New York Minutes Pt. 2

The final love note to New York, two segments in lieu of three. We will be returning you to your Food programming very shortly...

View from the Manhattan Penthouse (Thurs. night event)

Thursday, 10:18am: Sitting in a window in Brooklyn, working. Extra-motivated so I have time to get out a bit before the night's event. Wonder if iCi is as close as it looks on my map. It is. I've covered it, but that was 60 fantastic minutes.
Thursday, 2:12pm: Lunch at iCi. I'll reiterate- just a fantastic set of 60-odd Me-Time minutes.

Thursday, 4:02pm: Buy MetroCard at Atlantic Avenue. Take the Q to Union Square and wonder why I'm the only one looking as we cross the river. I have my new headphones on and the music goes from "The Only Living Boy in New York" to "Sweet Thing" and now at least three people are looking at me because I'm looking out the window and smiling ridiculously. I do not get lost when I get off the train. Mental note to send good karma to Jess.

Friday, 12:46pm: Get turned around on the perimeter of Bryant Park while meeting Jess for a picnic lunch. Ended up in front of the library steps. Think of Gossip Girl and not for the first time either. So sue me.

Friday, 1:23pm: Jess delivered me to the subway. I delivered myself to a train going in the wrong direction. The numbers were going up, up, up and I wanted to go down, down, down. I changed trains three times because in Chicago when you cross the platform, your train goes in the opposite direction. In New York, it means you're getting on the EXPRESS in the same, wrong direction. I ended up in Harlem. People were nice. This particular minute is the minute where a man passed me and goes, "Girl, you are looking good in that hat" and managed not to sound like a total creep. I said thank you and asked him for directions. I was soon on my way to 14th in the West Village. I inherently trust hat people like I inherently distrust people who don't eat dessert.

Friday, 1:49pm: I am in the West Village. There are Pride signs everywhere. I am on the phone with Jaimeson who's just been upgraded to first on an earlier flight from California. "I'm glad you found your people!" he says. Indeed, says me.

Friday, 2:32pm: In shoe store on Bleecker. Chatting with salesgirl. Couple overhears me say I'm in from Chicago and they are too. They send me to Magnolia Bakery and we exchange cards because they are very nice. They end up sitting next to me on the plane ride home.

Friday, 2:46-3:06pm: In line at Magnolia Bakery. Strike up conversation with the door guy. It is very hard to look tough when you're the bouncer at a cupcake shop.

Friday, 4:46pm: My hands are still sticky with Red Velvet cake and frosting but I am in an ADORABLE store called True in Nolita. I am afraid to touch clothes. Small shop dog approaches, I crouch down to say hi. Gizmo licks frosting off hands. Problem solved!

Friday, 5:42pm: I'm holding my hat on with one hand and hailing a cab with the other on the corner of Prince and Bowery. BARELY resist urge to throw hat in air singing, "You're gonna make it after alllllll...." Only I am not in Minneapolis, it is not 1972 and I'm supposed to be on the roof of the Peninsula at 55th and 5th with Bethany. Cocktails make great excuses to retain some semblance of sanity.

Friday, 8:15pm: How did that happen?! J comes in at 9 and I'm still sitting on the roof, nursing my Pimms cocktail and having sweet sweet girltalk with Beth and Abby! I have to get back to Brooklyn!! I have to get my bag! LATE!!! I am a hot mess with a dead cell phone! I am a pumpkin! I have missed my window and turned into a pumpkin!

Friday, 9:06pm: I do not get lost on the way home. I change trains and I pick up beer and flowers like a husband home late from work. Jess is in the window on the internet and I feel like Richard Gere at the end of Pretty Woman when he rides up standing in the limo sunroof. I am giggly and filthy from my day in the city.

Friday, 9:47pm: I'm already in Murray Hill and pull up to a cute little boutique of a hotel. I go straight up with my massive suitcase and all but skip the three steps to the door. Door opens and it's like getting to inhale and exhale at the same time. There is no difference between when it's been 6 weeks or 4 days.

Saturday, 12:39am: Weren't we supposed to go out? Walk to Alphabet City passing the scene of many crimes. Like walking through a huge anthropology museum. Scene- Girl and boy (22-23) making out in front of bar. Both drunk. She's hiding it only slightly better. They are all paws and drool. She pulls away, he kinda stumbles back and she cocks her head and goes "I live at _ & _, we could just walk there.” Drunk boy is understandable very excited by this turn of events.

"Pesto" & Weihenstephaner

Saturday, 1:40am: Switch tables at Zum Schneider. See that previous group has left their leftovers. Pesto pasta with indeterminate meat in the mix. We have forgotten to eat dinner (very out of character) and thus I finagle forks from the bus boy and we eat our treasure with the same beer that had me falling asleep in my clothes (also after pesto) on my birthday. What an adorable and disturbing pattern.

Saturday, 4:13am: We have now done a lap around the Lower East, passing all the venues I've seen on tour rosters and several bars of ill-repute that are garnering institution-like status. New York really doesn't sleep and I'm so high on Kofte and life that I'm keeping up. And it's beautiful out.

Saturday, 9:15am: I'm up. "Soho!" I say. Series of good-natured groans. "I'm up!! You're up!! You want some coffee?!" Rhetorical question. The next 120 New York minutes are spent walking to Soho and wandering the streets there.

Saturday, 11:47am: I have just been passed by my 7th stunning woman who is 5'10+. So. Many. Models. J takes me for brunch. I eat for all eight of us.

Saturday, 1:02pm: Find AMAZING store. Scorpion sucker, anyone?

Saturday, 1:22pm: Subway back uptown and there is all kinds of affection emanating from me. I'm in a dirty subway station in the middle of Manhattan and I'm giving and getting kisses and when the train moves I (rather graceless and haphazard by nature) am held still by a single strong arm. I probably look high and kind've feel it.

Saturday, 5:12pm: Arrive in Milford, CT for Jaimeson's show with Alexa. Check out the venue and head to dinner. This place reminds me a little of the Cape and we're goofing around till well after dinner. It's crazy watching the two of them rehearse unplugged- it's just a little unreal to hear this big, beautiful sound come out of the mouth of someone you've been jacking around with all afternoon! She put on a great show and made some friends after- small town=small show but a good one. She is going on tour with a few familiar faces in about two weeks so check the tour schedule and get your ass to the concert hall!

Milford <3's Pirates

Sunday, 12:18am: Back to Manhattan and off to Heathers in Alphabet City. We have our suspicions it is a gay bar. Two girls in huge headphones are rocking out turntables in the back and it feels like a speakeasy. Jaimeson's friend Johnny comes to meet us just after the bartender hits on Jaimeson by way of the waitress. The same waitress who grabs me by both hips to get by me in the bar. I accidentally flirt with a girl in line for the bathroom and still got walked home by the boy that brought me. Good Night.

Sunday, 9:08am: I wake up with an old Otis Redding song in my head. We are sleepy. I could sleep for days. But I have to go home. We go get amazing bagels and I get in my car to LaGuardia. Where the plane is delayed by 4 hours total. And I'm bitter for many many minutes that I couldn't have stayed in Manhattan for even half of that.

Sunday, 7:12pm: I am so tired. At least the HoneyCat was happy to see me. I really really love New York and wish I'd brought some bagels home with me.