Birthdays

Well, today I am officially another year older, and I can tell you that I do not feel any different.

Taken From Google

I feel like birthdays are super anticlimactic in that way - you are another year older but in reality nothing at all changes. Womp. Anyway, today was a super relaxing day in the city for me and Grammie. She had never been to Columbia before so we went up there and had lunch. We then came back to the apartment and relaxed before going for super delicious Mexican food for dinner. We went to Gabriela's and got dinner and a drink. It was perfect!

Since I am so good at being alone (NOT), I could not be more excited that Rachel is coming tomorrow to spend the weekend with me! I can't wait! She will stay through Sunday and then my roommate moves in (finally) on Monday. We have our orientation for school on Tuesday and classes start on Wednesday. I love school and can't wait to get back to it! First graduate school classes are a week from tomorrow!

Hopefully I'll have some more interesting things to share with you soon.

Where Am I, Again?

I am happy to report that my grandmother (aka GRAMMIE) has come to visit me and is spending time with me in New York this week. She was born and raised in the Bronx and arrived last Friday evening. She decided she wanted to to see the Eldridge Street Synagogue  in Chinatown. Ok, so we went down to Chinatown and ate lunch in Little Italy, it was fun. We then were walking to the Subway and were bombarded by an enormous mass of people. Immediately, my mind was confused and for a moment I believed that I was back in India. It was crazy, never in my life in the United States have I ever seen so many people moving in so many directions speaking languages I didn't understand. I was so overwhelmed.

We are spending today and tomorrow seeing various family members in New York. I am eternally grateful that Grammie has come to New York to spend my 22nd birthday with me :)

The Runner Takes Manhattan!

Well, I've done it! I have officially moved in to my apartment on the Upper West Side of Manhattan! If I had to describe my move in one word, it would be emotional. Now don't get me wrong, I am accustomed to living away from my parents, I have been doing that for the last four years. I have even lived in two apartments over summers basically alone, but for some reason this move just seems more permanent. That's probably because it is. When I would go to College Park in the fall I would know that I would see my mom soon for parents weekend, and then not far after that for Thanksgiving, and then Winter break. This year, however, I do not have my mom coming to see me in October, I can't really afford to go home for Thanksgiving, and I don't know what will be come December. In addition, I am no longer living in a sorority house filled to the brim with other young women and literally having no personal space. Needless to say, this whole experience is quite a culture shock.

Anyway - I flew back to New Jersey with my boyfriend and we spent the day at his parents house. Last night we drove in to the city and saw Potted Potter which was fun and incredibly silly. We then went out for a yummy dinner and they dropped me off at my apartment. As you probably could have guessed, I totally freaked out, and my boyfriend ended up staying with me (because he's amazing, even though he will probably never read this because he doesn't use his computer :-p). Today I saw a dear friend from high school, went grocery shopping, and made myself dinner. I feel pretty grown up right now.

Tomorrow my grandma is flying in to New York to spend the weekend with me and I could not be more exited!

Hopefully I have more exciting things to share with you all later. 

Keep on Driving

WEDNESDAY and THURSDAY


Yellowstone was quite an interesting place to visit! We ended up driving around the park for about eight hours to get from the east entrance to the west entrance on Wednesday. By the end of the day, it would be an understatement to say we were tired. Before going to Yellowstone we were most excited to see the wildlife (if you didn't know, we LOVE bears!). And did we ever see a bear! We saw a bear, plenty of deer, and buffalo/bison (did you know that buffalo and bison are actually the same thing)?

A Bear! 

A Bison!

An Elk! 

Our second day in Yellowstone was much more exciting - we saw old faithful and took a hike! Old faithful was awesome and we were pretty silly on our hike.

Hiding in a Cave

Jumping off a Log

Mom jumping off a Log

We also managed to get the cutest picture ever of the two of us! 

My mom and me at Yellowstone! 

After we left yellowstone we drove to Jackson Hole, Wyoming to have dinner through a little town called Moose, Wyoming. My mom and I have a little inside joke about moose from our first road trip my senior year of high school. Lucky for us, we saw moose in Moose!

Moose in Moose! 

We then spent then night in Salt Lake City, Utah.

FRIDAY 

On Friday we ate at yet another Diner, Drive-In, and Dive. We ate lunch at The Red Iguana in Salt Lake City, Utah. It is a mexican restaurant that is known for their seven variations of mole sauce. It was pretty good! We then drove to Bryce Canyon, Utah, which is in the southern part of the state. We got in early, but too late to really see anything, so we ate an early dinner and went to bed. 

SATURDAY

On Saturday we explore Bryce Canyon National Park and it was amazing! It might even be my favorite place that I have ever been! We did a three mile hike, then got lost, and ended up having to walk an additional two miles back to the visitors center to get back to our car - womp womp. 

Mom at Bryce

Me at Bryce

The sign for our hike!

