It's so fluffy I'm gonna die!!!

As promised, a far more exciting post tonight... 

The baseball game was so much fun!!! We went to the Yankees vs the Mets at the infamous Yankee Stadium up in Harlem. Feeling like very seasoned New Yorkers (lolzies!) we caught the metro train up there, hopped off right at the stadium (although not before marveling at the Trevor Noah poster in the subway!), bought some Yankees merchandise on the way to our gate and headed into the stadium with growing excitement and enthusiasm. We were not disappointed! The stadium was really quite impressive. The diamond really is as green as emeralds, neatly mowed in rows that cross over to make diamond shapes, and there was not a piece of litter to be seen anywhere. There is a cup holder in front of every seat (so much less danger of spillage than at the rugby!), there are cops based all around the field before, after and during the game in between innings (to prevent streakers, I presume) and security at every stairway entrance into the seats. Very very well organised. 

While the food and beer was ridiculously over priced ($11 for a not very large cup of LIGHT Bud!), the atmosphere was extremely contagious, and much to the surprise of all five of us very patriotic non-Americans, we very soon found ourselves standing, hats off, as the Star Spangled Banner rang out through the stadium. I must say, for all their noise about patriotism, we sing our anthem WAY louder and with far more heart at the rugby than any of them did last night. For that matter, I think I was the only person I could hear singing and I was doing it as a joke! They will never know :) We all threw ourselves wholeheartedly into the all-American experience of drinking beer, eating nachos and screaming encouragement at the players to catch the ball or run faster. Much to mine and Sam's disappointment (the boys chose to be non-mainstream and support the Mets) the Yankees managed quite a spectacular loss (9 runs to 4 if memory serves me right). So much so that their fans had all left before the game even ended! Nonetheless, Sam and I shouted our support with much enthusiasm until the last out when we eventually had to concede defeat to the boys. 

Tonight Jake and I descended on Times Square to take a few final shots before we both leave tomorrow. I could barely contain my excitement as I finally got to go INTO the Disney store!!! Eeeeeepppp. Too much of happiness :) it is pretty much just two stories of fluffy toys and pink sparkly stuff. I was in heaven :) and Jake was in hell. Poor boy. But he very kindly and patiently took a hundred and one photos of me with various fluffy animals and characters from amazing movies. I found Nemo! :) We also went to the Toys R Us that has an indoor Ferris wheel in it! I so wanted a ride, but Jake would hear none of it, so I turned my attention to my mission that, until now, has remained a secret... Finding a Wookie teddy bear! And I did! It is the softest and fluffiest Wookie I could ever have asked for, and it even makes Wookie-talk noises when you press its tummy :) Yay! You'll be with me for the rest of the trip now baby :) 

Tomorrow I am heading up to Connecticut to visit Jess, an old friend of mine. I'll be with her for the weekend before heading up to Boston for all of next week! I am also quite pleased to report that I am now very close to being able to upload pics for you guys... I have gotten them off my camera, I now just need to get them onto my iPad and I will post them ASAP! Just a note: I will be going back through my blog and posting them where they are relevant, as I feel it would be nicer to be able to read about the adventure and see the pics together.

Stay classy c",)

Nothing to report

Self-flushing toilets. What an amazingly useful invention! Said no toilet user ever. They're terrible! They just flush randomly if you happen to lean forward a little while you're doing your business! And let me tell you, if you haven't done your business by the time this happens, you will get such a fright, that you will definitely be done by the time the flush is finished! Then you stand there like an absolute twit waving your hand at the sensor to try and make it flush again once you're done! 

The last few days have been fairly uneventful. It was memorial day weekend so we have avoided all things touristy so as not to get tangled in the masses of people who flocked here for the weekend. So I haven't much exciting news to share I'm afraid. I have very inconsiderate room mates who seem to think that nobody needs to sleep if they themselves are not sleeping, so regardless of the time that they arrive back or leave the room, they stomp around and slam doors and make enough noise to disturb a hibernating bear. It's rather annoying. 

