The movies highlighted were Cars, Little Mermaid, Lion King and Tinkerbell. I’m not a huge fan of Tinkerbell and haven’t seen that movie. I already saw the Little Mermaid when we saw the princesses on ice. And the kids aren’t huge Cars fans. So honestly I don’t think I appreciated much of what we saw. BUT the kids did. They had a wonderful time. I don’t think Lexi quit clapping except for the small scary parts of Lion King. Everyone did a great job and it was done with true Disney quality.
#HBC New York Rundown
I promise…last post on NY. If you want our trip in old-style journaling every second of what we did, check out Heather’s post. I particularly liked this paragraph:
The shoot was AMAZING. Everything you could imagine a dream photo shoot in NYC could be, this was. I don’t think I’ve ever been prouder of my sister, other than at the births of my neices. She rocked. In her gentle way that she does everything she picked out an outfit (the one I told her over and over to use) and then sat and got her makeup done. It looked flawless. Then the posing. I’ve seen some of her “home” posing pictures…I’m not sure where this came from but she nailed it. I’ve seen my BFF from school go from normal girl to model girl and it’s like a light switch gets turn on…I had never seen this with my sister and I felt like a deer caught in headlights. My sissy was HOT. and she knew it. When she had done the shoot for a magazine awhile ago this confidence wasn’t there….here, she was a superstar. I failed to get pictures that really showed off what was going on at the right angles but trust me, the pics were awesome. So with the pop of a ballon it was over and we were “free” to go but I think Amy and me didn’t want it to end.
Grey’s Anatomy and The Office Review
The Office
- I kept finding myself saying I love Jim and Dwight! They are hilarious together. That stopwatch was hilarious. And that look Dwight gave after his 19 minute break? Hilarious.
- Michael blocking the copier? Hilarious.
- Corporate okaying the discounted paper? Hilarious.
- Michael taking the coffee pot from the kitchen? Hilarious.
- Michael telling her at dinner that he doesn’t want his “family” to think their jobs are based on performance? Hilarious.
Great episode but where was our Pam?
Grey’s
Whew, I felt like Grey’s hit their stride and thank goodness it only took two weeks instead of like 13 episodes like last season. There were really only two scenes though that I must point out.
- Meredith and Derek deciding at the end to let Izzie and Alex stay. Her asking Derek if he still loved her. And he does. And they hugged. I don’t know what better name to call him than his given McDreamy.
- Alex’s “Hello.” That is Shonda Rhimes’ at her best writing (placement not really the creativity or lack thereof of “hello” LOL) and Justin Chambers’ at his best acting. Loved. it.
#HBC The leftovers
OK, these are a few points I had written on my list that don’t really make up a whole post but as a listmaker, I feel as if I must post on them.
- What is with all the making out? We saw more than a few couples straight up french kissing on the sidewalk. One guy had his hand down his girl’s pants in the back. Couldn’t wait to get to the room? What? Is this normal?
- The talent we saw in the subway…are these scheduled? Are there rules about who gets to perform and for how long?
- I couldn’t help but notice how many people there were walking around and one might think New York would be chaotic but chaotic is the very last thing it is. The people and cars move in this fluid movement with their own set of rules that I think actually would be beautiful to watch from the air.
- Why can’t you touch money? People about jumped out of their skin when Heather tried to help a guy beside her at the newspaper stand and handed the lady his money he had laid down that she couldn’t quite reach. She said you did the right thing but we’re taught not to touch other people’s money unless we’re asked. Really? I’ve never heard of anything like that.
- I realize families are raised in the city but there was something so odd about seeing a child..especially a baby..in the city. They seemed like polar opposites. And I don’t know how moms do it with strollers and the subway. Seriously.
- Just FYI, we saw this guy with a Puggle. It’s a mix between a Pug and a Beagle and it was the cutest thing ever!
- There were so many gay people. Not trying to weird about it or anything but there’s just not that many openly gay people around here. It was just odd to see two men walk hand in hand down the street. It just doesn’t happen here.
- I mentioned the Apple store briefly in a tweet but let me just say the Apple store is cool. If you’re an Apple fan or even just an fan of architecture, go see it.
I think this wraps up my series on #HBC. I’m sure you’re breathing a sigh of relief. Good for you, because I’m not. Now I have absolutely nothing to write about except car lines and dirty houses again.
