FP- was assigned to do some work in the New Jersey area. We hem-hawed over the idea of Robby and I tagging along on this trip - we should've went with the hem and not the haw though in our thinking session about it. Hahahaha!!!

We loaded up the car, and that didn't go as per plans due to a myriad of setbacks on the home front that needed tending to before we left the area for two weeks. Our "leave time" was pushed back another hour ... then another ... and finally we were heading out the door! *whew* Ever have something pretty well planned out then watch no part of it go according to plan?

Once in the car and on the Pennsylvania Turnpike, things seemed to go better for us. Traffic was smooth, even with the three sections of road construction, so our travel time wasn't hindered on our way to Philadelphia. I settled back in the passenger seat while Robby snoozed in his car seat in the back, daydreaming of what I may find to do to occupy my days (while FP- was at work) for the next two weeks. We had gone on the WWW earlier to make motel reservations for this trip and the handy dandy "Motel Locator Resource" program said that Princeton was the closest area to stay at in relation to the town's name that FP- was going to be working in. Being in Princeton the year before for a stay, I was kinda looking forward to hanging out in the "Princeton Proper" area - the area by the University itself that wasn't infiltrated by strip malls and chain stores like the outer edges of the town seems to prefer dotting the landscape.

We neared Philadelphia and the first glitch in our plans since leaving the house occurred - having to get off the PA Turnpike and onto Route 1 ... along with every other New Jersey on that roadway wanting to do the same thing and "jockeying" for position per se.

Now in New Jersey, "jockeying for position" means that if they are traveling on a 2 or more lane roadway - well by golly - all the lanes of the roadway are open to their usage to "get in front of the line". No, I don't think they learned that no one is in front of the line of a highway as there will be another car ahead of you somewhere on it. On 2 lane roadways, it isn't quite so bad, they merely cut you off or "assist" you in periodic self-testing of the brakes on your car. But my oh my, you haven't lived until you have driven on a three-lane New Jersey roadway!!! My hint of advice is to drive in the center lane as much as you can - disregard speed limit signs (even if you see a New Jersey trooper along the roadside) because if you don't go at least 55 mph in a 35 mph zone you really risk being "cut off". Also, while speeding and still being tailgated, have your foot ready to hit the brakes at any time and the fingers aligned by the car horn. New Jersey folks love to toot them car horns - at red lights one or two will toot at you (even though you don't have the green light yet) and traffic jams are hilarious as the cars come to a standstill but a few folks think that by blasting on the car horn it will suddenly clear up the traffic problem.

Road construction is interesting in New Jersey. The road workers set out signs saying, i.e., "Left Lane Ends 2000 feet ahead" ... and every 500 feet a new sign is up to warn the motorists that the left lane is ending soon. Now, to be honest, New Jersey could have said a bundle of money by not even ordering these signs since the motorists disregard them - even traveling on the shoulder until the last possible minute before they have to merge over to avoid hitting road construction equipment! Now by traveling, I am not implying they are going under the speed limit - not at all, in fact 95% of them are going as fast as they can down this "soon to end" lane before they suddenly whip over into the right lane to continue on their trek.

Exit ramps are on the right hand side. I am not relaying this as a bit mere bit of trivial information since many states have their exit ramps on the right hand side, I am telling you this as a warning. See, if the road is 3 lanes wide and an exit comes up into view - I can safely bet and win that at least 2 cars from the farthest over lane will hit the gas while "sliding over" the other two lanes to get off onto that exit. It is silly to expect most of the folks to actually get into the lane they need to be in ... so you have to be prepared to have a car or truck suddenly "whoosh" across the highway and often times without turn signals.

Gas stations are on almost every corner in New Jersey, but don't (again) think that people will use the lane nearest to the gas station's entrance if they need to get their tanks filled. It is not uncommon to see a car in the center lane suddenly do a 90 degree turn into an entrance - and no, it doesn't matter if the right lane is free of traffic for them to have been in that lane to begin with.

Another driving tactic to watch out for while driving in New Jersey is if you think the car beside yours seem like it is getting a little close to the side of your car, chances are that the driver of the vehicle next to yours has taken a sudden fancy to the space you are occupying on the highway. My advice, tick off the person behind instead and slow down to let the "Road Hog" in front of you since this stunt is generally done when the roadways are packed so you can't try to hit the gas a little to get in front of said person next to you.

