here is my journal from our trip to new york city, from 5/23/09 through 5/27/09. my mom had a free flight to anywhere in the contiguous united states and decided she wanted to go to nyc. having gone there myself before, and gotten lost a million times, i didn't like the idea of her going alone. and since her tickets expired at the end of may, we figured memorial day weekend would be perfect. i would get to take advantage of the 3-day weekend (since i barely have any vacation time), and nick and i had always wanted to return. as usual, i've left all the original typos. if you want to see more photos from this trip, please click here

nyc day 1 (5/23/09) so i wasn't originally planning to keep a journal this time around, but since i for once actually have a laptop with me, i figured i really ought to take advantage of the situation. so why am i here? well like with our recent trip to europe, this started as somewhere my mom wanted to visit on her own. but in the end, i decided the probability of her getting lost was far too high, and i had always wanted to return myself. so, i have tagged along once again. and though nick would've preferred we'd gone alone, he absolutely would not be left behind, so he's here too. there were some things about our prior trip that had left a bad taste in my mouth. did i mention our very first meal last time around was at burger king?! i think of nyc as one of the greatest food cities, and i really want to take full advantage this time around. also, there were sites like the statue of liberty and coney island we had to skip for lack of time. so it's sunday morning and my mom's in the shower and nick's still asleep. i'm trying to type quietly which is really hard for me. i like to hit the keys really hard. anyways, so we arrived yesterday afternoon. we took a 6:25 am non-stop united flight. getting up at 4:30 am sucked! having to drop odin off at boarding on friday morning sucked even more. the flight was uneventful. they were charging for food (weak) so we just had drinks and stuff. they at least played non-stop tv shows and/or movies so that helped the time pass for my mom. nick and i just talked about random crap for 5 hours straight. sometimes i marvel at how long we can talk and not bore the shit out of each other. then again, i do zone out a lot... we arrived at jfk airport around 3 pm (late) and then hopped on the subway into manhattan. i accidentally took the longer route from the airport but i couldn't know since we couldn't get our hands on a subway map to save our lives. i just took the route i remembered from last time, only last time we were staying in brooklyn and not manhattan. i have to say, my memory has not failed me, and i still think the nyc subway system sucks. the stations are super rundown and gross, loud and hot, no maps can be found like anywhere, and it's easy as hell to get lost. i've ridden london, mexico city, paris, tokyo, kyoto, and osaka, and nyc is by far the worst. i should always tack on at least an extra hour to getting anywhere. last time around, we got stuck out till like 2:30 am once as the lines we needed had closed/were skipped or whatever! so anyways, we got into manhattan just past 5 pm, fortunately found our hotel (helmsley) with no problems, and checked in. we had dinner reservations for 5:30 at perry st (one of jean-georges' restaurants), but we called to let them know we were running late. the last thing i wanted was another crappy "first meal." i figured since we'd be coming from a 5+ hour flight, starving and tired, the chances of randomly picking a crappy restaurant out of desperation were too high, so i had previously done some research and picked this restaurant out. they have a great early-bird dinner special running for a 4-course dinner for $35 per person. we showed up at 6 pm and were sat immediately and boy they did not disappoint! first we got free amuse bouche of a carrot, fennel, crystalized ginger, and muscat soup. now i hate carrots and ginger, but this thing was damn good! already that was impressive for me. then the first course was an option of an arugula/avocado/radish salad with a light horseradish vinaigrette or homemade mozzarella with rhubarb. once again, they took something i HATE (horseradish) and totally made it edible. both dishes: awesome. second course was the option of salmon with sweet pickled shiitake mushrooms or jumbo shrimp with 2 types of peas/beans in a lime sauce. again, both awesome, and i don't even like cooked salmon. third course we all chose the hanger steak option with potato and spinach with a berry/horseradish sauce. again, the horseradish was more than bearable. and lastly for dessert was the option of strawberry shortcake or a hot molten chocolate cake with ice cream. and my mom and i got glasses of pinot noir and cabernet sauvignon (guess napa did make an impression on me). all in all, a freakin' awesome and filling meal for only $35! so after that, we wandered over to washington square near nyu. the restaurant was in the west village/soho area right by the water (we could see jersey from the restaurant windows). being saturday night there were tons of people hanging out and some street musicians. it was nice just to relax and wander a bit (and digest). then we wandered towards union station just to take a look. there was some guy doing the "free hugs" thing but we opted out. since by now it had gotten dark, we decided we should do the brooklyn bridge walk. i wanted to cross last time but ran out of time. apparently every tourist had the same idea last night. still, it was picturesque and kinda neat. only the problem is once we got to the brooklyn side it was impossible to find a subway stop. we were done by 10 pm but weren't back in manhattan till 11 pm! see, this is why i hate the subway system here. this always happens! and it's not even like we don't know how it works or what lines to get on. but from some stops, you simply can only go one way on a particular line, so you end up having to go the wrong way, get off, then turn your ass around again, ugh! anyways, after we finally got back to our hotel with sore feet, nick and i contemplated going back out for a hotdog (we were hungry again), but we decided to spare our tummies at least for 1 night ;) i slept like crap for some reason (isn't that the story of my life?), and now should be jumping in the shower. we're planning to do downtown, maybe the met, and a broadway show today. and i plan on eating as much as i possibly can :) oh, and i miss odin and have been calling them daily for checkups and i've been checking the webcam whenever i can. nyc day 2 (5/24/09) we're watching the last 2 minutes of the cavs vs. magic game. looks like barkley might be right... go magic! so today's been looooong. despite our best efforts for an early start, we finally made it to the subway at like 11 am! i slept like crap again, of course, but the bed and pillows were super comfy so no fault of the hotel's. we were planning to hit the met museum today since it was supposed to rain, but since it was dry this morning, we decided to go straight downtown while it was dry. first nick and i shared a hotdog from a street vendor for breakfast. it had watery-looking ketchup and spicy mustard (did i mention i hate dijon/horseradish?). anyways, for a crappy-looking hotdog, it was damn good. weird, but cool. then we wandered around little italy and luckily i found the same bakery (caffe roma) i had found last time that had awesome cannolis. we got 2 to-go and 2 to eat there with cappuccinos. nick had a whole one to himself, while i shared one with my mom. my mom decided she could not eat large pieces, and it was hard as hell to cut through the crust, while nick was at the same time begging to have a piece of ours. between the two of them i was going nuts! anyways, that was breakfast #2. i think they close off mulberry street on sundays so there were all these street vendors setup which was pretty nice. the smell of grilled peppers and sausages was pretty yummy :) after little italy, we wandered right into chinatown and ate lunch #1 at joe's shanghai. it's funny, as soon as you pass from little italy to chinatown, shit gets ugly ;). i had read earlier this restaurant had these great soup dumplings. we got crab and pork and some pickled cabbage and soy bean curd (like tofu). that was really good and interesting. they're like regular dumplings except with broth inside so the juice comes out as you bite them. pretty neat, like little mouthfuls of soup with meat. later, as we were walking around, i also got one of those young coconuts where you can drink the juice right out of it with a straw. i had never done that before so it was neat. plus it was hot as hell so it was very refreshing. after this we met up with our friend john from college and wandered through soho. my mom somehow got it in her head she had to see soho, not sure why. i think she read somewhere it was a must-see. we saw super expensive boutiques (eh) and some street artists (cool). also, did i mention it was like 90 degrees today?! man we were sweating! then we checked out the site of the 9/11 attacks. second time through the church right by the site, but it's still very sad. then we wandered to wall street, and i was all like, will we see the end of the day with all the brokers? then i realized it was sunday so that was a dumb question. at this point john had to leave us to buy a grill for a bbq he had scheduled for the next day, ha. anyways, we decided it was time for late lunch #2/dinner at katz's deli. it's super touristy but still we heard they were good so that's all we cared about. it also