#HBC The Photo Shoot
Alright, we’re on the home stretch, people. I promise there is an end in sight to all these #HBC posts. Now, I COULD come up with about 4 more posts if you’d like but I might just squish some random things I noticed into one last post after this. Anyway. Let’s finally talk about the reason I went — to get a picture with BusyDad the shoot.
(Let me stop here to say BusyDad definitely lives up to his hot blogger name and I really do mean I have a little bloggy crush on him but I want to be clear–mostly for my mother’s sake because she worries about my little crushes, bless her heart–that I love my husband and think he is hot as well and I know BusyDad has a wife that is super-duper gorgeous and he has absolutely no reason to pay any attention to my blogging nonsense. Just having a little fun. Except I really do mean that he’s hot. And I really did make Heather take our picture even though she didn’t want to.)
OK, so you’ve read about how long it took to get there. Sarah was waiting for us downstairs and brought us up. When we got there, BackpackingDad was getting his picture taken, his wife was sitting on the couch along with the makeup artist Jillian. BusyDad was on his laptop, Bill and Meg were working on the photos and Jane’s parents Barry and Sharon were sitting on the sidelines watching everything. Me? I walk in and while I planted a smile on my face and was truly excited to be there, my hands were shaking. I’d worked myself up into a tizzy even though I didn’t want to admit it and couldn’t really pinpoint one thing I was nervous about. I’d given myself a headache for about 24 hours and I was feeling it.
First order of business was picking out my outfit though. I laid out about half my clothes. And by the way, I took more than three outfits really. Here’s what I took:
- black dress pants
- white dress pants
- black shorts
- dark jeans
- both black shirts
- pink flowered shirt
- green shirt
- blue dress
That’s like a total of about 20 outfits if I mix and match. Do you think *I* could have actually made a decision and picked 3 or less?? NO!! I get only halfway through my selections and Bill says what’s that blue thing hanging in there? As soon as I pull it out he (and maybe Jane/Sarah) says that’s it and while I’m sure Heather was saying, “See, told ya!” Y’all, seriously. And I mean, seriously, was *this close* to leaving that dress in the hotel room. We even talked about it before I left. Heather was like, just take it in case!!
So off I went to the ba
throom to change. I came back and got my hair ready with shaky hands. I dropped the top to my hair paste on the floor, literally almost burned my face with my flat-iron and Dani looked at me and said, “OK, let’s calm down and get it together.” And I think I did as soon as Jillian started doing my makeup. She says either people hate it or love it. I loved it. I love when anybody ever does anything for me (service love language anyone?). And having a makeup artist make my face look good? Well, that just takes the cake. I relaxed and got to the point where I was getting sleepy. I think the tension slowly went out right there in the makeup chair.
There are only a few times in your life that you know without a shadow of a doubt you look your best. Maybe not THE best but YOUR best.
That was one of them. I stuck on my silver high heels and said where do you want me?
I’m usually really, really nervous in front of people. My neck and face turn red and my hands shake and when people notice, it gets worse. But not then. I stood or sat where they told me and looked at the camera with a confidence I wasn’t sure quite sure I knew I had. I joked with Scott when I got home that all of our photo shoots at home had paid off LOL. No, not every photo was perfect but I didn’t expect it to be. I’m sure everyone’s supportive compliments helped put me at ease but I don’t know. I’ve never been less nervous in my life and the worst thing I heard all day was Bill saying, “OK, I think we got it.” I think I might have dropped the phrase, “I could try another outfit” one too many times. I literally could do that every day of my life. Yes, my knees hurt and my ankles hurt from standing like I was for 30 minutes but it was so worth it.
Going back to the bathroom and changing into corduroy pants and printed tee felt a lot like midnight for Cinderella. I don’t mean to be overly dramatic for the sake of the post but honestly, those 45 minutes or so were really some of the best 45 minutes of my life. I have never felt more confident, more free, more HOT than almost any other time that I can recall. Seriously.
My blog isn’t very popular and I know I’m not the hottest person ever but you know what? That calendar is going to have one of the best moments of my life captured in it. And you know, I’m not going to apologize for it.
Thank, you Sarah and Jane for coming up with this crazy idea and no matter what people might think of this whole hot blogger calendar or how many sell, you helped make a little Southern girl feel like a princess for a day. And that, my friends, is hot. (Who knew I could channel John McCain AND Paris Hilton in one sentence??)
#HBC Paramount Hotel
How about we talk about something safe like a hotel review? I don’t want to make this drawn out but I do have to say I had high hopes for the Paramount. It was supposed to be mod, unique and fun. And yes, the lobby and little bar were very cool and the room looked pretty cool, but I have to give the room a thumbs down.
