Booze, I mean Blues Cruise

Today I got to leave work early to help the magazine out with an ad sales event (I have no idea why they asked me, but I'm not complaining). We took about 20 clients on a Circle Line Blues Cruise that went in a circle through NY harbor. When we first got to the pier, my ad sales coworkers went to a nearby bar to wait for clients, and I just hung out at the pier with a magazine, with the hopes that any lost clients would ask me where to go. While I sat there, I saw Alan Cumming get dropped off by a bicycle-cart taxi guy.....so that's celebrity sighting number 2, although no one knows who Alan Cumming is, although I'd say he's more famous than my first sighting of Gael Garcia Bernal. Anyway, I think of him as the pervert in 'Circle of Friends'. But he was also on an episode of SATC and many other things (see http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0001086/). So that was interesting. I took a picture of him since I'm a big dork.
The cruise was pretty nice. We got onto the boat a little early, so it wasn't too hard to reserve 20 seats (that was my primary job). There were a few belligerent folks who were angry at the reserved seats, but they lived. Good music and free drinks, amen. The cruise left from pier 83 on 42nd st at the Hudson, and went in a U to the Brooklyn Bridge and back - so we saw all of lower Manhattan, then Ellis Island/Statue of Liberty, and 4 of the 5 'waterfalls' art things (where is the 5th one, I wonder?), and the Brooklyn Bridge. I just wish I had a better camera. Maybe after paying off the debt of this summer.....
Oh, and if you wondered about the concert last night - Joshua Radin was awesome (i just quickly attempted to google for a youtube vid of his closing acoustic song which he did in the middle of the audience, but in my slightly drunk state i couldn't find it quickly). Vanessa Carlton was mediocre, but still interesting. She has some song about not liking her mom, and it just made me depressed for her. But Joshua Radin opened with my favorite song (Today) and also played my second fave (Lovely Tonight)...however he didnt play my third fave (Paperweight) but I guess I'll forgive him.
Tiiiiime for beeeeeed.



Alan Cumming looking particularly flamboyant at Pier 83.




The best picture I could get of Lady Liberty with my crappy camera in the dim light.



Even worse as far as my camera goes - but this is the waterfall under the Brooklyn Bridge.

What a cutie!

John had his official hospital pictures taken today, and I thought they were so cute that I had to share.

Welcome John Thomas Wilkins!

After a long, grueling day of labor, John Thomas Wilkins finally joined us at 2:33 this morning. He is 21 inches long, and 7lb 14oz. Not knowing what was going on was very miserable, but I guess my mom and Jessica were there are still in the same boat for awhile. Much of the night I laid in bed crying and praying, worried that something horrible had happened until I finally heard all was well at about 3:30. I just kept praying over and over 'please take care of my sister, please take care of my sister' while the Ingrid Michaelson song 'Keep Breathing' went through my head (yes, I know, I'm a dork). Not a fun night for anyone, I guess. But he's here now, and all is well! Keep Jenny in your prayers so she can recover for the flight home in two weeks! Besides the picture here, my sister Jessica has more on her facebook page, if you want to check them out.

Here's the handsome devil:


On an unrelated note, tonight I'm going to see Joshua Radin - I love his music and I've never seen him live before, so I'm very excited. Vanessa Carlton is one of the openers, which could be good. Then I got asked to help the ad sales folks at the magazine do something tomorrow night on a Circle Line jazz cruise in the harbor, so that should be fun. Friday night I intend to hit the JP Morgan Library (home and museum) for 'pay what you want' and then June gets here Saturday, and then just one more week of work!

Hooray for Erikka!

