Life without "Nose-Muffs"

Today was day two of our New York City adventure. The plan for the day? There is no plan. Like most days without plans, we started relatively slowly. We found a nice place to eat breakfast called Bagel Stix and had some rather large breakfast bagels to start our day right. We then walked down the street to get some morning Starbucks to wake us up. At this particular Starbucks, we BOTH got hit on by the baristas. It started when one of them yelled, "you have beautiful eyes!" I turned around to see no one behind me and knew that she was talking to me. I surprisingly politely said thank you. She continued to tell my beautiful wife that in no way was she trying to hit on me, she just had to say something. Then she got a glimpse of Angela's eyes (truly the better set between the two of us) and yelled something similar to her first remark. At that point, she came back and told me that my eyes are "whack". In a matter of seconds I had been downgraded. Needless to say, interesting start to the day. I think we'll go back tomorrow.

Angela wanted to see Grand Central Station, so we headed south on Park Avenue. Inside was very cool, and busy, but we did take some pictures!



The inside of Grand Central Station

We stayed there only for a few minutes, and then headed back north up 5th avenue to go shopping. We didn't really have anything particular we were looking for, and that usually turns out to be the most dangerous kind of shopping! We spent quite a while in Saks, where Angela had a hard time leaving shoe heaven.



The shoe floor at Saks

We came out of Saks empty-handed, which was completely fine with me. We took a short pitstop at F.A.O. Schwartz for an energy boost.



This is what a pound of candy looks like!

We did decide to loosen up the purse strings while shopping at a few stores, with the big winner going to Macy's at Herald Square. I actually bought clothes for myself today, which is about as rare as the lunar eclipse that we missed last night.



Macy's from Broadway

I bought some shirts and sweaters, and Angela bought this little beauty:



Michael Kors is Angela's new best friend

The final chapter of our day was about to begin. We needed to eat dinner, and go see Rockefeller center at night. We stopped at a GREAT build your own burger place called "The Counter", and we were ready to go. Our waiter even asked us if we had seen "the tree" yet, and we told him that was our next stop.

(As a short interlude, google maps has been failing me this whole trip. Not only is the "current location" dot always incorrect due to building interference, but the labels on the zoomed-in view are often on the wrong side of the street. This has given me a sort of direction vertigo for the last few days.)

As we walked out of the restaurant, we saw a big tree a couple blocks away, and were excited to learn that we didn't have to walk very far to see Rockefeller center! We got down there and found the tree, check, ice skating, check, and lots of big buildings, check. It was only when we actually tried looking for 30 Rockefeller Center (30 Rock is one of my favorite shows!) that we realized we had a problem. When it didn't exist, we looked back at the map and realized that we were about TEN BLOCKS south of Rockefeller Center.



Fake tree and wannabe Rockefeller skaters

Now that we actually knew where we wanted to go and how to get there, we were on our way! One good thing about our side trip to Bryant Park was that Angela got the ear warmth she needed.



Our first street-vendor purchase besides a soft pretzel

On our long, cold, windy walk on 5th Avenue, Angela reminded me of her favorite invention-to-be, the "nose-muff". Imagine you are walking in a frigid northern city and trying to stay warm. You have on your thick pants, sweater, jacket, and gloves. Your ears are covered by big fuzzy ear-muffs, but what to do about that pesky little appendage on the front of your face? The "nose-muff" would look completely ridiculous solve all of your frozen-nose needs! Most times when I ask Angela how she would accomplish this feat, the conversation ends at "a little clown nose thing that stays on your nose and keeps it warm." You heard it here first if it ever happens...

On with the adventure. We did eventually make it to Rockefeller center and it was much better than that "ugly blue tree".



The real tree




The GE building (I can just imagine Tina Fey and Alec Baldwin looking out the window right at us!)

All-in-all, today was a pretty great and eventful day. It takes a lot out of a married couple from the burbs to explore the big city for as long as we did, and I'm proud that I am still awake to write this. As Christmas approaches, I am starting to long for more time to rest and reflect on the blessings and meaning of this advent season, and I am thankful that our fun trip will end at a time that still allows us that opportunity. Now it is time for me to join my wife, who has been sleeping for a while now, and get some rest for another big day tomorrow.