Last weekend, I went to Pittsburgh for my friend Aly’s birthday, as well as St. Patrick’s Day!  I had never been to Pittsburgh before, so it was really great having Aly and her legit boyfriend, JR, show me around.  Plus, another Alpha Phi, Eliza, drove up from Charlotte with her boyfriend, Corey, so it was an added bonus to catch up with her too 🙂

I flew out early Friday morning, through Chicago, and landed in Pittsburgh in the afternoon.  I literally could not get over the hills.  There are hills everywhere in Pittsburgh.  And bridges.  And zig-zaggy roads.  It’s like up-down-left-right-over-under-up-down-up-down-you’ve arrived at your destination.  Repeat for the next destination.  It was very different than Arizona (flat with mountains) and southern Minnesota (farm country), and totally not what I had expected.  (I think I had expected something like Chicago?)  I feel like all I talked about during the trip were the hills but I still can’t get over them.  There were just so many!  I would have for sure broken a bone or twelve riding my bike on those hills if I had grown up in Pittsburgh.  Anyways…

After a quick stop to get some more green St. Patrick’s Day gear, we checked into a hotel in Station Square.  Station Square is an area of Pittsburgh that’s right across from the city, with lots of restaurants and bars.  That night, after dinner, we had a table at a bar called Buckhead’s to celebrate Aly’s birthday.  Along with Aly, JR, Eliza, Corey, and myself, Aly’s brother, some of her local friends, and some of JR’s friends came too.  It was fun!  I mean, birthday’s are always fun.

The next morning, Aly’s actual birthday, was when Pittsburgh celebrates St. Patrick’s Day.  (They always celebrate it on Saturdays.  Weird.)  We woke up early, got ready, and headed to Southside, which is sort of like a glorified version of Mill.  It’s just a billion bars on one long street, with Primanti’s tucked in the middle.  We stopped at JR’s friend’s house party on the way, too.

Everyone in Pittsburgh is so nice!  And they definitely enjoy both St. Patrick’s Day and their sports teams– there was a Pens game on that day & the half of Pittsburgh that did not attend the game in person, was screaming enthusiastically at the TV between Shamrock shots & Irish car bombs.  I’ve never seen people so passionate!

After bar-hopping all day, we crashed at Aly’s brother Josh’s house.  In the morning, we woke up feeling like death & headed to get breakfast before Corey & Eliza had to leave.  JR, Aly, and I spent the rest of the day at Aly’s house in the suburbs, watching the Pens game on TV and drinking Shamrock shakes from McDonald’s.  Then it was time to head back into the city to an area called Shadyside for dinner!  (Side note- Shadyside is where my friend Mia lives & we missed seeing each other by like 30 mins, as she was driving home from NYC as we were eating dinner!)

After dinner, we did drove to the top of one of Pittsburgh’s 40000 hills & took in the sites:

Then it was back to the suburbs!  We rented a movie to watch but we were all pretty tired & then Aly got sick too 😦 So we called it a night.  In the morning, we went to Panera for lunch (yummy!!) and then it was time for me to go home 😦

Aly is one of my funniest friends so it was really great time seeing her again!  (I hadn’t seen her since October, when we had a big reunion in Vegas.)  I don’t think there was a moment when I wasn’t smiling about something.  I was definitely bummed to leave.  I miss all of my friends and I living at the Vue together.  Now, post college, we all live in different places and while it’s fun to visit….it’s not fun to have to leave.

Someday, when I’m a billionaire, I’m going to hire all of my friends to just be my roommates so that we can live in the same place.