had finally started cooling down. it had been humid all day but it really looked like it was finally going to rain. originally i was going to order my mom a reuben, get myself corned beef, and nick was getting a hot pastrami. then my mom decided she couldn't eat so much meat. now i knew my mom was full of crap, but i had to obey and instead got her a tuna sandwich while i got the reuben instead, knowing full well i'd end up eating the tuna :( sometimes i'm way too nice a daugher. of course, as i predicted, my mom loved the reuben so we ended up splitting our sandwiches. the tuna was alright, but i didn't go to nyc for a tuna sandwich! my mom's response? "i forgot reubens had sauerkraut. i love sauerkraut!" i've made my mom dozens of reuben sandwiches... so after that frustration, it was time to head to times square and broadway for "mamma mia!" now i have to admit, i love abba. i really do. i'm not a huge fan of musicals and nick hates abba, but we decided we should try at least one. and you know what? i quite enjoyed it. we had really good seats in the back orchestra and the actors were all pretty good (except for the guy who played "sky"). the movie is amazingly faithful to the musical (hey i saw it for free on a flight, alright?). it's like the movie actors actually studied the broadway actors and mimicked them. and my mom's response halfway through? "i didn't know when they wrote those songs it was for a story." haha, sometimes... walking around times square/broadway was kinda cool. it's a bit much at times but definitely an experience. mostly we did it cuz i thought my mom would get a kick. we checked out piccadilly circus in london in december, and i think that's the closest comparison. also conveniently there's a junior's cheesecake location right in the area, so we picked up 1 plain, 1 strawberry & 1 cherry cheesecake (slices not whole pies; i'm not that big a piggie). not sure if that counts as dinner #2 or simply dessert. from there we just walked back to our hotel as it was only a few blocks away. also, i'm getting tired of standing around in the new york subway. the trains come way too infrequentyly. i figured in the time it took for the train to arrive we probably could've walked back to the hotel. we walked by "soup kitchen international" which i suspected was related to the "soup nazi" of "seinfeld" fame. turns out it is his chain of restaurants but he's no longer affiliated with the company so i don't think it's worth checking out. once we got back to the hotel, my mom was like "when we having the cheesecake?" she asked this a few times but i guess i just didn't catch on, cuz once we opened them and started eating, she went to town! between nick and my mom battling it out for cheesecake, i hardly got any! wtf is going on here? she who could not eat large chunks of cannoli was devouring the cheesecake! craziness i tell ya'! so we're all relaxing now. just watched the cavs lose and i think i'm pretty much ready for bed. i checked the doggie webcam but i can't locate odin. guess i'll have to call tomorrow and checkup again. we're going to meet john in coney island tomorrow morning, and depending on the weather, maybe the museum in the afternoon. we got a ton of sightseeing done today so we'll probably take it easy the next few days. two rough days of walking has taken it out of us. and i really hope it's not as hot tomorrow. i was afraid we'd burn today. ah yes, silly, but i forgot to mention our free dessert yesterday at perry st. they were these tiny strawberry meringues filled with a spicy strawberry jam. i don't normally like meringues but these were pretty good. my mom, the cheese-cake-devourer, wouldn't finish hers cuz "it was too sweet" and nick was only too happy to stuff it in his face. i feel this dinner must be well documented as sadly we have no photos from it. we had rushed out (since we were running late) and had forgotten to bring our point-and-shoot camera. and i just didn't feel right about dragging out my huge slr. sigh... nyc day 3 (5/25/09) today was coney island day! we actually managed to get out of our hotel by around 10 am. we were all starving but we didn't want to delay our start. the ride wasn't too bad except we shared it with these crazy boys who were screaming and running around. one of the kids you could tell normally was probably really well-behaved, but they really can be so influenced by the others (reminded me of odin, ha). so we went straight to nathan's hotdogs and i got a regular hotdog with grilled onions and spicy mustard and a corndog, and nick got the chili cheese dog with chili cheese fries. i really didn't see why he needed to get 2 items of chili cheesiness but whatever. also, since i didn't want to get dehydrated (it was really hot), i got these huge large lemonades. seriously by the time we