Pic 1 2016

In keeping with tradition, I am once again doing my 30 pictures in 30 days posts. Of course me being me, it may very well turn into 30 pictures in 60 days.  I did start taking pictures a couple of days ago so I have a little bit of a back up in case I start to slack off. :)  Picture one is from my friend's wedding on Nov. 19th.

Go Cubs: Reflections from a Red Sox fan

I wouldn't describe myself as a huge sports fan.  I don't understand football and when my husband watches it, if I'm in the same room as him I'm usually reading, doing work, or on the computer.  I do like hockey and went to a big hockey university, but I can't say that I watch it regularly now, but I did very much enjoy going to a hockey game a couple of weeks ago.  I enjoy basektball well enough, but I don't regularly watch it.  I find myself tuned into socc er during World Cup, but otherwise, don't watch that much and of course I love the Olympics, but it's not like those are on all the time.  I do however, pay some attention to baseball.  I'm not saying I could tell you any cool stats or name players on any teams besides the Red Sox or Yankees, but I grew up in a baseball house.  My dad watched the Red Sox regularly when I was a kid.  My husband watches them now.  I would watch games here and there in my childhood. I can remember my first Red Sox game--it was so cold and the game went on for ages and the Sox lost badly--it's kind of amazing I went back actually.  I started paying attention again in high school because it seemed "cool to do so" and I had a little crush on Nomar Garciapara.  I got really into the Sox in college.  It was so easy to hang out with friends and watch tv in the dorms that we often hung out and watched Sox games.  Then I went to graduate school in Boston.  I was there the year they lost the division series to the Yankees (you know when everyone said Francona should have pulled Pedro out) AND I was there in 2004 when it seemed hopeless that they would win--no, it seemed impossible.  I turned off game 4, then put it back on with my eyes half shut only to be SHOCKED that they won that game--and boy was that a late night--and the next three.  People in the city were so happy.  There was just a happy vibe when you'd be out and about.  I remember one T driver practically dancing from happiness talking about the game. And that was before they won the world series, gosh that was an exciting week.  My friends and I, and people where I was working, studying, and interning were SO HAPPY when they won.  So so happy!  So my point (because believe it or not I do have one) in all of this is despite not being a huge sports fan, I get what it feels like to see "your" team lose and not make the World Series year after year and how exciting it is when they FINALLY do win because admit it, you did wonder if you'd ever see a win in your lifetime, even though you're not that old, but you knew it had been a long time since they won.  So...when I heard the Cubs had a shot at the series, I was "Go Cubs" all the way. I've been to Wrigley and enjoyed it, but my main reason for wanting the Cubs to win was that I understood how it felt to have such a long streak without a World Series win.  So even though I generally don't watch baseball if the Red Sox aren't playing,  I did find myself tuning into the World Series this year.  And then getting nervous and having to turn off the game.  And then there was game 7.  OMG  If it were a movie you wouldn't believe it, they're up, they're not, they're tied, what do you mean there's a rain delay?  It's MIDNIGHT!  I should have been in bed hours ago.  I have to work in a few hours!      Well, I fell asleep during the rain delay and woke up the next morning too nervous to put on the phone or tv or anything, but  I finally did and I was so happy for the Cubs, exhausted, but happy--I was also annoyed that I was that tired and didn't get to actually see the win--thank goodness for YouTube!  So while I may not be a true Cubs fan, I was pretty happy to see them win.  Go Cubs!      

Trying to Leave Philadelphia

And before you knew it, two weeks has passed and you still haven't finished writing about a weekend trip to Philadelphia.  Let's get this done!
So as you may remember, we had a good weekend in Philadelphia, which is more than I can say for our departure from Philadelphia.  Our taxi was supposed to pick us up at 5:30.  I was worried we were cutting it close because our flight was at 7:15 and aren't you supposed to get to the airport about a month before your flight departs these days?  Anyway, the taxi arrived at 5:40 so from about 5:32 until 5:40 we were starting to worry, but the driver showed up and as it was a Sunday evening there wasn't much traffic.  I think we got to the airport around 6:00.  Didn't take us too long to check in and get through security so we headed to our gate.  Mike stayed at the gate and I went in search of a Christmas ornament--that's my new thing now when I travel.  I get an ornament from each new place I visit.  Actually, it's not really that new.  I've been doing it for a few years now.  As I was walking back to our gate, I heard some woman on he cell phone complaining that her flight was departing an hour late now.  I thought, "Geeze that stinks, glad that's not me."  Little did I know...I got back to the gate and couldn't find Mike.   Well, that was weird. He didn't seem like the type to just ditch me ha ha.  So I pulled out my cell phone to call him and saw I had a missed call from him. Turns out they moved our gate AND (bet you're not surprised) our flight was leaving an hour late.  Ironically (or not), the last time I tried to leave Philly (from a connecting flight elsewhere) our flight left an hour late.  So we decided to buy and eat an overpriced dinner.  Seriously, why is airport food so expensive? I guess they know you're starving and you can't exactly leave the airport and come back so you'll just pay the ridiculous prices.  Finally, boarded our flight only to be told the airport we were flying to had ONE runway open so we couldn't leave for over and hour.  WHAT?!  Seriously?  I was going to spend more time waiting to take off than the length of the flight.  Let's just say I was glad we didn't have to work on Monday.  We almost were going to come back Monday and go to work on Tuesday.  Thank goodness we didn't do that because by the time we finally got to the airport, got back to the car, and got home it was nearly midnight.  At least it was a short flight.  If I had to sit on a plane for over an hour and then have a 6 hour flight or something, I'd be a big grump!
So there ya' go, a month later, I'm caught up on a two 1/2 day trip lol.  Happy Thanksgiving!    