Erikka came to visit me this weekend! She took a bus up from Charlottesville, which was supposed to get in to the meatpacking district at noon yesterday. She has always wanted to go to this French restaurant called Pastis (I guess they went there once on Sex and the City), and it is right by where the bus would drop her off, so I made a reservation for 12:30. Unfortunately her bus was a little late, so I sat at the bar there drinking coffee for awhile. But she finally got in and we had a fabulous brunch. I had a blissful baked sandwich (can't remember what it was called) but it was toast with ham, melted cheese, and a sunny-side up egg on top. Yum! After brunch we headed for Brooklyn Brewery for a free tour. The tour itself wasn't much, we just stood in a room while a guy told us about the history of the brewery and then about the brewing process. They don't have free tastings, but they had a deal with 6 beers for $20 so that's what we did. My favorite beer (and Erikka's) was called the Grand Cru, it was pretty similar to Schlafly's No. 15. I also had a really good IPA and a mediocre beer called Blast! We chose dinner based on proximity when Erikka really needed a bathroom - a pizza place in the Lower East Side. Then we headed up to a place called Terminal 5 for the She and Him show (Zooey Deschanel and M. Ward). The show was pretty good, I was just very tired and my feet hurt from standing so long.
Today we headed into the city and went to MoMA - Erikka had never been and I was glad to go again to see the Home Delivery exhibit on prefab housing. I really liked the exhibit, and got to see a few other things I hadn't seen the last time I was there. The best part of the Home Delivery exhibit were the 5 examples of prefab designs that were set up outside - you could actually walk through them all. After MoMA we went down to SoHo and walked around for awhile going into various shops. I passed a guy on the street wearing a Ted Drewes shirt, so I talked to him for awhile (he was obviously from STL). Eventually we ended up at Magnolia Bakery in the village for their famous cupcakes (which were pretty damn good, but I assumed they must be if we waited in line for 30 minutes for a $2.50 cupcake!) Then it was almost time for Erikka's bus to come, and we just walked around the meatpacking district. Now I just need to recover for the evening, and rest up for June's visit next weekend!
Too bad tomorrow is Monday again....


Erikka and I at Brooklyn Brewery enjoying some fabulous beers.



Three different pre-fab house examples at the Home Delivery exhibit at MoMa - from top. The bottom one was called micro house and was tiiiiny. The middle one that looks like a wooden trailer was one where you can stack a number of them together. The top one was some weird computer-generated design where you entered the aspects you wanted in a house and the computer designed it for you. This picture was taken from the top floor of the Cellophane house - the coolest design there.




This is an example of a shotgun house designed for New Orleans. It is made entirely of laser-cut plywood, that fit together kind of like a puzzle. The coolest thing in this house was a laser-cut design on the wood floors, based on an algorithm using New Orleans zip codes.




Cellophane house....This house is 5 floors and 1800 square feet. It was all wired with solar power and weird batteries, very interesting.




Erikka enjoying the last bite of her cupcake from Magnolia Bakery.

