Things to do in NYC

There is talk in my household about leaving New York some day, possibly sooner than later. That plus the hectic schedule that summer always imposes on us has made me want to make a list of things I have to do in NYC this summer! Either before it gets cold again, or before the city is a plane ride away.

1. Visit the High Line.
The new elevated park opened last week. We're going to try to go take a stroll and experience the views from High Line and check out all the new buildings that have popped up next to it this week.

2. Times Square Pedestrian Area
We're in total crush with the city's Transportation Commissioner Janette Sadik-Khan who has closed off several blocks of Broadway at Times Square to vehicle traffic, mostly because of her devotion to creating hundreds of miles more bike lanes in all five boroughs. Times Square is still half-Disney, half-Vegas but I'm interested to see the new "park" and to sit in the middle of Broadway without fearing for my life.

3. Summerstage, Celebrate Brooklyn and River to River Festival
Summer in NY is all about free events in the park, from concerts to readings and dance performances. This week I'm going to try to see Wally Lamb and Sharon Olds reading at Central Park, next week the NY Opera is performing the Magic Flute at Rockefeller Plaza, and the last week of June, friends Explosions in the Sky from Austin are performing at Central Park (although their show is a benefit for the Summerstage series and isn't free). I'm hoping to cram in as many of these performances as I can throughout the summer!

4. The Observation Deck of the Empire State Building
It's not cheap, but it's such an NYC institution, I feel like I have to do it at some point. I've gazed at the Empire State Building from every angle around the city; time to view the city from the top of the ESB.

Other than that, boat rides, walks, taking photos, picnics, thrift store shopping on the Upper West Side (apparently the key to finding bargain designer wear) and whatever else I can squeeze into the next few warm weeks are all on my agenda. Gotta love NYC before the winter sets in and I'm a hater again.

Gardening

We went to the Brooklyn Food Conference a few weeks ago after returning from Oakland where everyone had a beautiful garden, so we were inspired and started learning all we could about putting in an urban garden. We'll see how it goes. I ordered seeds from the Hudson Valley Seed Library which does mostly heirloom seeds and then went to a couple of organic gardening classes that were free in the East Village at this community garden.

The seedlings in the window sill are: brussel sprouts, rainbow chard, two kinds of tomatoes, two kinds of lettuce, dill, basil, chives and parsley, then we have small starter plants of basil, lavender, oregano, thyme and rosemary. I'm going to plant carrots, kale and zucchini too! We're going to sow those straight into the boxes and planters when we get those ready. Today Ralphie finished assembling the boxes and we mixed manure, soil, sand and perlite. We're going to let it sit for a few days so the manure can age before we put the plants in it.

I'm so excited to get everything into the dirt and watch it grow! I've been watching my seedlings sprout with bated breath and am such a proud little mama already.

Well Done

We had a great back yard birthday party for Ralph on Saturday. Here's a view from above the party. Ralphie took this from our fire escape.
It turned out to be a lovely afternoon. Lots of good food, good drinks and good friends, which is, in my opinion, the perfect equation for a good birthday!
We'll do more back yard parties soon, for sure.

Snow Day

Sunday night through yesterday we got between 6 and 8 inches of snow, so Ralph & I decided to walk down to McCarren Park to make a snowman. We had to make a lazy snowman because the snow was too soft to pack into snowballs or snowman parts. That kind of snow is so pretty though because you can still see the flakes! I'm still new enough to snow to be mesmerized by snowflakes every time we get snow. As you can see, I planned ahead enough to take a carrot and some buttons for his nose and eyes and we improvised and added a stick and a toupee of moss to give him more personality.

Bye Bye Domino

Although the majority of the items in its pages were far beyond my reach, I still looked forward to browsing through Domino every month and it remained one of my favorite magazines. Domino was super light on content, with barely any substantive articles, but that's hardly what we readers expected from it anyway. Domino delivered yummy, luscious photo spreads of gorgeous apartments and homes all over the country that inspired us and made us want to keep refining our own homes.
It's going to be interesting to see how this economic downturn affects the print media industry and what print institutions are left standing when things start looking up again. I won't be surprised if 2009 sees more magazines and newspapers shuttered or going to online only versions (as the US News & World Report did).

