A feeling of "Intrepid"-ation

 "Oh no, I forgot I have a lighter in my pocket," I said as we approached the security walk-through scanner for the USS Intrepid. "Why do you have a lighter," Savannah asked, skipping effortlessly through, "You don't smoke." I eyed up the unsmiling security guard as I gave myself a pat-down. "It's like a fishing vest," I told him, pulling out what seemed like a thousand metal implements from my jacket pockets. He handed me what looked like a dog bowl. "Huh," I stuttered as my daughters rolled their eyes. "Put your stuff in here," he repeated himself, shaking the dog bowl. "Oh, sorry," I said, "I have a Justin Bieber song trapped in my head." "Don't we all," he winked as I finally staggered through the threshold, deemed no apparent threat to our national security.

I endured all that drama just so I could get in line to pay. I spotted a guy wearing a "Geneseo" sweatshirt and lamented that I had worn mine yesterday. "We could get a picture together," I said as we hamster-walked our way through a passage of complicated mazes. "You refused to stop at Wegmans in Geneseo yesterday because you had that sweatshirt on," Sydney observed, praying we wouldn't get within earshot of my soon-to-be-friend. "That's from the bible," I told her, "a sweatshirt is accepted everywhere but its hometown."

We made it to the front of the line. "Are you paying with a credit card," the red-shirted staff-person asked me. "Of course not," I sniffed, offended. She directed us to stand to the side to let plastic people proceed past us. Then a  parade of plastic people plowed ahead of us. "What happened to cash is king," I shouted over the crowd. We were finally allowed to pay. "Is there a cash discount," I asked. Nope. "Educator discount?" Nope. Sydney and Savannah flashed their college ids and received the student rate. "You know," I sneered bitterly, "without me, they'd be nothing."

Okay. We made it. First we toured the bathrooms. Lovely. Then we thought it would be fun to have

the claustrophobic woman tour a tiny submarine. Great. "Is that the Concorde," I squealed like a twelve-year-old at a Justin Bieber concert. It was! "We have to get a picture," I clapped. My 4th graders are currently learning their state capitals and they use mnemonic pictures to help them. Concord, New Hampshire is a nude hamster riding the Concorde! Savannah splayed herself on the ground and took a zillion different angle shots to try to get it right while Sydney tried desperately to look as though she's never met us as I straddled a picnic-table-sized dock hitch. It wasn't as sexy as it sounds. We abandoned that idea and instead went with the "holding onto the landing gear" angle.

Aside from the over-priced M & Ms, the Intrepid was awesome. We explored bow to stern, scrambling up every set of stairs we could find until we made it to flight deck. There were a million buttons that we were repeatedly told NOT to push. Not to mention the slew of dials and flip-switches. We admired the cup-holders in the navigator's station. "What's that," Sydney asked, pointing at a silver cylinder mounted nearby. I laughed. Sure, a twenty-year-old in the year 2016 may have never seen such a thing. "It's an ashtray. Good thing I have my lighter!"

Several hours of nautical exploration later, we were ready to see what else New York City had to offer for the day. Turns out it was tater tots topped with chili! The quintessential New York City experience. Okay...maybe not.