The room was small. Which I KNOW is normal for NY but I stayed at the Marriott right beside the Paramount when I went to New York in 2001 and there was no comparison even though the price difference wasn’t that big.
The bathroom made weird noises and smelled of sewer at times. Not a stinky bathroom but actual sewer. There was no countertop space even though the sink WAS cool. The shower felt dirty and the shower curtain was flimsy and stuck to you while you showered.
The beds were on the floor. I’m all for a platform bed but this was just a mattress and boxspring on the floor and we felt like we were camping. What’s worse is the beds SQUEAKED when you moved on them. AND they were very worn and we sank to the middle. It did have a nice down comforter and pillows going for it though.
The floor carpet also just looked and felt dirty. We were scared to touch anything that had fallen on it. But I guess that’s standard for any hotel room.
I don’t know, I guess some of it was par for the course in New York but I do know I had a much better experience at The Marriott last time AND I can plan to save up my Marriott gift cards for next time to cushion the difference.
#HBC The non-post about the bags we didn’t buy
I hope I don’t get into trouble on this post. I’m going to try to be discreet and if I’m being dumb and ignorant in any way, forgive me. I didn’t ask many questions and had no idea this was around. I just followed. If it’s well known and public and I’m being TOO discreet, well, I apologize for that too.
We went to the part of New York where a lot of Asian people are and the streets are packed and very busy. Catch my drift yet? Women and men would come up to you and ask you if you want Coach, Prada? If you didn’t walk away, you barely needed to nod your head in assent they said “Follow me” and off you were following them quickly to who knows where. Sometimes you’d follow them to the store directly behind you and in some cases we had to walk a block or two. Here is a covert picture we took being led to such a place.
We’d be ushered the store, walk toward what looked like a normal wall and then see that there would be a secret door. It would open up, usually revealing stairs. Some went up and some went down. Either way, they were usually steep. Those led to a landing where we were then sometimes taken to another room which was locked. The rooms were usually about 10×15 or so, sometimes much smaller and stacked with Gucci, Coach, Prada, Duney and Burke and Dolce and Gabana purses, sunglasses, wallets and sometimes scarves. The door was locked behind us and one worker would stay in there with us to make deals with.
Dani was tasked by a friend at home to buy four purses and of course we couldn’t left out. After at least five stores and way too many stairs, we left the town of Asian people with I think 6 bags and 2 pairs of sunglasses.
But lo and behold Dani pulls out her list from her friend and she was supposed to get two BLACK Coaches not two BROWN Coaches.
So Dani says she has some money left over and there are usually guys near Times Square with bags of them and she’ll just get them later. So we were out late Sunday night and went and got some cheesecake. Heather and I are in front of Dani walking out of the store and all the sudden Dani screams something and pushes past us. We didn’t see a thing but a guy is out on the street with bags. Woah. She must have smelled them coming. But they only have one black one. But then another guy walks up and talks to him with another bag but walks away. Dani finds out it’s the guy’s brother and Dani takes off after him. We follow him half a block and he turns around. So we turn around. We started joking, “Coach?! Prada?! Follow me!” The guy finally saw our interest and stopped and got the bag she wanted. Here may or may not be our loot.
#HBC Food Worth Talking About
There are two things I had recommended by EDW that must be passed on.
Angelo and Maxie’s Filet Oscar. Let’s note first that Heather actually got a steak salad…so proud! But the steak. And the crab on top. And the hollandaise on top. Oh my word. Honestly, if you looked “savory” up in the dictionary, a picture of my plate must be in there. It was like melt in your mouth goodness. On my last bite, I LITERALLY closed my eyes and held my hands out as if I was meditating. I wanted to remember that taste THAT much. DO NOT PASS GO until you get this.
One more thing I have to note. That stuff in the middle? It’s my “side”. I ordered onion strings thinking it would a few on the “side” of my plate. No! It’s like an appetizer. Also note the HUGE “side” of potatoes beside that. All three of us dipped in those. They were DELISH as well.
And just one more thing. It’s a very nice restaurant but even better? They played Pink and Usher instead of elevator music. Great atmosphere.
The price? $111 for everything you see on the table. No drinks. Just water. Yes, it’s a splurge dinner.
Junior’s. Cheesecake. DO NOT PASS GO. In fact, go order it online.