1,2,3,4 tell me that you love me more

Today I braved the butt-crack of dawn to go see Feist for free at Good Morning America. Those of you not familiar with indie-artist names, she's the one that sings the 1,2,3,4 that was all the rage in ipod commercials last winter. Anyway, she's awesome and when I saw her in STL this spring t iwas one of the best I've been to recently. So I woke up this morning at 4:30 and was standing in a line outside of Bryant Park (where fashion week also takes place) by 5:30. They let us in around 7, and I was very close to the front of the crowd. It was very strange because they had a black screen up on the stage, so we could hear Feist doing a soundcheck but we couldn't see anything. When I saw Tim McGraw on the Today show 7 years ago (yikes, that was 7 years ago!!) he did the soundcheck on the stage and everyone just got to shows, basically. Around 8 they sent out a warm up comedian who told us about how and when to clap and cheer. He asked if there were any people in the audience that knew the lyrics to Feist songs, so I raised my hand....they grabbed me and a few other people from the audience and took us over to where the weatherperson (apparently someone named Heidi? I'm a Today show girl...) was about to do the weather. She talked to us and said she was going to prompt us and then we'd sing the beginning of 1,2,3,4. So when she was on air, she just said something like 'Everyone here has heard of Feist and this popular song, but these people actually know the lyrics,' and then she cued us to start singing. I haven't seen it, but I was certainly on TV. Because they run these morning shows on an hour delay in IL/MO, I was able to have Kevin set up a tape, and my parents and sister got to see me on tv. Pretty crazy. After I was on tv, I had a slightly worse spot for the Feist concert, but it was still towards the front of the mass of people. Unfortunately a really old large man kept trying to stand right in front of me. But I survived.
Work went pretty quickly today, and soon enough it was 4:00 - I found out yesterday we technically can leave at 3:00 on fridays (summer hours?) so I was out of there. I headed up to the Guggenheim museum for the Friday evening 'pay what you want' deal. The exhibit right now is Louise Bourgeois, and it went through her entire career which is mostly sculpture. I'm not a huge fan, but it was still interesting to walk up the spiral pathway of the Guggenheim, experiencing the progression of her work. She was born in 1911 and is still creating art. Crazy! Other than the exhibit there wasn't much else on display. I saw a nice Rothko and an exhibit of early Kandinsky pieces that were pretty different from what I'm familiar with (there were even woodcutting prints, which were cool). So I was in and out of there, and glad to have only paid $3 instead of the $18 regular admission.
I'm SO TIRED I guess since I got up so early. I'm going to knit for a bit, then pass out. Erikka will get here about noon tomorrow, and we've got a full day planned. I can't wait!!
Entertaining side note: I had sent a ranting email to Delta airlines this week and they sent me a $100 voucher. Only time will tell if I have the audacity to use it....


Feist rocking out to 'Sealion.' Not my favorite song, but she played 'I feel it all' and '1,2,3,4' which are my favorites.




The GMA crew - Robin (?), Diane Sawyer (she looked gorgeous for however old she is), and Heidi the weathergirl that I was on tv with. I also talked with her briefly about music, and we talked about Ingrid Michaelson and Joshua Radin....who I informed her is playing in NYC next week (and I'm going!). I loved her dress, and she had on a really fun ring.




This was the fat head of the old guy that kept standing right in front of me. Jackass.



Weird scaffolding at the Guggenheim museum. It was sad to not be able to appreciate the building's exterior completely, but it was interesting. The dumbest thing is that they're selling jewelry made of pieces that came off of the building during restorations - for HUNDREDS OF DOLLARS.



Looking up through the atrium of the Guggenheim. I love this building!!!

Punch Bros!

One thing I love about NYC is its abundance of music...and a good amount of it is free. Last week I wasted time by googling a number of artists to see if they might be playing here some time soon, and I discovered 1. that Nickel Creek's Chris Thile is in a new band called the Punch Brothers, and 2. that the Punch Brothers were going to be playing for free tonight. The show was supposed to be in Battery Park City, but because of forecasted thunderstorms, they moved the show to a nearby high school.
So after work I headed down to lower Manhattan to find the show. I ended up with a great seat (although the auditorium was so small that all the seats were great) about 8 rows back. And the music was fabulous. They played a few songs I knew from Chris Thile's last solo album, and then lots of Punch Bros stuff which was all great. The highlight was when they covered a Wilco song in their encore - they played 'Poor Places' from the Yankee Hotel Foxtrot - by far my favorite Wilco endeavor. I just never imagined anyone covering any of those songs and doing them justice - but this was great. By far my favorite musical experience of the summer thus far.....but I have high hopes for Joshua Radin next Wednesday.
Work is keeping me plenty busy. Tomorrow, the coordinator of my AAAS program is coming up to check out the office and she's taking me to lunch. So that will be fun. Then Erikka is coming on Saturday/Sunday. Then June is going to come next weekend. Then the following weekend I head to DC and then come home. The end is increasingly in sight!!! (20 days!)



This was my least out-of-focus picture of the Punch Brothers.