Lastly, while dealing with the vehicles on the roadways while in New Jersey you have to keep an eye out for any pedestrians. Pedestrians have the right of way regardless of traffic condition, signals, or time of day (thus lighting). They are "encouraged" to use crosswalks but this isn't a law for them to do so. What *is* law is that you as a driver of a vehicle have to watch out for them. Many of the pedestrians don't even look both ways before crossing a street - they just step off the curb and you better stop regardless of how fast you are going or how close the car behind you is to the bumper. If you are pulling into a parking slot at a department store, going say 3 or so mph, and a person seeing you pulling into the slot but think they can get to their car faster by walking thru the said slot, well - they will walk thru it without hesitation right in front of your car. Leaving you with your heart in your throat after you hit the brakes and they stop to glare at you while saying loudly something like "Hey buddy, watch what you are doing!! I have the right of way! Geeze!" and then tug on the hand of the child with them (if they have a child) and continue on their way to their car.

These are only a few of the most common examples of driving tips I can pass along your way. It would take way too much time and cyberspace to relay on the majority of the driving tips for your visit to this particular state. The best thing I can say to sum up the others is to take note that not many vehicles with New Jersey license plates are "dent free" - sides, front, and back will sport a nice memento of a past "meeting". These "roadside meetings" also generally consist of 4 or more cars for a mere "fender bender" due to the speed they travel at while tailgating thus no time for cars #3 or #4 to stop if car #2 failed to see that car #1 was stuck in congested traffic or if car #1 decided to move over into another lane without warning or clearance of space to do so. Just have the aspirin handy to take as soon as you get to where you need to get to while in the area.

Now - back to my story. We arrived finally in the Princeton area and checked into the motel. Only to find out the next morning that we were conveniently located an hour away from where FP- needed to be at every day!! The "Motel Locator" was a wee bit off in what was the closest motel. *eye roll* With morning rush hour traffic conditions, it took sometimes up to an hour and 45 minutes for him to get to where he needed to be at. With him working long hours while "on site" he didn't get off work in time to be able to pick up a rental car and had to head out before the rental places opened in this area (due to the length of his drive) - so once again, Princeton had jinxed me by being car-less once again while in the city limits. Close enough to see the buses go by and the strip mall traffic lights but far enough away to not have any bus stops or sidewalks to get to the malls, let alone to Princeton Proper.

The following week, we had better luck as FP- managed to find a motel closer to the area he was working in so he only had a 20 minute drive to and from work. This helped in us being able to get a rental car for him to use so I could take Robby along with me on touring endeavors. The motel was in Saddle Brook, not far from the George Washington Bridge that will take you into New York City's outskirt area. I never actually found Saddle Brook's main business district although I did drive by the city limit signs a couple of times. The motel was in the center of 4 exits that made it hard to get around in that area in a direct route scheme of thought. I instead found Hackensack (shopping mall haven - only 4 large ones next to each other and this isn't including any strip mall set-ups. The one most often recommended to me by others was the Riverside Square Mall though the others were larger and blended together.), Paramus (by accident, we really wanted to get on the Garden State Parkway but the route back to it from a restaurant led us on a 7 mile tour of the area around it), Englewood and Ridgefield.

The latter two were the fun towns for me. I was out antique shopping for "trinkets" and these were the towns the yellow pages led me to that didn't have just buyers or auctioneers.

In Englewood, I had fun browsing through Bizet's Antiques And Rare Finds. Though at first it appeared to be a bit pricey of a shop, the items she had were in very good condition so the pricing wasn't out of kilter when you took this into consideration. Her main scheme of items for perusal are glass/dinnerware items and old photographs. Now the photographs though are either the ones that were "watercolored enhanced" style in the domed glass frames that people hung on the walls of their homes OR the postcard styles that were not available without the frame they were placed in which were usually table style frames from the mid-1800's that were in fantastic condition. Another cool shop to visit is on the opposite side of Englewood housed in with "A Place In Time" (though this particular shop was not open on any of the days I tried to visit it but is housed in the rear of the other two shops.) The woman I chatted with while visiting the front the half of the building was warm and friendly. She likes to travel about in England and France so sometimes brings backs items from there to sell thru her shop also. She had a wide variety of items to look at since she had a partner whose interests in antiques varied from hers but when put together made a pleasant blending of items to look over. The one shop I don't recommend in this area for antique browsing is "Global Treasures". The shop has an odd odor to it that is unpleasant to the nose and the owner doesn't price any of the items on display for sale. What he expects you to do is take note of the item's number he assigned to it then rattle them off one at a time to him so he can look them up in a book he has, since this is easier on him. He did have some interesting items (though not a lot) to look at but the combination of the smell and the pricing system cut my visit short.

