitaire to pass the time. She has the tiny, tiny Charlie Brown playing cards!

4:52pm--Just learned by looking at her computer screen, that Nyga goes by "Brownsuga". I've been on this train for 7 1/2 hours.

5:06pm--15 min delay, something the Reno boys were working on.

5:22pm--just left the Quantico station and whatever body of water is near here, I'll have to look that up, there are duck blinds everywhere!! I must have counted at least 20 from the train.

Time (confidential)--we are now at Central Station in Washington DC. I saw Marine One (the presidential helicopter) flying over head.

7:57pm--We are now in Delaware. It is freezing on the train and my throat hurts. They don't have any ibuprofren, but I did buy some orange juice.

7:59pm--just took a picture of myself on the train. "Brownsuga" is in the background.

8:03pm--i finally have my own seat in coach class. So there is this girl in bleached blonde hair sitting two rows behind me who has been talking for the past 2 hours on her cell phone. I now know all about this guy named Doug who is dating her roommate. Bleach girl works with Doug and her co-workers want to know if its weird when Doug stays over night. Don't worry, it's not weird, their bedrooms are on opposite sides of the house so she doesn't see him much. I wonder if Doug and Bleach girl carpool?

8:15pm--did I mention my throat hurts? it hurts mostly when I swallow so I started using my empty OJ bottle as a spittoon

9:40pm--I made it to New York!! Time to go see my folks, Jimmy and Barbara.

I found my parents and the first thing I did was get some ibuprofren from my mom! Thanks mom! Then we went to get something to eat. It was about 10:00pm when we got to this restaurant across the street from Madison Square Garden called Lindy's. We waited for a table, sat down looked at the menu, and ran. No, literally we ran! All five of us out the door as quick as possible. They had a revolving door and Jimmy almost knocked Barbara over trying to get out the door. We looked at the menu and the cheapest thing on there was a $19 hamburger!! We then went to this other place that was much more reasonable and good too. While we were eating, my mom realized she left her rain coat in the other restaurant. She said, "oh well, I needed a new one anyway!"

so i skipped the whole month of april but stay tuned...

stay tuned for my trip to new york to watch the yankees at Yankee Stadium(no I don't like the yankees, but I do want to see Yankee Stadium before they tear it down) I'm riding amtrak up there for the first time ever so I'll be sure to have some good stories/pictures to show when I get back. Maddie's first birthday is this sunday so look for pictures from her party coming soon...can you believe how small she was just one year ago! look at those little feet!!