Tea Time in the UWS

Another visit to Alice's Tea Cup, this time with erstwhile neighbor (of ATC) and jewelry designer CS. I always order the Mad Hatter at ATC, but can never finish it: two sandwiches, three scones, & two pots of tea. We'd actually walked up from Times Square, because walking is fun and healthful. CS and I had both been under a lot of stress and having a pot of tea seemed a good way to unwind.

I feel like I keep hearing the Cure wherever I go.

RUB it one more time

This vegan diet is killing me. I need some meat.

RUB (and Kingsford) to the rescue!

The best part was the 2 dozen garbage bags I took home that day. It might have been more, 2 score?

Builders, Slashers, & Bashers

I was pretty excited about today. It was going to be my first Meetup event and my 2nd visit to the Museum of the City of New York. (Bonus: reunion with MC.) Got up to the MCNY a little early and chatted with the organizer of the group, a librarian! Is it weird to be attracted to librarians? Anyway, I was eager to take to a look at Timescapes: A Multimedia Portrait of New York. It's a fantastic 25-minute history of New York. I mean what kind of nut wants to sit through a 14.5 hour documentary? :)

Of course there was also the main draw for the museum, Robert Moses and the Modern City: Remaking the Metropolis. I still need to check out the other two Robert Moses exhibits in the city right now.

Realizing that MC and I were both hungry we walked down Fifth Avenue and stopped for a bite and the old high school spot 3 Guys. Full bellies led to a desire to see 300. I remember how excited I was when I first saw the teaser trailer over a year ago. The use of NIN's Just Like You Imagined in the teaser was so freaking brilliant. I was actually hoping for an all NIN soundtrack, but was disappointed just like when I saw Se7en.

Oh yeah, also did my first of many fantasy baseball drafts of the year. Play ball!

Dancing By Himself (or Without Clothes)

KM and I had to scoot up to Chelsea in time for our evening plans. I was completely exhausted by then and wasn't sure if I could actually make it through the 4+ hours of dancing ahead of me. I probably just needed something tasty.

Read about my night with Philippe Decouflé at the Joyce and Miss Harvest Moon at Joe's Pub.

A Nine Hour Tour

Was supposed to play in KR's charity tournament for the MS Walk today, but it didn't end up happening.

My dad's sister's granddaughter, KM (2nd cousin? cousin once-removed?) was in NYC for the week and Saturday was going to be her last day here. I'm not sure how much fun she'd have driving around with the folks, so I volunteered to show her around town in my parents' stead.

We started off in front of her youth hostel near Times Square and walked up to Eatery to get some breakfast and figure out the plan for the day. KM noted all the "pretty women with small faces" inside the restaurant and in New York in general. I was a bit confused since I took a look around and saw only one woman I would describe as attractive. Everyone inside Eatery was well-dressed and well put together, but that's just money and vanity. KM didn't have a good idea what she wanted to do. She suggested we go to the Metropolitan Museum of Art, then proclaimed she didn't really like art. This was going to be a long day. Over the next nine hours I tried to give KM a New York City history lesson as we managed photo ops at Carnegie Hall, Columbus Circle, Strawberry Fields, Murray's Cheese, Porto Rico, Lombardi's, and Parisi Bakery. We took a break from the tourist-y areas and headed over for an afternoon drink atop W's roof in the LES. On our way there KM commented that the LES seemed the least "New York" of all the places we'd seen that day - I wasn't getting through to her at all. I gave up on the commentary and decided to let her just take the city in on her own. W had 8 others on the roof with her and we all enjoyed the views until it became too cold. I wish I could dance some more.

Dinner at Ariyoshi

Anniversary dinner got pushed back till tonight. I usually don't eat out in my home turf; it seems a waste of my Mom's cooking skills to venture out into the 'hood when she's so close. But it was a chance to revisit my favorite thread on Chowhound.

Mom and Dad seemed happy, and I get a kick every time I see the "Bon Voyage" ship full of sushi and sashimi. Yay for Sunnyside!

Little Manhattan

I couldn't sleep after The New World, so I went to the next movie in the DVR queue, Little Manhattan. It was a small film that came out in 2005, I normally would never have watched it except I saw a still from the movie at an exhibition last month. Actually that might not be entirely true. Love, a high school alum, & the Upper West Side - okay, I was destined to see this movie.

