The Kari AnnAlysis

Archive for the ‘Lifestyle’ Category

Lets just say that cabs are few and far between in my little West Virginia town. Not something that I am really used to. I’ve ridden a few, back in my childhood when I travelled to Washington DC and NYC, a couple in college and that’s about the extent of it. But with my recent trip to NYC, we took our fair share.

When we were at our first breakfast of the trip, we split up into groups of four and all threw in $30 for cab fare. I took charge of my group and folded up the envelope into my purse. Oh, I love being the responsible adult.

From breakfast, we took our first cab. I ended up being the one to sit up front and boy was it a doozy!

This was our first cab driver. I didn’t get his name, but we learned a lot about each other in that short trip. We are both aspiring authors, we both love books, but his downfall was HE DIDN’T KNOW WEST VIRGINIA WAS A STATE! Lol We were riding around the city, heading to Strand Bookstore when we told him we were from WV. He thought we were from Western Virginia….nope. So, I had to pull it up on my phone to show him. That led into a full-blown West Virginia history lesson, complete with a rendition Country Roads. He did know the words to that song though.

We ended up taking about five cabs during our two-day trip. The next was from the 911 Memorial back to the hotel, then the next day from our hotel to Serendipity, then one from Trump Hotel to Le Parker Meredien Hotel and finally from 5th Avenue to Lombardi’s Pizza.

I am the kind of passenger that freaks out no matter who is driving. When my husband drives, most of the time I have to keep my eyes closed, especially when we get close to someone, because if not, I’ll squeal or scream or say something that puts us both on edge. I know I hate when people back seat drive when I am behind the wheel. But in NYC, this is taken to an entireley different level.

I have never seen driving like in NYC. One of the drivers told us there is virtually no speed limit, you just go with the traffic flow. And that traffic flow, let’s just say it’s all over the place. The drivers are constantly weaving in and out of traffic and in and out of the way of other cars, none of which are staying in their lanes.

Then there’s the honking OMG the honking. I’ll admit I’m a honker. When someone cuts me off or gets in my lane or pulls out in front of me, I’ll honk at them, but it’s a surprise that horns even work in NYC because they are used so much.

I asked one of the driver’s if he ever got road rage, and told him that I got road rage on my daily commutes. He told me he never did, but then proceeded to lay on the horn, and mutter under his breath. Um….sounds like road rage to me!

I also learned, thanks to a sign at one of the hotels, a little cab knowledge. If the middle light with numbers is on, that means the cab is available. If no lights are on, that means there is someone inside. Then of course, if the “Off Duty” lights are on, well that one is self explanatory. That definitely helped with tracking down a taxi. There were a few in our group who were jumping a

I’ve never been involved in the arts, I have no musical or acting ability, but I love being in the audience. I’ve been to many shows over the years on and off Broadway. From Stomp to Cats to Lion King, I fell in love. The music, the passion, the acting. I don’t live in an area where Broadway is beating on the doors to bring in shows, so when I get to chance to see them, I absolutely will jump right on it.

When I was trying to decide if I wanted to go to NYC, my husband and a Broadway show were kind of what did it. I wasn’t sure if I wanted to spend the money but my husband persuaded me I would have a great time, which I did. But when I heard I could pay a little extra and see a show, I was all in.

Then I was told we were going to see Priscilla Queen of the Desert… and had no idea what it was! I checked out the website and it was so colorful and fun, I didn’t even care, I knew I was going to have a great time.

(Before we were asked to put our cameras away, I got one shot for my dad)

I chatted with my dad, whose been to way more shows than I have and he was super jealous that I was going to this show. It’s number one on his To-See list right now. And he gave me a good warning, that I overlooked on my first go-round on the website: The Show is All in Drag!

I told a couple of people that were going with us, but no one else knew. They didn’t know until the guys were walking around in thongs on stage. Ha! The woman who planned the trip apologized to us after the show because she had no idea. I mean we are a group of country folk, from the great state of West Virginia. But the girls I was with, heck, we didn’t care. I think they were all a little surprised when I told them I would actually go see it again.

