NYC Part 1

It has been two weeks since this trip happened and I don't know if I have the patience to write the whole 36 hours out. But here goes.

I left work at 4 and was planning to take a 6:40 flight from O'Hare to LaGuardia. I got there in time for a flight scheduled 90 minutes prior. I got on the plane with no problem and even got to sit in first class. But while I had been riding the Monorail to the terminal, Catherine texted me that there were heavy storms in New York. When I checked the flight board, I saw the later flights were delayed, but mine looked fine.

Well, we got on the plane and we wound up sitting on the runway for two hours. But I will say, if you're sitting on an airplane and not going anywhere, it's better to be sitting in first class. We were served drinks and hot roasted nuts.

We took off around 7:30. For dinner, I had a subpar chicken breast, salad, sweet potatoes, and the hardest, most in edible roll of all time. I mean, really, if I can't eat a roll, it has to stink. And it did. The two glasses of red wine made the flight much smoother, I must say.

During the flight in, we actually flew right over top of Yankee Stadium and a game was going on. But the coolest thing was seeing lightning flash in the nighttime sky. Down below were the lights of New York City. And up above shone these streaks of glowing light. It was quite a sight to see from 25,000 feet in the air.

We arrived at LaGuardia around 10 p.m. I turned on my phone and discovered to my aggravation that Nnamdi Asomugah signed with Philadelphia and not the Jets. Anyway, I could see Catherine from 50 yards away, right outside security. I pretended not to notice her and walked right by, before smiling, and giving her a huge hug. We hopped a cab for a 20-minute ride back to her house in Middle Village.

All I can say about the house is this. The main level is filled with cat artifacts and the basement looks like a shrine to the Yankees. Her dad was nice enough to get a few hero sandwiches for us to munch on. I had half a meatball sandwich and half an eggplant parmesan sandwich. Just that Italian bread by itself had that unique, earthy New York taste that just cannot be duplicated anyplace else. Despite having dinner already, I made room for them. I met her parents and unfortunately, two cats. Anyway, her mom reminds me of some of my relatives with the thick NY accent. Her dad was pretty cool too. I brought all of them Carole's cookies and they wiped them all out with total ease.

But within about a half hour, my eyes started to water and my nose began running. Despite the warnings that you should take no more than one Claritin every 24 hours, I took two maybe three hours apart. So we settled in the basement and she showed me her old Rangers videos. We popped in Marek Malik's shootout and Mark Messier's retirement. Actually, to be honest, we didn't spend all our time watching the videos...That took till about 2 in the morning. I fell asleep around 2:30 and slept on the couch very soundly. I must say I was quite startled when the alarm for 7 am rang.