Southern Hospitality

This weekend I flew down to North Carolina to see Jenny, Charlie, and the appendages of her unborn child constantly bulging from her abdomen.
You are probably well aware of the fun I've had with flying lately. Unfortunately they were continued on Saturday. My flight from NYC left almost an hour and a half late, first because something was wrong with the brakes, then because someone needed medical attention and needed to deplane. I was connecting in Cincinnati, and arrived there at about 9:12 with my flight leaving at 9:25. I sprinted through the airport to get to the shuttle to the remote terminal for my connecting gate, but when I got there the door was closed and they said I couldn't get on even though I could see the plane. They told me they had booked me on a later flight 'quite some time ago.' Gee, thanks. I was irate (I'll write my letter to the lovely folks at Delta later tonight) but they got me on a US Airways flight that left at 12:15 getting to Charlotte around 1:30. So it could have been worse, but I still missed out on about 3 hours I should have had to spend with Jenny. To make things interesting, Kevin called me while I was at the airport waiting for my flight to let me know he needed more help to unload my new piano at our house. My family helped him load it up, but not everyone could drive to STL to unload....so I tried calling just about anyone and everyone. Thankfully, Carlos was around and willing to help out - yay, Carlos! So now there is a huge piano in my dining room. And the furniture it displaced I guess will just sit there til I get home and help to figure out where to put it....
Jenny and I went shopping that afternoon, before going back to her house where Charlie's parents were also visiting. We went to Foothills Brewery for dinner that night (yum) and wandered through downtown. Sunday, after Charlie's parents finally left (his mom is fine but I get so tired of listening to his dad...), we went to the Reynolda house for a tour and walked around the gardens as much as we could tolerate in the heat. For dinner, we grilled chicken (on the bone - apparently the first time it has ever been consumed in their house since Jenny doesn't like touching meat on bones...) and fresh-picked squash and cabbage and it was blissful. This morning, Charlie drove me to the airport and of course for once my flight was uneventful. Then I went to work to get a little bit done. Exciting, I know.
I had a great time seeing Jenny so very pregnant. It was funny how often she would make weird pained faces and push back at the baby kicking her in the ribs. I'm sure its not comfortable, but watching her reaction was very entertaining. I also got to feel what I guess was the kid's foot sticking out weird all the time. Strange. And I love their nursery, the hand-made crib is gorgeous. Now all they need is for that baby to come, and it sounds like that could happen any time.....



Jenny and I at Reynolda House.




Side view of Jenny.




Reynolda House, AKA the bungalow.




These were socks I was knitting like a fiend so I could give them to Jenny to wear at the hospital should she want to wear socks there. They are resting on the beautiful quarter-sawn oak side of the baby's crib.

Seven Down, Three To Go

This wasn't a bad week. I was kept very busy fact-checking a number of things, most of which were interesting. In particular, I enjoyed learning about vertical farming....if you're bored, check out www.verticalfarm.org. Pretty crazy stuff. I also learned about FabLabs, or fabrication laboratories, where they have machines to make just about anything you can imagine. I am also working on writing a book review (maybe I already mentioned that?), but it won't be in until Nov. I'll take what I can get.
Yesterday evening I went to Prospect Park in Brooklyn to see Jerry Douglas for free. I took the train to the opposite side of the park, with the intent to walk through the park, which I haven't done before. Bad idea. For some reason, when I get into a park, I'm suddenly completely disoriented. So I walked through what was basically the woods, and even though I had a map and thought I knew where I was going, I ended up in the wrong place. So my nice stroll through the park ended up being a twice as long hike. Oh well. But the show was pretty good....can't beat free! I was glad to have the distraction, yesterday was a little rough since it was our 4th wedding anniversary and obviously I wasn't with Kevin.
Today work was fine, nothing out of the ordinary. Around 3:00 I realized that no one seemed to be around. While I was talking with another intern about everyone being gone, someone walked by and told us most people had gone to a bar for a drink. So we packed up and headed to do the same. It was nice to get out of the office early, because I'm trying to finish up my current knitting project in time for my arrival in Charlotte tomorrow morning. That's right, I'm going to visit Jenny and Charlie in NC. I found a cheap flight and decided just to go. I felt a little bad for spending the money, because I really don't have it, but then today I got a $100 check for going to the beach last Friday. So that paid for a good chunk of it. Anyway, its time for me to eat my dinner (pork chop and velveeta shells and cheese....i'm eating as much of that while I can since Kevin won't eat it) and a knitting marathon before my 5:00AM cab ride to the airport!

