Two Sets of Fun Tickets

Two weekends ago we had a very "ticket-oriented" weekend. It started on Saturday, when we woke up early to try to get tickets to the "Glee" concert. Anybody else watch "Glee?" I love that show, and in May the cast is going on tour to four cities. Of course, New York is one of them, so I was dying to get tickets to one of the shows Memorial Day weekend. I even invited my sister, cousin Molly, and my cousin Jacob's wife Zita to come for Memorial Day to see the show, too (and they're all coming!). Tickets went on sale to the general public at 9:00 a.m. that Saturday, so Eric and I were up with our computers ready to go at Ticketmaster.com right at 9:00. But, it didn't matter. Apparently tickets went on pre-sale to American Express cardholders a week prior and all seats for all shows were sold out by the time they even went on sale to the public. Awesome. And by "awesome," I actually mean "rude" and "unfair."

Eric and I decided to go out to Radio City Music Hall (the concert venue) just to be sure they didn't have any on sale there. It was a long shot, but we were willing to try. It was a terribly rainy day but we went anyway, and as expected, it was all for naught. No luck. (Apparently they have added another show the Sunday of Memorial Day weekend, and tickets go on sale to the public this Friday. BUT, they're doing the AmEx pre-sale thing again, and they're already on sale to those cardholders. So I expect the same outcome. Stupid not-having-an-American-Express-card!)

So, the day seemed like it was off to a pretty lousy start. Lots of rain, no tickets, bummer. But it ended up being one of those awesome New York days that just surprises you, you know? After Radio City, we wandered over to the NBC store in Rockefeller Center, where we did some shopping and caught sight of the open casting call for "The Biggest Loser." There's always something going on around here!

Then we decided to head home and stop at Crumbs for some cupcakes, but on our way we passed the Ed Sullivan Theater, where the Late Show with David Letterman is filmed. They had a sign outside that said "free tickets," so we went in to investigate. To be honest, we don't watch the Letterman show, but it films just blocks from our apartment, so why not check it out? We ended up putting our names in for the ticket lottery, and an hour later we got a call that we had been selected for Monday's taping! So, awesome!

Then, as we were relaxing at home that afternoon, Eric managed to find a couple of tickets to that evening's Big East Championship basketball game at Madison Square Garden for a very reasonable price. We have been wanting to get to an event at MSG, and since Georgetown was playing, Eric thought this was a great opportunity. So, that poor boy went out in the HURRICANE we were having by then to pick up the tickets. (I kid not about the hurricane - our weather that day was INSANE. We got four inches of rain, and a wind gust of 74mph was recorded at JFK airport. It was CA-RAZY. It was so windy, the wind-measuring device at JFK actually blew off the roof and shattered on the ground. So, yeah.)

We were so excited. Back in my pre-blog days (better known as "early in Eric's last year of law school"), we had season tickets to Georgetown basketball games in a block with a bunch of Eric's law school friends. We had a great time going to all the games with everybody! I have missed that since we moved to New York - both the friends AND the sporting events!

At a Georgetown game back in early 2008

At a game with friends: Chris & Leah (they're now married with an adorable new baby boy!), Greg and Will

With the (rather handsy) mascot

So, that night we went back out in the rain again (still awful) and headed down to Madison Square Garden for the game! We had a great time, even though Georgetown lost. They were ahead at the very start of the game but then trailed for nearly the whole rest of the game - until the very end when they tied it up, just to make me tense. I really don't handle close games well, especially basketball games. I think I may have covered my eyes for the last couple minutes, I'm not sure. Regardless, we had fun despite the loss!

The entrance to the Garden

I turned my free "New York Life" foam finger into a Georgetown spirit device, with the help of the permanent marker I apparently keep in my purse.

The teams lining up before the game

Pre-game

Georgetown cheerleaders, and my mascot friend!

Boo, West Virginia wins.

Shucks.

After the game - we had a good time anyway!

So, our rainy Saturday turned out to be a pretty fun day. Eric had to work on Sunday, but on Monday he took a half day so we could go to the Letterman taping!

