NYC....

One of the first adventures on our "stay-cation" was going into New York City. It was something that we wanted to do together for some time, but the opportunity never really came about. And with us being "on vacation", it seemed to be rather stupid being so freaking close to the city and NOT tool around NYC together, making a day of it and having a grand old time.
As it worked out, we also have a friend who lives in the city, that we hadn't actually met in real life. Perfect! We called up our buddy and told him that we would be on vacation and we would love to see/ meet him and chill and talk and whatever. Plans were made and we went into the city to meet our friend Kenny.

 We hopped onto the train and forty or so minutes later, we're at Grand Central Station seeing, in person, Kenny for the first time. (Just like we'd imagined him to be like!) He greeted us like old friends that he hadn't seen in a while despite the fact that, really? We were nothing more than strangers to each other. But as it were, our adventure into the city began and it was starting off great.

We tooled around a little in the train station to figure out the "plan". Honestly? We didn't have one and it wasn't exactly our "stomping grounds" anyway... Kenny took the lead and we got the most amazing tour that we could have possibly squished in to an afternoon of rabble rousing in the city on our own. Honestly? If it was just Lucky and myself, we would have gotten lost coming out of Grand Central station....


We did as most New Yorkers do. We walked. Walked down a few blocks, across, up and back, just to get a feel of the city. It was a weekend afternoon and the place was crowded and active, just like you would picture New York City to be. Our own personal guided tour of everything. We saw the Naked Cowboy, we saw the Bronze Man, (we saw the Naked Cow GIRL and OMG we all REALLY wish we hadn't....), we randomly came across a "Japanese festival" where people were doing odori (traditional dances) and others were playing the giant taiko (the giant drums). We attempted to follow along when the crowd was asked to join in, but were asked to stop IMMEDIATELY as they were afraid we would hurt somebody or ourselves (well, not really, but I looked bad.... It was bad.....)

Lucky took his first NYC cab ride and got to experience first hand REAL NYC cab driver driving. We went to the Metropolitan Museum and saw all manner of things. It was unbelievable seeing the artistry and craftsmanship put into some of the things we saw, from pictures, paintings, swords, stone statues, furniture, weapons of every sort, gilded this, carved that, chiseled, hammered, hand done everything. We are talking back during a time when there weren't machines and drills, machines and crap and junk to get it done. These are things artfully crafted by hand with small tools.... Everything from Ancient Egypt to more early 20th century... Just amazing. Of course, what made it even better was the fact that Kenny used to work there and was able to give us a guided tour of the museum as well. DANG!  Then we sat and ate and jabbered on in a nice cool cafeteria and shot the breeze for some time. Walked around and found ourselves in Central Park.

Seeing all of the life happening there. People walking or jogging, playing ball, watching ball playing, sun worshipping, chillin', relaxing, whatevs! Seeing the city skyline behind a wall of green was pretty cool too. We just kept walking around all over the place, talking and hanging out. We saw pigeons and crazy people and the tall buildings and the hot dog stands and the street vendors and rennie fair kids beating the crap out of each other with plastic swords and people dressed up in clown outfits or Hello Kitty (I swear we saw a woman dressed up as Hello Kitty, giant plush head and all.... Dang I thought I like Hello Kitty!), horse and buggie riders and NYPD officers everywhere and streets filled with people and the bucket drummer guy and signs and Spiderman talking on a cellphone... We experienced all sorts of sights, sounds and smells of the city and it was AWESOME!

The end of the day came quicker than we had expected, but Otis was needing to be fed and let out back "home" and left for too much longer and he would have taken the matter into his own paws. It would have been bad. So, we thanked Kenny for touring us around (we are SO going back soon!) and said our "see ya later" s... :(  And on the train ride back (after we stared at the sixty something :at LEAST: year old guy in spandex, and punk rock gear, topped with "devil's horns" hair do that stood at least ten inches from the top of his head...) we discussed out trip into the city. We realized and came to the conclusion that our day in the city was awesome because we had Kenny. There is NO WAY in hell we would have gotten in that much stuff in our day, seeing everything that we saw and having that much of a hoot!

I know I've mentioned it time and time again. I'll mention it again. If it were not for the internet, we never would have met Kenny. We're so glad we did AND got to meet him for really REAL! As an added bonus, we had the most amazing time in the city and we took in so much. More so than we would have thought possible.
Thanks so much Kenny! Hope to do that again soon. If you're ever up by our neck of the woods, give us a holla and I'll bake you your cherry pie! :)