My favorite thing about Bryce Canyon were the strange land formations known as Hoodoos. Hoodoos are strange formations that look like icicles sticking up from the ground made out of rock. They are bright orange and they are awesome! 

Hoodoos! 

After we explored Bryce we drove about two hours to St. George, Utah. In St. George we ate another incredible dinner by sheer luck and the help of the internet. We ate at Xetava Gardens Cafe which ended up being incredible! My mom and I shared an appetizer of fried avocado and fried artichoke hearts with a basil pesto sauce. It was amazing and I can totally replicate it if I bake it instead of fry it - panko crusted vegetables, so easy. For our entree we shared a New York Strip with avocado and potatoes with a veal demi glace. It was SO GOOD. 

yummm

We were the last customers in the restaurant, there an hour after the restaurant closed, and we really couldn't resist ordering dessert because we were so thrilled with our dinner. They are known for their bread pudding, but my mom and I are chocolate people, so we asked if we could have a half portion of two desserts. Our wonderful waitress said yes, but then surprised us and gave us two whole desserts and only charged us for one! And to let you know, it took us two separate occasions to finish all of this dessert.

Double yummm

TODAY/SUNDAY

Today was another amazing day. We drove forty-five minutes to Zion National Park from our hotel. My mom and I decided to be super courageous and go on a hike while through a river. We rented waling sticks and had a blast. We hiked one mile to the river, and one mile back. We think we made it about a half mile in to the river, and a half mile back. We wanted to go further but thunder started to roll in and we were urged to turn around due to a flash-flood warning. Regardless - it was the coolest thing we have ever done! 

Mom in the Water

Me in the Water

Mom Again

Me

Mom is so strong!

 We were even lucky enough to see some animals on our hike today!

Deer

Squirrel 

Tonight we had a pretty low-key time just hanging out in our hotel room. Tomorrow we are very excited to drive to Arizona to see the Grand Canyon! I will tell you about it tomorrow, hopefully. 

Road Trippin'

Hi Friends,

I am so sorry for not posting in the last week. I have SO much to tell you.

THURSDAY

Last Thursday I saw Niagara Falls for the first time ever - and let me tell you - it was incredible and I loved it and I hope I get to go back one day.

Awesome Niagara Waterfall!

Cute Ducky from the Gift Shop

After Niagara Falls (the New York side), we went to our second Diner, Drive-in, and Dive in Buffalo, New York. We ate at Restaurant Sophia's for Brunch. While Guy may have eaten a fried bologna sandwich, I certainly did not. I learned that Guy will not eat eggs under any circumstances, so if you were ever wondering why there were no egg dishes on his show, that is why! 

Restaurant Sophia's

Eggs and Pancakes!

As you can see, we ate eggs and pancakes. My mom ordered a vegetable egg scramble with beef and I ordered sunny side up eggs with chicken souvlaki. We shared apple-maple-walnut pancakes, yum! It was also probably the first time I have ever ordered pancakes in a restaurant - that's the truth. 

Immediately after brunch we drove to Cleveland, Ohio. Now you might be asking yourself, Cleveland, really? But yes, really, and let me tell you why. One of my best friends from college is a super genius and has started medical school at Case Western Reserve University. How could I resist going to see her? (I'm not going to tell you her name in case she doesn't want all 10 of my readers knowing her name, so let's just call her "P"). It also helps that my mom adores her so she couldn't really object. While we were in Cleveland we managed to eat at our third Diner, Drive-in, and Dive in a twenty-four hour period. 

We ate dinner at a restaurant called Melt Bar and Grilled in Cleveland not too far from the campus. This restaurant only serves variations of the grilled cheese sandwich - basically a dream come true for me - I love grilled cheese! Of all three DDD's we ate at, this was definitely the best (although it might have been the company). 

MELT!

Yum!

Mom, P, and Me with our MASSIVE grilled cheese!

Well, let me tell you what the food is you're looking at up there. I ordered the July fish special sandwich that had cheese, fish, okra, and some sort of garlic sauce on it. It was the most amazing grilled cheese I have ever had. My mom ate a grilled cheese with grilled vegetables (boring but she said it was delicious). P got a grilled cheese that had pierogies in it! It was crazy but she loved it! 

FRIDAY

On Friday my mom and I drove from Cleveland, Ohio to Chicago, Illinois. But before we zoomed out of cleveland we were sure to stop by the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. Since we had gone to the Country Music Hall of Fame in Nashville, TN we decided we couldn't pass up the opportunity to go to another music hall of fame. It was quick and fun and then we were on our way.