Phun in Philly

This weekend I took the Megabus to Philly. I spent Saturday walking around Old City on a self-guided walking tour seeing all of the Colonial sites. It was fun, and so nice to be in a less crowded, less crazy city. I saw a lot of really old buildings, the oldest of which I think was Christ Church (1760's I think). I was really surprised at the number of historic buildings which are gone though....there were many signs throughout the city saying 'this person lived at a house that once stood here'....in particular, the house where Washington lived while he was president and Benjamin Franklin's house are no longer there. I guess they were just torn down before anyone thought of preservation. There were also a number of buildings that were historical reconstructions. But lots of neat things to see (the highlights are in pictures below).
Around 3:00, Keith and Shirly met up with me. We had homemade ice cream at a soda fountain type place (amazing!), walking down to Penn's landing along the Delaware River, and then walked through various other areas and finally to dinner at a great Vietnamese place. On our way to the train station to go back to their house, we went to a Macy's (used to be a Wanamaker's) to see a huge gold organ, and I bought a fun wallet on major sale. It was so nice to go to a Macy's that wasn't freaking crazy! I've walked into Macy's in NYC a few times, and almost immediately turn around and leave every time. We also walked into the lobby of a new skyscraper, Comcast Center, which is now the tallest building in Philly. The lobby was really cool - it had a huge LED screen along one wall with more than a million pixels, and they just show random clips of beautiful images (we saw ones of the ocean, trees, and the earth/moon seen from space). Oh, but my favorite building was City Hall. Very cool.
This morning, we went to breakfast near Keith and Shirly's place, and then they dropped me off at the Philadelphia Museum of Art while they both went to work. The art museum was pretty great....they had quite a lot of impressionist art, which I'm always a fan of. No Tiffany glass though, damn them! I really enjoyed the museum though.
After the art museum, I was walking back towards the city, intending to just walk through parts I hadn't seen yet before getting on the bus back to NYC. I ended up talking to my sister Jenny, who directed me towards the Philadelphia Academy of Fine Arts building....a cool old building she had learned about. So I walked to check that building out, and it ended up having an art museum as well. The interior of the building looked so cool that I figured I might as well pay the $8 to walk through and check it out. It was definitely worth it. I believe the PAFA was the first art museum established in the country, which is pretty cool. This building was built for the first American world's fair in the 1870's (I think?). After PAFA, I just walked through the Rittenhouse Square neighborhood since I've read about it a lot in Jennifer Weiner's books (In Her Shoes, Good In Bed, etc). Pretty swanky. I walked to the bus stop and got there just in time for the trip back to NYC.
The bus was convenient and cheap, but both trips were kind of crazy - the bus drivers swerved in and out of lanes and stopped quickly the whole time. Coming back to NYC, we were getting close and I could see the city, and the traffic was horrible. I figured it was because of traffic merging into Lincoln tunnel, but then I could see the emergency vehicles in the West bound lanes blocking traffic. There was a COMPLETELY BURNED OUT SHELL OF A BUS on the other side of the road. Nothing left but a charred bus frame. Not cool. So I'll have to watch the news tonight and see what happened. But it was a great weekend, and I'm so grateful to Keith and Shirly for hanging out with me and letting me stay with them! It was so nice to see some familiar faces.



Independence Hall. I didn't get to go inside, but I wish I could have.




The Mercantile Exchange building. If I remember correctly, it housed the first stock exchange. It was one of my favorites.