Philadelphia Day 2

On our next (and last) day in Philadelphia we got up, got ready, and had another included delcious breakfast.  I hadn't had a donut since last year, but since I was eating junk all weekend, I had one.  It was fine, but I should have stuck with those delcious cinnamon rolls instead.  Then we checked out of our hotel, stored our luggage and took a taxi to Independence Hall.  It was only a mile away, but neither one of us had an umbrella because we're smart like that and it was pouring so a taxi seemed the way to go.  I at least had a jacket, but that only did so much good when we stood in the rain waiting to go through security twice later on that morning.  We got our tickets at the vistiors' center, then got soaked waiting to go through security, then finally got into Independnece Hall for our tour.

 









After that, we waited in the rain again to go see the Liberty Bell.  I like history so I enjoyed seeing both places.

 I wanted to go see the Constitution Center since I am a dork and took a college course on the Constitution, but it was only a little after 11 and it didn't open until noon so we went back to the Vistitors' Center for a little while to kill time.  Hung out there for a half hour or so then headed to the Constitution Center because we thought it was going to be a bit of a walk, but it was across the street so we stood in the cold counting down the minutes until it opened.  It wasn't exactly what I was expecting, but I enjoyed it well enough.

We then hopped on the hop on hop off bus and rode it over to One Liberty Plaza (with a quick pic of the Rocky Statue and stairs).  The views were much better than the day before, the staff was friendly, and we didn't have to stand in the rain (the sun was out now).

 We were hungry after that (it was well past lunch time) so we decided to go back to Reading Terminal Market for lunch.  We still had some time to kill so we wandered around a little bit, got cookies from Insomnia Cookies (place I'd read about on some travel site), and eventually went back to our hotel around 5 to wait for our 5:30 taxi because we didn't really have any other place to go for a half hour.  Getting home was a bit of a process, but I'll save that for another post and end this on a happy note.
It was a good day in Philadelphia.

 

Philadelphia

Our first full day in Philadelphia, we got up, got ready, and had the included breakfast at the hotel. I swear that cinnamon roll was one of the best cinnamon rolls I've ever had and I'm not just saying that because I haven't had one in YEARS.  It was delicious.  We then took a taxi to the stadium where the Philadelphia Phillies play so we could tour the stadium.  It was a pretty good tour.  I know nearly nothing about that baseball team, but I still enjoyed the tour.

Then it was off to Independence Hall to do a hop on hop off bus tour of the city.  We got off at the Eastern State Penitentiary and did a guided tour there.  I wasn't sure about touring a jail, but that was pretty interesting.  Our guide was informative and interesting.  After the tour, we had time to poke around a little.  Saw Al Capone's cell, which was MUCH nicer than any of the othe cells in there.

 Then we got back on the bus to head to One Liberty Plaza, which is a tower with a nice view of the city.  Unfortunately, it was raining when we got there and they said the visibility was zero so they let us exchange our voucher for the next day (so nice!, not all towers do that.)  We were going to get back on the bus, but decided to walk instead.  We walked by City Hall (a pretty cool looking building) and then to Reading Terminal Market, where there are WAY too many food choices. It's amazing.  We hadn't eaten since breakfast and it was now 5:00 so we chowed down.  Late lunch, snacks, and a variety of desserts to go (and ice-cream while we were there).  It's amazing I didn't gain 10 pounds with all those treats!   We made a stop at the Hard Rock Cafe so Mike could get a t-shirt got back to the hotel a little after 6, but nothing too touristy was still open and we weren't hungry for dinner since we ate lunch so late.  So we had a quiet night in.    