Sheng Wang & The New World

Another trip to the doctor, another lunch in Chinatown. Sheng Wang on Eldridge was the spot today. Pulled noodles again, I know, but I like how they taste.

I must be really sad, because I find myself becoming nostalgic again.

Finally watched The New World by Terrence Malick. The movie starts with the Prelude to Das Rheingold playing, its single bass note symbolizing the beginning of Creation. I really loved the score, but James Horner's work was apparently butchered by the director. This wouldn't be the first time Malick did something like that. I probably enjoyed the movie much more than most others since I was watching it in the middle of the night. If nothing else it rekindled a desire to see the entire Der Ring des Nibelungen.

ACES and V

Fire/emergency drills are no fun, but necessary. I've already had to walk all the way home two times since I started working in SoHo.

Since I am the fire warden on our floor I had to attend an annual refresher course on our responsibilities as part of the emergency response team.

In the event of a fire emergency always remember ACES.

Alert - Pull the alarm and contact the rest of the emergency team.
Confine - Close the doors and confine the fire
Evacuate - Tell everybody to get out.
Special Assistance - Help those who might need help evacuating.

Had a piece of my foot sliced off that morning. Walking was a bit of a pain. Watched a DVR recording (in HD!) of V for Vendetta that night. Am I the only one that notices the world seems more Orwellian everyday? I still think The Interview was Hugo Weaving's best movie.

Rai Rai Ken & Gama

My parents got married on this date many, many years ago and the family (me, bro and the folks) were supposed to go out to dinner. My mom's such a good cook we would rarely eat out when I was growing up. Of course we were also technically below the poverty line most of that time. I never felt poor as a kid -- actually no, I knew we didn't have any money, but we never went without food or heat or any of the other things that happen to poor families when they get squeezed for money. Anyway, it was supposed to be the anniversary dinner, but the folks were feeling a little tired, a little sick, so they called to postpone the celebration till Friday.

That didn't leave me much of a chance to rearrange my social calendar. Luckily, I soon got an email from JYC informing her friends that a change to her regular bartending schedule would shift her Wednesday gig to Tuesday that week. I wasn't sure what time she'd be starting at Gama, so I headed over to Rai Rai Ken first for a quick bite, and another stamp on my frequent ramen card. I'm always up for noodles!

Gazillion Bubble Show & Pam

No, for reals, that's what she said.

I wasn't so keen on the idea of being surrounded by kids/bubbles, but it wasn't my day and there was no way we'd all get stand-by tickets for 365/365. I got to New World Stages early and the ushers had no idea what to do with us, us being all the persons on line for 20at20 tickets. The rest of the kids filtered in, and we all had to wait outside in the cold until the tickets were finally released. There were lots of bubbles. Everywhere.

Dinner at Pam Real Thai after the show. They might have the most annoying restaurant website I've ever had the displeasure of visiting. Good thing the food doesn't suck as hard as their site. It's actually really good, even though we forgot to ask for "Thai hot".

Went to the Maison Derrière aka SC to catch a screening of Mad Hot Ballroom. Makes me want to go dancing again.

And lastly. Best. Pants. Ever.

Vegan Dinner

That's what she said.

I had fun until the end of the night, when the discussion literally took a nose dive (if you should replace nose with sagging and dive with balls).

My Favorite Aria

I popped into Balthazar to meet my cousin for a quick bite and to thank her for dropping off the concert tickets. I like the atmosphere every time I go into the space. But today was going to be an extraordinary day.

We were seated along the back wall of the restaurant, and I look away from the conversation I'm having with my cousin for a moment and notice a pretty woman walking into the restaurant. It takes me a second (probably less than a second, actually) to realize that this woman is in fact Aria Giovanni. She is without a doubt my favorite and has been since at least September, 2000. There were some who doubted my sighting (since she lives on the West Coast), but I think this bit of evidence proves me right.

I love New York.

Helvetica or Myriad?

We went to Hong Kong Station for our weekly jaunt into Chinatown. That font looks like freaking Helvetica to me. Others say it's Myriad. I wasn't really focused on the food since I was still trying to adjust to my new (somewhat) vegan diet over the past few weeks. I ended up getting the fat rice (chow fun) noodles along with some chinese broccoli to fill my soup bowl. It was tasty, but I felt like I was missing out on all the abundance and variety of ingredients.