~the stage deli~

While on the bus a guy recommended a deli he frequents so we thought we’d give it a try. Horrible choice. The Stage Delicatessen had the worst service I have ever experienced. Correction, that any of us have ever experienced. First off the prices were ridiculous. I get we were in NYC and things tend to cost a bit more but this was crazy. We figured since we heard it was the best and we were there that we’d try it out.

After joking with the waitress about Fanta (she wasn’t aware there isn’t just one flavor) Lance ordered a Coke. The waitress never brought it. We were dumbfounded how she could have forgotten it after all the talk of soda! #2 asked for a pitcher of water since the cups were tiny and he needed to hydrate. She said they didn’t have any. How is that possible? Then she barely ever refilled our tiny water glasses.

She watched us as she ate her lunch at the table behind ours. Odd. Why are you on a break when you have customers? Lance and I split, Dacey and #1 split, and #2 didn’t eat. I ordered a chicken salad sandwich. 10 minutes later the waitress came back and asked if I’d like a pastrami sandwich instead because she put in the wrong order. How about NO! Out comes Dacey and #1’s roast beef sandwich. Just a huge hunk of cold roast beef on bread. Nothing on it. They were disappointed and didn’t even eat it all.

Our sandwich was quite large and was filling for the both of us. It was in fact pretty tasty as well. However, I found two chicken bones in my food. I called the waitress over. I explained I found bones in my chicken salad. She first said it must be bacon. I told her I know what bones look like and I didn’t have any bacon. Then she said…wait for it…”It must be from the chicken.” NO DUH! I agreed that obviously it was from the chicken but it shouldn’t be in my food. Then she made up some excuse that it is normal when the chicken is being ground up to have bones get mixed in and walked away. No it isn’t. WOW! No apologies. No “I’ll make you another.” No “Your meal is complimentary.” Nothing. (I always order chicken when I go out. I’ve had bones in my meals several times. I get it, it happens. Chickens have bones! The restaurants ALWAYS make it up to me and apologize though.)


My large half of the sandwich.

Out comes our bill. Lance’s Coke he never received was on it. He called her over and asked for it to be removed since she never brought it. She rolled her eyes and walked away. Didn’t apologize for that either. Our total for 1 bone filled sandwich was $21!! The nasty roast beef was just a little cheaper. We asked if she could split the bill but she said she couldn’t. I hate it when places don’t split. She was hovering while we were dividing up the bill and asked a couple times if we were ready to pay. Back off! Why be so attentive now? Do you think we were going to bail? Because we didn’t have smaller bills and weren’t waiting around for change once she snatched up our cash, she ended up with less than a 30 cent tip between the 5 of us. We wished she wouldn’t have gotten anything.

We did spot an actor eating there though. Robert Klein. I recognized him as he walked in. He played Sandra Bullock’s dad in the movie, “Two Weeks Notice”.

~day 3~

Day 3: Tuesday, August 3rd

I slept in until 6:45. Late start, haha. After breakfast Lance, Dacey, and I caught a shuttle. We figured we’d try to negotiate price since we’d been asking $2 previously. Lance asked if it was the $1 bus and the driver said yes. Score! So we thought. When we asked to be dropped off the driver stopped at a red light. We got out and handed him $3. He said we owed $2.50 each. No no no. You agreed to $1 man. Your loss. Not our problem you don’t speak English. I continued walking and told the guy he said $1 and he wasn’t getting more. Bold of me, I know. Lance stood by the bus telling the guy he had no money (which was true because I was carrying all our money) knowing the light had to turn green soon and he’d have to drive away. And that’s what happened. We decided to not try to go so low again and stuck with $2 the rest of the week.

We went to the Metropolitan Museum of Art. There was so much to see! We didn’t even get through a third. Not a fan of all the nudes though. Why is nudity art? I’m also not a fan of “contemporary”. If it’s something I can make myself by throwing paint at a canvas to me it’s not art. Doodling on a piece of yellow lined paper and framing it, again, not art. Everyone has their own opinion I suppose. There were lots of true artistic pieces though. And there happened to be a huge Picasso exhibit. Some of his stuff, holy inappropriateness! But there were lots of cool works as well.





