Spa Heaven or Hell

A friend of mine is moving away next weekend. And while I am sad to see her go, I am moving into her bedroom, I took her calling, and she is moving to San Francisco. Maybe she can move into my old bedroom and take my old calling? Would that make things even?

As a going away, we had a spa day with some of her nearest and dearest in Heaven. Heaven is in Queens, believe it or not; and is a place also known as Spa Castle. Holy cow - if being in water and laying in saunas is your thing, this is the place to go.

First off, the girls all wear matching outfits and so do the boys. Then in each locker room, there are bathing areas where swim suits are not allowed. Scary. For most of the day, we laid in saunas, hot tubs, special pools where the water flowed over you, etc. Each sauna had different minerals - like jade, gold, salt, etc. and was pretty cool (and hot). I run fairly hot naturally so I didn't last as long in the saunas as some of the girls did. I really enjoyed my 45 minute nap though in a lounge chair this afternoon. Those were special times.

By 6:30pm, there were only 3 of us left at the spa. We went down to the locker room and checked out the spa there and decided that we were going to brave it and go full throttle. Let me also say that the towels that they gave you in the locker room were about 6 inches wide and 12 inches long. If you were going to do it, you were going to do it. I must admit that after about 30 minutes of being in the room with about 50 other women who were baring it all, it became fairly empowering and suddenly I realized that no one cared the least about what I look like without my clothes on...except me. And then I ate a huge burrito and a snow cone for dinner. I'm just going to eat away that pain!

So - would you do it? I'm curious. Are you too self conscious or would you strip down in front of your friends in a bathhouse?

Zundelac Island Vacation 2010 - NYC

A few months ago, Zach emailed me, Scotty P, Uzi, and his roommate Mike to see if we would all like to go to New York City with him to see his girlfriend in Jersey Boys. The responses were all an immediate yes, but we needed to nail down a date that worked for all of us. One day, we all got an email saying that Zach and Mike had booked tickets for the weekend of July 31. Within an hour, everyone had tickets and we started planning our weekend.

Details are as follows:

Kristy and I flew into NYC on Friday morning and met up at the airport. My sweet cousin Beverly decided to fly in from Syracuse for the day and surprise me, which was really nice of her. We were all really tired from our flights, so we headed to Steph Bishopp's house (who was our VERY gracious host) to take a nap. Upon exiting the Subway right by Steph's house, I did some damage to my toe that left me barely able to sleep. I am fairly sure that I just jammed it, but it was not pretty, as you'll see in a minute. After getting some rest, we headed over to the Metropolitan Museum of Art. Beverly used to be an art teacher, Kristy graduated in interior design and at one time, I was an art minor. Needless to say, we all enjoy a good museum.

Here I am with Beverly outside the museum before going to dinner.

I made plans with two of my girlfriends from elementary school/high school who live in NYC now to meet up for dinner. It took some planning, but we went to Motorino's in Brooklyn and it was delicious. Brussel Sprout pizza! Two things that I love! Amazing. Here I am with Kristy, Beverly, and Steph.

And here I am with Courtney and Katie. I could write an entire blog post on them and how I could. not. stop. smiling. all through dinner but I'll spare you that. I will just say that it was more enjoyable than I can tell you to see two girls that I grew up with - who loved me in all my ugly phases - and see how they've turned out to be amazing, successful, and happy women. That dinner made up for me not attending my high school reunion last fall.

Then off to Prospect Park to see The Swell Season. By the time we got there, we couldn't get in, so we sat outside the gates and listened for an hour or so. Then we met up with these love birds for 4th meal.

And these two really started hitting it off as well. I couldn't have been more pleased.

And this is where the story starts to get exciting. So. .....

After 4th meal in Brooklyn, we got on the subway going back to Steph's house in Manhattan. We were on the train with about 10-15 other people in our car, laughing and talking about whatever. I specifically remember talking about our adventure hiking half dome last summer and how I'd rather die than do it again. :) We were a few stops outside of Manhattan still when some people got in our train car. I was facing Steph & Kristy and saw a man walking toward me. I was not prepared for what was about to happen. He sat down fairly close to us and was facing me. He sat for a second I think then proceeded to throw his bag down, walk toward me and get about an inch away from my face and start screaming that he was going to f*** me up over and over and over. Please keep in mind that this was a very large black man who was solid muscle and was not homeless and not dressed like a crazy person. This went on for a few minutes and apparently from what Kristy told me later, I had a look of sheer terror on my face. And he wasn't yelling at all of us girls - it was just me. He went back to his seat talking about slavery and how we don't respect him, and how he knows how to make weapons. All awesome, right? Then he'd get up and start doing the same thing again, inches away from my face. The entire time, none of the people on the train were moving, let alone looking at each other - especially us girls. At the Canal St. stop, Steph B made eye contact with me and said "I think we can change trains here. Do you want to?" I said "yes" and we tried to get off the train as quickly as possible. The worst thing was that we thought he'd try to follow us off the train based on how he was acting. I seriously thought that he was going to kill me. As we exited the train, we literally walked into 6 cops and 2 undercover cops who just happened to be getting on our same exact train from the same door we were getting out of. Steph B immediately told them what had been going on and within about 5 seconds, the guy who had been harassing me was being pummeled to the floor by 6 cops (it took 6 to get him to the ground) and handcuffed. Thank you, first degree harassment and resisting arrest. He was in jail within minutes. We, however, were in the police station until 2am with this dude:

I asked him if he'd pose for a picture with us and when he said no, I just took a photo of him alone. Take that! All the cops were thoroughly enjoying having 3 good-looking ladies in their subway police station and started calling us "Miss California, Miss New York, and Miss Utah." Then I noticed my toe and its awesome purple hue:

And I also want to add that there are very very few subway stations in all of Manhattan and the five Burroughs that even have police stations inside the subway station. God answers prayers, people.

On Saturday we slept in a little and then went for a jog through Central Park with Scott. who had flown in the night before. In the afternoon, we met up at the Manhattan Temple for an afternoon session with Mike & Zach who had also flown in on Friday night. What an awesome thing - to be at the temple with 5 of your closest friends. We had a little tour of the temple afterward and when Zach said to me at one point when he was kneeling at an altar with me "Please don't blog about this", I knew that I just had to. haha.

After the temple, we went to Magnolia Bakery, picked up some overrated desserts and then slowly but surely made our way to dinner at Land Restaurant. Oh my, the food was amazing. If you like Thai food, please go. And please get the mango sticky rice. You will not regret that decision. Ever. Then after dinner, we made our way down to see Jersey Boys, but mostly Heather, who is Zach's girlfriend. You may have seen her before here.

After the show, she took us backstage and we proceeded to take goofy photos.

Oh, this photo is amazing.

We were in such a good mood at that point, that we decided to take tuk-tuks through Times Square.






And since Serendipity's is open until 2am,...

The night ended very late. Shocker.

Church on Sunday morning. And of course we ran into random people at church who we know and who don't live in New York City. Leave it to me, folks.

Zach & Heather

The rest of Sunday was spent walking around New York City - and of course we had to pose for a picture at one of my all-time favorite New York sites - and the home of my favorites - the Rockettes.

And Kristy wanted to see St. Patrick's Cathedral, so we went.

Scott left us Sunday night, which was a very sad occasion. So on Monday afternoon, the rest of us went to see the Statue of Liberty. It was Mike & Kristy's first time there and it does not disappoint. I loved seeing all the history on it. I especially loved this poster:

We got pedestal access with our tickets to Liberty & Ellis Island, so when we got up to the top of the pedestal, this was our view.

This was her view - unedited and unscripted.

After seeing Ellis Island, we headed back to Manhattan to meet up with Steph and go to Brooklyn for Grimaldi's pizza. It was delicious of course. This time, instead of braving the subway ride from Brooklyn to Manhattan, we walked the Brooklyn Bridge.

And then jumping photos ensued.

We ended the evening in Madison Square Park with this amazing view of the Empire State Building during 4th meal.

Dear New York, your streets made me feel brand new, your big lights inspired me. Let's hear it for New York.
Love, Me

Dear Bev, thanks for making an effort to come see me.

Dear Steph B, thanks for hosting and for laughing with us. I've said it once and I'll say it again - please let your birthday hurry up so we can play again.

Dear other friends that I was there with, I miss you all. A lot.

xoxoxo

**Kristephanie Zundelac has taken a vow that every summer we will take a summer trip to an island within a state. That can be left up to interpretation obviously, but here is our 2nd year. Last year was Catalina.

Ironman St. George

Last weekend was Rita's Ironman in St. George. And because I like to be supported when I need it, I flew out to support Rita in her time of need. Maybe I also was itching to leave the state and hang with Kristy for a day.

Kristy and I stayed with some of her brother's friends and when we noticed that they had 2 couches, we immediately pushed them together to make a "hot tub" a-la Zach Pond's house. Unfortunately, this tub was a great deal smaller than Zach's, so Kristy dubbed it "The Birthing Tub". Imagine the two of us sleeping in that thing. Also imagine legs and arms hanging off the sides while we slept for about 3 hours.

We had to get up at 5:15am to make it to the parking lot in time to catch the bus that took us to the startling line for Rita's race. The gun shot went off at 7am on the dot, right after the National Anthem was sung karaoke style in the early morning light. Then the scene looked a little like this...

...and this. I know for a fact that several people got hypothermia in that water. Brr!

a few hours later, we got a huge smile from Rita as she moved on to the second event.

And off she went to start on her 112 mile bike ride.

And then we were off on our 183 mile tour around southern Utah.
Aren't the mountains there beautiful?

Of course Kristy and I had to go to Colorado City. I've dressed like them before, so I wanted to see them with my own two eyes. So strange!

Turns out that people don't quite finish their houses there since it is a way to avoid paying taxes on them. Yet again, strange.

It was a Saturday morning, so we saw lots of people out and about. My boss says this looks just like it does in "Big Love." I guess I'll take her word for it. :)

Other than strange people in unfinished houses, there's nothing else to see in Colorado City, so we were off to Kanab and to Frontier Movie Town! Yeehaw!