We were told to arrive at the theater between 1:00 and 2:00 on Monday afternoon to claim our tickets. After we made our way in to the theater and had tickets in hand, they told us to go stand in a certain spot. After a few moments, a woman from the Late Show pulled us aside to talk to us. She told us we had been "hand-selected" as part of the "audience elite," which meant we would be seated in one of the first three rows, right by the stage, and would probably get on TV! We had about 45 minutes from that point until we had to get back to the theater, so we went to grab some pizza for lunch then came back to get in line once again.

Our tickets!

In front of the theater

Once all the rest of the "audience elite" had assembled, they brought us all inside to wait (rather than outside in the rain like the rest of the audience - we were so VIP!), then they started to talk about what was expected of us (ENERGY! LAUGHTER! ENTHUSIASM!) and what was going to happen. Before long they brought us in to the theater and got us seated. Eric and I ended up in the third row on the aisle, directly in front of Letterman's desk!

They had a comedian come out to warm up the crowd, and the band played a few songs to get everybody ready. Then Dave came out and did his monologue and the show was underway! The main guest for that show was Jennifer Aniston, which I was excited about. It always surprises me when celebrities are like, normal people-sized. I guess I always picture them as really tall? I don't know, but Jennifer was small and had really cute shoes.

We had a great time at the show, and afterwards we waited around outside for the guest for the next taping to come in (they did two tapings that afternoon) - Gerard Butler! So, we got another celeb sighting to add to our list, and he's an attractive Scotsman to boot! (Although really, aren't we all?)

Gerard Butler, about to head in to Letterman

Naturally, that evening we tuned in to the Letterman show to see if we could spot ourselves. It was really interesting to see what all made it into the show and what parts they cut. For example, Dave's monologue was much longer in person, but they cut it down a bit for the show that actually aired.

We did manage to catch sight of ourselves on TV a couple of times! The first was just a really, super-duper fast pan of the audience at the beginning of the show. If you didn't know exactly where to look for us, you never would have picked us out, but I found us. I'm right on the aisle, and you can sort of see my fun pink shoes I was wearing, too!

It's a pretty bad picture, but it kind of gives you an idea of how big the theater is and how close we were to the stage. I circled us there! (That's me on the aisle, and Eric is next to me.)

A little closer look - there's me in the middle on the aisle. Can you make me out? Can you see my pink shoes?

We also were on twice more during the "what's coming up tomorrow" segment in the middle of a commercial break. We were on right at the start, and then again when the camera came back down and we were right under the "We'll Be Right Back!"

Do you see us there on the left?

A closer look

See us right under the "We'll Be?"

Another closer look at our pixelated selves. Eric seems to be hitting his head on the "Be."

We're famous! Ha.

Anyway, what had started out as a dreary, rainy, Glee-ticket-less day turned into not one, but two really fun events. You just gotta love New York!

Could It Be...Spring?

All week I have been wanting to post about the super fun things we did last weekend. To spoil the "surprise," we went to the Big East Championship game at Madison Square Garden on Saturday, and on Monday we went to a taping of the Letterman show. Both were awesome and I'm so excited to tell you about them, but that's not happening now. I've been too busy working (yay!) to make that happen, and now I'm in weekend mode so I just don't have it in me for all that recapping right now. So, you must wait.

BUT I did want to post a quick update to tell you that the Guinness Beef Stew I made was AWESOME. Very delicious, indeed. Eric and I enjoyed a lovely St. Patrick's Day dinner of stew and Irish beer, and of course, the Empire State Building sent her St. Patty's Day regards as well.

Our festive St. Patrick's Day meal

Luck o' the Irish to you from the Empire State Building!

The other thing that I simply must discuss right now is the weather. People, this weather is TO DIE FOR. I don't remember last March being like this, but maybe it was. Actually, no it wasn't, because I just read that we set record high temperatures today - LaGuardia airport recorded a high temperature of 72 degrees! I mean, that is just so fabulous. People were running around in summer dresses and sandals. I thought we had a solid three more months before that would happen!

I know this weather is not going to last yet (it's supposed to be back in the 50s and raining by Monday), but it was just so nice that it was killing me to be stuck inside working all week while this was going on outside. So, today when I wrapped up my work mid-day, I went out to enjoy. I did some shopping this afternoon, then this evening Achilles and I met Eric for a walk in Central Park. And guess what I saw there? FLOWERS! Is it really spring?

