NYC

Well, it was a little crazy there at the end, but I successfully got out of St. Louis on Sunday after church and so far have not forgotten anything. I'm gone now for a month. It seems kind of like a trial run for me, seeing as I'll return to St. Louis for a month or so on 12/14 and then God willing be gone for 2 years. In any case, I started my travels in NYC visiting my friends Caroline and Tim. Yep, the same Caroline mentioned in the last post. Here they are, outside their cozy little on campus apt. on the Upper West Side. They graciously hosted me for about 36 hours and I got to chill out after being on the go for a while before leaving St. Louis. They also indulged me in my only definitive request for my time in NY....PIZZA! Here's a picture of the wonderful yumminess in all it's glory, if any of you have ever eaten pizza in NY, you know the yumminess I'm speaking of. And speaking of food, you should have seen the meal that Carolina cooked up when I arrived on Sunday evening, from a kitchen the size of my piano: killer pasta with hot sausage, a scrumptious greek salad with roasted red peppers and feta and artichoke hearts and walnuts, and lovely roasted asparagus...sooooo tasty! Okay, so there's more to NY than food, believe it or not :) Monday evening I ventured out of the apt. for some fresh air after a relaxing morning of productivity and an afternoon of scintilating conversation with Tim. I took the subway down to the base of central park and wandered around a bit and then met Carolina after she finished work. We met up at the Mac store - check this snazzy place out, the store is down below this glass enclosure and was totally mobbed...kind of a Mac Mecca of sorts. Made me feel proud of my little MacBook. Then yesterday I met up with my dear sister, and while waiting for her and freezing my butt off on a park bench next to Central Park I had the opportunity to witness this fascinating phenomenon: The NYC dogwalker! I mean look at this, 11 dogs at one time! And I think there might be a 12th in the little back pack like thing on her back. Now, this woman did not seem to be particularly happy about being a dogwalker but you can tell from this lineup that she is pretty skilled. Not a peep out of any of the 11 dogs and they're all just walking along in a line. My sister and I later met up with Josh Corey, a friend from St. Louis and evidently a friend of his does this for a living. Josh says you get paid per the 1/2 hour per dog and you just go and pick each of them up from their various homes and then off you go, returning them home after their 1/2 hour of fresh air. Hilarious and oh so fascinating! Only in NYC. Josh has been doing some pretty sweet design work after graduating from Pratt in Brooklyn. Check out his work at: pariahdesignjargon.com. Then the adventures continued when on our way to Penn Station via subway, I couldn't successfully get into the subway...$16 and about a 1/2 hour later after 3 cards that didn't work an extremely frustrated Heidi made it through the darn turnstile and onto the subway and here's the picture of the evidence...So, Carrie and I made it to Penn Station and then to Westwood, NJ where we're spending Thanksgiving with Uncle Gary, Aunt Carol and cousins Bradley and Jeremy. Have a happy Turkey Day!