A trip to the Big  : Day Three

So now that Thanksgiving is over I can finish up talking about the trip to New York City. We didn't go into the city until the afternoon. We ate lunch at the Hard Rock Café and saw a bunch of music memorabilia:

Billy Joel's motorcycle



Suits and backpacks worn by The Beatles



Paul McCartney's guitar



The original doors from Abbey Road Studios



This is where we sat, below Keith Moon's pants.
Oh, you're asking me what band he was in?
Yes.
Who.
Keith Moon, what band was he in?
Who.
That's what I want you to tell me. Who did Keith Moon play for?
Yes, he played for Who.
That's what I want to know!
Okay, I suck at this, watch this clip:



When I saw the pants of the Who's Keith Moon at the Hard Rock Café it reminded me of this clip from the Animaniacs.

We just walked around Times Square most of the day and checked out all the different shops. We looked at the Hershey's store and M&M World. I think I got a cavity just from walking around those places. We stopped into a bunch of other places and saw a few more familiar sights in the Times Square area:

Look at all those M&M's...I just drooled on myself.

There we are. It was so nice of that random guy who took our picture not to run off with my camera. Of course my mom offered to hold his camera while he took our picture. Good thinking, mom.

We ended the night by going to a comedy club. It was okay. I didn't see any comedians I recognized but most of them were pretty funny. It was a small crowd, there were maybe only ten people there so of course the comedians were a little more interactive with the crowd. Some of them got my mom and my sister pretty good but they left me alone for the most part. We called it a night after that and went back to the hotel.

The next morning we had to check out of the hotel and we were going to look around the local area where we were staying, there were some mini-malls in the area. But after we loaded up all of our luggage, souvenirs, and everything else we realized that the car had a flat tire. So we had to call around to see who could help. We had to put the donut on it and we took it to Sam's Club. My mom ended up getting four new tires since the others didn't look so good either. She got a pretty good deal. It was a pretty smooth ride home from there. Overall it was a pretty good trip, but I think I know what to expect the next time I go to New York.

A Trip to the Big  : Day One

So here I am in the Big . Well, actually, I'm in Secaucus, NJ because that's where our hotel is. See, here it is:



I'm here with my mom and my sister. We had a pretty good trip in, except for when we switched from looking at the Mapquest directions and starting using my sister's GPS. Somehow we ended up in some ghetto in New Jersey. We were sitting at a red light and the street sign said Dr. MLK Ave. which of course stands for Dr. Martin Luther King Ave. But my sister didn't know that at first. She said something like "Who's Dr. Milk?" and with my quick wit, I replied "He's the guy who started his famous speech with the phrase 'I have some cream'". Yes, I know, I'm hilarious.

We arrived at LaQuinta and our room is on the top floor. We were upgraded to a nice suite, it's sweet! Here are some pics of our room:

Our living room...

...another shot of the living room area...

...the bedroom and my sister relaxing before heading into the city...

...the bathroom...

...and the view from our room.


Then I had some fun with the mirrors on the closet door:

It was a long trip and I was a little tired, okay?!

After we checked in and rested up a little we hopped on the bus, went through the Lincoln Tunnel and went into the city. Our first stop was the Bubba Gump Shrimp Co. restaurant for dinner:

I won a free t-shirt at there for answering a trivia question. The question was "What was the name of Forrest Gump's boat?" I was the first one to shout "Jenny!" After dinner we went to the huge 3-story Kids-R-Us to look at all the toys we're all too old to play with. They even have a Ferris wheel in there:

...and a Lego Statue of Liberty...



...and a T-Rex...



...and Steph made a new friend.

We walked around the city for a little while more before getting on back on the bus and here's some of the sights we saw:

Radio City Music Hall, which is where we're going tomorrow to see a show.



A fountain near Radio City Music Hall



My mom and Steph in front of the fountain, kind of blurry.



The New York Times building...



...and the rest of the New York Times Building.

So we went back to the bus station to ride back to the hotel, but as we tried boarding the bus driver said we needed a ticket and we couldn't pay cash, which is weird since we paid cash when we got on the bus earlier. We had to go get some bus tickets and then find another gate to catch another bus because the gate we originally went to closed after the bus we couldn't board left. It was a real hassle, but at least we know now.

When we arrived back to our hotel room, Steph decided to go downstairs to look around and because I was tired and delirious I decided to dress up her stuffed koala bear she brought to use as a pillow:

I used her gloves, scarf, vest, shoes, and a bag of pistachios. Then I put my sunglasses on it but that was after I took this picture.

And now it's time to go to bed, good night. I'll have more tomorrow.

Inspiring Minds Monday ~ charity: water

The "I Hate Mondays!" posts are no more. I decided to change it because I'm not a hateful person and I only have so much to rant and rave about. The things I hate most are ignorance and selfishness and I think I covered that in last Monday's post. That was the pinnacle of the "I Hate Mondays!" posts and it was a good place to retire it. So now, instead of starting the week off talking about such negative things, I will be talking about people and organizations who inspire minds through their thoughts and their actions. The first one we'll start off with is called "charity: water".




Last night I attended Valley Mosaic. We meet weekly and sometimes discuss different issues in the local community and around the world and keep Jesus Christ as our main focus when tackling these issues. We watched a DVD about an organization called charity: water and it was very eye-opening. The DVD showed how so many people in Africa walk for over three hours everyday just to get water that could cause them to become infected with disease and other illnesses. Unfortunately it's the only water available to them.

One in six people on the planet don't have
access to clean, safe drinking water.

Scott Harrison is the founder of charity: water. Scott's story starts like this:

In 2004, I left the streets of New York City for the shores of West Africa. I'd made my living for years in the big Apple promoting top nightclubs and fashion events, for the most part living selfishly and arrogantly. Desperately unhappy, I needed to change. Faced with spiritual bankruptcy, I wanted desperately to revive a lost Christian faith with action and asked the question: What would the opposite of my life look like?

Read the rest of Scott's story here.

On June 27th, Williamsport, PA will host it's annual Music Festival called Absorb in Brandon Park. Learn more about it from my friend Natalie on her blog. Valley Mosaic will have a space set up with information about charity: water. We are going to keep the booth as green as possible. We will be raising money to build a well in Africa by selling reusable water containers. 100% the proceeds will go to charity: water. We aren't sure what kind of containers we will be selling yet. Either stainless steel or aluminum, but one of our Valley Mosaic attendees told us that if we go with aluminum it will have to be coated so it doesn't "smell like a boy scout canteen by the third use" as he put it. So if you live in or near the area come on out and see what we have going on. Heck, even if you live far away, hop on a plane and get your patootie out here!