were done with all that, we knew there was no way we'd be able to do any of the rides. that lemonade was a freakin' meal! john met up with us and we also got arepas (sweet corn cakes with mozzarella). i had gotten this previously at the san gennaro festival in little italy so i always figured they were italian, but apparently they're latin american. whatever they are, they're really good. for the most part we just wandered around on the boardwalk and people watched. we saw this one old dude, like late 50s or 60s, freakin' jump rope for like 20 minutes straight! on a bench! dude was in better shape than any of us! as we were leaving we encountered the "shoot the freak" booth. this dude was dressed in like homemade armor, with a ski mask, and a shield, standing in this large pit. and you pay to shoot him with a paint gun! the shill was great, yellin' stuff like "how many times have you wanted to shoot somebody in the head and couldn't do it? and now you get to shoot them and get away with it! here in coney island, we don't wait on line to shoot somebody in the head; we just walk up and do it!" CLASSIC!!!! so after this we decided to check out john's new condo/apartment. he and his fiance were having a memorial day bbq with some friends so we were only going to stay a few minutes and then take off. well, nick and john ended up disappearing into jazz world and my mom and i were stuck socializing with his fiance and her friends. definitely not what we had planned or wanted, and we ended up spending like 2 hours there. totally sucked. also, all that lemonade and heat was exhausting! by the time we all left, we were just exhausted. my mom wanted to see central park, but halfway there on the subway, she was like, maybe we should just go back to the hotel first. so then i figured we'd walk by the soup nazi place, grab a quick soup snack, go back to the hotel for a bit to eat, and then go to central park. well, we ended up finding bryant park, and my mom really liked it. so we decided to let her hang out there at a table and relax and we'd go pick up the soup. well stupid soup place was closed! so then i thought we'd check out 'wichcraft since i heard they were good. well they were closed too! dammit! so we ended up just sitting and relaxing a bit at bryant park. after a little rest we headed back to the hotel to figure out where to eat for dinner. then we saw a huge market on madison so we strolled down there. i got some black bedsheets for $30 :) finally we got back to the hotel and settled on lombardi's pizzeria. we had gone there last time so we were planning to hit john's on bleecker street this time around. but then i thought, well i know i love lombardi's... what if i don't like john's? anyways, so we decided to play it safe since we probably wouldn't have time to go to both. well, i think we made the right decision cuz it was bomb! and my mom even loved the pizza despite the fact that it had meatballs on it (she doesn't like meat generally). and now we're back at the hotel, preparing to go to sleep early. we have ferry reservations to the statue of liberty at 8 am! i think i'll hop in the shower and just wear a hat tomorrow. nick's watching the lakers vs. nuggets. there's no way we can stay up and watch the whole game. fortunately tomorrow is supposed to be cooler. i just hope it doesn't rain too early. it's definitely supposed to rain, but i'd like to squeeze in central park for my mom before it hits. i think she enjoyed the socializing at john's even less than i did, so i would feel really guilty if she missed central park cuz of it. nyc day 4 (5/26/09) & 5 (5/27/09) so this morning i was so happy to finally find odin on the webcam! only to discover all he's doing is humping this poor boxer! he's apparently picking up lovely habits while at boarding :( UGH!!!! also, i must mention that i woke up monday night to the sounds of projectile vomit. and tons of it. apparently something didn't agree with nick, or the heat had gotten to him from wandering around coney island. either way, super gross and inconvenient as we were getting up super early for the statue of liberty on tuesday. and it's funny cuz i got a facebook message from someone we met on the inca trail hike stating it had been exactly 1 year to the day that we started the hike to machu picchu. for those that don't know, i got horribly sick on the first day of the trek, and remained so for a full month afterwards. oh the irony. even if we didn't remember, our stomachs clearly did ;) so i woke up at 6:15 am to shower (cuz i got too tired the night before to shower before bed), then i rushed out to get nick a smoothie. damn front desk gave me the wrong address for a jamba juice so i had to settle for a store-bought bran muffin and fruit punch (i know that sounds gross but he loves both items). then we