Happy FriYAY!
This weekend was a whirlwind and that's why I needed Monday to recuperate a little. How were your weekends?
Friday was a blast from the past night for me. Cara (if you're new to the bloggy, she was my college roommate for 3/5 years at TCNJ) and I met up in Princeton (our Home Away From Home during our college years) for dinner. We attended TCNJ before the wonder that is of College Town. We went to Tandoori Bite for dinner. I was craving Indian food and since Cara had never had it before, I decided we needed to remedy that situation ASAP. The restaurant was...meh. It was good don't get me wrong, but I'm used to GREAT Indian food. We started with and it was delicious! is basically a latka with chana masala on top. We got it mild, but they can customize it to your spicy desires. We then split some naan chips with a green tomatillo salsa-esque dip and a sweet teriyaki-esque dip. Very delicious! For dinner we both went vegan and I got Baigran Bartha (creature of habit) and Cara got a spicy cauliflower dish. Both were yummy and came with roti. AMAZING roti!
After dinner we wandered campus and reminisced about all of our fun trips to visit the fountain and Woody Woo. We don't get to see each other that often (#grownupproblems) but when we do we pick up right where we left off.
Saturday was a pretty typical Saturday. I started it at the gym with Zumba, taught Total Body Blast, and then took Pilates. After I made the rounds at Wegman's for Sample Saturday (raise a (petite whole grain) toast in the air for the out of this world Wegman's Smokey Blue Cheese! After, I came home and began getting ready for the Erin and Caitlyn's Future Husband's Concert aka Cole
Cait, Kate, and I headed into Camden to meet up with Cait's brother for a little tailgate. My hair was a casualty of the humidity and on and off rain. FGL puts on an amazing show! They bring so much energy to every performance.
 |
| Country Trio |
Cait and I have decided that Cole Swindell should be our husband. We decided not to be selfish and share him. We're caring like that ;) Cole's an amazing song writer on top of being a great performer. He genuinely looks humbled when he steps out on stage. He always has a huge ear to ear grin on his face and genuinely has a good time when he's rocking out. He also happens to have written my favorite song, Get Me Some of That performed by Thomas Rhett. He always does a cover of it during his shows and I always dance unabashedly.
 |
| Yogi Fraaaands! |
Sunday was the big day! I went skydiving. It's something I've always wanted to do and I'm glad I finally got the opportunity to do it! Dylan and some of his friends wanted to go and luckily they let me bum along. It was insane! It's crazy because I wasn't super nervous about jumping out of a plane, I was more excited.
 |
| Dylan's friends and me...the crasher |
So Sunday rolled around and we all met down at Cross Keys Skydiving. When we walked in, I think it started to hit us...we were voluntarily jumping out of a perfectly good plane. We began our adventure by watching a short film about our upcoming adventure. After filling out a waiver in which I'm pretty sure I legally signed away everything I own, we went over to training. We suited up (much to my dismay...no lycra spandex suits that resembled Avengers' costumes. Womp womp womp.) and practiced jumping out of the plane. We basically laid on a giant spool of thread and held a modified superman position. They taught us how to read our animeter, how to pull the parachute, and the body positions for landing. I kept waiting for the nerves to kick in, but they never did. I just kept getting more and more excited. I met my tandem skydiving partner, Mike, and he was everything you'd want in a skydiving partner...he was friendly, confident, with a smattering of tattoos and piercings. If I'm going to be trusting my life with someone, I want them to LOOK like they are a skydiving genius. Mission Accomplished.
Around 6, they called our group up and we boarded the plane. The little, rickety, biplane is the scariest part of the whole thing. We all sat on two benches and our trainers began attaching themselves to us. They were narrating what they were doing the whole time. I think that kept my nerves in check. We started ascending and then one of the trainers was like, "Oh, we forgot to put the door down." They just laughed and shut the plane door! Yes, the plane door was open when we were ascending into the sky! The trainers kept trying to make us nervous by saying out suits weren't on correctly or they were too loose.
Finally, we reached our point of no return. One by one Dylan and his friends started jumping out of the plane. It's scary to watch your brother jump out of a plane, because besides the obvious, once you jump you are sucked out of the plane. YOU CANNOT SEE THEM! They are there, and then they are gone. Poof! Gone! As they one by one jumped, I kept moving closer and closer to the open door. Finally, it was my turn. My partner and I waddled over to the door and I held on to the overhead bar. I let go, crossed my arms over my heart, and Mike started counting 1, 2, 3. Then we let go and flew. We started flipping around and then started the 60 second free fall. When we were on the ground, the trainer said that the 60 second free fall could feel like a minute, an hour, or a second. I think it felt more like 5 minutes. It was windy and loud, but I didn't care or notice. I just watched in awe and tried to take it all in. It was amazing! I thought my animeter said 5 (the cue to pull the parachute) so I reached for the parachute and Mike signaled me to stop. He pulled the parachute a few seconds later (kinda relieved on that one) and we started floating to the ground. As we were floating, Mike pointed out Philly and then turned the parachute around to show me A.C.
As we were floating down, Mike told me he was going to loosen the straps on the harness so it would be more comfortable as we glided down. He's like, "If I had boobs I'd want them to not be squished." I was like, "I don't really have boobs either." He laughed. Another point for Team Itty Bitty Titties!
When we were landing, he told me my landing position. In training we learned 3 ways to land. When you land, you have to pull your feet up almost like a tuck jump. When the instructor tells you, you perform 1 of 3 reactions:
1.) stand-sometimes you just have to stand up when you land
2.) Run-start running in the air and the motion will transfer to the ground
3.) Slide-pretty much fall on your butt and slide
Guess which one I got?
SLIDE! Yup, I got to slide on my butt in front of everyone. #Graceful
When we were done, we waited around to watch the video of one of our friends. Dylan and I didn't buy the video because it was $130. Honestly, it wasn't worth it for 5 minutes of film. They do get a lot of pictures of you, but I didn't think that was necessary.
Afterwards, we went to get drinks. We all decided we could get as fruity a drink as possible because we jumped out of a freaking PLANE!
It was a great experience and I'll never forget it. I'm really glad I did it and I can't wait to go back.
xoxo,
e
