New York Trip 2013

Hey guys!

I just came back from my NYC trip last night, and let me tell you that OMFG, it was the best new York trip I remember ever having. We went with my schools Chinese society and let me just say that it was an amazing event planned by students. I'm super happy about the trip because we got to do everything we planned to do and more! I went on this trip with ST, Y, a friend that I will call LN, another ML and two of LN's friends. Yes, seven girls in New york city hoping to make their dreams (a nice stress free weekend) come true. Here's a break down of what we did each day:

Day 1
Well actually this vacation could have started out a little more smooth, since ST and I got up about an hour late. But we got there in time and we did board the bus! The trip there was boring, basically, everyone on the bus could fall asleep but me :( But when we got to NYC, the fun started, we got dropped off at Times Square and then we started out walk downtown, we walked to Strand (a new, used and rare bookstore), then headed down to SOHO for a bit of shopping and then we headed to Chinatown where we got little nicknacks, jewelry and some pastries. We then headed over to little Italy where we ate at an Italian restaurant with live music and then went across the street to have cannolies and we took the subway back to Times Square and took a shuttle bus back to our hotel.

Day 2
We started the day my taking the bus into NY and got dropped off at Grand Central station, from there we took the subway to Union Square and walked to IHOP where we all stuffed our faces with food and then we took the subway back to Times Square. We then split up, LN's two friends went to the MoMA and the rest of us went to Madame Tussauds. Then we met up again and we lined up at tkts to get Broadway tickets. We were having trouble deciding what show to go watch when the guy working there announced that they had tickets to the opening night of Cinderella, and the tickets were half price! so we all obviously got tickets to that. After getting the tickets, we split up again, and we went to different places around Times, then we all met up at the Theater where the show was going to be at. There was a "red carpet" in front where there were celebrities coming in to watch the show. We saw Anna Sophia form the Carrie Diaries and then some of us went to the washroom before the show, the ones that stayed behind saw Laurie Metcalf (Sheldon Cooper's mom on The Big Bang Theory). The show was amazing, it was a somewhat modern version of Cinderella where she is a strong independent woman who is doing what she believes in. The show itself was amazing, the performers were incredibly talented and the costume changed in the show were amazing! It was done right before your eyes in the blink of an eye. Nothing covering the performer. The costume legit changed in front of your eyes, from her normal beat up clothes to an amazing white and later on gold dress. It was an amazing experience and on top of it all, it was something that we could all experience in a school trip. We were in the same theater as Anna Sophia (Carrie Diaries), Regis Philbin, Megan Hilty (Smash) and a bunch of other celebs while watching the show!
After the show we went to go wait by the stage door hoping to get autographs from the members of the cast and we waited outside for an hour and got a few autographs, but then we got to go inside! We got to go on stage where the magic happened, it was truly something amazing, we got to stand on a Broadway stage! How many times does that ever happen? Well unless you are crazy talented, NEVER!! It was truly a night to remember and isn't it ironic that the unforgettable, magical night happened while we watched Cinderella? And all before the stroke of midnight :P

Day 3
On the last day we went to Woodbury Premium Outlets and we did a lot of shopping. Some stores had amazing deals, like Coach, who had 50% off all handbags and clearance items. How do you say no to that?! After 6 hours of shopping, we headed back to MTL on a long bus ride home.



Now I'm not going to pretend that this trip didn't have it's ups and downs, but it was an overall amazing trip with friends in the big apple. It was also an amazing time to get away from everything and turn off my phone and just have a good time. I would definitely do this again next year if the trip is offered again.

I spent a lot of money on this trip, but I actually didn't come home with a lot of stuff for myself like the last time I went. Here's list of my hull:

For me:

• white chocolate Reese's
• Kinder maxi bars
• a trench coat from Kelvin Clein
• Little woman, Wuthering Heights and Warm bodies
• Nars blush in Orgasm
• Coach wallet

For family and friends:

• Nike tshirts
• One Piece tshirt
• plain solid colored tshirts
• men's wallet
• Adidas jacket
• giant Reese's bad
• white chocolate Reece's
• Kinder mixed chocolate bag
• Coach Purse
• pastries
• bracelet

And of course, money was spend on food, the Broadway show and Madame Tussaud's. Hopefully this spring break continues to be an good one :)

-J

Potential Shopaholic?

