Chrissy's Blog

Sunday is the day that Travis and I both have off. So, it has become the day when we play New York City tourists. We are especially pushing ourselves now, before winter sets in and it is cold, snowy, and dark. The fall is beautiful here, most days are sunny, warm, and breezy.

So this Sunday we went out to the Brooklyn Bridge to make the trek across. It is quite an impressive structure, and it provides incredible views of both Manhattan and Brooklyn. As the pictures will attest, it was perfect weather. The walk took about an hour, and then we spent some time in Brooklyn. We walked around and headed toward Brooklyn Bridge park where we immediately saw a building with an enormous line coming out of it. It was an ice cream shop, and the line told us that it must be worth the wait. It was! We enjoyed our ice cream and took in the views.

Granted, I did not spend a whole lot of time in Brooklyn, I am enthralled with this neighborhood. I would say 95% of the people I’ve met in New York live in Brooklyn and LOVE it. Being there reminded me of when I would visit Portland. It had so many of the benefits of Seattle but was so much more low key. Brooklyn is a place I would definitely be interested in living in one day. For now, though, I’m just going to have to make the Upper East Side work.

Since I don’t have to work until 1p.m. most days, I still get that wonderful, lazy Saturday morning feel. I let myself sleep in and take my time getting ready in the morning, unlike most other mornings. This Saturday, Travis made blueberry muffins and coffee.

That night we went out in the East Village. We went to happy hour at a funky little bar and met up with Travis’ co-worker Dan. We felt very proud of ourselves for getting out there, but we were in a taxi heading home around midnight.

“You going out somewhere?” our taxi driver asked.
“No, we’re just heading home,” we apologetically told him.
“Oh, so you are party poopers.”
“No, we’re just older than we look. Old souls if you will.”
“You look like you are 15.” After a bit of a pause, “You know they are going to deport you right?” he told us.
“Deport us? How could they do that? We are from here!”
“No, they will deport you to party pooper island. It is no fun there. Everybody goes to bed early and no liquor and no talking to the opposite sex.”
“Well, that sounds horrible.”
“It is a horrible place. You don’t want to end up on party pooper island.”
“Please don’t report us to the authorities.”
“They’ll figure it out. They’ll show up at your apartment, and if you’re home at an early time and sober, they will send you to party pooper island.”
“Thank you for warning us.”

I thought I would share this warning with you all.

My friend Zach heard about my book/DVD loss and sent me a book to help make up for my loss. I started reading it, and I like it. What a good friend! Even though I lost so much, I know I can build up a new collection that I can love equally. The thieves of New York will not defeat me.

I am very fortunate to live two blocks away from a Papaya King. From this picture, one might jump to the erroneous conclusion that this is a juice place. I’m sure they do serve juice, but this is not the main draw. They serve delicious hot dogs for $1.50! Inside, the walls are shellacked with famous hot dog stats and quotes.

I personally love a hot dog with yellow mustard and raw onion. I have now made the mistake of just asking for onions twice in New York, and the vendors give me this hot dog with some sort of red gooey onion thing on top. It ruins the hot dog! This day, though, I took a step in the right direction and emphasized RAW onions. Delicious. Although my breath was not in primo condition for work.

A word about the subways. I kind of like them. At first, I was none too pleased. But they have grown on me. As opposed to the buses I used to take in Seattle, they are much faster, and one can wait for the subway underground as opposed to on the side of the street, completely exposed to the elements. Like other cities, there are two subway systems, the local and the express. We live right by an express stop, but I work close to a local stop, so I often have to transfer to the six to get to work. I take the express to Union Square, then transfer to the local. Much faster this way. However, on my way back, I hop on the six and ride it the entire way home, which usually takes over half an hour. But I love it. I know exactly which cars will be empty, so I always get a seat, take out a book and don’t worry about it. It’s perfect reading time.

On this day, though, I had an interesting encounter. From time to time on the subways, people get on a car and start screaming really loud about the Apocalypse or about how they just got out of prison, but their mama taught them to be humble, so please give them some money. Most New Yorkers just ignore this and go back to playing on their iphones or turn up their Mp3 player. On this day, though, a short man with a very impressive mullet in a red jumpsuit with a red folder he held in front of his face with a toy microphone disrupted this system.”Happy Columbus week to you all! Yes, it is I, the one that brought you the EARTH ANGEL at the Columbus day parade. That glowing, golden EARTH ANGEL. I was the one that after seven days, tied to a cross, the oceans, Christopher Columbus saw the EARTH ANGEL. I am holy, and I am on a mission. I need to find three EARTH ANGELS to come with me to the holy land. I look in this subway car, and I think I see them hiding. Come with me EARTH ANGELS. Don’t be afraid. I will love and take care of you. But I have some requirements. You cannot be a day over 24, ladies. Now, HURRY, I only have one EARTH ANGEL.” I look over to see that he is carrying a shopping bag with what looks like a doll he might have bought at a toy store. I couldn’t see what type of doll, but I’m sure it had an angel theme. “Your disgusting New York ways are making me ill, because I am holy and cannot be tainted by this subway car. Surrender your EARTH ANGELS to me, or I will be forced to exit this subway car.” This is when everyone in the subway car began to laugh uproariously. The laughter continued to the next stop when the man got off the subway car to go find his earth angels.

I felt kind of old, not within range of the crazy man. 24 and no longer an earth angel.

My income at the moment is very sad. I’m happy that I found something that I like, but I just wish that I could not be in poverty. I’m sure something grander will come along, but for now, it is pretty rough. Boyfriend is so great about paying for things, because he knows that I simply don’t have the funds. It is a huge crush to my pride. BUT. What I can do is bring home delicious treats from work. One of the best things about working at Think Coffee is that I can eat as much as I want. They don’t mind at all. (Probably because they know we are all impoverished.) So, to save money, I try to take advantage of this situation so that I spend less money on food. I have taken to bringing home a pastry of some sort every night for me and the boyfriend to share. This was a pretty, little coffee cake which was quite delicious.

A productive day off, but not an exciting one. I always have glamorous expectations of what my day off will hold. “I’m going to read a whole book!” “I’m going to walk through ALL of Central Park!” “I’m going to write a book!!!” But it usually comes down to the basics. Like laundry. We are lucky to have a facilities in the basement of our building. I always feel very exposed though with this see-through door.

Travis needed a new suit. The one he has been wearing around New York to his client meetings was not very polished, and it was just time. I went along with him to provide a woman’s eye. We went to the central Macy’s store, which was HUGE. We went into this entrance, and followed the escalator up to the eighth floor trying to find men’s, only to realize that men’s is in an adjacent building. After three hours or so, we found him a nice suit that fit pretty well (a little bit of tailoring will make it perfect), a couple of dress shirts, and some ties. He definitely looks much more professional. And I learned a TON about suits. I had no idea what I was doing when we walked in there, but now I have a pretty good sense of how to shop for a suit. Perhaps useless knowledge, but you never know.

Not much to report. I worked most of the day, and when I got home we were too lazy to get a plan together of where to go or what to do. So we watched “Casablanca” which Travis has never seen.