rushed to get down to battery park for the ferry to liberty island. we had a reserve ticket for the 8 am ferry. fortunately we got down there with no problems, although we were all pretty damn ragged. and although it wasn't raining (huge plus), the waters were choppy as hell! the boat was definitely rocking HARD! i was worried my mom might get sea sick, but once the thing started moving it was pretty steady. we sat on the top deck and got a pretty nice view of like everything. they have gnarly security before you even board the ferry. then when you get to the island, there's an even gnarlier set of security you have to pass to enter the actual monument pedestal. like you stand in this machine that blows bursts of air at you, then another regular metal security machine. nutty! but at least since we were the first group out there, the wait wasn't too bad. they also had a nice little museum showing the progress of the statue and some historical stuff. all in all, definitely worth it. that statue is mighty impressive and green :) after that, we took another ferry to ellis island. by this point, it was crazy windy and cold out there! waiting for the boat was kinda painful, but i'm glad we made the extra stop because it was really neat. they had little rooms which depicted each step of the process for the newly-arrived immigrants. they had tons of photos and actual documents and some personal stories. they also had this huge like computer screen set up where you could choose a particular ethnicity, and they would tell you how many residents are in each state according to the census. a fun little toy for sure. people would choose their ethnicity and then take a photo of the huge screen depicting the spread. most chinese people live in ca, ny, then tx (no big surprise really). for japanese (nick's a quarter), most in hi (by far), then ca, then ny. what was surprising was how few japanese there were in any other states. by this time it was around noon so we hopped on a ferry back to nyc (this time inside the boat cuz it was freezing!) and took the subway up to central park. it was barely sprinkling at the time but i wanted my mom to see it. i also knew there was another one of jean georges' restaurants "nougatine," at the southwest corner of central park, that had a $24 per person lunch promo :) so now i'm on the flight back to lax so i figured i'll just finish up my journal. i left off at lunch at nougatine. apparently "nougatine" is what they nicknamed the less formal dining area of his flagship "jean-georges" restaurant, which is rated 3 michelin stars. the nickname comes from the tile flooring which looks like candy nougats (guess he has a sense of humor). as i mentioned, they have an awesome promo running for $24 lunches, or rather $24.07 to be exact. you get to pick 2 dishes plus 1 dessert. i started with spicy citrus fried calamari, nick got a radish/ginger halibut, and my mom got this tuna tartare. i must say jean-george really does love his ginger and horseradish. like at perry st, nougatine used a lot of both. but while at perry st i could handle all of it, nougatine was definitely pushing it. nick still liked his halibut but there was no way i could've finished it. it straight up had julienned fresh ginger all over it! for the second dish, i got blackened cod with a fresh artichoke sauce, nick got another steak, and my mom got salmon in a basil sauce. these were all really good too. now the desserts are where it got just a bit to avant-garde for me. nick and my mom both got this chocolate ginger cake. while it looked really cool, all these sharp edges and cubes, i just couldn't get past the ginger. i generally dislike ginger, but i really hate sweet ginger. the whole restaurant was about rectangles and squares. short of the drinking glasses and tables, everything was rectangular at the place, all very modern and clean. they also had a huge open airy kitchen. anyways, so instead i got this citrus sponge cake thing with honeydew melon. while not bad, i stand by the whole "way too avant-garde/creative" for me. it just tasted kinda weird. still, for $24 at essentially a 3-michelin-star-rated place, i really can't complain at all! i got this spanish tempranillo red wine and my mom got a cabernet. nick of course had his usual roy rogers. he always gets his sodas without ice at fancy places cuz they never refill. the problem is the straw often falls out. our poor server had the straw fly out on him and spill cola all over his white dress shirt. he actually let out a "shit" ;) so after our rather filling lunch, we walked around central park aimlessly. it's funny as whenever i go, i end up going in circles along the southern edge so i've never been to the center or the north side. but it was nice to be totally hidden away from the city, except for when you look