Achilles is clearly very excited about this sign of spring.

We had a lovely little walk and even stopped in the dog play area to let Achilles run around with the other little dogs, and run he did. He was loving it! I think he really loves the grass.

VIDEO: Achilles in Central Park today

We'll be spending the rest of our weekend enjoying this weather. Eric is going to do a little golfing tomorrow, and on Sunday he's running the NYC Half Marathon again. So, more fun things to come - I have my blogging work cut out for me next week!

Enjoy your weekend, everyone! And as of tomorrow, Happy Spring!

300! (plus Kiss Me, I'm Irish!)

Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to my 300th POST!

Wow. I have really filled 300 separate entries with my ramblings, recaps, thoughts, plans and gazillions of pictures. It just seems crazy - back when I started this blog in 2008, I didn't think that someday I might be hitting "Publish Post" for the 300th time. What's even crazier is that there are people out there who actually read all this stuff. Are you all wishing you had your 300-posts-worth of time back? Never mind, don't tell me. Regardless, thanks for sticking around!

And...Happy St. Patrick's Day!


I do love this holiday. Last year we had a great New York-y St. Patrick's Day, complete with the super long (but awesome) parade and some fish and chips at a local pub. This year is going to be a bit more mellow, as I have actually had some work come in this week. So, I'll be working all day. I'm a little bummed to have to miss out on St. Patrick's Day festivities, but really, I'm not at ALL complaining about having work! And I'm still sporting my green of course, plus I have the parade on TV in the background while I work. Ah, the lovely sound of bagpipes to serenade my day!

Want to hear the plus side to being stuck inside on St. Patrick's Day? I get to smell the Guinness Beef Stew I have cooking in my crock pot for dinner tonight. I don't think I've ever made this before, but I'm pretty excited about it. I wish I could share the smell with you, I really do. But instead, I'll share the recipe I'm trying. Eric sort of put together a few he found online, and this is basically what I'm doing:

Crock Pot Guinness Beef Stew

Ingredients:
2 lb. beef round cut into one-inch cubes
1 cup all-purpose flour
Oil
1 large onion sliced into wedges
3 cloves garlic, chopped
1 lb each: carrots & potatoes, cut into chunks [Note: I actually have more potatoes and fewer carrots, because that's just how I roll]
12 oz. mushrooms, sliced
Salt & pepper to taste
1 can tomato paste
1 bottle Guinness stout beer
1 cup beef broth
1 tbsp finely chopped fresh thyme
2 bay leaves
Oh, and I might throw in some peas, too. Gotta have that green!

Evenly coat the meat with flour. Heat a large skillet over medium-high heat and add the oil. Brown each side of the meat without allowing it to stick.

Meanwhile, add all other dry ingredients (except mushrooms) to the crock pot and turn on low. When meat is browned, place in crock pot. Pour in the broth, stout and tomato paste.

Cook for 4-5 hours on high heat, or 8 hours on low. About 30 minutes before the cooking time will end, add the sliced mushrooms. Remove bay leaves and stir well. Return lid and continue cooking until mushrooms are soft.

Yum!

(Disclaimer: I cannot attest to the actual deliciousness of this recipe, as I have not yet tasted it. I can only vouch for the smell, which so far is very enjoyable. But I mean, it's meat and potatoes and beer all mixed together. What could be bad about that?)

Happy St. Patrick's Day from this Irish girl!

Adding the second-best part of the stew to the crock pot (the first-best part is the potatoes, DUH)

So, tonight I will be dining on my (hopefully) delicious stew, drinking some McSorley's Ale, and just enjoying being Irish in a quiet, orderly, generally sober fashion. (Is that an oxymoron? Has that ever been done before?) I wish you all a Happy St. Patrick's Day as well, and thank you again for helping me reach this 300-post blogging milestone!

May you have all the happiness
And luck that life can hold,
And at the end of your rainbows
May you find a pot of gold.
~Irish blessing

Brains AND Brawn

So, you have heard all about my experiences during those two weeks I was in the Caribbean. But, what you have yet to hear about is what was happening here in New York in my absence. What might that be, you ask? Well, Achilles learned a new trick.

While I was on the ship, Eric emailed me THIS picture, with the title "Some Birds Aren't Meant To Be Caged:"


Oh, heaven help me.

