I was awake for an hour and a half in the middle of the night last night which didn’t do much for getting me a good night’s sleep, but being awake gave me an opportunity to babysit the Handbrake jobs running in the living room on all three computers, to read an issue of eWeek and to read a chapter in the book that I am currently reading, “POJOs in Action” by Chris Richardson. For those not down with the lingo, a POJO is a “Plain, Old Java Object.” The term is used in reference to using lightweight frameworks for enterprise Java servers as opposed to the non-Java Object method formerly proposed under the old J2EE architecture using EJB 1.0 and 2.0 (EJB is Enterprise Java Beans.)
Dominica and I got up at nine forty this morning which didn’t actually leave us very much time to get into the city and to get to Planet Hollywood to meet everyone for lunch. It would be plenty of time if we didn’t need to feed and walk Oreo as well. It is supposed to be very warm in the city today which will make all of the walking around a bit uncomfortable.
We left Eleven80 at five till eleven. It was the earliest that we could manage to get out of the apartment after both of us showered and got ready to go and fed and walked Oreo. We took NJ Transit from Newark to Penn Station in Manhattan as that is sometimes easier, especially on weekends, than trying to use the PATH to get into the city. This ended up being our first time riding on one of NJ Transit’s newer, double-decker trains. Those are much nicer than the old cars that I always have to ride out to Summit.
We made it just in time to meet everyone at Planet Hollywood in Times Square on 45th and Broadway. I don’t think that either Dominica nor I have ever eaten at a Planet Hollywood before. Nate and I ate at the Hard Rock Cafe in Washington, D.C. once in 1993 (it was awful) but that is the closet that I have ever been. It wasn’t bad at Planet Hollywood. They handled the large group really well and we were in and out in an hour.
From lunch we went to the ToysRUs store to kill half an hour. Then it was down to the New Amsterdam Theater on 42nd Street – right across from the 42nd Street Subway Station – to see Disney’s Mary Poppins.
The musical was surprisingly long and the story diverged quite a bit from the Disney original. I really feel that the characters were modified quite a bit as well with a lot more of the story focusing on Mrs. Banks and far less on the children or Mary Poppins herself. It was a rather different feel that the movie gave.
After the show we had to zip back to Newark to rescue poor Oreo who had to spend the day alone in the apartment. He doesn’t like that. Between our travel time, lunch and the show he was alone for almost seven hours. It doesn’t seem that long when it is in the middle of the day like that but it doesn’t take much before a long time goes by. He did fine, though. He has gotten a lot better at being left alone from time to time as he has gotten older. He hasn’t panicked about being alone in over a year, I don’t think.
The evening was short as I have to be up at four thirty in the morning tomorrow. We watched National Treasure 2 and then Third Rock from the Sun and went to bed quite early. Tomorrow is going to be a very long day for me. NT2 was quite good. I liked the first one better but I think Dominica preferred the second one.