In Ridgefield, the town is a bit oddly laid out as the main road thru it curves and heads you back out of the town so you have to be careful to find out directions to where you want to go there in advance. (I didn't do this so took me 6 tries to get off on the right side road that would take me a shop that was recommended to me in Englewood - hahahah!) In this town there is a little shop called Cello's Antiques and if you are more into the small trinket aspect of antiques versus furnishings then this is the shop to go to! Reasonable prices on many of the items (some were higher but you get that in any antique shop) and a wide variety of items to look at. You can spend two hours alone in the small one room set-up to just look at the items they offered!! This is not including the time spent selecting out your purchases though. Tins, vases, small decorative plates, political pins, cartoon/children shows items, Pez containers (many unused and in the original packaging), Victorian era match cases and more filled this shop's cases and walls from floor to ceiling.

In Princeton area, I had fun both times walking around in Old Davis Mill Antiques (closer to Edison than to Princeton and off on a side road). They carry new items such as Lizzie High dolls and some crafts by local artists that blend in well with the antiques and herb plants they have set out in 3 buildings - a two story house and 2 smaller outbuildings. The plants are housed in one outbuilding along with gardening items. In the other outbuilding is the larger pieces of furniture mixed in with some small items in the cases there. The porch of the house is generally filled with some interesting items and large pieces of furniture that is only a small sampling of what they offer inside of the house. The prices are reasonable but this was the only antique shop out of the ones I had visited while in New Jersey that said they wouldn't respond to mail "wish lists" requests or shipping the items even if you gave them extra money to try to cover the shipping costs. This policy sort of bummed me since I saw three items that I had been looking for for some time now but didn't have room in the car with Robby and luggage -- oh yeah, and FP- too -- to haul the items to Saddle Brook with us or to pick them up on our way home to Pittsburgh. *sigh*

I would have tried to peruse other shops in the area as I drove around and stumbled upon them but the 3 shops I had fun browsing in took all my allotment of money for the trip this time around.

One really delightful thing I really enjoyed in the Saddle Brook area was the multitude of Mom&Pop places to select to dine at. And dine is the operative word since they were almost all in the diner style of buildings from the 40's and 50's that used to dot the highways. Some were bricked or stone covered thru the years but quite a few of these places still allowed the well-cared for chrome to glisten in the sunlight. Every one of them had reasonable prices and large portioning of foods as well as homemade desserts that were not skimpy in size either. Elmwood Park Diner and Willie's were run by the same folks and the selection on the menu was so awesome that it was hard to make up one's mind what to have for dinner! In Englewood there was a place called Jackson Hole that served only three items - burgers (turkey or beef), chicken sandwiches, or salads. Not don't drive past this place yet though ... the portions are not small (the burgers alone are 7 oz. in size, and the toppings offered are not small in portioning either. They serve the sandwiches plain or in your choice of 14 other style of topping creations and blendings. The salad selections were not limited either as they offered about 10 different ones in just the lettuce base variety!! Needless to say, you won't leave this place hungry at all even if you just wanna grab a quick burger.

All too soon it was time for us to get ready to pack up and head back home. FP-'s next job assignment already relayed to him that was a bit further away from home so I will be staying in Pittsburgh, readying up our apartment for the invasion of the relatives ... errm, I mean Robby's first birthday gathering. *chuckle* I do enjoy the visits to New Jersey as they have some really nice areas to walk around in, the mom&pop-ish feel they have for the center of the smaller sized towns is pleasant and offers a chance to purchase something you wouldn't find in any of the strip mall or mall havens that try to fill in the outer edges of the towns. One thing I don't miss after leaving is the resident's driving talents that are on constant display until we pass the Philadelphia area.