A good excuse to play in the city

Rob’s nephew Vincent came to visit us from Long Island this weekend. Vincent turns 15 next week and is the perfect shaggy, baggy, shrugging teenage boy. I think he’s adorable. He took the train in for the first time alone and, aside from having to stand up the entire first leg of the trip, seemed unscathed. His younger brother Harry has always been a little nervous to take the train without his mom for fear that someone will “steal" him, but Vincent was ready to make the trip.
It was fun having a kid-like person in town. We took him to some sports stores on Saturday because he needed new workout clothes, watched football, and went to dinner in Times Square (this is like Rob’s personal nightmare, so it says a lot that he was willing not only to enter Times Square on a Saturday night at 7pm, but also walk around it and even—gasp—go to M&M World.)
After M&M World, we went home and watched Transformers. Whose idea was it to make that movie 2 ½ hours long? I simply do not have it in me to sit still for that long watching robot aliens fight each other. I think my robot alien battle tolerance is more like 1 hour 45 minutes long (it's good to know these things about yourself.) After that, I start looking for things to clean.
Yesterday we also had Vincent all day, so we walked through Central Park, went to the Met, and then went bowling at Chelsea Piers. It was great to do the kinds of things that we talk about doing on our own, but never would. In fact, if Vincent hadn’t been in town, I think the highlight of our weekend would have been when Rob picked Smokey up, two feet in each hand, wrapped the cat around his neck, and said, “Smokey, I’m going to wear you like a scarf this winter.”
Ok, that’s not strictly true. This was a bit of a last-minute visit, so we had to cancel plans, including a movie with Jay and Cameron, a brunch date, and a party. But it was a good trade-off. I think we had a much healthier and more well-rounded weekend than we would have otherwise. And when I say healthier, I’m thinking more about the skipped alcohol and less about the fries, cupcakes, pizza…never mind.