We met up with the Ryan’s at Madison Square Garden for a tour. Lance enjoyed the hockey information and the locker room. #2 enjoyed getting a picture with a cheerleader. Haha. I’m not into sports so it wasn’t the highlight of my trip.



We went to the Stage Deli for lunch. That ordeal deserves its own post.

We went to the American Museum of Natural History. It’s hard not to compare it to “Night at the Museum” and try to find all the stuff that was in the movie. My only problem is all the evolution garbage they state as fact. “2 billion years ago this meteor crashed…blah blah blah.” How in the world do they know? Were they there to document? I do believe there was life on Earth before Adam and Eve. Genesis 1:2 states “…the earth became formless and empty…” Became. This gives a probable dateless past leaving room for Neanderthals and dinosaurs. I could go on and on about this!





Lance, Dacey, and I went to Madame Tussauds wax museum. It was kinda fun to see all the “celebrities” and take photos with them. Too bad some did not quite capture the look of the person. For instance, Robert Pattinson is much cuter in any movie or picture I’ve seen him in but that didn’t stop me from getting a photo. Haha.







We met back up with the “secretive” Ryan’s for dinner at Schnippers. They wouldn’t tell us what they did while we were split up. Childish. I had Mac & Joe. It was yummy. I had never seen that combination but plan on making it soon.





We ran to our bus and just made it. That was good or we would have been stuck another hour. The pool was closed when we got back but that didn’t stop #1 from jumping the fence and trying to open the door to let us in. It was locked but he took the opportunity to jump in. Haha. “Rule Breaker”, remember?



After a long conversation it was time for sleep.

~day 2~

Day 2: Monday, August 2nd

I got up at 5:45 in order for Dacey and #2 to shower after me. Lance and #1 showered at night the whole week which helped a lot. We didn’t have any bathroom conflicts at all which is what I was concerned about. That was great! I got up first each day because I didn’t want to feel rushed or anything.

We had continental breakfast each morning as well. It was decent. Scrambled eggs or a cheese omelet, biscuits and gravy, sausage patties or bacon, cereal, yogurt, rolls, muffins, bananas… Some may ask why we decided to stay in NJ. It was cheaper. Way cheaper! Not as convenient obviously but I couldn’t find a hotel in Manhattan that allowed 5 in a room besides being way overpriced.

After getting to NY we headed to Circle Line Cruise for a 3 hour tour around the entire island. The guide was very informative and funny which made the time fly by. I took a ton of pictures but it’s hard to remember what they are all of!



Lance, #1, and I headed to lunch while Dacey and #1 headed to lunch (well we thought so, more on that later) and Bodies Exhibition. We ate at Chevy’s. Overpriced. #1 had so much food left over that I suggested he bag it up and give it to a homeless person after watching a man dig through the trash outside the window. While we were eating there was a situation we couldn’t quite see but at least 11 police officers were there! Wow. We were glad to see so many uniforms throughout the trip. I felt pretty safe throughout but did take precautions. Our original plan was to have at least 2 together at all times. Well #1 went off by himself a few times so we dubbed him ‘Rule Breaker’ aka ‘RB’ which fits perfectly with his name!



On the way to Intrepid: Sea, Air, and Space Museum I spotted a man who looked like he needed a good meal so I waved #1 over to him. He seemed very appreciative. There were quite a few homeless people or people pretending to be homeless. I heard an interview where a guy’s job is pretending he’s a beggar. He brings in about $100k a year just from the streets of NYC! After he’s done for the day he gets picked up in a limo and heads to the casino. True story! Wow. I would never give money to anyone. Food, fine. At least you know they aren’t going to blow that on alcohol.