Apparently, every day before he went to work, Eric was dutifully putting Achilles in his crate and securing him there so he couldn't just open the door and let himself out. But then, to his surprise, he came home from work one day to find Achilles NOT in the crate where he left him, but rather, in the bathroom drinking from the toilet. HOW DID THIS HAPPEN.

It was then that Eric realized that Achilles had BROKEN OFF some of the bars at the top of the crate. Sure, before I left, those bars were a bit bent, but he had never just straight up broken bars before. And anyway, what was he going to do if he DID create an opening for himself at the top of the crate - hoist himself up and climb out?

Why, yes. That's exactly what he was going to do.

Because apparently, by leaving him alone all day while Eric worked and I was out of town, we gave Achilles enough time to fully break off those bent bars. I don't know exactly how he did it. I imagine it being something along the lines of Andy Dufresne slowly chipping his way through his prison cell wall with that tiny little rock hammer in "The Shawshank Redemption" (also the source of the "some birds aren't meant to be caged" quote that sprung to Eric's mind). He just worked at it and worked at it, little by little, every day while Eric was at work until eventually he had built himself a tunnel to freedom. Of course, this is purely conjecture on my part, but can't you just imagine it?

And this is the opening he made for himself, left blatantly out in the open (rather than hidden behind a poster of Raquel Welch, as in "Shawshank"):


I realize that in a photo, you really have no way to gauge the size of that hole, so I measured it for you. That hole is six inches long by four inches wide. That dog somehow managed to escape out of a hole the size of a STANDARD PHOTOGRAPH. I have no words.

Naturally, we had to see this with our own eyes to believe it. Since I had the video camera with me on the cruise, Eric put Achilles in the crate and sat to watch him, hoping he would perform this stunt with a live audience. No such luck, though - all he got was the above photo of him sticking his head out of his hole.

But then I came home, determined to see this for myself. So, we set up the camera on a little tripod and prepared to be amazed. Now, he's not very good at this yet, because he was crated for about an hour and a half before he did manage to escape once again. But after that hour and a half and numerous failed attempts, this is what I saw:

VIDEO: Achilles Strikes Back.

Don't worry, before we set him up to get him on tape we made sure there were no sharp edges on the top of the crate where he could cut himself. I'm pretty confident that after he removed the bars he took the time to sand them down neatly. But, regardless, we are back to putting him in there sans padlock so that he can use the door as his exit route once again, because I don't want him hurting himself climbing out of there like a freaking doggy gymnast.

And now we're in the market for a new crate. But really, my heart just isn't in it anymore. The video says it all: I Give Up. I mean, what's the point? So we buy him a new crate. Then what? He does it again? He comes up with something new? THE DOG CANNOT BE CONTAINED. I'm pretty sure that even if his next crate is a solid steel box, I'll be back here in a month posting about how he has learned to cut through steel with his eyes and is now running free once again.

I mean, really. This is just getting ridiculous.

All Good Things Must Come To An End

As I mentioned yesterday, I am still feeling fairly reflective about the whole cruise, so I thought I would wrap up my recaps with a sort of debriefing session. I just want to think back to my favorite parts of the trip, what I learned, my impressions, and what I miss the most. Please indulge me, will you?

My thoughts on cruising in general
This was my first cruise. I was very interested to see how I liked it, because Eric and I always say we're more "go to a place and stay there and really explore it" type people, but I really had no basis for comparison. After cruising, I do think we were right. I definitely enjoyed seeing so many places in such a short amount of time, BUT I feel like I didn't really see any of them, does that make sense? Many times I only saw the port area, or wherever we went for our arranged excursions. I do realize I could have taken it upon myself to research the places we were going beforehand so I knew more about them when I got there, but I didn't. When you're only in a place from 8a.m. till 5p.m., you just can't possibly get a full experience of that place. I wanted to explore more, have dinner on the islands, and see more of each of them. For example, in Curacao they were having a big parade for Carnival the day we were there - but at night, after we were gone. Bummer! I so wished we could stay to experience that.

So, although I had a fabulous time, and it's highly likely that if Heather does more cruise ships in the future I will want to visit her again, I still think as far as Eric and I are concerned, we're not really cruise people. Plus that whole seasickness thing is really for the birds.