Behind a little tourist shop there is a yard with old movie sets and props. Reminded me of Portugal Dos Pequenitos, but for Country Westerns or something.

"Go faster, Bessie!"

And maybe it is because I have "Gone With the Wind" on my mind, but I fear that I look a little like Belle Watling in this photo.

Kristy enjoyed the porch and watching her cows go out to pasture...

And all I could think was that I was making Rachael jealous, by being dead.
(inside joke? was it funny for anyone but me or rachael?)

Ok enough silly pictures from Frontier Movie Town and Kanab. Westward, ho! On to the Moqui Cave. I guess the cave was once a bar/dancehall in the 50's. Now it is a museum that pays respect to one of its previous owners, Garth Chamberlain. His son Lex now owns the cave and he has a lot of artifacts such as dinosaur tracks, glowing rocks, and other family memorabilia. Nice people, those Chamberlains.

The next stop on our tour was at Zions National Park. I didn't look at the map closely enough to realize that we had to drive through Zions to get to our next destination, but it was a super bonus that we got to drive through. Kristy had never been, and the last time I went was about 8 years ago, and I didn't remember just how amazing it was. What a beautiful place. If you haven't been, go. And here we are, looking our finest. (remember - 3 hours of sleep, no showers, up since 5:30, etc.)

Going west from Zions back to St. George, you drive through the town of Springdale, which was next on our stop. Bumbleberry Pie was something we both wanted to try. Don't ask what a bumbleberry is - something to do with fairies and giggling huckleberries. We even heard someone calling it bumblebee pie on our way out. This lady who served us the pie was quite upset that I wanted vanilla ice cream with my pie instead of bumbleberry ice cream. Lady, have you ever heard of bumbleberry overkill? :)

But it was delicious.

On our way back into St. George we stopped at the Historical Museum in Hurricane, Utah. The most disgusting/awesome thing in the museum is this piece of 103 year old fruit cake. Not even kidding. It was made in 1907 and apparently is here in the museum to show you how resilient fruit cake is? Or maybe to convince you never to eat it? Maybe they should be having a competition between a McDonald's Happy Meal and the Hurricane Fruit Cake. Wow.

And back to St. George to see Rita at mile 13 of her marathon. Still smiling. Since we are both at home now, we have laughed about how much caffeine she had that day because as she ran by us at mile 13, she yelled at us that she wanted us to all come over that night to hang out. hahaha. Let me just say that after running a marathon, I was not asking people to come over. hahaha! Rita is so awesome.

Cafe Rio for dinner and then back to the finish line to see her bring it home. 14 hours and 59 minutes of competition. And here she is, smiling and high-fiving the spectators as she crosses the finish line. SOOOOO amazing. She put in the hours, people. Only missed 1 workout the entire time she was training. And she didn't have just 1 workout a day - it was always at least 2. Can you believe that? Yep, she's awesome.

Here is our group of cheerleaders after Rita finished. Somehow this is the only photo of the poster Uzi and I made. But it was seen by Rita several times. :)

Sunday morning I decided at the last minute to go to the Grand Canyon. I mean - it is on my bucket list, and my flight wasn't until about 9pm that night out of Vegas. I was up and at'em at 6am Sunday morning and by 11am, I was looking at this. And yelling expletives, as previously mentioned.

I think my mom was sad that I wasn't there sharing it with anyone, but there were strangers there who took my photo. Plus, although you can't tell from the photo, it was snowing. And it was freezing. I did not want to be out of the car any more than necessary. May in Arizona and it was freezing. Yep. Believe me.

Then of course I pulled over at Flinestone-ville or Bedrock, or something on my way to Vegas because why wouldn't you? It is a hotel and little tourist stop. I didn't pay to go in, but I maybe should have. Maybe I'd like to stay at the hotel one day. Just because that would be hilarious.

And a few hours later, I was at the Hoover Dam, stuck in traffic for more than 3 hours. Damn traffic, I tell you! Seriously though - we were at a standstill for more than an hour, so I made friends with the car behind me and took a nap. Since I'm friendly like that. And when the traffic started to move, they came and knocked on my window and told me to wake up. Friendly people in Arizona. There is a new bridge being built over the damn dam to help traffic move faster, which is pretty necessary considering all the tourists and that it is BY FAR the fastest way to get from Arizona to Las Vegas. 'Bout time, people. 'bout time.

I was glad that I had driven fast enough to be able to put 3 extra hours into my schedule on Sunday and make it to the airport on time for my flight.

A few lessons I re-learned this weekend:

1. Rita is amazing.
2. Kristy is hilarious. We have the best time together.
   
3. I run into people I know EVERYWHERE I go.
4. Cheering for people based on what they are wearing is always the way to go. Screaming "Way to go deep V-neck tank!" or "Keep it up backwards visor!" can keep you entertained for hours. Thank you to Scott Porter for helping me see the light with that.

PS - here are some more photos that Ann took if you'd like to see more of how awesome Rita is. I know you do. Here are the rest of Uzi and I's photos if you'd like to look at them too.