up and see all the skyscrapers. if i lived in nyc, i would probably go there a lot too. but for me, i prefer to get my peace and quiet at home. that's another thing we noticed at bryant park. there were all these people sitting out and reading. i can't figure out if they just all love the park atmosphere or if it's almost like an attempt to look smart. once again, if i'm gonna read, it's gonna be at home. maybe their homes are just not very well insulated? anyways, we headed back to our hotel at around 5 pm, and we had intended to walk to the UN building which was only 1.5 blocks from the hotel. but once we laid in bed and relaxed, i pretty much passed out. i think we all pretty much slept (except nick who read cuz he's smart) till like 7:30 pm when we had to get up to make our dinner reservation at daniel (boulud), a 2 michelin-star restaurant. yesterday was all about the crazy fine dining apparently. daniel is in the upper east side and definitely more old-school fancy. while the jean-george restaurants were all very modern and airy (and had no dress codes at all), daniel was super fancy. we walked in, and it was immediately obvious it was filled with the super rich of nyc. people were crazy dressed up and they actually made nick borrow a dinner coat. up to this point, i was impressed that all the fancy restaurants had let us in dressed in ragged jeans and hats. this place didn't have any special promos running but i thought it would be fun to end our trip in style. their 3-course prix fixe menu was $105 per person, and considering we never do this, and probably wouldn't again for some time, i figured what the hell! we had i don't know how many servers and bussers and food runners. they have a crazy huge staff that's very specialized. there was one guy who handed us the menus who we found out later was italian. then there was this other guy who seemed to be in a more supervisory roll who i assumed was latin american. both of them were excellent. at one point they brought out nick's soda with ice by accident, and when we told the supervisor guy, he apologized and ran off. we figured he was coming back with another soda, but no, he came back with a tray on which to place the wrong soda to take it away! haha, kinda cracked me out. they wouldn't take or deliver anything unless it was on a pretty silver tray. and they kept changing all our silverware between each course. at one point i asked what a particular spoon was for since they took it away and promptly replaced it with another. he basically said it's a "sauce spoon but since we sauce every dish for you, you don't need it." it was for decoration, for real. i just can't imagine the amount of water and labor wasted in washing utensils over and over again that never get used. so anyways, on to the food :) they gave us a free amuse-bouche, consisting of some octopus thing, a smashed bean thing, and a bean salad. i think bean was the theme. i can't describe them any better than that cuz i really have no clue what i ate. they were super tiny but pretty. and the servers even had a sense of humor about them. they were like "here's your whole dinner. dessert will be next." ah yes, and i got their seasonal special drink, this super girly fruity thing with raspberry and lychee and vodka. it was pretty tasty. if it weren't so damn expensive i'd probably order several and get crazy drunk. my mom got another cabernet. for the first course, i got maine lobster tail with broccolini salad with chili sauce, nick got sauteed duck foie gras that was crazy rich (but his favorite dish of all the fine dining we tried), and my mom got this fresh chilled white asparagus soup with jumbo poached shrimp. these were all seriously excellent. they also had these fresh breads you could choose from, and they had a badass garlic one with an actual piece of garlic soaked in olive oil in the middle. yum! i think they purposely were spacing out the courses cuz it kinda took forever for our second course. but the effect was that we realized we were full after only the first course! that french food is seriously rich! anyways, so for my main course i got this traditional french dish of kidneys, potatoes, spinach, and mushrooms. and while it was like perfectly prepared, i now know i do have a limit to how many kidneys i can eat. nick got lamb chop with shoulder and some sort of sausage. he had wanted to get this baby rack of lamb but they were out, but it turned out he loved what he got in the end. my mom got halibut topped with a thai yogurt curry sauce and a second brothy sauce. the preparation of her fish was kinda ridiculous. they brought out this huge tray where our italian server had to first present it to her on a square marble slab. once we approved, then he moved the fish onto a plate. while on the plate, he then proceeded to