Elfreth's Alley - the oldest, continually inhabited street in the country. It was so cute, with really narrow row houses. I saw one for sale, and I wonder what something like that is worth!




City Hall - this building was huge and awesome. The tower has a stature of William Penn on top - its the tallest statue on top of any building in the world - the statue is 37 ft tall.




The good ol' Liberty Bell.




Looking up the side of the Comcast Center. This was the building with the awesome lobby.




The Philadelphia Museum of Art. These are the stairs that Rocky famously ran up (not that I've ever seen that movie though).



This was a set that Marc Chagall painted for a ballet production. It was huge and beautiful!




The Philadelphia Academy of Fine Arts. My sister could tell you a lot more about the significance of this building, but I think she said it was pretty wacky for the time period. You better appreciate this picture, because I was standing in the middle of the street to take it - there wasn't a sidewalk across the street because of construction.




The interior of the Academy of Fine Arts building. It was VERY ornate - crazy floor and wall tiles. This part had a beautiful red and gold wall pattern, and then the ceiling was blue with gold stars painted on it.

Beach Party!!!

Friday I had the chance to work at the Discover magazine beach party instead of going to the office. Obviously, I jumped at the chance. The party was at the publisher's penthouse apartment at Long Beach, on Long Island....about an hour train ride from Manhattan. When I first got there, we were put to work pretty quick (me and the other 3 interns that went). I somehow got stuck outside alone for awhile with this bossy woman that was a slave driver, I sweated so much that my hair was wet for the rest of the day - not kidding. But other than that, the rest of the day was great! The other interns and I just rotated between a few different locations, and all we really did was help direct people various places while we ate and drank. I had two dips in the frigid water, but it felt wonderful! I got a bit of a sunburn, but its not too bad. Overall, it was a fabulous day, and I'm glad I got to go to the beach at least once, and on a Friday no less!


Our first task (the intern's that is) was to put up this tent. There was a table inside for lunch and dinner.




This was the building that the publisher's apartment was in. Not the swankiest thing I've ever seen, but I would guess a penthouse with an ocean view still costs a pretty penny!



Me enjoying the beach.

Things Are Looking Up

This week has by far been the best week yet. In general, work is going much better and it seems like I'm more in the loop for things to do. I still don't think I'll be writing like all the other people in my program are, but at least I'm getting interesting experience. I did get my first story assignment today though. For this special issue I am working on, I will be writing something about extrasolar planets. Right now, there have been 307 planets discovered that orbit other stars, and I will be picking my 'top 10 exoplanets.' So I think I will get to do a bit of reporting and then writing about the 10 planets I pick. Sounds fun to me! I also did some fact-checking this week about a guy that is a plant scientist (Dr. Pedro Sanchez, who won the World Food Prize in 2002 for bringing sustainable agriculture practices to areas with poverty and hunger) so that was fun. I went out for drinks last night with some co-workers, so it was my first real social outing with them.....its just nice to actually know some things about the people you work with all the time. AND THE BEST PART - I get to work at a beach party tomorrow! The ad sales team at the magazine is having a party for their advertising clients on Long Beach, and they needed some extra help, so me and three other interns are going there to help. Not only do I get to hang out at the beach with free drinks and food instead of working, they are going to PAY US. Probably only like $100, but damn, I would have done it for free! And the weather is supposed to be gorgeous, so I can't wait!
This weekend I am heading to Philadelphia. I love anything that's old, so I'm sure I'll enjoy wandering around. I'm also going to meet up with Keith and Shirly who used to be grad students at Wash U, and I'll stay with them Saturday night. So it will be nice to see some familiar faces!

