We start out today with our coffee using the filters I bought. We took the cups with us and had Starbucks refill them with their Christmas blend, which was so good. We had to stay close to Ashley's apartment because our thanksgiving meats are on the way.
This is where I notice how cheap that Ashley really is. Unless it is close to free or 300 dollars she will not even look at it. Nothing in between, I don’t know why but nothing in the middle. Me on the other hand, if I like something or I want it, I spare no expense. We were talking about how cheap she was and opposite I was from that. I made a comment that “I like to make it rain,” and she came back with “I don’t even like to make it sprinkle.” Lol I thought that was funny.
After shopping we head to Sports New York. Ashley met the talent coordinator from the network and got a hookup for a backstage look and we got to set in on a live broadcast. I was so excited for this. We get there and it looks awesome. We check in like VIP and the lady comes and gets us. First we get to look at the control room and I don’t know how they have “control” in that room. There is so many buttons and TVs that I couldn’t keep track of them. We met the broadcasters and sat right behind the cameras as they were live. It was so cool to see how much detail they put into every angel. The camera coordinator works like a movie director. Fixings every small thing and changing camera angels constantly.
The broadcast was four men at a round table talking about all the sports stories and giving their opinions. It was so cool. It reminded me of being with my friends and talking about sports, except these guys make bank to do it. We also got to meet Damien Woody, an offensive lineman for the Jets. That was pretty cool. He was a beast. Too bad they didn’t have Mark Sanchez there; that would have just been too much. Overall, I thought that was so incredible to see what actually happens during a sports show. Thank you, Ashley, for that opportunity.
On our way to Little Italy, we walk through Bryant Park. It was like the Iowa State Fair but shops instead of food. They had all kinds of stores and a holiday feel to it. It was really neat. They had every kind of knick knack you could think of. One lady melted down liquor and beer bottles to made vases out of them. And one stand had all different flavors of oil and vinegars that you could sample with bread.
When we get to Little Italy it is smaller than I thought it would be. But it did not disappoint. It looked like I thought it would, like you would expect. It had the Italian restaurants, the shops, the dark haired Italians. It just had the Italy essence. I love Italian food and I could not wait to eat. This is the one place I wanted to eat at before I came back home. As we look for a place to eat, I caught myself gazing at all of the buildings and marveled on how genuine this place was. We finally pick a restaurant. This is hard because every place has an Italian in front trying to talk you in to eating at their place. We decided on Giovanna’s. They offered us free wine and we stepped in.
There was live music and the place looked legit. I looked at the menu just to see what they had. I already knew what I was getting but I wanted to look any way. The food they had sounded fabulous. We ordered our food and had an olive oil and bread appetizer which was very good. Our wine came with that and I almost gagged when I drank it. I don’t like red wine. I ordered manicotti and Ashley got lasagna. It was the best manicotti I have ever had. And Ashley's lasagna was the best lasagna I've had. The food was second to none, just like I was hoping. Next we got desert. Ashley got a canola and I was looking and seen spumoni. And the first thing I thought of was the movie Semi-Pro. Will Ferrell fights a bear and his safe word is spumoni. So I had to try it. It was an Italian ice cream that was half vanilla and half banana with tiny bits of fruit in it laying atop the filling that is in the canola. It was very good. So was Ashley's canola. I couldn’t have asked for a better meal or a better experience of Little Italy than the one we had.