labor day weekend

ok, i don't want to make this too long since i *should* be working hehe.

FRIDAY:
Anyways, our flight on Fri was scheduled to leave sj for phoenix at 6:00pm, but it got delayed til 6:50. luckily our layover in phoenix was 2 hours, so it just cut into our layover time. we didn't sleep on the plane cause you know, it was 7pm, so we just chatted the whole way. we got to phoenix, boarded the plane, and were all sitting in the plane at 10pm ( when our flight is supposed to leave ). they then announce on the PA system that they had to change the tire of the plane and would take 30 minutes!? wth?!! this guy behind us calls his friend and tells him that he's been at the airport for 2 hours and the plane has been there for 2 hours, why couldn't they have checked this earlier?? i couldn't agree more! anyways, we also found out that the flight time would only be 4 hours!! so we decided to try to sleep while we were waiting for them to change the stupid tire. so we slept the whole way, i mostly slept i think, i don't think it was very good sleep though.

SATURDAY:
we arrived at jfk airport around 6am. took us ~2 hours to get to the hotel ( had to figure out the airtrain/subway ) and the subway ride itself is like 1+ hours. i had hoped that when we got to the hotel we would be able to get a room so we could sleep before everyone else arrived in ny, but we couldn't get one!! so we thought we could go sleep on the couchs in the lounge. so we were lying there for about 5 minutes, and i opened my eyes and there was this security guard standing there. i have nooo idea how long he had been standing there, but he started asking all these questions, he was sorta creepy. he was this short vietnamese dude, which increased the creepiness tenfold haha. he was asking stuff like "oh where are you from..?" "Is that your sister?" ( sharon was pretending to sleep next to me...grrrr while i had to answer his stupid questions!!) " have you had breakfast yet?" "are you chinese?" etc etc. and then he was like....ok, i'll let you guys sleep here, usually i'll have to ask you guys to sit up, but i'll pretend i didn't see you guys. i was like....ok. so he left, and sharon "woke" up, i was like..umm...do you want to do something else?? haha.

so we decided to get up and go to breakfast, it was about 9am at this time. we go to this diner across from our hotel, the food was ok, very small portions, but very fast service. we ended up finishing around 9:30. so now what were we to do?? we decided we would go shopping until nancy arrived and then hope we could check in then. our hotel is right next to fifth avenue, which has the big h&m. as we were walking over there, we saw a store that said "Tax Free Week 8/31-9/6" I was thinking, cool, this store is having a tax free week. But when we reached h&m, they also had a sign that said tax free week! we then realized that NYC was having a Tax Free Week !!! YAYY!! i was very happy and excited. so we sat outside the church across from h&m waiting for it open.

as 10am neared, there were about 20 people waiting from h&m to open as well. we went in, most of the clothes were business-y. sharon's flip flop was starting to cut into her foot, so she wanted to buy a new pair of flipflops. there weren't any in h&m. i browsed and tried on two tops, but i didn't really find anything that i liked. so disappointing! we then went to nine west to look for some flipflops, but they didn't really have anything that cheap and pretty. we then went to gap, but they didn't have any as well. i suggested jcrew, so we asked the gap lady if there were any nearby, and she told us there was one pretty close by. so we decided to go back to the hotel and see if we could check into our stupid room yet ( this is around 12pm ) and we *still* couldn't!! so frustrating. i was starting to get very tired. it just so happens that as we were leaving the front desk, we saw nancy standing in the lobby!! she checked in her luggage, so off we were again, back to shopping!

nancy only had one day in ny and her mission was to go on a shopping spree, buy a new dress for her semi-formal and a bunch of other stuff. when we told nancy about sharon's flip flop problem, she showed us the flip flips she was wearing that she got from ann taylor loft which she said was $5! and it just so happened that we were really close to one, so we went to go look, but they didn't have it. it seems like all the stores are getting ready for fall, no more summer shoes. we then went to jcrew, they didn't have any flipflops out, but we asked a saleslady, and she told us that they had some in the back! so finally we have found flip flops for sharon and her feet could be saved!! we then went to h&m again, so nancy could look around, i still didn't find anything that i liked, so i basically just followed those two around. it was starting to get veeery crowded. after h&m, it was time for lunch! we found an au bon pain, and ate..yumm. good soup in a bread bowl =P now it was back to the hotel, around 2ish. our room was *still* not ready, but check in was at 3, so we decided to just wait. by this time, jody and her 4 friends have arrived so we met them. alice and louay were staying at a different hotel in downtown ny. jody and her friends wanted to go eat, so we sat in the lobby til 3. i was ready to sleeeeeeepp!!