I Just Want to Go to My Hotel

So as you read in my last blog post, our flight was late and I'd worked all day so I was a bit tired when we (finally) arrived in Philadelphia.  We only brought carry on luggage since we were only going for a weekend.  We got down to ground transportation and asked the attendant (is that the right word?) where to go for our shuttle as it wasn't very clearly marked.  He said we had to call them.  I told him we had a reservation to be picked up, shouldn't they be waiting for us somewhere?  Apparently not!  So I called, got a recording and was told to dial 1 if I were waiting to be picked up.  The lady who answered told me I needed to check in with ground transportation.  I told her I'd just done that.  She told me I had to check in with them and they'd give me a number.  What the heck???  I thought perhaps I had checked in with the wrong person since when I asked him what to do he told me to call them.  I told her that and she directed me back to the same place I'd just been.  Thanks for nothing lady.  So Mike asked someone else who told us to go to that phone right there and dial 24. Just 24?  Yes.   Guess what happened when I dialed 24?  The operator told me my call could not be completed and to hang up and dial again.  Guess what happened then?  Here's a hint:  see above.  So I relunctantly went back to the grond transportation man and explained the situation to him.  He gave me a card with the number 61 on it. I called the shuttle again with this number and the woman was RUDE.  So rude that I'm ready to write a review and tell people never to do business with this company again.  She told me to wait to be announced.  I asked her where they were going to announce it, was someone going to come over the intercom?  Walk in and yell our names?  Her response was to tell me to go back to the ground transport guy who did not concur with this information.  This is the most messed up shuttle pick up I've ever seen.  I have traveled many times and either a shuttle person is waiting outside in the spot where they promised to be, inside with a sign, or gives you a number to call and hustles over from the cell phone lot.  Never have I had to keep calling the company to find out where my shuttle was and be spoken to so rudely by someone.  So eventually some guy comes in and asks if we're waiting for him. Yep.  So he drives us to our hotel--and wait for it, drives right by it.  At first, I thought, well, maybe that's not our hotel, I think there are a couple of Holiday Inns in this city, but wait, that's the right street.  Unfortunately, he can't turn around and there are a bunch of one way streets--and traffic--yes, traffic at 11:00 on a Friday night--so it takes a while to go around and get back to our hotel.  We finally checked in a little after 11:00pm.  Let's just say I'm glad the hotel staff was nice and our room was fabulous!  Good size, comfy bed, decentish view.   Oh, and by the way, the next morning, we had a text message from the shuttle company saying they were on their way. I guess it got sent sometime that night, but it didn't come through before we went to bed.  Thanks for nothing shuttle company!  (Don't give up on me based on this grumpy post, the rest of the trip was better.)  

Off to Philadelphia

My husband and I somewhat randomly decided to go to Philadelphia for Columbus Day weekend.  I'd never been there before and he hadn't been since he was a kid.  The day before was a bit hectic--I'd planned to leave work close to on time, but ended up staying two hours late (and still bringing work home grr), hitting every red light and some traffic on the way home and having to wolf down dinner before my ballet class.  For various reasons, which I will not get into right now, I have a love hate relationship with my ballet class this year.  I really didn't want to go to ballet that night since I had so much to do--like finish packing, but I ended up being glad I went as it was a good class that night.  After class, I managed to finish the work I brought home, clean the house up a bit, pack, and eventually went to bed.  I was planning to go straight from work to the airport shuttle the next day so I got up a few minutes early (after staying up too late) to make sure everything was good to go.  And off I went--on time to walk laps with a co-worker before work when I remembered my lunch was in the fridge.  Normally, I would have just said forget it, I can get a snack at work, but since I had no idea what time I'd be having dinner that night, I decided to turn around and go back home to get my lunch.  Back on the road again and off to work, I only ended up being able to walk laps for 20 minutes, but I guess it was better than nothing.  When I got to work, I remembered I forgot my ipod and though I could certainly live without it for the weekend, I really wanted it for the plane ride.  Thankfully, the planets somehow aligned correctly at work and I left at a reasonable hour--a Columbus Day weekend miracle.  I had enough time to run home and grab my ipod before catching the airport shuttle.  It was cheaper to take it from the park and ride instead of taking it directly from my house so I got there a few minutes early.  The shuttle was waiting and since I was the only one who booked it, we got to leave 15 minutes early.  Amazingly traffic wasn't bad--correction it wasn't bad the way we went it, it was awful going the other way.  I feared it would take hours to get to the airport with all the holiday weekend traffic, but it took under an hour and a half.  My husband met me there a few minutes later.  We got our boarding passes, cleared security, and had time to get a sit down meal since it was only a little after 6:00 and our flight wasn't until 8:05.    Does anyone else wonder about airport prices?  I drink a lot of water so I always a buy a water bottle when I get to the airport since you can't bring it through security, but really, does it have to cost more for a bottle of water at the airport than it costs for a case at home?  (I have a Brita so I rarely buy water any more.)  I'll save my complaints about food prices for a later blog.    Soon it was time to board the plane and off we'd go--or so I thought, but because they were waiting for some data, we got on the plane and sat there for a while. We eventually took off and landed in Philadelphia a short while later.