New York

August 16th continued...
The train turned right and Manhattan came into plain sight. What I had seen so many times in movies and television was right before my very eyes. We dipped down into a tunnel that was taking us under the water and to the island and came up in Grand Central Station. Beautiful. The Philadelphia station doesn't even compare.

Outside, we jumped into another taxi where I made another amazing discovery. Taxis here have bumpers!! Bumper car bumpers!! And every vehicle is dented!! Bringing your car to Manhattan? Parking is $30 every half hour, and nobody takes street signs seriously.

After being thrown around like change in a washing machine for twenty minutes, we were outside our hotel at Lexington and 49th. We checked into the W, and ran up to our room to drop our suitcases off, where we were made uncomfortable aware of the erotic light up photo above our beds in the room where my dad, sister, and I were sleeping.

After a few uncomfortable minutes, we left the room and headed to 30 Rockefeller Place to NBC studios and The Top of the Rock; a few blocks away from our hotel. It was ginormous. HUGE. It was so beautiful inside and had an equally large gift shop where we immediately purchased a Dwight bobble head for my other sister and Office shirts for everyone else. Afterwards, we bought ridiculously overpriced tickets and took the elevator to the top of 30 Rockefeller place, where we had panoramic views of the Empire state building, Central Park, The Statue of Liberty, and Harlem. Just kidding about Harlem. It really was
breathtaking though. I really didn't know how huge Manhattan is until I saw it from a bird's eye view.

We did so much that day I'm sure I'm forgetting something. My dad got a Philadelphia Cheese Steak even though we weren't in Philadelphia anymore. We stopped at Radio City and then the Ritz Carlton for drinks. Dad was getting fussy so Michele and I dropped him off at the hotel and hit fifth avenue for some shopping. I think one of the highlights of the day was when some tourists mistook us for locals and asked us for directions. Michele and I made it back to the hotel just in time to wake dad up, throw on some dresses, and grab a taxi to Broadway for a real Broadway show! After the show, we stepped outside and decided to walk back to the hotel since it was only a few blocks away and the subways underneath us kept the city warm at night. We crossed the street and BAM!! TIMES SQUARE! While walking, I got really excited about something I was talking about and put my hand up in the hair for some reason. Within seconds I heard screeching tires and a cabbie leaned out of his window and asked if we needed a ride. Awesome service huh! We stopped and got dessert at a nice restaurant and people watched for a while before getting some much needed rest.