My favorite picture I got of the ship, docked in Curacao.

This was a long vacation!
Two weeks is a really long time to be on vacation. It was wonderful, of course - after the first week, I was so glad it wasn't over yet. But, that second week flew by and I spent much of it feeling bummed that the trip was winding down. I always get that way on trips, but when the trip is a week long I only spend a day or two being bummed. With this long of a trip, I spent the whole second week thinking "oh no, it's almost over!" But, at the end of the day, I would say it's always better to be on vacation than not, so I suppose I can deal with it!

Some of my favorites
I've done quite a bit of thinking back to all my "favorites" from the trip: favorite port, favorite beach, favorite excursion, etc. I think I've got them all figured out!

I had two favorite ports, which I did mention in my recaps. My favorite for scenery was St. Vincent - I just loved all the cliffs and the beautiful turquoise water. My favorite for atmosphere was San Juan, and the food didn't hurt either!

Gorgeous St. Vincent

Streets of San Juan

As far as which island I would be most likely to go back to visit, I would say Curacao. Eric really liked the pictures from there, and I enjoyed our time walking around the port. I would love more opportunity to explore the beaches and other parts of the island. Others I can really see us visiting would probably be St. Thomas, and maybe Aruba.

Curacao - how can you not want to visit a place that looks this happy?

My favorite beach was the little beach our boat pulled up to in Barbados. It wasn't much of anything, but I just had such a good feeling while we were there. I know that can be attributed to the whole situation - the snorkel, the rum punch, the beautiful day - rather than the beach itself, but I'm sticking to my answer!

Heather on the beach in Barbados

My favorite excursion is a tough one. I have to say my #1 favorite was the horseback riding, but the sea lion swim and scuba diving are very close runner-ups. I do think we did a great job choosing excursions and I had a great time on all of them!

Horseback riding on the beach has always been a dream of mine.

My favorite meal is obvious - I gushed all over the place about our lunch in Puerto Rico. AMAZING. My runner-ups in this category are our steakhouse dinner, and our first dinner in the dining room.

Our delicious Puerto Rican feast

My favorite show of Heather's was Motor City. I loved the energy, the dancing, the music and the costumes. My second favorite was probably Cinematastic. I just loved Heather's "Titanic" number.

Heather in "Motor City"

My favorite day overall was probably Grand Turk day, with the horseback riding, Margaritaville, beach time, and a fun night out. A very close second is Barbados day, with the snorkeling, beach, the Boatyard, and Island Night.

On the beach in Grand Turk

My favorite part of the trip as a whole was getting to see Heather's life. I got to see where she lives, the shows she performs everyday, meet the people she spends her time with, and visit the places she goes to every two weeks. When I got back home I went back and looked through all her pictures again, now with a new understanding of the context of so many of them. I feel like I got to know her better as an adult with a career and an exciting life, not just "my little sister." I love that now every day I know where she is and what she's doing and I can picture it all. It's very cool.

Heather showing off her headshot on the ship

Souvenirs
As I mentioned in all my posts, Eric and I collect a magnet and a postcard from every place we visit. We figured these are good, easy-to-display souvenirs (we plan to put all the postcards in a photo album) that don't cost very much. Well, that theory breaks down on a cruise with nine ports - because, say you just spend $10 in each port on those souvenirs. Well, after nine ports, HELLO you just spent nearly $100 on magnets. So...hmmm. But, I am glad to have a little something from every place I visited!

The current state of our refrigerator - all the magnets I got on the cruise have joined our others, including ones from Budapest, Scotland, the Cayman Islands, and various states.

As I mentioned, my favorite magnet from this trip is the one from San Juan. It is so different from all the others and really reminds me of the atmosphere of San Juan.

Isn't it cute? What a happy little house!

Also, in case you're wondering, here's a little postcard update - as of today, Eric has received seven of the nine postcards I sent him. The only ones that haven't arrived are the ones from Aruba and St. Vincent. The ones from St. Thomas and San Juan (the U.S. ports) arrived first, while I was still on the cruise, but the rest have been trickling in ever since. I'm pretty much giving up hope for the Aruba postcard, considering that was our first port almost a month ago, but I'm still holding out hope for St. Vincent!

