Category Archive
The following is a list of all entries from the New York City category.
constant cravings
It’s Thursday. I’ve been out of the office since Monday afternoon. I don’t know what is wrong with me but I went home and slept for the past two and a half days. Self-diagnosed mono perhaps. I’d wake up to the alarm, phone into work, roll over and go back to sleep. I’d wake only for grilled cheese sandwiches. I had to make them myself since Raymond is the worst at bringing me things. I brought my crusty, cheesy comfort food back to bed and thought of all the things only an invalid who misses NYC would crave. Like the spicy “make your nose run” noodles from Xian in NYC, sure to chase any illness away. And then I mentally walked a few more blocks to Chelsea and her sweet Magnolia Bakery. And I wanted nothing more than a vanilla cupcake with pink frosting and a tiny decorative sugared flower that looks way better than it tastes.
Yesterday I remembered that I had a recipe for their cupcakes they shared with Food Network. I serendipitiously had all the ingredients. It would be a shame not to fire up the oven. I made two dozen vanilla cupcakes.
One bite. I’m sitting on a park bench with my best friend from college. Second bite. The Sex and the City craze helped craft my first time in NYC itinerary to include a stop at this little bakery. Third bite. It was definitely worth the wait in line with other tourists. Fourth bite. I reach for another.
today
I was wearing purple underwear this day eleven years ago. A notion as trivial as all the moments after that tragic day. My story probably doesn’t look that unfamiliar from yours. In between classes at Queens, there were rumors about what had happened while we were deep in our lectures. The tiny TV in the freshmen dorm lobby confirmed it. Scenes of terror splashed every news outlet. Unthinkable images that were once fodder for blockbuster movies were suddenly all too real. I didn’t go to any more classes that day, even if they weren’t cancelled. I felt led to the chapel where other co-eds had flocked. To pray, to reflect, to make sense of it all.
More than a decade later, it still doesn’t make sense. As recently as May I toured the 9/11 Memorial, odd to be smiling into a camera on a grave site. It’s a beautiful work in progress, a phoenix rising from the ashes.
Take a moment to remember today.
any last words?
I read a lot of books, and there are some titles that I’m not exactly proud of. Like the 50 Shades of Grey trilogy that swept the nation and spread faster than a whore’s legs. It’s these titles that I would be ashamed to be found with in my posession should I meet my untimely death, like in a fiery plane crash. What will friends and family think of me if they knew that the last book I read in my entire bibliophiled existence was one so horribly written? I send up a silent prayer before boarding the plane that would take me to New York City in May with 50 Shades Darker in hand. I send up another silent prayer before boarding the plane that would take me to Las Vegas in June with 50 Shades Freed in hand.
You would think that I would atone for my literary sins by picking up a copy of something along the lines of War and Peace or Gone with the Wind (two tomes that I have started but not yet finished, thinking that’s what my retirement is meant for) but no, I contiune to play fast and loose with my book selection. I won’t share what’s in my queue from the library, but I will share that I am currently in the middle of Bond Girl. But it’s not what you think, I swear.
Returning home from NYC, I now have to scour this website to make sure that I wasn’t caught unaware reading something I’d die of embarrassment.
oui oui
I can’t quite remember how many francs/euros it cost to pee in the bathroom of a restaurant near Paris’ Notre Dame 3 years ago, but I do remember not having exact francs/euros and having to borrow from my friend. Pay to pee? We surely were not in Kansas anymore.
I’ve visited NYC enough times to compile a list of places where one full-bladdered tourist can relieve herself as Starbucks and other dining establishments around the city frown upon non-paying customers using their facilities. (And if you are buying coffee in exchange for bathroom privileges, you are most certainly defeating the purpose, now aren’t you?)
In no particular order:
1) Grand Central Terminal (downstairs)
2) The New York Public Library (third floor)
3) FAO Schwartz (second floor)
4) Tiffany and Company (fourth floor)
5) Hotel lobbies usually have restrooms (I know for certain that Hotel St. James has one)
6) Any major department stores (but you might spring a leak finding them since they are not easy to locate-I’m talking to you, Macy’s)
7) The High Line (public restrooms)
8) Central Park (public restrooms)
9) Other public restrooms around the city
10) The Hudson River
grand love
Want to see a couple embracing in a bustling New York City Grand Central Station on a Sunday morning in March? Go here.
