So It's Been Awhile...

It's been awhile and nothing too crazy has happened. Here's a run down of the last week or so. Sat next to a man on the subway who smelt tragic. Washed dishes with my hands at work in the bathroom sink. Put together Ikea pieces at work. I had to literally climb inside the piece of furniture to put the top on. Went to the FSU bar and met this guy who awkwardly followed us to the diner after. Went to some club where I think we met the son of a mafia man. And today, we got followed by some man off the subway. And I saw two HUGE rats and freaked. But, I did buy a super cute pair of shoes from this highly annoying man at Bloomingdales. Happy Saturday!

The Day I Got Stuck on the Subway (and fell asleep at the bar)

This story actually starts the night before.  Well actually two nights before.  So okay, two nights prior to getting stuck on the subway, we (7 people) were all supposed to go to dinner then go out for drinks.  Well around dinner time we (3 people) find out that it is not dinner just drinks and that we are to meet everybody (4 people) at Pat's to pregame and that everyone else had already eaten.  So since apparently Carlie and I don't know how to listen when people talk and both get rather angry when we haven't eaten, we decided to stop for food before heading downtown.  Ali texts us directions during dinner, so after we eat we head to the 6 and head downtown.  By the way there is a monsoon outside.  The rain is literally coming at you sideways and it is windy and I am in no way dressed properly for the weather.  We get all the way downtown, get off at Canal, walk to Broadway and proceed to walk five block to find Broome St.  Well let me tell you, when you go left on Broadway as opposed to right on Broadway, you end up in Chinatown.  That's right, we walked 5 blocks into the heart of Chinatown at 11 at night. In the rain.  By the way, Chinatown is not the safest place in the city at night.  We are cold, wet, lost, tired, I kinda looked like a wet dog and there is not a drink coming my way for a long time.  We text Ali (and lie to her of course because if we told her the truth she would run into the rain 16 blocks to Chinatown to find us) and said we were going home because we are tired.  The next morning Ali stumbles in around 7:30 to get ready for work and we tell her why we really didn't come.  She feels so bad that automatically we have to go out that night too.  So we all go to work, come home, change and head out for dinner.  We went to this great little sushi place in the Village that had the best ginger dressing! Anyways we head to this bar called Bleeker Heights.  Which by the way I love. It's above a Five Guys. You literally have to walk through the Five Guys and up the stairs to get there.  And which if you know me, drunk eating is my favorite so this place is perfect! The bartender's name is Patrick. He's Irish and told me that he used to only date Sarah's and that if he wasn't married I'd be in trouble.  We did shots of whiskey together.  I proceed to be a slight bit drunk.  So we decide to go to another bar.  All I can tell you is that it's called Joshua Tree.  As soon as we walked in the door, I got the hiccups.  We walked to a table in the back, and...I fell asleep. Right there on the table, in the bar, with my hiccups.  Whitney, being the fabulous roommate that she is, takes me home.  We both wake up the next morning without crashers in our bed.  Let me clarify.  I share a bed with Carlie, and Ali has been crashing in Whitney's bed for the week.  Neither are there.  We call, brief chat, their at brunch, we go get the best bagel I've ever had.  After restocking the paper towels, trash bags, and toilet paper (please see previous post), we head home.  About an hour later, these two coming strolling through the door.  Ali now has to be at the airport in 2 hours.  So let's do a time run down.  It's going to take 1 hour to get to the airport from the time you walk out of our apartment.  Ali is not packed, we have to go find her a charger for her phone, and she has to shower.  Miraculously, we make it out of the apartment at exactly the right time.  Also, I'm sure you are wondering why we are making a group trip to the airport.  We aren't.  Whitney and I are going shopping in Soho and just left when Ali left and have to take the same subway.  Anyways, right before our stop (literally you can see the platform off to the other side but we just aren't close enough to open the doors) the subway comes to a screeching halt. Yep. The emergency brakes went off. They don't know why. And now we are stuck. For 30 minutes.  Let me just tell you, getting stuck on the subway is not fun. And there were these little kids running around thinking the subway car was a playground. It's not. Dear Man, please control your obnoxious children.  But I did take a girls picture for CollegeFashionista.  Anyways, longest 30 minutes ever! And that's the time I got stuck on the subway.

Things There Are No More Of

We are presently out of toilet paper, paper towels, and trash bags. Probably three of the most essential things in a house.  My friend started a blog called Hot Hot Mess. I'm pretty sure we would qualify to be on this site by the fact that we are all out of these items and have been for 2 days now but we are all too hungover to actually go buy them. Hot Hot Mess. And incredibly tragic. I also have no food. Hello shopping Saturday.