at 3, we went back to the front desk, and we FINALLY got our room! hooray! jody had gotten another room for her friends and we *were* supposed to be in rooms next to each other, but by that time, i didn't really care, didn't want to argue, i was happy with any room as long as i could rest. so we went to our room, i got ready for bed, but nancy wanted to go shopping some more since she was only going to be here for a day and if she slept she would miss out! sharon decided she would go with her, so they went out while i took a nice blissful 3 hour nap hehe. they were gone for 4 hours but they ended up only buying stuff from old navy! they bought soooo many skirts, it was crazy. they were skirt happy haha.

(man, this is starting to get looong! and i'm not even halfway done! argh!! this is going to take forever!! anyways..back to the story, oy )

so when they came back, we were wondering what jody was doing. she wasn't answering her phone, but we found out from alice that the room they were assigned to, the people didn't check out of their room til 6pm, so they had been sleeping in the lobby! the security guard (this was a different one that accosted us....) felt so bad for them, so he went to the front desk and basically demanded that they get whatever they want! so they got a $200 voucher for dinner tonight, many drink coupons, and breakfast for the next two days! nice!! alice and louay already had plans for dinner that night, so the 3 of us were on our own. we browsed through the guides that we got from the concierge desk looking for a restaurant. we finally decided on a japanese restaurant near times square. as we were walking over, we saw all these other japanese restaurants, and just stopped at a random one after looking at the menu. the food was yummy, and reasonably priced, and nancy finally got to eat her asian food!! then we went back to the hotel to change so we could go out and meet up with alice. we first went to the hotel lobby to get some drinks since jody had all those free drink coupons. we had some drinks and the bartender recommended us to go to Tao ( the restaurant with a big buddha from sex and the city). so off we went, it was ok, the people there were older, we mostly just chatted, alice jody me sharon nancy and caught up with each other. jody and i had mojitos at Tao, and they were sooo strong. jody got drunk, she was talking VERY loudly, haha. it was funny. we left around 1:30am, we had to get up early to go to the us open the next day!

SUNDAY:
the weather today was cloudy, but not *too* cold. i would say maybe low 70s? The day before had been slightly hot if you are in the sun, about low 80s I would say. Very nice weather.
yesterday alice had told us about this japanese store that sold fresh mochis, so we decided we would have it for breakfast today. when we came out of the hotel, we saw this fair right on our street! they had closed down the street and it was sort of like a flea market, with food and people selling stuff. sharon and nancy got a crepe. we walked over to the mochi place and i got a fresh mochi, it was REALLY good, but it better be at $2.50/mochi. it was crazy expensive, but very yummy. =)

we went back to the fair looking for some lunch, so that we wouldn't have to buy anything at the us open because it probably would be very expensive. i got a chicken skewer, but it was SOOO dry and hard, it was not good. i ended up throwing it away. sharon got a corndog. now it was off to the us open! we were going to meet jody and her friend heeyup there, cause they ate breakfast in the hotel ( lucky them! ) it was soo crowded on the subway, we basically had to stand the entire time. when we finally arrived there were sooooo many people there. our tickets allowed us to watch any games on all the courts except the arthur ashe stadium. all the other courts were open seating. it was the men's 3rd rounds and round of 16 for the women's. we sat in the grand stand for a while watching the match there it was between robredo and some other dude ( i forgot his name already ). the view is very good, you can sit very close, it was cool. we then decided to go to the louis armstrong court to watch those games since they have the next biggest names after the people playing in the arthur stadium. can you believe they charge $3 for the schedule?? i had to peek at other people's schedules so that i could see who was playing where!!

