A little bit of culture today.

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Riding the subway
The rain is in NYC
Grey clouds follow me!

We all had an early start this morning since Eric had to go to work and Maria had to accompany her uncle to an Appointment out in Brooklyn. So Eric dropped us off at the Flushing Chinatown and we caught the shuttle into Chinatown. We made a short stop to say hello to Maria’s parents and then I started my day that I have all to myself today. My plan was to go to the American Museum of Natural History and check out what cheap tickets I can get at TKTS for a Broadway show.

The museum doesn’t open until 10AM so I wandered around a bit and found myself a Starbucks - not too tough. Lol I ordered a hot chocolate and iced lemon cake that were super delish…I can taste the lemon cake now just thinking about it…then I found myself a seat and table and proceeded to chow down as I also started on updating my journal…the never ending tasks!

Once the food was consumed and I’d had enough journal writing, I packed it up and headed to the blue line which would take me to the 81st street and the American Museum of Natural History. It was relatively easy to find. The line ups weren’t too long. I think I spent about four hours in the museum. Well that included a lunch break as well. The American Museum of Natural History sure has a lot of stuffed animals. The taxidermists have been busy over the years supplying all the animals for this museum. There were other interesting displays on different cultures of the World, the Earth and also at the Space Centre there were space type displays (go figure!) I learned about the Big Bang Theory as well. Hmm, perhaps it was the Met that I wanted to see again. Lol Oh well, I had an enjoyable time at the American Museum of Natural History anyway. 😊

Next up was to find my way to Times Square. So I took the train downtown and got off at 42nd Street. In retrospect I should have got off at 47th because that stop was closer to the TKTS booth. DOH! But the five blocks weren’t too far and soon enough I found myself looking at the electronic boards to see what tickets were available for tonight’s performances. I was gonna get Wednesday Matinee tickets but they actually don’t go on sale until tomorrow so I figured if I could see something tonight it would fill up tomorrow for a day of relaxation. There weren’t too many things that I wanted to see or that I had heard about so I settled on watching Rent. I saw this years ago when it was in Vancouver and loved it and I’ve been listening to the soundtrack lots lately because I really don’t have much downloaded onto my MP3 player. So what better to watch then Rent? I bought my ticket and had about four hours to kill before the start of the show. Hmm, what to do? Of course there’s always some browsing at the high end stores. So I did that for a bit before heading to Applebee’s for some dinner.

I really hate eating by myself but hey I’ve gotta eat and I don’t really want to go for fast food tonight. I ended up having a really yummy salad with chicken strips and honey mustard dressing. Plus a raspberry iced tea. Yum! Hmm, being a solo eater the food came out real fast and I still had over an hour to kill.

I ended up checking out the tourist information centre where they have free internet access. Well at least free access to Yahoo. Perfect. That killed about half an hour so I decided to get a vanilla cone from McD’s. Mmm…gotta love the soft serve!

Now it was time to head to the Nederlander Theatre. There was a bit of a line up forming because the doors weren’t open yet but once they opened, the line moved swiftly and before I knew it I was sitting in my seat. The theatre was a bit smoky for some reason. I was starting to get excited…20 minutes until the show starts! I forgot that the show didn’t have curtains. Anyhoo, soon enough the lights dimmed and the show started.

The show was just as good as I remembered although there were a few parts that seemed a bit rushed and the guy playing Roger wasn’t the best singer. But I was still really happy that I had come to tonight’s performance.

The show ended after 10PM and since I had forgotten my LIRR schedule back at the house, I wasn’t sure when the next train was set to depart so I quickly walked the seven blocks to Penn Station and found out I had two minutes to buy a ticket and board the train. Thank goodness I was prepared with the exact change in my pocket and quickly bought a ticket. In my haste I grabbed what I thought was my ticket and raced to track #16 and got a seat just as we were about to pull away, that’s when I looked at the paper in my hand…this isn’t a ticket! It was the previous customer’s receipt. Doh! I was really lucky when the train conductor (ticket collector? Not sure of his title) came by and I explained what happened that he didn’t make me pay again, although I was willing to pay for my stupidity. Lesson learned - check to see what it is that you’re pulling out of the ticket machine! So it all worked out and I was at Maria and Eric’s house before 11:30PM

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