Let me set the premise for you: Tick/Mitzi has a son who is 6 years old that he has never met. He’s been out starring in shows since the day he was born. Now his little boy has asked him to come home. So he quits his job and heads across Australia. But he doesn’t go alone. Bernadette, one of the original Queens of Drag, and Adam/Felicia go along with plans to perform a show in the hotel that Tick’s wife runs. Oh and Priscilla, Priscilla is the tour bus they travel in.

The show is fun, has amazing music that you can sing along to and the most fabulous costumes I’ve ever seen. My favorite characters in the show are the divas. They come down from the ceiling and sing. They have the best voices I’ve ever heard!

Since my dad had to miss out, and his birthday was coming up, I made to sure to get him all the goodies I could get my hands on from the show.

I gave dad my Playbill and ticket, a cd and a program and yes, that is a feather boa it is sitting on. The trip planner gave us all feather boas before we headed to the show, as part of a bachelorette party, but they were also selling them at the show. We came prepared. And of course I wore mine around the city the rest of the night

I would definitely recommend this show, just make sure you tell the people you are going with know what to expect when it comes to the characters in the show so they aren’t surprised!

What’s your favorite show???

This definitely ranks up there for me! I think that Lion King is still my favorite. The adaptation and costumes, you can’t beat it. But the music and happiness and colors in this show

When we started gathering ideas of things to do while we were in New York City, our list quickly filled up with good restaurants and snack hot spots. There was no way we could get to all of them in less than 48 hours, but we made a very strong attempt. The ones we didn’t get to, well you better believe they are on the list for the next trip.

So here’s how our foodie trip to NYC went. We started at Ellen’s Stardust Diner at 1651 Broadway. It was breakfast time, and they had plenty to offer. I knew theat we had a long day ahead of us, so I started light. I had a couple of cups of coffee, a bagel, and a side of bacon.

Those are very easy to do, so they were great, but they weren’t what made the trip. The waiters and waitresses are all aspiring performers. They take turns singing and putting on a good little show to go well with your breakfast. It was so fun. And one of the waiters was actually from WV. He said we were the first group dof West Virginians that he has met while working there. I’m sure he’ll never forget us!

What a fun atmosphere right??  Definitely a place to go back to.

Our next stop was a vendor stand so we could get some roasted nuts. There were several different kinds of nuts, they also had roasted coconut. Yum! What a good little snack.

We got so caught up in taking in the city, we didn’t get lunch, but that was ok because we needed all the room we could get for dinner. Dinner Friday night was at a place right across the street from our hotel in Times Square called Juniors at 1515 Broadway. It took a while for us to get seated because there were 12 of us, but once we were there, we told the waiter we were in a major hurry because we had less than an hour until our show started. He was a peach and got us our food within 20 minutes. And it was soo good. We had coleslaw and pickled beets as a salad. I had a burger, the specialty, along with fries and HUGE onion rings. I was the only one who liked the onion rings. I’m more of a batter than an onion person. These were really thick and I think they were dipped in corn dog batter. Yummo!

 We may have done more sightseeing than eating on Friday, but Saturday was definitely a different story.

We started Saturday morning off at Serendipity 3, 225 East 60th Street. Yes, the place from the movie! This was one of my top choices of places to go. I absolutely love that movie and watch it every time it’s on. The movie itself has nothing to do with the eats…and drinks, but the novelty of saying I’ve been there, well that’s all I was looking for. But I found so much more.

We got to the restaurant about 11. On Saturday’s it doesn’t open until 11:30. There was a line by the time we got there and it started to snake after we fell in. Now one think we didn’t know is that you can make reservations. We didn’t have to wait too long, but being able to get straight in is definitely something to keep in mind for next time. And there will be a next time!

We were seated on the second floor. And yes, let me say that the tall, slender steps you see in the movies are very accurate. We had a table for the six of us girls and we all had one thing on our mind…. FRRROZEN HOT CHOCOLATES!

Doesn’t that look yummy? It is even yummier than it looks! And they were huge. I think I could have downed all of mine, but I had other snacks on the mind. And since I knew there were other snacks in the near future, my friend Melissa and I didn’t get brunch. The other girls did however. They had nachos, and black bean soup and the biggest cob salad I’ve ever seen.

