Long ago I lost my heart to NYC, maybe it was time to help two people join theirs.
Ten of us booked flights to NYC to be witness for a friend’s wedding proposal. Doesn’t that sound romantic? Because it was.
Flash back to January, Carol pings me and informs me of Alex’s request. Five minutes later I had reached all the girls separately to let them know about the proposal and they all agreed to go. Sent a dummy email proposing a group trip to New York, where miraculously everyone chimes in immediately and are free and available to go. Amazing!
Enlisted our travel expert Jen and one week later she has booked the Westin Grand Central and most of the flights for the crew. Personally, having visited NYC many times, I’ve always stayed Midtown (minus that one stint in Soho during Fashion Week for work, and my very first visit in Times Square because we didn’t know any better). I know Midtown particularly well and Grand Central has the most train lines available in multiple directions.
For flights I had sandwiched my week with both a bachelorette and a business trip, so for the most cost effective solution my itinerary for the week would be:
SJC -> PDX – > SJC -> LAS -> LAX -> JFK -> SFO.
Now that we’re getting older, it gets harder to do the redeye to NYC, so the majority of us all intended to get in at around 1:30am local time. Needless to say that by the time I got to NYC, I was extremely homesick and pretty tired. My plane landed first and while I waited for the group to arrive I texted friends back home from a chair on JFK arrivals until I saw on the girls light up on Find My Friends at the airport.
They’re here!
Once we met up it was constant chatter and the homesickness melted away. Maybe it’s cliche to say it, but if home is where the heart is, these people hold my heart and I feel at home wherever they are.
As soon as we stepped outside the airport I realized I hadn’t packed correctly. Going from Vegas to New York after a recent snowstorm I was still wearing my espadrilles. I step in a puddle and watch as it gets sucked up by my shoes. Damn it. Since there were so many of us we tried to call an XL Uber but they kept getting lost, and we eventually settled for cabs.
I’m gonna soak up the sun…. and every goddamn puddle in NYC.
By the time we get to the hotel we’re all a bit tired, but starving. Plane food had left us craving something more. Alex and Patricia were already at the hotel and found a place down the street for Pizza. We wanted something more hearty and found Nishida Sho-ten via Yelp. It starts to rain as we arrive and there are two girls siting in the back talking about failed relationships fairly loudly.
We all gather around the bar and look at what to order. Since I always get Shiyo broth, I ordered the standard fair and am the only want who gets an Orion beer. There’s just something about beer that pairs so well with ramen for me. The ramen itself was ok, soothing and warm, but not very good at all compared to the plethora of great ramen places in the San Francisco Area.
Meh ramen, but it was open late at night and filled with Japanese people.
We went back to the hotel and separated into our rooms at about 3:30am. Jen and I started unpacking when I remembered I acquired a free selfie stick from Vegas. Not knowing how to use said selfie stick, I broke it out and bluetooth paired it with my phone then Jen and I ended the day by taking a bunch of test selfies.