carefully remove the outer skin of the fillet, then carefully cut it in half, then carefully move those pieces on to her final garnished plate. then he had to get his gravy boat thing and poor the second sauce all around it on the plate. nick's and my dishes also required the gravy boat with the sauces, but mom's was quite the procedure. i felt bad for the guy as i'm sure it's nerve-wracking cutting and messing with someone's food while the whole table is staring at him. also, some manager guy was standing by as he did this and told him to move one of the fillet halves like a few millimeters to make it perfect. ha! and unfortunately, after all that, my mom didn't even like her fish that much. i think she wanted something heavier and not quite so light in flavor. we had to commit a faux-pas and request extra sauce for her. by the time dessert came around, we all opted for fruity desserts versus chocolate cuz we were all going to explode. i got this rhubarb and sponge cake thing, nick got what looked kinda like pineapple cookies with coconut sorbet, and my mom got a blueberry cream cake thing. all pretty good but not as impressive as i would've hoped. but afterwards they brought out these freshly-baked madeleine cookies that were super yummy. i was such a piggie and ate them all even though i was stuffed. they also brought out little petit-four candies that were good. and earlier nick had requested a copy of the menu so we could later refer to what we ate. but by the time dinner was done, i assumed the guy had forgotten. but of course not! the supervisor guy brought out 3 perfectly rolled up menus tied with pretty ribbon actually monogrammed with "daniel boulud." man places like that crack me up. and when we left, the coat lady told us how wolfgang puck eats there all the time. i guess he's friends with daniel boulud. now mind you our reservations were for 8 pm. we didn't leave till 11 pm! and when we did, they were still seating super dressed up people. what people are doing there at 11 pm on a tuesday night is beyond me, but i wish i could afford to do that. and while everyone was leaving by taxi, we hobbled our fat asses to the subway ;) so i guess if i had to choose i'd say i prefer jean-georges to daniel boulud. both super fancy and nice, but i liked perry st the best. i think we all agreed perry st was the most satisfying. and i definitely favor places that aren't too snobby, and jean-georges wins points for letting us look like shit while sitting in the front of their restaurant :) we got back to the hotel just in time to see the cavs lose in overtime. sadness. so this morning, we all slept in, packed, and checked out around 11 am. we finished off the 2 cannolis we had bought from little italy for breakfast (hope the cheese didn't go bad). then we headed to ess-a-bagel for our first ny-style bagel, and we got the nova scotia lox and cream cheese sandwiches. nick was a piggie and got 2 bagels, one garlic and one onion. and he was planning to go to ray's pizza afterwards! i got egg for myself. you know what? bagels are kinda expensive. between the 3 of us, we spent like $44! still, it was good and i always wanted to try one. then nick took us on a wild goose chase lookiing for this phantom ray's pizza. but after several blocks of wandering and being told by 4 separate individuals at a drugstore that it doesn't exist, we admitted defeat and headed back to the hotel. but since we still had some time, we continued on to the UN building. we walked around it and then went through security check to get in. we didn't have time for a full tour so we just wandered around the visitor section for a bit and then left. we picked up our stuff at the hotel and headed for the subway. we managed to not get lost or make any mistakes, and thanks to an express train, got to the airport in only about 1 hour. all rather uneventful. and we even managed to get 3 seats together as this wasn't an option when i first booked these flights. i fell asleep for a bit when we first got on the plane, but clearly now i'm up. i do feel pretty ragged though. i'll need this weekend to recuperate. also, we didn't finish all the bagels from lunch so i got to finish half my mom's lox bagel which was still really good. ess-a-bagel makes really dense huge bagels that are very filling. i'm sure the passengers near me loved the fish smell ;) so all in all, a pretty good trip. we got to hit a lot of the stuff on our list, only missing out on 2 restaurants: ray's pizza and gray's papaya. still, i got in more fine dining than previously all combined probably! hey figured i may as well take advantage of it while i can. but i'm definitely glad to be sleeping in my own bed tonight :) and we must work immediately to cure odin of his new humping habit!

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