The Flea Market

This past Saturday I took a journey. A journey to Brooklyn. In this far away land known as Brooklyn, we went to an indoor flea market.  I love flea markets.  I think they are great.  You can buy vintage and not pay outrageous prices.  Yes you must dig, but you get to barter and there are some great things to be found.  Please just look at the necklace I bought.  It's from the 60s, I only paid $40, and you can't run to Target to get your own! This flea market was great though.  All of these food truck set up tables on the first floor and the food is amazing.  I went to this place called the Milk Truck.  All they serve is grilled cheese and it's delicious.  There was also an Asian hot dog place and a some taco place that looked really good.  Oh and I also had this bread stick thing that had butter and parmesan cheese and kale and it was uber delish.  The cupcakes I had though, while tasty, were a bit dry (mine are totally better). If you can't already tell from the post below, you should be able to tell by now that my life clearly revolves around food. Here are pictures from my Brooklyn exploration.

                                       

Clearly my life revolves around food.

Food food food. I love food. Here's the run down on what I ate this weekend.
Friday: Southern Hospitality (Justin Timberlake's restaurant.)
Well Carlie's boxes arrived Thursday, and clearly UPS wouldn't leave them.  Naturally they try again on Friday and won't leave them again. This leads to a trip to the UPS distribution center. Perfect seeing as Rob has ordered me an ethernet cable and forgot to put my apartment number in the address so it too is sitting at the UPS distribution center.  At around 8, we cab it there.  After waiting some period of time, Carlie's boxes are brought to the front.  Obviously they are too heavy for us to carry, so the very nice UPS man wheels them out to the cab for us.  We get home and get the boxes upstairs (miraculously!).  By this point we are starved seeing as it's 9:30 and none of us have eaten since lunch.  Whitney suggests Southern Hospitality which is conveniently located within walking distance from our apartment.  At 9:30 on a Friday night we had a very short wait.  I got the pulled pork sandwich with fries and creamed spinach.  Overall the food was really good, the wine was really good, the atmosphere was great, and the price was reasonable (only $11.95 for my sandwich, but I did pay $6 for a side of spinach).  By the way, the people hanging out at the bar next to our table were role playing. And by that, I mean they would stand back to back and another person with them would make a doorbell sound and then they would talk in different voices. Strange, but this is New York.  Anyways, very good and I would definitely go there again.

Saturday: Agave
It's this great little Mexican place.  I could not tell you where, but I had the best blood orange margarita and tuna thing.  So this tuna, it's kind of like a tuna taco but on a big blue corn chip with this chipotle cream and guacamole (Ps, we ordered guacamole as an appetizer and I don't even like guacamole and this was the best stuff I have ever had! ) and some sort of chunky tomato salsa on top, and it was fab!  Also, our waiter, named Bradley (not Brad...Bradley) was the funniest man! His iPod was what was playing throughout the restaurant and at one point "Popular" from Wicked came on!  No picture of Agave but I swear this is the best Mexican I have ever had. A little bit pricer than Southern Hospitality, but then again I did pay $9 for a margarita and $13 for a grande margarita (clearly the later was a better deal).

Sunday: Le Pescadeux
Sunday, we hit this great little place in Soho called Le Pescadeux.  We made reservations Saturday night as we were walking to dinner, and Patrick decided to make the reservation for six.  There are only five of us.  He tells us he made the sixth seat for whoever brings home a shacker.  This week it was Patrick.  We first walked in and it was really cute.  I then saw the menu.  $14 for all you can drink mimosas or bloody mary's? I knew I was going to like this place.  Needless to say, we took full advantage of the all you can drink. The owner of this place is a man named Chuckie, an ex actor who used to work on broadway, did the first speaking role in a music video, was once married to some singer I can remember the name of but was apparently very popular, is Canadian, majored in economics, was going to get his PHD in economics at Brown until he landed his first role, and is the nicest, funniest man.  I love him.  Even if this place sucked, I would go there just because I love Chuckie so much! There was also this little girl there.  She is 3, speaks 4 languages, half German, half Dutch, lives in Tribecca, sings a summer song in her head because she is tired of the cold, like to ride her bike, her birthday is in May and she wants a doll house.
Alli: What color doll house do you want? Pink?
Little Girl: Red. No Black.
When asked about her party this is what she had to say to Patrick.
Patrick: Are you excited for your birthday? Are you going to have a party?
Little Girl: Yeah. But you're not invited!
This little girl is a true New Yorker and she's only 3! And her party is so exclusive! I love her. I want my kids to be her! We ended up staying at brunch for 3.5 hours.  And yes we were drinking the whole time. We loved this place so much we are going back every week.  And we have decided to always get a table for six just to have the awkward shacker join us the next morning.



















  
The right image would be Ali's foot and this little girl's foot. They are almost the same size.  That's just how small Ali's foot is.