at the louis armstrong stadium, we saw the ending of the johansson ( i think that's his name, i'm really too lazy to go look it up ) match against some other dude. periodically sharon would doze off...i think her sleeping only 4 hours on the plane the night before was catching up to her! after that match, we watched the beginning of the dementieva-zvornova ( i don't think that is correct, but some other russian chick who's last name starts with a z ) match. dementieva was doing very poorly and was on her way to losing the first set. we then decided we wanted to go see sharapova play mixed doubles ( she had already been ousted in singles ) on court 11. who wouldn't want to go see a tall hot blonde chick? =P

at court 11, there was a huuuuge line. i think they all wanted to go see her or something. i think we waited like an hour or something, but we finally were able to get in. the sharapova match hadn't started yet, it was men's singles ( no-namers) and they were on the 3rd set, and they had split the first two sets. it was going to take a while!! from our seats, we could see the tv screen for the louis armstrong stadium so we could watch what was going on in the dementieva match. dementieva had finally gotten her act together and won the 2nd set !! the z-chick was starting to lose it, we saw her throw down her racket and during the breaks, it seemed like she was crying! cause she would put her towel over her face and it looked very red. if only we had checked the score for court 11 before leaving the louis armstrong stadium, we would have found out that they were still playing and it would take a while, so we would have stayed at louis armstrong and we could have witnessed this meltdown in person!! darn! we could only see it from the tv, ah wells.

towards the end of the dementieva game ( she eventually won the 3rd set cause her opponent was not keeping it together--- i still wish i had seen racket throwing!! ), the TV screen announced they MOVED the sharapova match to the louis armstrong stadium!!! originally, the davenport-sugiyama game was scheduled to be played after the dementieva game ( which i had really wanted to see as well ) but now they were moved to the arthur ashe stadium!! BOOOO!!! so as soon as we could move from court 11, we and about half the people in court 11, rushed over to the louis armstrong stadium!! once we got there it was PACKED to the brim. there were basically no seats available in the lower stands were we had been sitting originally, so now not only would we not be able to see davenport-sugiyama, we would only be able to see sharapova as a little speck from very far up. we ended up sitting at the 2nd to last row from the very top. if only we had stayed at the louis armstrong stadium, we would have at least been able to see the meltdown of the z-chick AND seen sharapova!! mixed doubles is very boring...and i guess from my vantage point sharapova looked hot. i mean, she looked tall and skinny and had blonde hair...but she was like a speck, haha. we only watched the first set and decided to leave. enough tennis for one day. overall it was a fun experience, i think i would want to get arthur ashe tickets next time. roddick and serena were playing at arthur ashe that day. and i didn't see any famous people there (like celebrities), darn.

we went back to our hotel room to rest. after taking a nice nap, we were going to meet up with alice and louay for dinner. they told us to go to this street corner, and we were going to look for some mediterrean place that louay likes. ( he didn't remember exactly where it was ) so when we met up, it turns out louay was tired and wanted to rest, but since he was the only one that knew where this mediterrean place was, we ended up just going to a random japanese restaurant. we had a nice dinner there and we all just went back to our hotel afterwards. we were all pooped from a long day.

MONDAY:
the next day dawned with blue skies. it was time to do some real shopping cause today was the last day of tax free week!!! we got up around 11, jody and her friends went to eat breakfast/lunch in the hotel ( so many free meals!! =P ) so sharon and i went to soho. right out of the subway station, we found chill. ( the store that alice and jody love so much hehe ) we browsed a little, i tried on some things, but didn't really find anything i liked (sigh...) sharon bought a cute skirt ( another one!!!! ) it was about time for lunch so we ate at a random cafe that we found, where you basically picked your ingredients for your salad or sandwich. we bought got a sandwich with sundried tomato spread and pesto chicken. it was already 2pm, and jody and alice were leaving at 3. we called them up and they told us where they were leaving from in chinatown. we told them we would seem them off.

so we had to backtrack back past the subway station we had taken, and it took us about 30 minutes to walk there. it was getting hot! and i was getting very thirsty. but we eventually got there and got to see them before they left. we then went to get a drink at taipan bakery. sharon bought some lychee and longan which she made me try. i liked the lychee better but she likes the longan. i had never tried either, so it was interesting trying them both. at that time my shoe was feeling wobbly, so i looked at it, and my heel had broken. i played around with it and oops, the heel came out! i guess i broke it even more, heh. i tried walking on it, but every minute or so, the heel would fall out, so i just decided to walk around lopsided. my heels were 2 inches high, so i think it must have looked sorta funny, but i dunno if anyone even noticed!