At Intrepid while waiting in line there was a Jewish family eyeing Lance’s shirt. He wasn’t sure what it said since it was in Hebrew and it had a Star of David on it. He had gotten it at a Christian music festival a few years ago. The dad finally couldn’t contain himself and asked if Lance knew what his shirt said. Lance said no and asked if he knew. The dad said of course he knew but he wasn’t going to tell us. Haha. All we can assume is it said something on the lines of “Jesus is Lord”. We talked with him for a bit and discovered his family was visiting from Israel and his sons didn’t speak English. I’m not sure his wife did either. They were such a sweet family. #1 got to share that our church supports Israel and “planted some seed”. He asked why the dad doesn’t believe the Messiah has come yet. The dad replied there should be total peace when He does arrive and that hasn’t happened yet. I’ve never heard that before. I’m glad he was willing to answer some of our questions. But the dad didn’t want to hear anything about Jesus. We love the same God. We’re family.

We went in a submarine. That was crazy to see how some people live for months at a time. I couldn’t handle it. Way to close for comfort. We also went in a Concorde and saw a bunch of other planes. Lance was in heaven.





We did a bunch of sightseeing while waiting to meet back up with Dacey and #2. We went to the library. Super cool architecture. We just don’t have that here. We walked through Bryant Park. I would have loved to have spent more time there. They had ping pong tables, a little make shift library where many were reading, lots of cute little nooks…We also walked 5th Ave. Lots of hoity toity shops. I stopped at a McDonald’s to try a smoothie.



We finally met back up at the Empire State Building. Poor Dacey. She was starving. They never did stop for lunch and it was past dinner time. They apparently went the wrong direction on the subway and were lost for over an hour. #2 fell asleep so she was left to figure it out herself. The Bodies Exhibition was longer than they anticipated and they were bummed with the information provided. It just wasn’t a good day for them.

After being told misleading information (urgg) we made it to the 86th floor of the Empire State Building. What a view! On a clear day I heard you can see 4 states. It was beautiful and I love being high up. For some reason I always feel closer to God. I took lots and lots of pictures!





In the same building we went to the NY Skyride. What an ordeal finding the stupid place! You’d think they would have better signs. While in line lo and behold who do we run into? The Jewish family! We briefly talked. The ride sucked. Very cheesy and not what any of us were expecting. Don’t waste your time or money.

We wanted to make the 10:30 bus so we didn’t have time to stop for dinner. We headed back to the hotel and they ordered a pizza but I wasn’t hungry. We were all just beat and it was only day 2!

~day 1~

I will be blogging about my recent trip to New York over the next few posts. It’ll be a lot of information! I’m writing it as an extension of the journal I kept on the trip.

Day 1: Sunday, August 1st

Lance and I started our day at 2:30am. We got ready and drove to his parent’s house. They are usually up by 4am anyway so they were a good choice to drive us to the airport. The self check was being lame so we had to go to the counter but that worked just fine. Lance forgot to remove his phone when he went through the metal detector. Silly. We had many other security checks throughout the trip and he remembered to remove EVERTHING from his pockets, including his Chapstick which he got many odd reactions too. Haha.

We waited about 20 minutes before Dacey, Ryan B (#1), and Ryan N (#2) showed up. We were pleasantly surprised they made it that soon.



We got some breakfast at Burger King while waiting for our 6am flight to Chicago. Smooth flight but I was so exhausted. Once we landed we had a 2 ½ hour layover and had to change terminals twice.

We boarded the plane to New York but had to sit on the tarmac due to poor weather conditions in NY. Luckily it didn’t take long. Another smooth flight (minus the annoying conversation #2 wouldn’t drop. I’ll spare you the details.) We had to circle in the air when we were close to our landing destination due to the same poor weather.

Finally, we made it!

We purchased MetroCards good for 7 days of unlimited bus and subway. They made the week very easy to commute. We happened to catch the bus we needed right away but missed our stop so we walked a little and a helpful guy directed us to the subway. Oh the sights you see! There was a guy in a “wife beater” and boxer briefs only. Yuck! Put some pants on dude. We arrived at the Port Authority Bus Terminal which would be the “middle man” between our hotel in New Jersey and all the stuff we planned to do in New York.