So in less than a month I somehow spent over 800$ on stuff. This is not just on Black Friday... but I think that played a key role in it too. But in my defense, I feel like I got a decent amount of stuff for the bill that I'll be getting. So here is a list of the stuff I bought that will be on this bill (some of the stuff are presents for Christmas for family members)

• iPod Touch 5th generation in blue
• 2 pairs of leggings
• a cute tank top
• a long sleeveless sheer button down shirt that can be used as a dress(ish)
• facial mask from Clinique
• Blotting sheets from Bosica
• nail polish set from the Sephora Collection
• Smashbox Photo Finish Color Correcting Foundation Primer
• bow shirt
• shirt with sequenced sleeves
• black jeggings
• sweater (for my brother)
• Reached by Ally Condie
• Hidden by P.C. and Kristin Cast
• Vampire Diaries- The Hunters vol 3 by L.J. Smith
• Insurgent by Veronica Roth
• black and white striped sweater
• light and dark blue striped shirt
• 3 t-shirts (for my brothers)
•  my Secret Santa present ;) (2 parts)
• and some food here and there (Tim Hortons and Starbucks)

I feel like it's a decent hull, but it's still a significant amount of money... and I'm not working anymore so there is no way for me to make my money back until next summer.

To solve this problem, I've told all my close friends that if I want to get something, they must stop me from getting it. I am only allowed to buy Christmas presents and Timmies, but I need ti stop buying that too.

What do you guys think? Would you have regretted the purchases?

-J

Update 2.0

Hey guys!

So multiple things I want to talk about today. Most of which are unrelated... I think. Well I kind of hope they all fit into one another so it would be easier to understand.

So first on the menu, Finals are coming up. I am scared crazy right now because I'm behind in almost ever single class and I feel like even though I'm up to date... I don't know anything. I'm scared because although most of my midterms went okay (there was room for improvement) I didn't do so well in a few classes. And I'm afraid that I'll mess us in the finals too. I have five courses six finals. YES SIX -.- I am stressing out and the first two are back to back, then three days later I have two on the same day, then two days later I have another final, and finally five days before the last one. and I am upset because the last one is the one that I believe I need the least time studying for... School how I hate you... But I'm hoping I do well this semester because it would really help to kick off my Uni life with a pretty good GPA.

Secondly, I just got the 5th Generation iPod touch, and I am loving it! I got it in blue and it is such a pretty shade of blue. I had the old 3rd gen one and not having a camera on it was killing me (along with the fact that half my apps no longer worked). I got it about a week ago and I honestly love it. Y likes to iMessage so it comes in handy with her. I also love that it's easier for me to use Instagram or Twitter or Facebook. Consequently, it also makes for a good distraction in class when I'm bored. That's it for shinny new toys.

Next on the list is Black Friday. So you guys (most of you guys) know I live in Canada, so we don't have the crazy super sales or anything. But we do have a few decent ones. I'm not one of the people who go for high end stuff. More casual places like American Eagle and Garage and stuff. And I picked up a few things. I feel like a lot of the stores had a lot of hype around their sales, but there really wasn't anythings special about them. A few places had 40% off everything, which I thought was a good deal, but most places just had sales on their sale items. I ended up spending over 150 today though, although about half of that was on books. Because yes... I am a bookworm :P

Lastly, I would like to address a situation that ST probably wants to read about... L. So ST and Y have met L and at a point they both wanted me to either become better friends with him or a little more than that. But I'm having issues ever since they mentioned this, cause last year I kind of did have a crush on him. and I put that aside. But I always felt like we had pretty good chemistry, like we play fight and we make fun of one another all the time (well him more than me). But he's kind of like that with everyone I guess, well a little (I know he's like to all the pretty girls at work. And before ST jumps to conclusions: I am not one of the pretty ones). So ya, but there are so many negative aspects, like he parties all the time, he drinks a lot. He smokes pot often. and I find smoking is a huge turn off. But he's also nice to me, in his weird way and he's smart too, he dropped out of school but he is still very knowledgeable. That's another thing! He dropped out of school! He's planning to go back... but I don't know. Maybe ST is right and I just don't want it to go any further than this, maybe cause I'm scared... I don't know. But ti's so annoying cause we were shopping today and every time I saw a nice men's sweater, I though "Hey that would look good on L" and it annoys me... and I don't know why. cause I don't like him!

Anyways it is 1:15 and I have to get some Biology done... yay -.- Wish me luck!

-J

NYC Trip

Hey guys!

So I just got back from my NYC trip. It was a fun 3 days, but boy, did that break my wallet... We spent 3 days in NYC, and now the spending limit is $800 as opposed to $400, and boy I am glad that limit went up! I spent almost $600 the last 3 days.

So let me tell you guys how the 3 days went.

Day 1:
Basically slept for an hour, since many of you know, I went to the MSO concert. Got up at 3:30AM to get ready to leave for the trip (thank God packing was done ahead). Got to the bus at 5AM, and spent 12 (yes 12!) hours on the bus, because we spent over 2 hours at the boarder and got into NYC right at rush hour... It took us an hour to get through the Lincoln Tunnel -.- Not the best way to spend a day after an hour of sleep. When we got into town, we just had enough time to go to the M&M World and Hershey's Times Square before we had to head to our hotel.

