Thursday, after informing all of my agencies that I was unavailable for assignments, I began my foray into a short lived charmed life. For the next two days I was going to play the role of Trophy Wife companion to my (somewhat) imaginary fiancé, Galleta. I left Queens at 4:30 am to begin my train journey to Philadelphia. Traveling through Penn Station is charming in the wee hours, oh so many 20 somethings sleeping peacefully on the tiled floors awaiting the next train home on the LIRR – extreme alcohol consumption and deciphering complicated train schedules is never a good mix.
Galleta and I met up in Philly at about 8:15 (he took the Acela, I traveled by steerage) and we were off to the swank Sofitel . After we checked our bags Galleta informed the front desk that I would return at 3pm to check in – since he would be otherwise occupied at work. A quick walk down the street brought us to Galleta’s fancy office building where we bid adieu and I was off on my adventure to discover the city of brotherly love.
Philly is a beautiful city and the day was glorious. Deep blue skies, bright sunshine and pleasantly cool for early September. I walked about a mile East to Independence Park
I saw the Liberty Bell, Independence Hall, Betsy Ross’s house and basically everything “historic”. Exploring on my own- singing in my head (and out loud) all the songs from the musical 1776 , enjoying the weather and just basically having a kick ass day until I hit the wall. It was noon and I was DEAD! I had slept about 3 hours the night before (since I had to get up at 3:15 am) so by now I was a walking zombie. I had nowhere to go – couldn’t check in until 3pm – and I was beginning to downward spiral into a complete melt down. I sat on a stone bench in front of the National Constitution Center and thought, “What if I just lay down and take a nap?” I knew it was federal park grounds but really how bad could it be – right? Maybe a little hobo-ish even vagrant-y but not unlawful. I pondered this for about a half hour then decided to slowly walk back to the hotel in hopes that I could at least get into the room at 2pm.
The travel gods were on my side for when I returned to the Sofitel I was greeted by our desk clerk asking me, “Checking in, Mrs. Santiago?” I didn’t care to correct him about the Mrs. S thing – cause that’s my future anyways – I was just relieved to collapse into that crazy super soft cozy bed…yummmm.
My nap was cut short by my sudden urge to get my nails done – so off I went to the International Nail Salon where my fingers were gruffly manhandled by an ex-soviet Jew who decided that I didn’t know anything about choosing the proper nail color.
Back in room 1122 (my birthday date coincidentaly – oh that Galleta thinks of everything) Galleta returned from work and we began our evening game plan. Dinner at Davios then out for drinks and stuff. Dinner was fantastic – lamb, wine, tiramisu…. Yummmm. Galleta however had his eye on a table of ladies who were celebrating an 85th Birthday. I had spied these party guests first and turned Galleta onto the scene – however it was the ass of one of the girls that truly captivated his imagination.
After dinner we visited a few of the area’s lounges and bars – all DEAD! We had some cocktails in various posh locations however they were all empty. The last place we tried out was the g lounge - cause well how could we pass up a club named in my honor? We returned back to our room, tucked ourselves into the most decadent bead ever created, and drifted off to dreamland.
No comments:
Post a Comment