We had to purchase separate tickets between NJ and NY. We got a ticket to North Bergen where our hotel was located. We were dropped off at a park and ride where we could see our hotel less than a ½ mile away. Problem was there were no places for us to walk to the hotel! #1 called the hotel to see if they offered a shuttle to pick us up but they acted as if they didn’t have a clue where we were and didn’t have shuttle service anyway. They told us to walk. That was one crazy maneuver we all had to pull with our luggage to boot! We seriously were jumping medians, walking in the ditch, and running on an interstate! What an experience! We realized we needed to figure out a different bus stop for the rest of the week because we were NOT doing that again.

We arrived at The Holiday Inn Express and had another hiccup. What else could go wrong? They said they only had reservations for 2, not the 5 of us, and they only book 4 to a room anyway. That last part is not accurate according to The Holiday Inn website. I quadruple checked everything I booked! I gave them our Travelocity itinerary and it clearly stated 5 of us in one room. A manager had to come and he said Travelocity only paid them for 2 and charged us for 5. Not our problem. They let us in and said it was fine. Thank God. We were tired and just wanted to sit for a bit and decompress.

The front desk gave us a bus map and $6 hotel shuttle map so after taking a breather we headed in the direction of a bus. On our way a shuttle stopped and asked if we needed a ride. #1 asked if it was the $2 bus and the driver said yes so we hopped on. Those shuttles were a shady operation. We ended up taking one into NY every morning. They charged different prices for different people and it appeared some didn’t even pay. They were basically stealing the business from the buses. It was cheaper than the bus when we bartered so we benefitted and didn’t have to walk as far to the bus stop. And they came every 5 minutes so it was very convenient.

We did purchase a 10 trip NJ bus pass after figuring out the bus schedule not thinking we would be taking a shuttle every day. I felt like Lance and I should only buy a 10 pack while the others obviously each had to buy one. I know that was God directing me because we wouldn’t have needed 20 trips and would have wasted money.

We decided to get dinner at Dallas BBQ. That place was huge and full but we got a table right away! Delicious and very reasonably priced.

We went in search for Planet Hollywood to pick up our 3 day NY Passes that would allow us entry to a ton of sites without us having to pay at each place. We all had pre-ordered online so it was very convenient.

We were in Times Square. Super bright. Super busy. Very cool. We stopped at the Hershey Store. I wanted some candy but it was ridiculously priced so I passed. We were on one of the huge screens too. Very tiny but we were there!

We just missed the 9pm bus so we had to wait until 10:30. Bummer the bus didn’t run more often. Very busy day of transportation issues and lots of walking. It felt good to be back at the hotel.

~books to movies~

Last night I went with my mom and Dacey to see, "Eclipse", again. I was so bummed watching it the first time. There were so many differences to the book that I needed to see it again and try not to compare it. Dacey was on the same page as me. After the movie we both agreed we liked it better having watched it a second time.

Why do screenwriters feel the need to alter books so much? It is one of my biggest pet peeves! EVERY movie adapted from a book just doesn't live up to the book. I don't know why it bothers me so.

For instance, "My Sisters Keeper", changed the whole frickin book! Ages, appearances, characters, and who dies for goodness sakes!! Another one that comes to mind is, "A Walk to Remember". The date was the first change but I could live with that to make it more modern. But the whole point of the name was that Jamie was in a wheelchair and at her wedding she got out of it and walked down the aisle. In the movie there is nothing of the sort in it and for those who didn't read the book they'd have no idea what the title was about. I read, "I Know What You Did Last Summer", in 9th grade. When I saw the movie I was so put off. They made an unfortunate accident into a horror film that besides character names it wasn't the same at all. I just rented, "A Little Princess", for the girls I nanny after we read the book together. They didn't understand why everything was so different and either did I. In the book Sara's dad dies. In the movie, nope, he just has amnesia. What the crap! I could make an extensive list of all the changes in that movie but I'll spare you.