Now the scrumtious hot cocoa wasn’t the only awesome thing to happen at Serendipity. We were all taking in the sights when a couple was seated behind us. We overheard the host tell them they were sitting at the table where…wait for it… Jonathan and Sara sat during the movie! WHAT?!? Of course I asked them if I could take a picture. They definitely thought I was kidding. They soon realized I wasn’t!

I will definitely go back to Serendipity, even if it’s only for a Frrrozen Hot Cocoa.

After the hot cocoa, it was only another block before he had our next snack. We knew from the time we got to NYC that we had to have a hotdog. So, we couldn’t pass up the opportunity for a vendor hotdog, topped with ketchup, mustard and kraut. I love me some WV hotdogs, but I think I could eat an NYC hotdog every day, if I had enough Tums

Our next stop was Central Park, which was conveniently close to our stop for lunch. Although we had hamburgers for dinner the night before, burgers were on the list again. You can never have too many burgers! Lunch Saturday was at a little hole in the wall called the Burger Joint. I had no idea what to expect and when I walked into the swanky Le Parker Meridien, (119 West 56th Street) I had no clue what kind of burger I was going to get. The hotel was gorgeous and there was a coffee shop with red velvet…then we got to the Burger Joint.

From the outside, it’s just a black square. They squared off a corner of the hotel with plywood and made one of the most popular little eateries in the city. Burgers, fries, sodas. That’s what’s on the menu. It took us about an hour to get in, order, eat and get out. And let me tell you we were only sitting for about 15 minutes. The line was snaked around the lobby of the hotel, but the wait was worth it.

Inside, there’s a bunch of low budget decorations, writing on the walls. It’s so down to earth and low key. Reminded me of a little place here at home called Hillbilly Hotdogs.

My friend Melissa and I split a burger. We decided the more we split, the more we could eat It was such a fun experience…other than the fact that while we were there, the cooks turned down the music and yelled that people needed to hurry up so that someone else could sit down. There were people breathing down our necks for our seats. Scary!!

You may think that by now we have to be stuffed by now but we were far from it! We did a lot of walking and shopping between lunch and time for dinner. We worked up our appetite and were soon ready for dinner….after walking 40 blocks before catching a cab.

Dinner was waiting on us when we finally got there. Nothing like a little brick oven from Lombardis, 32 Spring Street. The restaurant was originally opened just down the street in 1897. Now it’s double the size, but still uses the same old brick ovens to make awesome pizza. What a tradition.

We had three pizzas, with lots of different options. Half of one had cheese, there was a half with red peppers and pepperoni, there was a half with meatballs, and there was a whole white pizza, which is one of their specialties. It had ricotta cheese on it and was pretty dang good. I love me some pizza, but I’m a plain cheese kind of girl, so of course, in the end, that was my favorite.

By now, our time in the big city is running out. We have just enough time to take a limo ride to the places we didn’t make it to, spend a little bit just taking in the scene of Times Square, do last minute shopping, and of course grab a snack!

Our final stop on the “Eats of NYC” trip was Roxy Delicatessan.

Since we had made so many stops on the tour, we were just in the mood for a snack….again. Since we started the day with a sweet tooth, I thought I’d end it that way.

Look at these HUGE cookies I got. There were so many options, it was hard to decide. One of the girl’s that was with us got a cream stick, a guy got a piece of cheesecake, one woman got onion rings and one woman got the most awesome looking, and equally expensive, philly cheesesteak sandwich. I had a hard time eating even one of those cookies, so don’t think I was the cookie monster and ate both of them. I brought one of them home for my husband. It was a great way to end the trip.

As you can see, food was the biggest part of our trip and I wouldn’t have it any other way.

Some of the places we didn’t get to was Magnolia, Crumbs, and Carmine’s. But don’t you worry, I have full intentions of making those top priorities for next trip. Does anyone have awesome places for me to add to the list??

Since this is a book blog, of course I have to start with a bookish post about my trip to the wonderful New York City. And this post if brought to you by my good friend Meg at WriteMeg! Because of her, I knew about this amazing little (BIG) place called Strand Bookstore.

