Taking on New York: Part 4
Since this is a storied series, I want to link the first 3 installments here: Journey to New York - Part 1, Journey to New York - Part 2, Taking on New York - Part 3.
And the next installment, Taking on New York - Part 5.
Day three:
At 4am on July 13th, I wake up to pee.
I was using my flashlight so I didn’t run into anything when I saw our host, sitting cross-legged on the couch, staring straight forward.
I jumped when I saw him and said “Oh, I’m sorry. Hey!” *waving*
AND HE DIDN’T MOVE OR BLINK!!!
Like, maybe that sounds small. But at 4am, when he’s staring at you, motionless with dead eyes, you really need to pee, the bathroom is past him, your precious husband doesn’t wake up easily, and this is his house-a strange space to you, it’s just creepy af. On bone-chilling levels.
So I swiftly walked past him to the bathroom, pee, and stood at the bathroom door pumping myself up to swiftly walk past him again to the bedroom.
Back in the bedroom I told Trey what just happened and that I no longer felt comfortable there.
He wasn’t thrilled because that means more money to go somewhere else and the hassle of moving, but he understood and we decided to figure it out in the morning.
So, 8:45 rolled around and we decided to book a hotel, for a crap-ton of money. And a lifetime worth of peace.
I’d also confirmed I definitely had flea bites. Which means he wasn’t medicating his dog with flea prevention. So, yay. I wanted to get rid of these fleas before we got to our hotel and we had to wash some clothes anyway.
That meant our morning was spent packing, dragging our luggage to a laundromat, and washing clothes.
We finally made it to the hotel and it was amazing! We were at Hotel Boutique at Grand Central.
Literally a few blocks from Grand Central and a block away from a 99c pizza place!
It was nicer than any hotel I’d ever been in and CLEAN!
Having a nice place to sleep at night made the days spent in New York feel better, more relaxing, and fun!
We shower in our super pretty bathroom and head out to SoHo.
We basically spent time walking around SoHo, Chinatwon, and Litlle Italy, taking in our surroundings and just enjoying being in that space.
Oh, and we bought me some Croc flip flops because I could not walk another mile in the shoes I brought. My feet hurt so bad I wanted to cry!
Those Croc flip flops were on sale for $20 and instantly made my feet 1,000 times happier!
That evening we ate dinner at Kazuza, a middle eastern restaurant with hookah in the Village.
Having dinner in a middle eastern restaurant with fantastic hookah was one of Trey’s goals for New York!
Kazuza was amazing. We had really good food and the shisha bowl was a cored pineapple. Then we were given shots, on the house! As if the hookah and food wasn’t good enough!
P.S. I kept seeing this artist, Hektad's, work everywhere. Notice the first heart I saw by him above.
It was a nice little date night in the Village. And the Village was so pretty, happy, alive, and wonderful. They were our kinda people!
Our first night in the hotel was amazing! We slept so good with the ac and clean room!
Day four: MET Day!!!
This day was one of the most anticipated days for me! I got to spend a whole freaking day at the Metropolitan Museum of Art.
I was going to spend one day, open to close nearly, in one of the best museums.
COUNT ME GIDDY LIKE A CHILD!
It was everything.
The art was incredible.
The history was fascinating.
The paintings and sculptures featuring women moved me.
The paintings of Jesus moved me.
I loved this one in particular because it was very scandalous for its day for being realistic vs idealistic.
I always like a good upset of culture with reality!
Around this time I got a Facebook message from the photographer we would be trading photoshoots with tomorrow.
She is having an allergic reaction and wants to move to Sunday.
Of course, automatically all of my senses are telling me she might bail completely.
But we reschedule for Sunday and keep on with our day at the MET.
I won't let her ruin the most amazing day!
AND THEN THIS EXHIBIT!!!
A fashion exhibit. I probably spent two hours in an 1,500 square foot area. Just photographing and staring at every piece.
The MET filled my soul.
We headed back to the hotel and had pizza and wine for dinner.
Day five:
Saturday, July 15th we were shopping in New York thrift stores for our photoshoot later that evening.
I thought the Goodwill’s on the Upper East Side would be incredible, but they weren’t.
They were like every other goodwill on earth.
So I gave up and went to another locally owned thrift store.
It was super cute, but I didn’t find the thing for our photoshoot.
Then we decided it was kind of a lost cause and we didn’t want to waste an entire day shopping.
So, we went to Central Park to relax and recharge.
There were people biking, relaxing, running, and even an adorable pregnant couple taking their own portraits. The guy was taking his girls photos and then would set up the camera and get in a few shots himself.
I wanted to offer to take a few for them but I didn’t want to scare them or anything.
From there we took the subway to Columbus Circle and the edge of Central Park, which was beautiful.
Then we hit up another thrift store that I was specifically looking forward to, Beacon’s Closet.
Now that place was awesome! Not the kind of place where I’d find a nice dress for a photoshoot, but a place full of funky and awesome wardrobe pieces.
I spent a few hours in there and I wish I could’ve spent more time.
But they closed, so I kinda had to leave.
Since my store closed and I had to leave, we decided to go to Washington Square Park which was my favorite!!!
Talk about a fabulous place!
People everywhere, doing anything and everything.
Just check it out for yourself!
After dark we went back to our hotel and got ready to go to another pub Trey wanted to go to.
On the way through the subway, we heard the most beautiful music echoing and we kept thinking "are they playing music in the subway?"
And then it clicked, this was a street artist playing his music.
We followed the sound until we found him, and I just kinda stood there in amazement.
This man was so good. I never wanted to stop hearing him play. I wanted to buy a CD with his music, I wanted it on Google Play.
But instead, I just recorded this little video.
This pub was so pubish it was amazing!
I didn’t really like the exploited barmaids, but the food and beer was legit and good!
You could order a whole pint, which was way too much for two miserably exhausted people. But we had fun!
We head home at a decent hour, excited about church in NYC and ready for our photo shoot that was supposed to happen Sunday.
But if you haven't figured out yet, things aren't always going as planned with this trip. So, we'll see about that photo shoot.