we ended up walking back to where we were at before we left for chinatown to see them off, and we went to this asian store called Pearl River Mart. both of our feet were hurting by this time ( i guess it's never a good idea to wear heels if you're going to walk around the whole day -- we were both wearing heels ) so we both ended up buying a pair of pretty asian flip flops. we went to bloomingdales and i tried on some jeans but didn't end up buying any. i bought this pretty purse that i had been eyeing when we were in there before we left for chinatown, it was my first purchase! unfortunately it was over $110 so it was not tax free!

we then decided to go to century 21, cause we saw alll these people with the shopping bags. it's basically a discount department store, similar to filene's basement in boston. it was CRAZY crowded in there, i think people were trying to take advantage of the last hours of the tax free day. we looked at handbags and sharon got 2, i got another one for school. we then went to look at shoes. in the midst of looking at shoes, they announced the store was closing! it had only been an hour! so we decided we would just buy stuff now, and we were going to go back the next day, so if we wanted to return stuff we could. i got 3 pairs of shoes and sharon got 1. yay! finally i got stuff that was tax free!!!

we then went to little italy for dinner. there were many restaurants and we just picked a random one after looking at many many menus. they ended up all looking the same after a while. the food was pretty good. i still love bread with balsamic vinegar and olive oil! after dinner, we went to get some gelato. all the flavors i wanted were gone: pineapple, peach, strawberry. i ended up getting raspberry. the lady behind us told us to go to the vendor right across the street, she said the mango was really good and it was $2.50 vs $3. the vendor across the street had pineapple!! sharon got the mango that the women raved about, but it turns out it was mango ice cream and not sorbet like sharon wanted! so she ended up throwing most of it away cause it wasn't very good at all.

we went back to hotel and rested, we watched deliver us from eva on hbo, hehe. it's fun to watch black movies =P

TUESDAY:
tuesday came around half cloudy half blue skies. we woke up early so we could hit century 21 early. we looked around some more, but didn't find anything else that we liked. we ate lunch at the food cart that sharon's friend recommended to us. i got a gyro sandwich and sharon got a chicken sandwich, i thought it was ok. i guess maybe if you were eating it after 12am it would taste pretty good which is when he said he ate it. we shopped some more around fifth avenue, i got a skirt and top from armani exchange, and bought some more mochis to take home. we went to manolo and jimmy choo to look at shoes, but i just looked, no buying hehe. there were some very pretty shoes though, even sharon agreed =)

our flight was at 6:25pm so we decided to leave for the airport at 4pm. so we left at 4, but we didn't get to the airport subway station til 5:30 something. once at the airport subway station, we had to take the airtrain to our terminal which would take another 10-20 minutes!! we were cutting it close! when we got there to check in, luckily there was no line at the ticket counter ( sharon had to check in her bags ). so i checked in with no problems at the kiosk, but sharon was a couple minutes too late cause when she tried to check in it told her that she couldn't check from the kiosk anymore cause it was 30 minutes before flight time! so the ticket agent had to call the gate, at first they wouldn't let her get a boarding pass, but the lady explained to them that she had a seat so they let her issue a boarding pass. thank goodness!!! the plane was already boarding, so we had to rush over there!! i had to get a space for my luggage!! as luck would have it, there was no line at the security gates either, so we went right through and ran to our gate.

we boarded our plane, which was totally full, and i found a space for my luggage! yay. when sharon and i booked our tickets, we had chosen seats next to each other, but i guess they gave away her seat when she didn't check in early enough, so her seat was now two rows behind me. we were too lazy to ask people to switch seats and stuff, so i was pretty bored on the flight. i watched raising helen for the first two hours, and tried to sleep the rest of the flight but couldn't really sleep too well. the rest of our journey was uneventful, got back to sj around 11:15pm.

now we're home!! we were lucky weather-wise, cause we missed the heat wave that occured in the bay area over the labor day weekend and we missed the heavy rain that hit ny on wed!!

ok, this blog was waaaay too long, hehe. enjoy! since i had a nice 4 day weekend, it totally doesn't seem like a thursday today! it feels like...tuesday...or wednesday. i'm sooo glad it's thursday though, can't wait til the work week is over! i really wish every work week was this short!! hehe