So after brunch, we decide that it would be a good idea to go to Ikea...drunk. Let me tell you, never go to Ikea drunk. When we get there (By the way Ikea is in Brooklyn. We don't know how to get there. And we have to take a bus.), we are so hungry we end up eating at the Ikea cafeteria. Yes, Ikea has a cafeteria. I ended up with meatballs and macaroni and cheese.

Overall, the food was great for being drunk. Would I eat is sober, no. So now let me tell you why going to Ikea drunk is a bad idea.  This is how the process goes. Drunk, a little less drunk, kinda sober, hungover. For those of you that have walked around Ikea know, this is no quick process. We were there for four hours. And we knew what we wanted. The longest part was waiting in line to check out and then get the home delivery.  Let's just put it this way, by the end of the trip Carlie, Whitney, and I were passed out on the bench.  Yes, we were literally asleep on the bench at Ikea waiting on Ali.  Here is the best part.  Ali was talking to this guy in line.

Ali: This is the longest line ever.

Guy behind her: I work in management and this is the worst managed place ever.

Ali: Yeah look these kids in front of me are falling asleep.

Guy: Clearly this place is a bore, I mean just look at those girls over there. They actually fell asleep on the bench.

Ali: Yeah, those are my friends. We came here after brunch...

Guy: What would make you think that was a good idea?!

End of conversation.

Oh by the way, I forgot to mention that it's a hurricane outside. Drunk, cold, rain, Ikea. Awesome.  Moral of the story, never go to Ikea drunk.

Just a few shots of the UES...

Since I don't start work till tomorrow, I decided to spend my last day off on a nice little run through Central Park and back down 5th Ave.  Here are a few shots from my run!

The Guggenheim Museum 

5th Ave. Homes

Future Residence

5th Ave. to the left, Central Park to the right

Lexington and 65th

The Locksmith

By the title I'm sure you can tell this is going to be interesting.  Yesterday my boxes came.  Well the UPS man leaves them downstairs so I have to go down the stairs to get them.  So, I throw on a pair of shoes and run down the stairs to grab them.  Well of course as soon as I close the door I remember, this door locks back automatically, which means now I'm locked out.  Step 1, get all the boxes upstairs.  Which by the way, props to me because each one (there were 3) weighed 40 pounds.  Step 2, knock on the neighbors door and ask to borrow her phone.  Side note, our neighbor across the hall is so nice and she just moved in too. Step 3, call the locksmith.  He tells me he will be here in 15.  Now here is where the drama starts.  I stood downstairs for 20 minutes waiting on him.  Five minutes late. I knew this was going to be bad.  As we're walking up the stairs he asks me how it happened and I told him.  The following I will put in dialog just so you get the full effect of the craziness.

Locksmith man: (shining his flashlight in my lock) "You see, you have a kind of lock that can't be picked."
Me: "Of course it can't."
The Man: "What I would have to do is either break the lock or take a drill and drill off the whole thing to get you in the door. And I would have to see your ID first."
Me: "Okay well everything is inside that door so I can't show you anything."
Man: "And it would be a $55 service fee and then $125 to break the lock."
Me: (almost in tears) "Umm no. I'll just wait for my roommate."
->Yes, I was actually going to sit in the hall for 4 hours and wait for my roommate to get home. I refused to pay this man $200.
Man: "Well you still have to pay the $55 service fee."
Me: "Yes, well as I stated before, EVERYTHING is inside that door. So, you can sit and wait for 4 hours with me or you can leave and come back because you aren't breaking that lock and I have nothing except these 3 boxes and you aren't getting their contents."
->Magically his phone rings and he has an emergency.
Man: "Listen, I have an emergency. Can you pay cash?"
Me: "Yes, but EVERYTHING IS INSIDE THAT DOOR and you aren't breaking my lock."
Man: "Okay well if you can pay cash, I will open this door right now for $55."
Me: "Okay than do it!"
-> I was willing to right the $55 off as a life lesson and move on.  Next, you would suppose the man pulls out his drill or lock breaking tools. No. Want to know what he pulls out? A piece of sheet metal. Yes, sheet metal.  A small 4x2 piece of sheet metal.  Now I'm sure you are thinking how is this man going to break the lock with a piece of sheet metal.  Well guess what. He doesn't break the lock.  He takes this lovely piece of sheet metal and slides it between the door jam and the lock and wiggles it a little and magically opens my unopenable door. Without breaking a damn thing.  This stupid man was about to charge me $200 to break my lock when he was able to open it with a piece of sheet metal. I was furious! I mean wouldn't you be? This man was straight up taking advantage of me! Either way, I got in, payed the man his cash, and he left.

So, lesson learned. A) Don't leave without your keys. EVER. Even if you are just going to check the mail. B) Never trust the locksmith. EVER. Because now you know he can always open the door with a piece of sheet metal. C) Be sure to lock the deadbolt because a man can always get in the bottom lock with a piece of sheet metal.