The NYC Experience: You are a Dancing Queen!

So yesterday turned out to be a very interesting day, indeed!

I woke up feeling crappy, to be honest. My cold was getting worse. It had settled down into my chest and my cough was atrocious. I sounded like Kramer in the episode where he goes to a vet instead of a people doctor because his cough sounded like the dog's cough! I texted Bindu the Wonderful who suggested I go to a minute clinic. I googled one and decided to give it a whirl.

Another first.
Going to see the Dr. in NYC.

Jules decided to take the Uptown Bus tour, Gina did the tenement museum and the girls did Statue of Liberty on Staten Island Ferry - so we all had our plans.

Largest Starbucks in USA

I took a taxi to the Dr. because I was too exhausted to walk. We had all gone out to breakfast at my favorite diner and Jules and I had then walked up to the Times Square Starbucks - which is the largest Starbucks in the nation! They also have the largest Starbucks Logo in the world. It was a really cool store actually. But after just that small amount of walking, I was exhausted and a coughing machine - so thus - the taxi.

He dropped me at a corner and I thought I'd see the sign for the clinic, but after walking up and down the block 2x - I realized I needed the actual address. Thank the Lord for my iPhone. I re-googled, got the address and realized it was on the 3rd floor of an office building. The building was quite old and all wood and brass inside. The elevator doors were wooden painted black - I felt transported into Mad Men!

They were able to get me an appointment in an hour, so I waited there - it took 2 hours total, but I was fine to wait. Basically I have bronchitis and the beginning of a double ear infection, so the doc gave me an Rx for antibiotics and I was on my way. I walked most of the way home til I thought I was going to collapse and got a $4 taxi ride the rest of the way. By the time I got some lunch and got my prescription filled - everyone was home. So not much rest - but progress!

We all wanted to go out together for Italian food on our final night of the whole crew being in town, so I had made reservations at Mario Batali's ESCA - which is his southern Italian restaurant. We all got prettied up and walked down to 43rd and 9th for a pre-theater dinner.

The dreamy gelato drunken with espresso

We had quite the experience!!

First of all, southern Italian (apparently) is seafood! So there were only 3 things on the menu that didn't have some kind of fish. Woops. Only 2 of the 5 of us even like seafood. Then we realized that it was an uberPosh place - with lots of rules. LIke each person had to order 2 appetizers or one main course - Anni and I had decided to share an appetizer and a main course and the waiter was very unhappy and instructed us on the protocol - so we each got a pasta dish to satisfy him. The food was really good. I got gnocchi with mozzarella inside and a fresh tomato basil sauce. So so good. I also shared the mixed veggie salad with ricotta cheese and vinaigrette with Anni - and it was really, really yummy. We all saved room to share dessert, so when the waiter came along - of course - I had to give him a hard time and ask him if there were any dessert rules or could we just get two desserts for the table. He had to hold back a laugh - so we were glad to see he was only stuffy and rude because he had to be :)

We got vanilla gelato with toffee pieces, topped with brownie bites and "drowned" in espresso. IT WAS MORE THAN AMAZING!!! We also got a pumpkin cheesecake with cranberry sauce - but the gelato sundae was so so good that we all left feeling happy and satisfied.

At that point - Gina took the nighttime bus tour, the girls did their final shopping and Jules and I went to see Mama Mia.... which was SO SO SO FUN! I was so impressed with the actors in this show. I liked it on Broadway WAY better than the movie version. We left the theater singing, dancing and laughing - what a great way to end an evening!