"That's SO new york"

Walking by familiar faces in your neighborhood....
-the dry cleaner guy
-one of the cooks from Bite Me Best (local pizza shop), walking with a buddy & dressed up to go out
-'John' (the cash register guy) from Bite Me Best, barbequing some corn-on-the-cob on the sidewalk in front of Louis - ostensibly to 'beat the heat'
-one of the cash register women from the neighborhood grocery store
-the guy who takes orders at The Bagel Shop
-the nail girl at JinSoon

Standing on the corner of Ave C and 9th street to watch fourth of july fireworks, with a crowd of cheering people blocking traffic.

Going to the local cuban cafe to get 'Cafe con Leche' (ordered just like that, not espresso or cappucino, but 'cafe con leche'), and ending up reading for several hours at the counter, drinking coffee, eating, and listening to the cuban band that happens randomly to be playing there.

Fleeing my sweltering 'no air con in the living room' apartment into the cool recesses of the neighborhood jazz bar to read, write and have a cold beer - but mostly to enjoy the cold air.

Wandering to Thompkins Square Park to read on a bench and people-watch, and having music on the side from a random cuban (or puerto rican?) band playing nearby.

Looking at art by local up-and-coming 'street' art, having beers & people-watching in an 'urban beach' setting, listening to DJs spin hip hop, funk, then house and trance - all in one day, all in one place - PS1, which used to be an elementary school.

$1 oysters and $5 martinis at Five Points Restaurant - named after the actual intersection (of Park, Worth & Baxter) & historic 'center' of vice and debauchery in the early 1900's - all the "vices" of new york society came together Tammany Hall, The Bowery Boys, Irish thugs, Jewish racketeers, and Italian hit men.

Being able to appreciate the art of a good martini and have people get it, without them thinking you are an alcoholic.

Smelling ode' de garbage, ode' de urine, and ode' de just-plain-nastiness while walking to the subway station in the relatively-speaking fresh & quiet summer mornings in the east village.

Going for a run in Central Park when it's 98 degrees and 98% humidity, and not be the only crazy one running.

Running across the Williamsburg Bridge at dusk, and every time still, gaze in awe at the twinkling lights across the east river.

Having an $8 Corona on the only rooftop deck in the Lower East Side, with ironic 20 somethings who are trying too hard, as opposed to a $14 key lime martini on the rooftop bar of a chichi mid-town hotel with bankers.

Partying with co-workers, drinking the bar empty (until the waiter had to kick us out), then hopping from street party to street party during the big blackout of 2003.

Making a picnic out of waiting in line for free 'Shakespeare in the Park' free tickets, it's almost as much about the tradition & process of waiting in line as it is about the play itself.

Doing late brunch (at 3 pm), then drinking the rest of the day away since you've already wasted most of the day already anyway.

Escaping the oppressive humidity of a summer heat wave by having a good 'dirtee' martini at a cute little neighborhood bistro.

Air Con, Soy Ice Cream & Lime Perrier

The weather forecast in NYC this week is on the order of "a high of 98 and a low of 80, with 110% humidity." No joke. After freezing my ass off all day in the meat freezer we call work, I dripped buckets of sweat in yoga class only to come home to a sweltering "No we don't have air conditioning in the apartment" situation. I was melting within three seconds.

Luckily I have a nice roommate, nice enough to stay at her boyfriend's place and let me move her air con unit into my room for the rest of the summer. I didn't realize those suckers were so heavy, and to use quite a bit of ingenuity (involving a side table of just the right height) to move the sucker into my room & fit it into the air con 'hole in the wall' that I'd been covering up from non-use until now.

After the work was done and I turned the unit on, I called my friend to see if she wanted to escape the heat with a nice martini in an air conditioned bar. Being the good new yorkers that we are, she and another friend had the same idea - so we whiled away a cool couple of hours at the neighborhoood french bistro Casimir.

Now, am sitting here like 'AL' - Al Bundy minus the hand in crotch that is - sitting on the couch in my, um, underwear & lime green "Chou" wife beater, eating butter pecan soy ice cream out of the carton, drinking Lime Perrier WITH ICE (something about the ice that makes the bubbles THAT much more refreshing), and watching That 70s Show, waiting for the air con to kick in in my room. WOOHOO. AIR CON IN MY ROOM.

I've somehow survived three New York summers WITHOUT air conditioning in the apartment. I KNOW RIGHT. It was either due to some arcane belief - "I don't believe in air conditioning, it's bad for your health and it makes me cough & get sore throats" or the ascetic desire to somehow remain pure and not "give in" to air conditioning. Well I've either become soft or have become more of a New Yorker because I've just about had it with sleepless, humid, stifling nights - simply melting on my tatami bed, getting little red itchy spots from god knows what bugs or plain heat. The first time I experienced air con at night (it was 98% humidity and I couldn't breathe in my room, even with the fan blasting on "3", and my roommate was gone, so I slept in her room & jacked up the air con), I realized what I'd been missing out - a good night's sleep in the sweltering summers of Manhattan.

Alright, gonna go jump into the ice box now and love every minute of it.

Jersey

Had a cajun brunch & a pretty good latte in Hoboken. OK OK it was pretty cute, very 'small town in upstate New York or Philadelphia'....but ended up being fascinated by this rather than the cutsy, waterfront cafes or the Brownstone-lined streets.


Hoboken Path Train

aiya

OMIGOD. I'm a wreck. It was supposed to be an ideal wedding in the Berkshires of our old roommates - and while we had great fun catching up with old friends and the wedding was perfect and beautiful yada yada...

The big drama was that I suffered a systemic allergic reaction & contracted a bacterial infection from bug bites. By night time of the wedding, I was getting the chills, vomited and all I wanted to do was sleep. Then my right forehead & eye swelled up so much (YES I got bit there) that I looked REALLY Asian. Eventually it got so bad people started shying away from me as if I were scary boxer chic.

I also had a huge bite that had spread all over the underside of my left thigh. We thought it was funny when my friend slapped me so hard it hurt more than itch, which was preferable. When the itching became unbearable, I would beg him to "slap me please", and then everyone would crack up. Two days later, it didn't seem so funny (especially when I had to explain the bruises to the doctor) when the redness kept spreading, became very warm to the touch (indicative of an infection), and I was still running a fever.

I popped benadryl until it knocked me out for the flight to Cali, and to my great chagrin, I missed the in-flight movie "Hitch." (damn! the one time I actually want to see the movie!). Apparently I've gotten soft from living in the city. sigh.

And to top it off (unfortunately not a wine glass), I got to sit through ten hours of presentations yesterday inside a dark, cold conference room - brutal.