Tick Tick - NYC

I am killing time at work. I've been killing time for most of the day. If I continue this tomorrow, I'll be on trial for murder by the end of the week.

Christmas break was lovely - it was great to have family and friends home. It's always so rushed, but I love it. Life has such an unfortunate slow pace in the winter months that I want to be ran off my feet over the holidays so that I want at least a few days of peace in January. But only a few.

Six of my friends and I went to New York City for New Years Eve. The NYE thing didn't really matter to me, I just liked the idea of leaving PEI. To make a long story short, the adventure began 7:00pm on Friday, Dec 28th. I was excited, but a bit bummed as I had said good-bye to Tom (which I thought was going to be a perma-foever-and-ever-and-ever good-bye, but wasn't thanks to the PEI Weather Gods), Brother, friends, etc. Then I got forced to sit with a random stranger away from my friends on the bus. Wasn't so bad though, I made myself a little cocoon and spent some hrs immersed in music, writing, and reading. I never read as much as I plan to on long plane/bus trips. In fact, I don't have much focus on reading at all lately. Apparently I would rather stare at grids of numbers and do sudoku or similar puzzles.

About seventeen hours later, we checked into our hotel in New Jersey and had a slight "room issue" on which I will not elaborate here. Sheena, Julie and I trucked to the mall (along with hundreds of other people, apparently) for part of the afternoon and evening, and then pretty much collapsed on our beds in dramatic shopping exhaution. After a treck to the liquor and grocery store of course. I love groceries stores outside of Canada. I know the US isn't that different, but walking around in a non-familiar grocery store with different food enthralls me. As with liquor stores. Plus liquor is much cheaper in the States. For the liquor Sheena and I brought home, we figured it would have cost us $36 CAD for what cost us $15 US. Hardly seems fair.

Sunday we left the hotel at 9:00 for a "four-hour long" bus tour (actually only 3.5 hrs) which was a waste of time. I won't get into it, but I was rather disappointed and chose to skip the night tour. After the tour, a few of us grabbed some food from the greasiest diner ever, and wandered around for the next few hours. I parted ways with the others at about 5:00 (after a note-worthy struggle through Rockefeller Center which was far over-filled with people) and walked around. I felt like a regular New Yorker by the end, cursing at the strollers, sighing at pedestrians that stopped to gawk in the middle of heavy foot or car traffic, etc. It had also been lightly raining since about 4:30, so by the time 9:30 rolled around I was a wee bit wet. However, actually didn't really notice too much - until I sat on the bus at 10:00 and promptly started to freeze from the not-warm air coming out of the air vents. Upon arrival in our room, I pretty much stripped, rushed into my pajamas, blasted the heat, and cuddled into 410 blankets. La fin de dimanche soir.

Monday was the 31st. We took public transit into the city because our free shuttled was mysteriously cancelled. First we went up to the Museum of Natural History to check out the crowd levels. Packed. We snapped some photos of the area, and took a wander through the area just west of the museum. Afterwards we headed to China Town so Sheena could indulge in the "real" knock-off purses. Quite an experience! We dined in Little Italy (which given how the area is changing may need to change its name to "Very Little Italy"). Afterwards I squealed in excitement and bought watches. Yay! Sheena, Julie and I had decided that it would be nice to take a rest before heading into the crowds for NYE and headed back to the hotel. However, before catching the bus (which we unknowingly timed ridiculously perfectly) we decided to take a peak of the crowds at Times Square. Couldn't really get close to the area, but I didn't really care too much. The people you see on TV have to put in pretty much a whole day of waiting to watch the ball drop. I had better things to do with my time [buy watches].

We rested at the hotel for a bit [after a liquor stop] and, not gonna lie, I was a bit mopey for the same reasons as the bus ride down. However, turned out PEI was getting blated by Madame Nature, and Mr. Boyfriend had not departed the province. My mood may have perked up ;)

We ventured back into the city arriving at about 9:30. Our bus dropped off at... I get mixed up, either Penn Station or Port Authority. The one on the corner of 42nd and 8th. We decided to walk around the area around Times Square to soak in some of the atmosphere. Apparently we weren't the only ones with that idea. There were loads of people, but traffic flow was decent since many roads were blocked off and there were always a couple of cops attempted to direct the crowds and vehicles. After a half-struggle with the crowds, we had our fill and joined the rest of our group at a bar/restaurant close to our bus pick-up point. Great location, great seats, and great fun! So much better than standing with 1.1 million of my closest and new best friends in Times Square!

The following day shall wait because I get to leave work now. Woohoo!