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September 21, 2015 - 9:34 p.m.
"best corn maze ever" or "adventures in vestal"

Hey Journal!

What a crazy day we had yesterday! It was a lot of fun and we did a lot of stuff...so let me get right to it...

Dan and I got up in the morning with the plan of getting away for the weekend and going upstate. We woke up around 9:00 and we packed our bags and did a few things around the house before we departed. We left home around 10:30 and went over to Dan's parents' house to drop off the ladder we had borrowed from them last week. After that, we went to the deli in the Morewood shopping center to get something for breakfast. I got eggs, sausage, and orange juice. It was okay, but not nearly as good as Blvds or Bagel Maniac. The portions were smaller, too.

After that, we hit the road. We had researched some corn mazes online and were really hoping to find a good one. We selected one that was 10 acres and it looked cool but it's really hard to tell from a website.

If you've been following my life for the past several years, you'd know that every fall I'm in search of a GOOD corn maze. The ones on Long Island are lame and you can see through the corn, or it's all been mashed over, or it's sooooo obvious which way you have to go to get out. I don't think we were ever in the maze for more than a half hour. Last fall, we looked up some mazes in Pennsylvania thinking that it might be a better place to find a good corn maze. We went with Linda and, while we all had a fun time, the corn maze was really easy. It was so small, you could see through the corn, and again, it was obvious when a path would lead to a dead end.

We had two picked out this time and we stopped at the first one which was about two hours from home in Chester, NJ. It was called the Stony Hill Farm Corn Maze. It had a "Knights and Dragons" theme which worried me because I was afraid it might be too kid-centered, meaning it would be too easy! Even when we pulled up, I was a little skeptical. I told Dan I thought we would be back on the road in about 45 minutes if it was a good one.

Well, it turned out that I got my wish! We FINALLY found a corn maze that was UNBELIEVABLY DIFFICULT! It was intense and I loved every minute of it. They did that game where you have to get 9 rubbings while you're in there, too... and we did that, but even without that game this maze was by far the most complex I have ever seen. They had all these warnings about bringing bottled water and being prepared and I just ignored it all. About 15 minutes into it I realized just how difficult this was going to be and so I turned on my phone's workout tracker app so I could "map" our progress in the maze! (I'm really glad I did because that came out really great at the end!)

Anyway, we found the first few rubbings pretty quickly which lulled me into a false sense of security. The maze was divided into three different colored sections which were marked by the color ribbon that was used to hold back the corn and make the paths.

After about AN HOUR AND A HALF of wandering around with no idea where we were going or where we had been, we finally decided that we would need some help getting out of this! We remembered a sign in the front of the maze that said you could go online and get a map of the maze with GPS to help you. We used it to help us locate the rest of the rubbings we needed and then, ultimately, to get us out of the maze!

It was also a pretty warm day out and I was afraid I was going to get a sunburn. All in all we were in the maze for just over two hours and, after checking my exercise app, we walked OVER 5 MILES! I couldn't believe it. The map of our path was insane!

I am so happy we picked this maze... I told Linda that we should definitely go to this one. I'd go again for sure. I guarantee I'd had no idea what to do to get out any faster. I just am soooo excited that we finally found a REAL corn maze!

After we were finished there we took a little walk around their store area and then hit the road again. We went to a nearby Wendy's on the way back to the highway and got something to hold us over till dinner. We also got gas a Speedway and it was 1.87/gallon! Niceeee.

Since we were up that way, we made plans with Alec to get dinner. He said he was busy from like 8 until 11:30 so we figured we could go to dinner and meet back up with him later. Doug was available, so we planned to hang out with him, too. Unfortunately, as we got closer and Dan texted Alec and he told us he had totally forgotten he had a date and that he couldn't do dinner. Classic Alec.

On the way we stopped at Wegman's because.... ummm... it's Wegman's! We had a list of things we needed to bring back with us. On the top of the list was the seasonal scented hand soaps! Amazing! We also got cereal, soup, and some other necessities. I am so sad that we are only able to go there one or two times a year but I cherish every time we do!

Oh, and another good thing... we have been carrying around a bunch of Wegman's water bottles for over a year in Dan's trunk with no place to redeem them so we were finally able to get our money back! Interestingly, Wegman's had a sign that they accept ANY bottles that have a NY redemption code. That make so much sense. More places should be like that!

We got to our hotel around 6:00 and we brought our stuff in and got settled. After sweating like crazy in the corn maze we also both wanted to shower up. Dan and I wound up going to dinner by ourselves. We went to Tully's which was in the shopping center right next to the hotel.

We got there around 6:45 and there was about a 20 minute wait. We bought two scratch off lotto tickets for $2 each and won $4 on one and nothing on the other...so we broke even.

Our waiter was really nice and they had a lot of very inexpensive drink specials. I got a frozen margarita followed by a cranberry vodka! We had been here once before and I was craving their popcorn. They gave us a bowl as soon as we sat down and Dan and I devoured it! It was so amazing... perfectly popped.... and you know popcorn is my weakness.

We asked for a second bowl and we finished that one off, too. So bad. I probably could have skipped dinner at that point and just left full of popcorn.

For dinner I got the chicken parm and it came with amazing garlic bread. I wish more restaurants gave popcorn.

After dinner we walked back to the hotel and had some drinks in our room while we watched TV and waited for Doug to get done with his dinner. He picked us up and we went to have some drinks before going out to the bars. Some friends of his came over and we hung out there for a while.

Eventually, it was time to go so we headed down to the parking lot. It was raining and the temperature was supposed to get pretty low later so I borrowed one of Doug's hoodies. Doug's friend Todd drove us downtown and, before the bars, we stopped at someone's apartment and then we stopped at this house party because it was Nick's birthday. (We had met Nick last time we visited!) Nick was pretty drunk when we got there and he was like "who are you guys" when he saw us! The party was crazy! We didn't stay there very long, though, and we walked from there to the bars.

We stopped at one bar just to use the bathroom and then we went to Tom & Marty's. We hung out there for a while and they had some good music! After a while we went down the street to Dillinger's and that's where we FINALLY saw Alec. He finally decided to grace us with his presence! He introduced us to some of his friends and to the infamous "date" for whom he missed our dinner plans!

Dan and I still stuck with Doug after that because Alec didn't really make much of an effort to see us and Doug really did and was really great all night!

I feel like my description so far doesn't quite explain all that went on. This whole time I was very drunk and for a lot of it I was confused -- having no idea where we were going, what we were doing, or why! It just made for a fun and wild time!

At about 2:00 Doug said that Todd was driving us back so we all walked back towards the car but stopped back at that apartment we had gone to, hung out there for about 20 mins or so, before being driven back. They dropped us off at the hotel and Todd asked "this is student housing?" which indicated that he thought we were students... which clearly I loved because being mistaken for a college student is just fine by me!

I also learned a new term.... "fuckboy." I heard several people say it over the course of the night and I'm not 100% sure what it means. I want to use it, but I'm afraid I don't know the correct context. Of course I looked it up on Urban Dictionary but there are too many definitions that mean different things so I'm at a loss.

Anyway, we got back just before 3:00 and we were EXHAUSTED. We got ready for bed, drank lots of water, and went to sleep!

We managed to get a good night's sleep.... but that's all for Saturday! I'll be back in just a little bit with the Sunday rundown!

I'm very happy we got to go away this weekend and that it turned out to be such a spontaneous and fun time... and, certainly, am very thankful that Doug was such a great host!

Adios for now. :)