GAH!! We're back from Jersey / Philly and let me just say that I learned some things on this trip.
First of all, let me get to the good stuff - the wedding was AMAZEBALLS. Cassie and Mark are the cutest couple ever and their wedding was endless cute!
From where we stayed, it was an hour from Philadelphia so we planned a lot of our activities in the City of Brotherly Love. Funny that that is the nickname but from what we experienced, NO ONE in Philly has a sense of humour. Well, except the guy who rented us our car at the airport and the wonderful lady at Geno's. I'll get to the cheese steaks in a moment.
We tried joking around with the people at our most favourite Whole Foods in the world -
Whole Foods South Street. BEST vegan selection I've ever seen and LOTS of wonderful desserts. The staff wasn't the most humorous but they were nice enough, I guess. The small amount of people we interacted with at the various places we went to weren't that friendly either. Here's an example: we went to the wonderfully AMAZING
Philadelphia Museum of Art 50 minutes before closing time and it just so happened to be the first Sunday of the month so it was "Pay what you wish" Sunday. Normally admission for 2 adults is $40 but we paid $20 for the both of us since we only had LESS THAN AN HOUR to check things out so when my old man handed over the $20, the guy at the counter was like, "Uh, that's all?" Um...we could've paid LESS but we didn't. I think $20 was generous since we only had 50 MINUTES OF VIEWING TIME LEFT. Geez. I will say, I was nearly brought to tears in this museum though. Everything was GORGEOUS. I mean, we got to see Picasso's
Sunflowers in person! The High can't compete with that. Sorry, ATL.
My other terrible encounter was at Pat's King Of Steaks. I get it - they have a no-nonsense attitude when it comes to ordering. I even had my order ready: One provolone with. That's all I needed to say. So what was the problem? Well, there are two windows: one for sandwiches and one for fries and drinks. I got it. I went to the sandwich window. The 4 guys behind the counter ALL SAW ME and they turned back to their phones. I stood there, waiting to spit out my order but I got the side eye and then nothing so I went to the fry window and was like, "Can I just order with you since they're not paying attention" and the kid was like, "If you want a sandwich, you need to go to that window". Really? Frustrated, I went back to the sandwich window and waited. They saw me and two other people behind me and turned back to their phones. Finally, I was like, "Hi, can I get a sandwich?" I expected a bad attitude from what I've seen on all the TV specials and stuff but I wasn't expecting a SHITTY attitude. I'm clearly not aggro enough for the North East. And guess what? The sandwich was "meh" anyways. I wasn't that impressed. Geno's, on the other hand, had GREAT customer service and the same sandwich - provolone cheese steak with onions - was AMAZING. The lady behind the Geno's counter was a doll. She greeted me and let me get my sandwich order out the way I wanted, not in a 3-word command. I don't get the two window thing, though - Geno's had a separate sandwich and fries/drink window as well. So in the Great Cheese Steak Debate, my pick is defnitely Geno's.
As for the rest of the trip, it was fantastic! We hit up the Mütter but I don't have any photos from that since they don't let you take photos. *Sad Face*. We also hit up Love Park, Independence Hall - which I dubbed
National Treasure for the obvious reason, the Liberty Bell, Philadelphia City Hall - sounds boring but the building is GORGEOUS and we couldn't be staying in Jersey without hitting up my favourite comic book store: Jay and Silent Bob's Secret Stash! We also found a killer vegan pizza place in Philly (with amazing hand-cut fries) and enjoyed ourselves at the real reason we were there: Cassie and Mark's wedding! Several photo posts to follow!