In other news, we watched the third Hangover on Sunday morning. The movie theatre is HUGE! They have four floors of cinemas! It totally blew my mind. Each floor has up to eight cinemas, plus its own concession stand. Simon and I shared a large popcorn and I still didn't get the bucket! Very disappointing. I'm starting to think they're doing it on purpose. Jake and I then waited around while Simon went on a helicopter flip over Manhattan. It took a long time because the queue was so long, so eventually we just headed back uptown to our hostel and we played pool and table tennis until bedtime. 

Yesterday the weather was really crappy so I stayed indoors for a much needed rest, I did some laundry which was a fun experience and then Jake, Simon and I went to a nice restaurant last night (for some real food) and I had the most tasty and monstrously large blue piña colada cocktail. It was scrumptious! 

We have bought tickets for the Yankees vs Mets baseball game tonight. We are all very excited! So I will definitely have more exciting news for you guys tomorrow! Also, I have finally found a memory card reader for my camera, so I am one step closer to posting pics! Yay! 

Stay classy c",)

Boston strong

So... It's been a while! Sorry guys, the last few days have been insane. We left Niagara Falls and drove to Berkshire for a sleepover before heading into Boston. We set up camp under a wooden picnic area, due to the steady rainfall outside. Once all our tents were comfortably squished under the roof, we proceeded to play THE FUNNEST GAME EVER!!! It's called "what would you do if" and is ridiculously simple and endlessly entertaining. You all have a slip of paper, write some random question on it (what would you do if you were a belieber?) and pass it to the right for the person next to you to answer. Once they have written down an equally random answer (question the purpose of my life), they pass it right again for that person to read. The point of the game is that you then read the question you have in front of you, and it is answered by the person to your right with the answer to whatever question they're holding. Hilarity ensues. This kept us entertained well into the wee hours, until we eventually retired with aching cheeks and bellies from the side-splitting fits of laughter induced by the game.

We arrived at Boston on Friday morning and split up to wander around the city. (You can take the kids out of high school, but you can't take the high school out of kids - we ranged from 19 to 30 something in age, but still fell into the age old "cliques" found at school.) So I went with Sam, Jordy, Jake, Simon and Hannah and off we went down the Freedom trail (after which, we assume, our trek was named). We saw all sorts of amazing landmarks, stickers, posters, etc labelled "Boston strong", which are everywhere (obviously has to do with the marathon), ambled through the fresh produce market, saw where the Boston tea party happened, and went to Harvard (which didn't look as old as we expected, for the most part). We also wanted to go to Copley Square (where the "big bang" happened) but ran out of time. The city is beautiful and has a lot of lovely old buildings scattered throughout. I thoroughly enjoyed it. I will definitely be going back soon! 

Friday night was easily one of our best nights. We went and had pizza and beer (yes, I am temporarily succumbing to American ways. Never thought the words "I drink beer" would tumble off my lips, but there it is...) at Boston's original Italian pizza restaurant! The place where Italians first brought pizza to Italy four score and many years ago. The pizzas are monstrous. No two ways about it. At a cool 16" diameter and $19.99 before tax, because this is America and America doesn't put tax on the prices shown, only on the final cost (Whose stoopid idea was that anyway?! Caught me out more than once with that!) they were big enough that four pizzas fed fourteen rather famished individuals, seven of whom were male! What a fantastic night.

We were dropped off in New York in the early afternoon on Saturday, stepping out of the van to bone-chilling temperatures and gale force winds. Pleasant surprise! Not. All hostels were fully booked due to Memorial weekend, so after much frantic inner panicking (of which my trek mates saw none) I got into my previous hostel and am now happily snuggled in here. It is Memorial Day weekend so it is a very full New York until Tuesday. Not that it was ever empty before! Jake, Simon and I are exploring New York together. Today we almost saw the Empire State Building and the Museum of Natural History, but then we didn't. 

Well, I think that's all for now folks! I'm knackered. Off to get some shut eye. 

Stay classy c",)