Have you ever gone on vacation and then felt like you needed a vacation? When did vacations become so much work?
Earlier this month my family and I took a trip to New York City. It was a combination graduation present for my daughter Casey, who loves musical theater and 
wanted to see Broadway, and a quick vacation for the rest of us. It takes a lot of work to cram a weeks worth of sightseeing and activities into just three days…have you been to New York lately, three days is all you can afford! With map in hand my husband plotted the most efficient routes and I purchased all our activity tickets ahead of time online to save time from waiting in long lines (on a side note – something I highly recommend because many attractions sell out each day…you snooze you lose). We had a plan in place…now begins the real work.
In radio when we’re on a roll with a certain topic or joke and then someone suddenly says something that brings the conversation to a dead stop or ruins the punchline, we call it a bit-killer. I’ll use that same analogy for my vacation story because that pretty much sums it up.
Bit-Killer – getting around, what a time suck. I mean Manhattan is only 22 square miles, why is it so difficult? Who’d have thought hailing a cab in New York City was such an ordeal, they sure make it look easy in the movies! Plan B…try the subway, however you need to be an MIT engineer to navigate the right train with the right time schedule (not always convenient for where you need to be when you need to be there) and underground who knows which direction you’re facing. Props to my husband Jeff for taking charge of this, trust me it wasn’t easy and at times the wait was longer than the walk we would have suffered in the stifling summer heat. By the third day we finally figured out Uber was the way to go.
After full days of fighting crowds in a very busy Times Square, hauling ourselves from Central Park down to the Statue of Liberty and all points in between, we always seemed to be cutting it close. One night I ran two city blocks in heels to the theater and barely sat down before the curtain went up…hence sweat dripping and hair a mess…on my big night out. Talk about stress!! By the third and last night, we were all so exhausted that we passed on going out and crashed early…even the 18 and 20 year old. What happened to all the fun we were supposed to be having?? Do we look like happy people on a relaxing vacation?
Honestly we did have a good time and of course it was a time I’ll always treasure experiencing with my family, but it was a lot of work. I actually felt like I need a vacation when we got home.
Marlee McCormick
