ZUMBAZUMBAZUMBA!

If you don’t know what ZUMBA is (go look it up on youtube), it’s a work out class but you DANCE. And it’s GREAT.  I’ve never done it before tonight, and I’ve always wanted to.  The I-House had a class, and  girl in my group and I did it.

Holy crap.

It didn’t necessarily kick my butt, but by the end I was sweating my derrière off, and my calves might be feeling it a little tomorrow.  But seriously?  If I had to choose only one workout plan for the rest of my life, it would be Zumba.

At first, once it starts, you’re kind of looking around, thinking to yourself (or at least, I did) how much of a dork you look like.  Then as you get into it you realize no one is paying attention to you and you’re not paying attention to anyone else except the instructor and how you’re moving your legs/arms/body all at the same time (which is a lot harder than it looks).  I also realized I have no rhythm.  For some reason I kept thinking of Glee and how everyone always mocks Finn because he can’t dance.  I felt like that.  I blame my parents, partly, for taking me out of tap lessons when I was younger.  Occasionally I wonder what would have happened if I’d stuck with dance instead of going for more, shall we say, aggressive sports.  But that’s beside the point.  The point is, once you get moving, you don’t realize what’s going on around you.  You’re listening to the music, watching the instructor, and trying to get some kind of rhythm.  It’s a BLAST.  I think I’m going to look into it once I get back to MSU in the fall.

This was my breakfast this morning at the Algonquin Hotel on 44th just off Times Square.  Yeah.  It tasted as good as it looked, which was AH-MAZING.

The Algonquin, for those of you who don’t know (which I didn’t) was home to a group of writers who dubbed themselves The Vicious Circle.  It was comprised of Dorothy Parker (possibly the most memorable, apparently), Frank P. Adams, Heywood Broun, Harold W. Ross (founder of The New Yorker), and Robert Benchley.  Don’t worry.  They’re not really household names, so it’s okay if you don’t know who they are.  Anyway, they were famous in their day (the 1920’s-1930’s, Prohibition era) and would get together at the infamous Algonquin hotel where the owner created a very large 16-seat round table so they would all be able to fit.  Last night we watched the movie Mrs. Parker and the Vicious Circle (starring a very young Matthew Broderick and a small role by Gwenyth Paltrow) and today we visited the site where a few scenes were shot.

Some of our group with our breakfast.

The opening room/lobby.  We didn’t actually see the round table and I didn’t get around to asking my instructor if it still exists as there are several rooms to the Algonquin.

There is a cat that lives in the hotel.  We found it before we left curled up underneath a window ledge on a couch.

Afterward we trekked (it wasn’t actually a trek.  It was quite close, just up 44th to 6th and down to 49-51st) to Rockefeller Plaza.

Building where The Today Show is shot.  By the time we got there, the typical morning crowd that stands outside with signs that say “We Came all the Way from Oregon!” or “Hi Mom and Uncle Chuck!” was gone, and the show had already wrapped up for the morning.

30 Rock, anyone?  Where’s Tina Fey?

So awesome.

Right across the street from the plaza (where I would love to be at Christmastime to see the tree!) was Radio City Music Hall.  I thought (as did most of our group) we were going inside, but apparently you have to buy tickets and/or schedule a tour.  So we basically just stood outside, snapped pictures, and walked past the entrance.

Some of our group walking down the sidewalk, heading toward the Ed Sullivan Theater.  Home of…

The Late Show with David Letterman!

And now I have a story to share:

Once upon a time there was a group of 16 college students that went to New York City for the month of June.  They had received word from their instructor that they had a chance to get to see a taping of David Letterman.  Excited, they waited for the news and what it entailed.  The day before the group left Michigan to head to the Big Apple, their instructor posted the news on their Facebook group page saying there were only TEN TICKETS to the Late Show taping on Tuesday, June 8th, and the FIRST TEN TO REPLY TO THIS POST would go.  So, ten people replied, leaving six out.  One girl was so busy packing all day and running last minute errands that she didn’t check her Facebook until an hour before she left, an unusual thing considering she normally checked it at least once when she got up and then again a few hours later.  Alas, she found she was 15th to reply, so there was no going to David Letterman for her.  Mildly disappointed, she didn’t let it get her down because she was already in NYC so missing out on something like that wasn’t going to keep her from having a great time the rest of the trip.

Apparently, there’s like a five month waiting period for Letterman, about the same for Fallon, and about a year for Cobert and Stewart.  And two for SNL, despite not being in season during the summer.  So, it really wasn’t that big of a deal for me.  The guests were Kyle Chambers (star of the show Friday Night Lights and the upcoming action movie Super 8) and Kathy Griffin (who would have been hilarious to see).  The musical guest I had never heard of before.  Our instructor, I was informed of today, had only just heard back from them last week when she posted the news of the Facebook group page, so we were pretty lucky to even get 10 tickets.  I assumed that was probably the most they would allow for a large group.

Columbus Circle, right outside the entrance to the south end of Central Park.

Another Trump building; this one apparently the Trump International Building.

Somewhere inside Central Park, near the 59th and 5th Ave entrace, kind of kitty corner (but not really) from where we entered at Columbus Circle.

CNN building outside the Time Warner building across from entrance in C. Circle.

For those of you that watch Gossip Girl, isn’t a large part filmed in and around and outside the Empire Hotel?  Doesn’t Chuck Bass own the Empire Hotel?

And, lastly, I leave you with this.  I don’t know if this is for real or if it was just on this corner, but seriously?  Is this a joke?  There is honking EVERYWHERE.  I just heard two cars honking at each other outside my window.  This has to be a joke.  I’ve learned that there’s a better view when you look up in NYC than down.  Because I also find amusing gems like this.