Happy New Year!!

We had a very chill New Year's Eve this year, and it was great.  We just stayed home and ate a bunch of appetizers, and I drank champagne and McGee drank beer.  We watched movies and spent time with Guinness, and I think we were asleep by 12:30!  I may have been more like 12:15, because I had to take 2 Benadryl due to a small allergic reaction I was having (I'm quite allergic to band-aid adhesive...).  It was a really perfect evening though (aside from that allergic reaction thing).

All 3 of us slept quite late for us (9am!!  Yay Guinness!!  And yay Benadryl!), which was great except that we had to catch a 9:54 train into downtown Philly.  So we quickly took Guinness out and fed him, and got VERY bundled up to head into town.  It was around 25 degrees for most of our day outside, so the warm clothes were necessary!!

When we arrived into town, we found a good spot to stand and watch the Mummers Parade!!  It's a parade held every New Year's Day in Philadelphia, and it's taken place every year since 1901.  I don't know much about the parade, except that there's a competition in different categories, and there's 3 or 4 categories.  There's "Fancies" (these were my favorite) that had very elaborate costumes, "String Bands" which are awesome bands that put on fun costumes too, and I don't remember the other category or categories.  Two of our friends (Timmy and Kate) joined us a bit later in the parade, and they brought red solo cups so we could drink the bottle of champagne that McGee brought!  Here are some fun pictures from the day!!

I think these guys were shrimp or lobsters or crayfish or something?

My favorites were the Nemo hat people!  A lot of them carried frog umbrellas too.  If you look closely in this picture, you'll see the RV in the background is handing out beers to the parade participants.

It's a baby crayfish (or whatever) asleep in a stroller!  Too cute.  

Look at the fun frog umbrellas!  And that beautiful Philadelphia skyline.

A fun crocodile thing!  I liked this "Fancy".  

A peacock!

A circus themed group.

This cop near us started smoking a cigar a bit later in the parade.  He also didn't mind that we were drinking champagne out of red solo cups.  

Aladdin in the background!  

After the parade, we walked back to Timmy's place where he and his roommates were throwing a New Year's Day party!  There was more champagne and 2 kegs, and lots of yummy food, including these delicious chocolate cookies with Rolo candies baked into the middle!  It was really great to spend some time hanging out with Timmy and Kate.  

After a few hours a the party, we headed back to our shit-hole apartment to hang out with our dear Guinness and spend some time taking down all of our Christmas decorations.  Our apartment is officially de-Christmased!  I'm sad the holiday season is over, but it was definitely a great one this year.  

Oh, fun fact for all of you people in warm-ish locations:  It is going to be TWO degrees this Friday.  They've been going back and forth between 2 and 4 degrees, but either way it's completely ridiculous.  I hope everyone is having a great 2014 so far, and staying warm!  Happy New Year!!