On one of her trips to the Big Apple, she visited this lovely bookstore and blogged about it. I immediately fell in love. So when I was making a list of where I wanted to go, this was at the top.

After we stopped at the Today Show on Friday morning and had breakfast, no one really had anything pressing, so we got my request out of the way and went to Strand.

I got all giggly when I saw the red flags flying and actually had a nice little chat about the store on the cab drive there. Our driver is an aspiring author like myself and had made several trips to Strand. That solidified it. If a local goes there, it must be a hot spot.

Believe it or not, I really had no desire to get a book while I was at Strand. I just wanted memorabilia. Honestly, there were no books that I had to have, so I spent my money buying multiple things with the Strand brand on them.

This was a store I just felt at home in. The woman who planned the trip went along with us and as soon as I walked in she told me she could tell how excited I was just by the look on my face. Everyone kept looking at me because I was like a kid in a candy store. But since I’m a book junkie, it was more like a blogger in a bookstore.

I perused the aisles downstairs, checked out some of the rare books, went up to the YA section, but couldn’t stay long because I knew if I did, I’d walk out with multiple bags, I spent a little time at the coffee table section and drooled over the fashion books, but that was all after I greedily stuffed my arms with goodies. It took me more time to decide what to buy than looking in the store. I was afraid I’d go on a rampage and not be able to stop.

Although I have more presents from Strand than I think is necessary for one person, I have made a list of others that I would like to pick up. For instance, I would like to get a bookmark, a t-shirt and most of all, find a rare copy of Jane Eyre. The main reason I didn’t spend more time in the rare section this time is that I hated to hold everyone up. Granted, my entire group never complained about stopping at Strand and I was actually not the only person to buy something, but I could have spent the entire day petting the books. Ok, that is getting a little personal.

Anyway, I thank Megan for sharing about her trip to Strand. It definitely lived up to the hype I gave it and I will absolutely make it a stop on every trip to NYC I make.

Here are some pictures from my little shopping excursion.

Aren’t my goodies fun? I got a tote bag (pattern on left). I don’t really know what I’m going to tote around in it, but I had to have it. I also got a mug, which was one of five I brought home from the trip (post to come on those), the yellow bag (right) was the bag from the store. I kept it because it was quite sturdy, the black pouch (center) is just the right size for my Nook. I actually have four Nook cases right now, so this one is kind of just for the purpose of having one with ”Strand” on it. And my final purchase, to the left of the Nook case, is a Sharpie. It’s actually a Sharpie, for signing purposes, that says Strand on it. I probably didn’t need a special Sharpie, because I rarely go to signings, but still, it’s the novelty right?

So now I have all the goodies from the store, next on the list is a good book

I have lots more NYC posts on the horizon, so stay tuned for adventure and pictures on the blog!

I just spent two days in NYC and wow, what a whirlwind. I cannot believe how much we got done in two days. I have several posts planned, but I want to give you a little sneak peek of what to expect.

We left West Virginia Thursday evening on a bus

This is all of us after a 12 hour drive…through the night. We stopped at a rest stop just outside the city, around 5:30 a.m. and got all dolled up for a day on the town. I must say, we all look pretty stunning for the circumstances!

As I mentioned, I have several posts I plan on writing over the next couple of weeks, but I want to give you a sneak peek of what to expect and a rundown of some of our trip basics.

There were four of us that were NYC buddies
*We walked HUNDREDS of blocks…including 40+ one evening just searching for a cab
*We ate at 8 different locations in 2 days
*We rode in 5 different cabs (and thought we were were going to die each time)
*We got lost on the subway for more than an hour and ended up on the streets of Brooklyn after dark
*We watched an awesome Broadway show, where most of the characters were in drag (we wore pink feather boas to fit in)
*I bought lots of presents for my loved ones
*I was up 22 hours on Friday (my friends stayed up 24 hours)
*I slept 9 hours on the bus ride home and took a 5 hour nap

So those are just a little fun facts about the trip. I can’t wait to share the trip in more detail with you and I have more than 500 pictures to sort through and share. They will be on Flickr soon, so keep an eye on the right side of my page and click on the widget.

And stay tuned for my NYC fun-filled posts to come over the next couple of weeks!