We decided to go to Chicago because my father has relatives in a Chicago suburb and we wanted to see them! Now, let me tell you something about my mom, she remembers everything, it's crazy. The last time we were in Chicago was almost three years ago for one of my cousin's bar-mitzvah's. During that weekend three years ago we ate at a very good italian restaurant which I had pretty much forgotten about until my mom reminded me of it. She remembered exactly where it was and how to get there without any directions! I was so impressed. So on Friday we ate dinner at The Next Door Bistro in Northbrook, IL. It was just as good as I remembered!

SATURDAY

I must admit that Saturday was a relatively boring day for us. We spent the majority of the day visiting with family in Chicago which was really fun and relaxing. We didn't end up leaving the Chicago area until almost 5pm - oops! We then drove from Chicago to Des Moines, Iowa and went right to bed. 

SUNDAY

Something I did not realize before this trip is that the majority of places in this country are closed on Sundays. Who knew? So while Des Moines actually appeared to be pretty cute, nothing was really open for us to see or enjoy. What we did find, however, was Zombie Burger. Now to be honest, I don't really care much for zombies, but most of my friends do, and we thought it was funny, so we decided to eat there. 

GRRRR

So Zombie Burger was fun, but here is my only advice - order a burger! I was silly and ordered a portabella mushroom salad, and my mom ordered a grilled chicken salad. What were we thinking? I'm not really so sure. 

If you are ever in Des Moines you should make it a point to be the capitol building because it is really quite beautiful. We then drove to Sioux Falls, SD and spent the night there (not much else to do there). But before we got to South Dakota we decided to take a detour to Omaha, Nebraska to say we ate a steak in Nebraska. 

Welcome to Omaha!

Welcome to South Dakota!

MONDAY

On Monday we drove to Rapid City, South Dakota so we could see the famous Mt. Rushmore. Well, let me tell you, it took us a lot longer than anticipated to get to Rapid City. We decided to make our first stop at the Corn Palace in Mitchell, SD. 

Now let me explain to you what exactly the corn palace it. It is literally a giant building that is decorated on the outside entirely with corn. Yup, that's right, the murals pictured above are created out of ears of corn and corn husks. It was not quite as exciting as we were hoping for, but it was ok. 

After the corn palace the next place of interest was the Badlands National Park. We drove around the national park for about an hour and were blown away at how beautiful it was. The craziest thing was that the badlands used to be entirely under water and dinosaur-era fish used to live there! 

Ta Daaaa

Shadow Fun

Me and my Mom!

All along the interstate were countless billboards and signs for a place called Wall Drug. So we had to go! It was the most overwhelming place I have been since India (I would say ever, but that would be a lie). Second most overwhelming place I have ever been. Anything you could ever want, they had. I was able to finally buy my first pair of cowboy boots! I was, and still am, very excited because I have wanted cowboy boots for ever. They are cute, comfortable, and surprisingly affordable - score! 

Rapid City has been the nicest city we have been to so far. We decided to google the best restaurants in Rapid City, South Dakota and stumbled upon Tally's Silver Spoon. It is my new favorite restaurant. We got in last night (we called ahead) and they stayed open late to serve us because we called (bonus points). We then found out it was late night happy hour so we got two for one glasses of wine (bonus points). The most amazing thing was what they called the "indecision menu." If you don't know what you want to eat, you pick how many courses you want to eat for a flat rate, and the chef's are in total control of what you eat. The catch? Everyone at the table has to eat the same thing, and the chef's will honor any dietary restrictions that you may have. We got a two-course dinner that consisted of a beet and arugula salad with baked apple and apple chip salad for the first course. Our second course was coal fish with locally grown roasted vegetables. Everything was so amazing that our waiter talked us in to dessert. We got a flourless chocolate cake with avocado-orange pudding and ginger glaze. It was pretty much the best dinner I have ever eaten, and I'm not exaggerating. We liked it so much that we were shown the breakfast menu in case we wanted to come back in twelve hours. YUM. 

TODAY/TUESDAY

As you probably could have guessed by this point, my mom and I went back to Tally's for breakfast this morning and we were not sorry that we did. Their breakfast was incredible! Something fun about Rapid City is that they have statues of a lot of past American presidents. So obviously we had to pose with them! 

After breakfast we finally made it to Mt. Rushmore!! 

Mt. Rushmore!!!

Mt. Rushmore was so cool! We didn't spend very long there because it was 100 degrees out - but we were amazed at how truly awesome this was. How did they carve those faces with dynamite and ax's? I don't know but I was sufficiently impressed (who wouldn't be). 

After Mt. Rushmore we went to Custer, SD because I hear there was a pink and purple building there.

Purple Pie Palace! 

I was in heaven - a colonial house painted in pink and purple! I don't even like pie and I was delighted to be there!

We then drove through the state of Wyoming to get to Cody, WY. 

Welcome to Wyoming! 

We drove through the state of Wyoming on back country and mountain roads and were surrounded at times by beautiful forests and at others by boring flatlands. Tomorrow we start to explore Yellowstone National Park! 

I promise to update before next Tuesday!