Not Bad for a Monday

Today work went by relatively quickly. After work, I went down to the Lower East Side to buy tickets to a show that Erikka and I are going to see when she's here (the band is called She and Him, I haven't heard their stuff, but the 'she' is Zooey Deschanel, Will Farrel's love interest in Elf). The place where I bought the tickets was right next to Katz's deli, which is a famous Jewish deli that's been there since 1888. So I decided to eat dinner there - I had a combo sandwich so I could try the pastrami and the brisket - both were blissful, but the pastrami was particularly fabulous. When I got back to my apartment, I was welcomed by FOUR pieces of mail, so that made for an exciting evening. So thanks Jen, Ang, and Jessica for the cards! I especially liked the one from Jessica - the front read 'My bologna has a middle name....And its Marie'. Very funny. My other piece of mail was Kevin sending me my InStyle magazine, and my new credit card since someone stole my old number. Hooray for mail! To top it all off, Weeds was actually interesting for the first time this season. Only four more days of work til the weekend....

My Saturday In Pictures

I did a lot of random things on Saturday, so I'll show some pictures and say what I was doing.

I started my day by heading towards a place in Nolita (NOrth Of Little ITAly) that I had read about in this book about shopping that Erikka sent me. Its called The Market, and its a place where up-and-coming designers sell their stuff every weekend. There was lots of jewelry and some clothing and handbags. It was my personal heaven! Lots of really nice jewelry, and it was all pretty reasonably priced! I wanted to buy something at the first table I went to. I ended up buying this necklace, and I love it! Now if only I come up with $150 to buy the handmade Italian leather purse I saw (it was the softest most beautiful leather I've ever seen!).




After wandering around to a few other shops, eating gelato at 2 places (yes, I know I'm a dork, but it was my lunch!) I walked through Chinatown on my way to South Street Seaport. My sister Jenny had told me about this art installation on the East River called 'Waterfalls', which was pretty cool. I could see 3 different waterfalls (there might be 5 total?) but the coolest one is underneath the Brooklyn Bridge.




After South Street Seaport, I went to another yarn store called Seaport Yarns. It was the largest place I had been to, and of course, I bought more sock yarn. After I left the yarn shop, I got out my book to figure out where the World Trade Center site was relative to me, because I thought it should be close. It ended up being right around the corner. I thought there was supposed to be a memorial park, but I guess that was temporary until the new buildings are built. There was a WTC Tribute Center, but it cost $10.....so I tributed from the sidewalk. It is just so strange, a huge gaping hole among so many skyscrapers. Very sad. I'm just grateful that Kevin and I were able to experience the top of the WTC, which ended up being just about a month before 9-11.




This is Trinity Church, the oldest church in Manhattan, and maybe one of the oldest buildings there in general. I have a picture of this church with the WTC in the background from summer of 2001; I tried to take the same picture again with the emptiness behind it (that's not this picture though).





Next I walked down Wall Street briefly. The streets down there are so narrow, and the buildings are so tall. Its a strange feeling. Did you know Wall Street is called that because there used to be a wall there? The wall was built around the northern part of New Amesterdam in the 1600's to protect the town from Indians and whatever else. This is Federal Hall, where George Washington took the oath of his presidency back in 1770-something....



It was a long day with lots of walking, and I was beat. I thought about not doing anything today, but decided to go ahead and go to a museum. I went to the Whitney Museum of American Art. They have a new exhibit about Buckminster Fuller, the guy who made geodesic domes kind of famous (he designed the Climatron in St. Louis). The exhibit was pretty interesting. Other than this exhibit, they had an exhibit by Paul McCarthy, which was a bit weird. There was also a collection of Polaroid photographs by Robert Mapplethorpe, which varied from interesting to somewhat strange. They didn't have many paintings from their collection on display, but what they had was pretty nice - quite a few Edward Hoppers.
I'm sad tomorrow is Monday. But I am planning to go to either Boston or Philly this weekend, so I'll spend my week at work looking forward to that!