The only movie I liked better than the book was the 2005 version of "Pride and Prejudice". The book was published in 1813 so for me the language is difficult at times.

Is it possible to just take a book and put that on screen? Obviously they have to condense to fit an allotted time but the characters should be the same. They should say the same lines. It should be as close to the book as possible. I get annoyed about this too easily I suppose.

~back to work~

I'm back to work. The family I work for went on vacation so I had 5 scheduled days plus 4 days of weekend to enjoy off. I love getting paid to sleep in and do my own thing. I did get a little bored at times. I don't know what I'd do if I didn't have a job. I have to stay busy. However, on occasion, I love days when I can stay in my pajamas all day long and do absolutely nothing.



It was the 4th of July last Sunday. Lance and I decided to stay home instead of going to see fireworks since he had to get up early for work. He ended up going to bed about 9pm as usual and I watched fireworks on tv. Haha. I did see a few outside that our neighbors were doing. I really could care less about this holiday. Probably since my family never really got into it. We'd occasionally go to see fireworks or maybe go to a picnic but it just wasn't a big deal.



I was able to get some much needed gardening done on Monday and Friday which was nice. It was sooooo hot out though both days. Yuck. I was drenched. I filled up the garbage twice! So many weeds. Next to our shed on the left is just a huge weedfest! I cleaned a fraction of that out. We've been trying to figure out what to do in that area since the soil is so sandy. [Idea 1:] I would like to move our shed over but that's not an easy task. Of course Lance just wants to demolish our shed and buy a new one to place where we want it. He's all about the easy route! [Idea 2:] Another thought was to get a dog and put a kennel there. I do not like animals inside. They're dirty! So we're figuring out if we want to get a full time outdoor dog. I want a chow chow or husky. I know myself and that poor thing will be alone all winter! I hate going out in the cold! So we'll see. [Idea 3:] I might just make a huge garden there. I'm leaning towards the last idea currently.



My nephew, Noah Michael, was born on Tuesday. Now I have 4 nephews and 1 niece. I love being an auntie! Caleb will be 11 in August. I can't believe how grown up he is! He'll be taller than me probably within a year or two. Cooper is 5. He's a little daredevil and loves his 4-wheeler! Lyla will be 2 in August. She is a doll. Thank God we have a girl in the family! Joshua is just over a year. He's a little cutie. And of course Noah is tiny and adorable! I can't wait to get to know him.



I also got a chance to go shopping but didn't find ANYTHING I was looking for. It's not like my wish list is outrageous or anything either. I've been looking for a set of 3 or 4 black and white nature prints for the basement wall. I've looked all over! Nothing. I think I am just going to buy a really nice camera and take my own pictures! I have also been looking for jean shorts. All I'm finding are super-short-show-your-butt-cheeks styles. Uggh.



On Saturday we greeted at church. After service we had a Hawaii themed party for the Saturday night teams. We're among the youngest greeters. I've heard on more than one occasion by random strangers upon shaking their hand, "Oh, it's so nice to see young people." I'm not that young. Haha. It makes me feel like they think I'm 12.



So, I'm working right now. Haha. I'm working really hard! The girls are outside with a neighbor catching bugs so it's not like I'm ignoring them. We already went to the library this morning and stopped at Target. We had lunch and rest. I have about 3 more hours until I go home. We were going to go to the pool but they have swim lessons tonight so I am not going to bother.

~my yard~

This lovely daylily was the only plant I salvaged from the back garden.

Here's our front entrance. (Oops, I need to weed the hostas.) We put these in last summer after digging out hideous looking bushes. I filled in the left of the sidewalk with rock after removing nasty faded red wood chips. I absolutely hate the color of our house! Hopefully it will get painted this summer/fall.

The hostas are starting to bloom.

I love my little bench and flowers. Lance did a good job picking out the planters.