It's Christmas Time In the City

The Saturday before Christmas, Hers and I got a reprieve from our boredom and hoped a train into the city. It was raining steadily when we left Albany at six in the morning. When we arrived in New York several hours later, the rain had ceased and it was getting warmer.

We headed for Rockefeller Center to see the symbol of the holiday season. It was actually a little disappointing. The tree seemed kind of thin this year.


After the tree, we headed for H&H to enjoy a bagel. I alway forget that when they ask you what you want, the correct response is "Whatever's fresh." Luckily, yhe sourdough bagel I ordered was fresh and yes, it was the best bagel I ever had. From there, we hit the Fifth Avenue and the Apple Store and from there, to FAO Schwartz where we were greeted by the largest stuffed animals I've ever seen.


That wasn't quite as impressive as life-size Lego figures that included Chewbocca, Batman, and yes, the Lord Vader himself.

After the toy store, it was more shopping and snacking. Eventually, we worked our way back toward Times Square and the theater district. They have cheap day-of tickets for sale in the city, but they weren't as cheap as we thought they'd be. We happened to walk by the Jacob's Theater where Martin Short's Fame Becomes Me was playing. We stepped inside to check out prices and not only did they have the least expensive tickets we had seen, but they also had student prices.

The show was great. Martin managed to work in most of the characters he's known for. The best was the little bit of improve in the middle of the show where celebrity interviewer Jiminy Glick interviews a member of audience. When celebrities are in attendance, they're usually brought up on stage for the interview. Rumor has it that one night Mel Brooks was in the audience and was brought up on stage. Glick asked him what he had against the Nazis. We hear Brooks replied "They were rude." We got Matt, a personal trainer who from the city. He was no Mel Brooks, but the whole thing was still hilarious.

We spent the rest of the day walking around in the city. We saw some of the Christmas displays outside Macy's and Bloomingdales. The sidewalks were incredibly crowded and we couldn't have gotten a picture if we wanted to, but they were impressive.

Our train was supposed to leave at 11:45, but we ended up at Penn Station around 7:30 or so. We were both exhausted and we traded our tickets for a 9:45 train. Our bed never felt so good.