Celebrating America's Birthday With Free Museums and a Sprinkle of Tiffany Glass

All week I was looking forward to, but also dreading this weekend. I enjoy checking out the city, but it just gets kind of lonely. At first I thought I might try to go to a beach, but the weather is just too iffy to go that far. So I decided I'd try to go to the New York Historical Society (I had read that they had a lot of Tiffany glass) and to MoMA which is free after 4 on Fridays. I called the Historical Society to make sure they would be open, and the recording said it was free if you wore red white and blue. I can do that!
At the Historical Society, they had all kinds of stuff going on, with people dressed up like Revolutionary War people and doing re-enactments. Interesting. I quickly found the Tiffany glass, which as usual, was fabulous. They had a whole big room filled with the stuff, but it was in the part of the museum where it wasn't all set up for display, it was just in glass cases (some center where you can study design?). But I could still see some of it. It was worth the trip, but I'm glad I didn't have to pay to get in because there wasn't much else there. One of the things they have at the Historical Society are all the original watercolors of Audobon's birds. But they are in a part that is only open by appointment to researchers. Oh well.
Next, I decided just to walk back to midtown instead of taking the subway. So I walked along Central Park from 77th to Columbus Circle, which I'm not sure I've ever been to. Not much exciting there, there are just lots of new buildings being built and that is where CNN's headquarters are in the Time Warner Center. Then I walked on towards MoMA on 53rd. It was only about 3, and the free tickets weren't til 4 so I figured I'd shop as I walked, but I didn't really see anything interesting. I decided to go on to MoMA and see if there was a line - its a good thing I went because by 3 the line was already pretty long. Then they let us in at about 3:45. I really liked MoMA when I went in 2001, but it is amazing now. The new building is beautiful...I just kept thinking of my sister Jenny cause I know she would have really liked it - just very simple and modern. I tried to take pictures, but they don't do it justice. Thankfully I was forewarned from the website that Starry Night is currently not on display (damn them!) so that was disappointing (but I'd seen it before). But I had read about a special exhibit they have about prefab housing design where they actually have houses built outside to walk through. Unfortunately, this doesn't open til July 20th! I will need to go back for that - I could see the houses on the lot and they looked very interesting. My favorite stuff there were all the Matisse paintings - there was one cubit Matisse, an homage to Picasso, which was really interesting.....the goldfish that he paints so often were just orange marquise shapes. I really wanted to buy a poster of my favorite Matisse, but I am out of wall space at the house - maybe someday. But I loved MoMA, and you can't beat going there for free!
I went back home, waiting for my roommate to call. She invited me along to two parties with her friends. I was so grateful! First we went to a place right by ours. Everyone at the party was an actor/actress, so they were all small beautiful people...but all very nice (lots of them even hugged me when I left!!). I got to meet this girl Autumn who is on the Legally Blond reality show on MTV, she was cute and nice (and way smaller than I could tell she was on tv). She came with another of the Legally Blond girls that I think was already kicked off the show. I also met a guy who just finished recording a pilot episode for Adult Swim....but I don't know whether it was voice over or if they do shows that aren't animated? Regardless, lots of nice people - and grilled meat! Oh, how I've missed grilled meat.
Next we walked a bit farther to another party, where the people have roof access so we could try to watch the fireworks in Manhattan. These people were all nice too, but they were mostly coworkers of my roommates from the restaurant. One girl there is leaving soon to go play Nemo in the Finding Nemo musical at Disney World, which was interesting. It was raining a bit, but we still went to the roof and we could see fireworks going off in every direction. I was just so glad to be with people watching fireworks, drinking, and eating as opposed to sitting on my couch. It was a good day.
Now I need to plan out my day today. I think I'm going to go to Brooklyn Brewery, and then who knows?



A Tiffany window at the Historical Society. This was cool because the lead that formed the magnolia branches was three dimensional and sculpted. And because I love magnolias.




Columbus Circle. I almost got ran over by a girl on a bike right after I took this picture.




Inside MoMA. The building is just so simple and perfect, I felt like I was walking through one of my sister's architectural models.




I tried to take a picture of the outside of MoMA from the sculpture garden.





My best attempt at capturing the fireworks that were going off in the East River.