The best lesson I learned
I actually feel like I learned a life lesson on my trip, and that was from scuba diving. I went through such a mental struggle before actually diving, and I nearly let my mind and my emotions get the best of me. They almost kept me from doing something I've wanted to do for years. But, thankfully that instructor was patient. She pulled me back to the surface and told me to relax my breathing and focus. And THAT'S the lesson. I left that day feeling like I can do anything I want to do. I may be scared, or anxious, or uneasy, or whatever adjective you want to use, but that doesn't mean I can't do it. I just have to relax my breathing and think about what needs to be done. Then DO IT. I will be fine - it can be done! And I will feel so good about myself afterwards. Relax your breathing and focus. This mantra has already helped me in my daily life since being home.

Here's me, overcoming anxiety and gaining an incredible experience as a result.

I miss Heather.
Although my scuba lesson is very useful in everyday life, my biggest takeaway thought from this cruise is that I miss my sister. And I'm not just talking about missing her now that she's on the ship and I can't just call her whenever I want and she's not in Florida when I go home to visit, although all that does stink. I'm talking about missing her in every day life. It has been 10 years since I lived at home with her permanently, although I did live at home during summers in college. But it's even been six years since the last time I did that.

What that means is that it's been a long time since Heather and I were able to spend this much time together, especially just the two of us. This was such a great, healthy dose of sister time that I haven't had in so many years, and it made me realize how much I do miss having Heather as a part of my daily life. We're great friends and I miss being able to hang out with her, go to dinner with her, have a drink with her, go to the beach with her, go shopping with her, or just hang out at home watching TV with her. I miss her, and it's been hard being back home because of it. Of course I am delighted to be back with Eric, but I still miss my sister.

Sisters

Okay, I'm feeling more "finished" now and am ready to put an end to my talk of the cruise. It was a fabulous trip, one that I will always remember. Heather and I did so many amazing things, saw so many beautiful places, and had such a great time together. Thanks to all of you for listening to me reminisce about it all, and for putting up with these seemingly endless recaps. Now, back to regular life!

And most importantly, thank you to Heather for giving me such an awesome experience to write about for the past two weeks. I am so grateful for everything. Thank you, Heather! Love you and miss you!

Back to Ft. Lauderdale

Day #14: Thursday, February 25
At Sea

Well, our port days were over, and we were on our way back to Ft. Lauderdale. Our last day at sea was pretty quiet and uneventful, especially in comparison to the previous seven days of non-stop island fun.

We slept in that morning until about 11:00, then got up for our last buffet breakfast (waah!). The weather had already turned quite a bit and it was very cold and excessively windy, so we ate inside rather than at our usual spot outside by the back pool. After breakfast we wandered around the ship to take some pictures with Eric- and Molly-on-a-Stick that we had been meaning to take, then spent some time in one of the hot tubs. After the hot tub, we got some ice cream.

Playing shuffleboard with Eric-on-a-Stick. Can you tell by my hair that it was a little windy?

Eric-on-a-Stick at the on-deck putting green. Also, my sweater is even blowing in the wind!

You probably can't read that sign, but it says "CAUTION: Possibility of strong winds." Oh, so true.

In the hot tub with Eric-on-a-Stick

Our plan had been to lay out in the sun, but it was just too cold and windy. So, we went back to Heather's cabin to come up with a new plan. We ended up just lounging around a bit, but the boat was really rocking so I started to get pretty seasick, and we ended up just laying around all afternoon as a result. Heather took great care of me - she gave me Dramamine, a green apple (which I guess is supposed to help?), and her seasick bracelets. She also went up to get lunch from us from the grill and brought it back to the cabin. Eventually I was able to eat it slowly but surely, and after some time I started to feel a bit better.

We had planned to go to the 6:45p.m. finale show by vocal impressionist Tony Cherry and comedian Carl Strong, but by the time I felt better it was too late. So, we just got ready and went up to the Vista Lounge to check out the Wii@Sea - they had a large screen set up on the stage and people were playing Wii bowling! We didn't participate, but I did take a picture for Eric.

With Eric-on-a-Stick at Wii@Sea

After that we picked up the portraits we had ordered from the photo department, then went back to the cabin to grab a glass of wine. We then went to the dining room for our last dinner.