Here's Hoping

Is it wrong of me to hope that this Holland America Line cruise ship gets struck with the Norwak virus that was plaguing so many others in the last few years??

25 Random Things About Myself

I just read Kat & Ama's 25 Things posts and Kat tagged me to do the same, so here are 25 Random Things About Me that you may or may not know.














1. I think I have the best mom in the world and she's one of my favorite people.
2. Having said greatest mom somehow helped me develop a love of being with kids and made me a nurturing person. I think I'll be a pretty good mom myself, mostly because I know I'll love doing it.
3. It took me a long time to call myself a writer, even after I was getting paid to do it.
4. I have several people that I call my best friend and mean it heartily. It confuses people when I say, my best friend here in NY, my best friend in TX, my best friend in FL...etc. I honestly think they're all the best. I'm just lucky.
5. I daydream about traveling the world constantly. To the point of making excel spreadsheets about how much money I would need.
6. I'm learning to love winter more - snuggling up, bundling up and drinking hot beverages - but I would still move South to warmer climes in a heartbeat if the opportunity arose.
7. I look forward to snowy days.
8. I miss hot hot days in Texas and jumping into Barton Springs!
9. I love my adopted kitty baby Matchska and talk to her as if she understands what I'm saying all the time. I also love throwing popcorn kernals on the floor and watching her play kitty soccer with them.
10. I love reading. Lately I've been devouring books and neglecting my magazines, for once. Goodreads is my favorite social networking site.
11. It takes me a long time to really get into a writing project, but once I'm in that place, it's hard to stop.
12. I can't sing worth a damn and so I only sing for my kitty and small children.
13. I let my boyfriend pick out outfits for me to wear because he has a better eye for fashion than I do.
14. I love having my boyfriend cook for me. He's a great cook and I always look forward to what we're having next.
15. In college I too (like Kat) failed a class called the Theory & Dynamics of Racism and Oppression. Amazing class, bad time. I think it was Tues & Thurs mornings at like 10am and I could never make it. Total slacker, I know. I'm completely and suitably ashamed. I also failed ballet which was on Mon & Fri mornings at 8am, freshmen year. I think I made it to 4 or 5 classes and then forgot to drop it.
16. I've lived in eight cities and eighteen different houses/homes/apartments in my life. Someone asked me the other day if they thought New York was "it" for me. I don't know if I've ever imagined myself settling anywhere for good. There are too many places in the world to explore and fall in love with.
17. I would love to live someplace again where I have a garden and a porch. And a large dining room to host dinner parties.
18. I love vampire stories, tv shows, movies - I used to watch Dark Shadows after school with my friends Elaine & Eileen and their mom when I was in 2nd grade; Kat got me hooked on Buffy; my sister got me hooked on Anne Rice's Vampire Lestat series; and I blame the girls at camp this summer for my brief Twilight addition this fall. I just read book one of the Sookie Stackhouse series though and wasn't that impressed.
19. I love looking at old photos and hearing about family histories.
20. My family didn't go to church when I was growing up, so it's always held an intriguing mystique for me.
21. The first night I met my boyfriend we walked through a graveyard and kissed on our friend's doorstep.
22. I love baking things. I have a sweet tooth and I find it relaxing.
23. When I'm awake, I wish I never had to go back to sleep again so that I could accomplish all the things I want to do. When I'm asleep, I never want to get out of bed, but would rather lay there all day snuggled under the cover with my boyfriend and my cat.
24. Sometimes I narrate scenes in my head between characters that I make up. They profess love to each other, have arguments, lose their minds, try to solve the problems of the world. I've tried writing these down into scripts but I always forget them when I have a computer in front of me.
25. I'm still pleasantly shockingly happy every time I hear a tv or radio announcer mention "The President" and "Obama" in one breath. Just hearing the man talk (and his wife) restores my faith in the world.