Day 2:
Spent 13 hours in New York City just walking around and of course shopping :) (I'll list my haul after i tell you guys what we did during the trip) We started off on Wall and Broadway, and walked all the way to Union Square. Now on a map it looks super far, but the walk really isn't that bad, according to Google Maps, we can walk the distance is about 45 minutes, But we took about 6 hours, why? Because we were busy shopping around. The walk is a 2.3 mi (3.7 km). We stopped my a lot of stores on the way and not to mention we had to wait for stores to open.

We went to this amazing bookstore called Strand on Broadway and 12th street. OMG this place was huge, with books going almost to the ceiling, I could honestly live there. The books they sell are used, new or rare books, and the prices there as just amazing.

When we got to Union Square we had lunch (well snack/lunch) at SeoulFood, an Korean/Mexican food truck. It was delicious, I thought it would be weird, SB once recommended it to me and I told him it sounded weird, but it was amazing, it may sound weird, but these people know what they're doing. For $10 it was totally worth it and really filling.

After eating, we decided to take our chances with the New York Subway, that was fun cause we got on the wrong tracks, then ended up having to ask a local, their Subways are quite different form the Montreal ones, they are a little less of a smooth ride, they skip stops, and a million subways pass on the same track, how are tourists supposed to find their way around?! We got off at 34th to go check out the Macy's then from there on, it was just taking our time walking to Times Square. We ended up at the back door to the Theater where they were producing the Broadway show Marry Poppins and got to see the actress in full costume since she stepped out for 2 seconds before going back into the theater after seeing us!

Day 3:
Went to Woodburry Premium Outlets and shopped like a mad person. Went to just about 6 stores and I honestly have to say, I have no idea how money flies to fast... We got back into town in about 7 hours, which was such a relief after the 12 hours it took us to get there!

Now for a list of everything I bought on the trip:

• Hershey's Chocolate World chocolate pack (4 different flavored bars)
• M&M keychain
• M&Ms from the Wall on the M&M store
• Nail Polish (Essie, O.P.I., Prevail)
• Lip Gloss (Wet n' Wild) although I really want a Clinique one, but the Sephora we went to ran out
• 2 dresses from H&M
• Kate Spade earrings (little gold bow shaped ones)
• 5 books from Strand
• A travel mug for loose tea leaves (I've been looking for this for a few months now)
• 2 pairs of Converse (one for me, one for my brother)
• 2 pairs of running shoes from Adidas (one for me, one for my other brother)
• 2 pairs of Adidas flip flops (one for me, one for my mom)
• A pair of Levis jeans
• A Nemo head Cushion for the bus ride home
• A Perry the Platypus t-shirt
• A Mickey & Minnie Hoddie
• A bottle of Lovestuck by Vera Wang

All this plus, W and AB's birthday presents! I still spent a lot of money though, there goes my next paycheck... All in all, it was an amazing trip and I would do it again, although this time, I would get all the heavy stuff later in the day instead of bringing everything around and not feeling out arms later in the day.

Until next time, cause I am in serious need for some sleep :P

-J

Summer is Here!

Hey guys!

Classes are over, the sun is shining, the temperature is burning up, not to mention that finals are over and I am FREE! Well, from CEGEP at least. The temperature is beautiful in MTL all week, and summer feels like it's already here. The sun is shinning, the temperature is at least a balmy 25-ish (I won't lie), what else can a girl ask for? Ohh ya! Plans with her friends for the whole summer!

So, I'm currently working, but I'm going to make sure I still see my friends as much as possible. Especially because some of them are traveling this summer, to cool places in other continents and I am stuck here, in MTL, not that there's anything  wrong with that, but you have to admit, it's not that cool to stay in town. But I may go to NYC at the end of the summer, fingers crossed that'll happen :)

The summer is starting off pretty well, I'm working a little and so far, made quite a few plans, I have museum day. For those of you in the MTL area, you should check it out, it's on the 27th (tomorrow) and it's free access to 29 of the museums in town (x). And then I have a Laronde day planed out with my friends, so AB, W, ST, SB, AK, H and of course myself. It's going to be a fun time, so hopefully no rain! Then I'm going to be checking out the Star Wars Identity exhibit at the science center (I know what id it with me and museums). I also have a few days I'm planning to go shopping with a few friends, once again NYC at the end of summer, and a trip to the beach :) Hopefully most of this will happen and more :) I also have to make plans with AA, because we've always bailed on our plans in the past.

Also not to mention the 20 books I have on my ever growing reading list! Yes, I am a big reader, I enjoy reading a lot. so now you guys know I am a bookworm :)

So let me tell you guys how I kicked off finishing school, after my  last final, I volunteered for the Montreal Children's Radiothon (I know, lame! who does volunteering right after an exam?), then went out to a pub with friends and had a few drinks, and watching drunk guys yell and dance, now that was funny. But the highlight of the night was when the guy at the table next to us bought our whole table a round of tequila shots! It was super nice of him. and I also went to watch the Avengers yesterday. So that is how I kicked of my summer and a few of my plans. How have your summers started and what do you have planned?

Enjoy the sunshine :)
-J