Day 12: "Eat a hot dog!"

Today was our second day into the city, and we are figuring out our way nicely. The subways aren't as scary as they were last year, and even walking around the city doesn't feel as foreign to me as it did last year. Its kinda like walking through LA except with tons more people. We went to the Statue of Liberty and Ellis Island yesterday; Central Park and the Met today. We have had so much fun!
The Statue of Liberty was nutty, you get put on a boat after going through security first of course, and this guy in front of us in line had so much crap with him it was ridiculous, are you really going to need your laptop, and nail files with clippers to see some gift from the French when probably a few years ago you were eating "freedom fries" geesh, REALLY?!?! No, is my answer to that one. But we got there safely beside that guy with the evil nail cutters-he wasn't even allowed on the boat-poor you and your family. Liberty Island was neat, we got there, got food, then wandered around. You had to have a "monument pass" before actually gaining access into the pillar that the Ms.s stands on, which of course we didnt have, you must book that weeks in advance. So we walked around, took pictures from the sides and of Manhattan. Then we waited in line with a million of other people before piling into another boat to go to Ellis Island. By this time we were beat. We walked the 2 stories of exhibits before looking up Pat's families name and heading outside to take a picture of it, "The Avedisian Family" We found them! And I got pictures. Pretty cool huh? Then after trying to find some of my own families names we got frustrated and headed to the mainland. After again waiting forever in the hot sun with tons of little kids around, we piled onto the boat and headed back. While on the boat this family had two little kids with them and nowhere to sit so they sat them inside their strollers and waited out the ride. These kids were not having it! they were crying and screaming and pulling each others hairs, the oldest child was twisting in his chair, screaming and flailing about. The parent were obviously stressed out, and when they tried to leave the father was slowly pushing the kids out of the boat, when some other stupid fat old man got all angry with him, "LEARN HOW TO BE PATIENT, WE'RE ALL TRYING TO LEAVE, BE PATIENT WHAT ARE YOU DOING?" EW! The flabbergasted parent looked at this man and said, "I have two screaming children, what do you want me to do, I am trying to get through just as you sir..." The other man held the stroller back and pushed his way through rudely without any regard for anyone else (let me also remind you that there were about 200 people trying to get through 1 door on the bottom floor of this boat, people were coming from 3 stories up and while we were exiting there was one man at the door yelling at us to keep coming, move faster, and watch your head, it was hot, the waves were rocking, and there were children screaming as if they were being executed!). So the man with the children replied, "Hey, why don't you be patient" but that comment was ignored. We were off the boat and easily navigated ourselves to Union Square were we were meeting Christian. We stopped at this coffee shop and bar, where everyone who worked there looked like a model, no joke, they even had this attitude about them, "we're the pretty people, don't talk to us." heh, well we had some drinks, and off to meet Christian for dinner. Dinner was good, expensive, but good. More beers. Christian was good also, his dreams it sounds like are coming true. Living in Manhattan, playing music all the time, and teaching music; it was so nice to see him doing so well.
Are next trip into the city was not quite as eventful, but we did almost, sorta, kinda get lost, but not really. And Blake finally got his hot dog.
More tomorrow.....