Dinner was fabulous. We both started with shrimp cocktail, then for appetizers, I had poached seafood with lime-cilantro vinaigrette and avocado, and Heather had watermelon and feta cheese topped with toasted pumpkin seeds. We both also had a grilled vegetable salad.

Our appetizers: shrimp cocktail, grilled vegetable salad, Heather's watermelon and feta, and my poached seafood mix

For the main course I had clam linguine in cream sauce and Heather had some to-die-for mussels in some sort of white sauce.

My clam linguine

Heather and her amazing mussels

We finished it all off with THREE (yes, three!) desserts to share: New York Cheesecake, Sweet Mud Pie and Baked Alaska. During dinner, the waitstaff did a parade of Baked Alaska, and marched through the dining room each carrying one. It was very unexpected and entertaining, and inspired our dessert choice! All in all, it was a lovely dinner and a nice way to end the trip.

Parade of Baked Alaska

Heather with all of our desserts!

Us at dinner (I'm still sporting the oh-so-stylish seasick bracelets, as you may notice. Better safe than sorry!)

After dinner we stopped to pick up some popcorn from the Movies Under the Stars area (because we totally hadn't just eaten tons of food), then went back to Heather's room to watch the movie, "Love Happens." It was just too cold to actually watch it under the stars, and they show it simultaneously on the cabin televisions so we thought that was the way to go. We drank some wine and watched part of it, then Leisel and Ryan came down to the cabin to say good-bye to me, so we talked to them for a bit. When they left we finished the movie, drank some more wine, and I packed. I packed up all my clothes and all my souvenirs and was a very sad person. Then, it was time for bed. The cruise was over!

My souvenir magnets, hanging on Heather's wall (her walls are magnetic!) - I was sad to take them down and pack them up!
In case you're curious, they're in port order - top row: Aruba, Curacao, Trinidad, Barbados, St. Vincent; bottom row - St. Kitts, St. Thomas, San Juan (my favorite), and Grand Turk

Day #15: Friday, February 26
Back in Ft. Lauderdale

On the last morning we had our alarm set for 8:30, but we woke up off and on fairly early due to noise from them unloading passenger luggage near Heather's cabin. As we got ready to disembark, Heather learned that Rick was coming to surprise her for the day and I learned that my flight back to NYC had been cancelled because of a snowstorm. Awesome. We had planned to leave the ship at 10:00, but we got a call at about 9:30 that told us to basically get off the ship NOW, so we left in a bit of a rush.

We went through customs with no trouble, and my mom soon arrived to pick us up. In light of my flight cancellation, I was even more glad she had decided to drive down for the day, because my plan was to get my Ft. Lauderdale flight rebooked out of Tampa instead, so I could just go back with her rather than having to stay the night by myself in Ft. Lauderdale.

Mom first took us to CVS to drop off our underwater cameras (we were dying to see our scuba/snorkel/horseback riding pictures!), then we went to Denny's for breakfast and Rick met us there. We spent some time there then picked up our pictures, then all piled into Rick's car to go to Target for some shopping.

During all this I spent over an hour and 20 minutes on hold with JetBlue, trying to take care of my flight. I did eventually get myself rebooked on a flight out of Tampa the next morning. Whew.

After Target we went to the beach for a bit and ate cupcakes my mom had brought, then it was time to say our good-byes. Rick took Heather back to the ship so she could start the whole cruise all over again (lucky!).

The actual last beach of my trip - Ft. Lauderdale!

At the beach with Heather and Mom

Mom and I started our journey back to her house in Weeki Wachee. We stopped for dinner at Applebee's when we started to hit bad traffic around 6:00, then made the rest of the drive without any problems. We made it to her house around 10:00, where we had some wine and I showed her all the pictures and videos from the trip. That took until 1:00 a.m.! Then it was bedtime, since we were leaving at 7:15 the next morning for the airport.

And, you know the rest! My flight the next day went smoothly, and Eric was waiting for me at the airport when I got in. Home sweet home.

Up next: All the recaps are finished, but I feel the need for a little debriefing session, a little reflection, a little more thinking back, and a little bit more of a finishing touch. So, stay tuned for that - then I'll finally stop rambling about the cruise. Thanks for sticking with me!