Road Rage via the M7 Bus

  I don't miss driving. Yes, I miss stopping at the gas station and getting my icy 64 oz. Diet Coke, but I don't miss driving.  For the most part the New York City bus and subway system are very efficient.

  But on the days that I work at "un-named retailor" I often catch the 3:35 bus from 108th Street to 83rd Street. It should take 15 to 20 minutes with the bus stopping every two blocks.  But... there are so many factors.  First of all the busses pick up handicapped and wheel chair passengers, which can take five minutes to board.  And since I often catch the  bus after schools have dismissed for the day I am riding on what has literally turned into a school bus.  In NYC all public school students get a metro car that can be used between 5:30 a.m. and 9 p.m. for four rides weekdays.   I live one block away from a middle school.  When I get on the bus there are 30 kids from Delta Middle School waiting to board the bus.  Down the road on 92nd Street we pick up the kids from Trinity and Columbia Prep, and so it goes. ... Oh, yeah, there are the nannies and preschool set that get on at Columbus Square.  So now the bus is packed. 

  What do kids do after school?  They eat. Imagine a bus full of middle schoolers eating Fritos, Cheetos, Twizzlers, gummy bears, Pirates Booty, and RingDings and the nannies are getting out juice boxes and granola bars and Cheerios.

  I have a loud voice that carries, so I have never told anyone to whisper, but the sound of middle schoolers shouting from one end of the bus to another is ridiculous.

  I know it's not politically correct to speak ill of the handicapped, but... The other day a woman got on the bus with her walker, which took about five minutes.  The bus had to lower the ramp to the sidewalk, she slowly (I cannot emphasize the word "slowly" enough) walked onto the bus.  Then all the seniors and mother's with babies had to make room for her in the handicapped seating area.  After all this she pushed the button to get off at the next stop. Are you kidding me!!!!???

  And then there is the rude bus driver. Don't even get me started.  One night I was coming home after midnight.  Legally drivers have to stop on any street on their route after 10 p.m. when requested by a passenger.  I asked the driver to stop at 108, although the next stop was 109.  I know it's only a block but late at night I'm not crazy about walking alone down a quiet street and I don't like the idea of crossing the path of a rat on the way.  I asked for 108 and he replied, "You can't get off on 109?  Really?"  I just stood there quietly waiting for 108. He did stop but I could hear him huffing and puffing in his seat.

 One night after work a bus stopped that read "Out of Service", but he had a few passengers still onboard.  He stopped at 83rnd and let someone off.  He asked me, "Where are you going."  I relied that I was going to 108th and Manhattan Ave.  Much to my relief he said, "Get on."  On 96ths he let off the other passenger on the bus.  He turned off the interior lights and he said, "Hang on!" and we flew up Amsterdam all the way to 108th/Manhattan.  When he stopped at my bus stop he said, "You and I are both gettin' home early tonight."

  On those rare un-crowded rides I try to be present and appreciate the moment. I guess it takes all those rides where I'm wishing for a Xanex to make me really appreciate the few and far between express rides home.

Whole Foods at Rush Hour

   I was at Whole Foods around 4:30 p.m. last Thursday.  Cameron is a locavor, so I rode my bikes the eight blocks to the store to buy locally raised produce so that she can enjoy her food in good conscience,  Most of the larger grocery stores in New York City are on two levels.  You take an escalator that has a stair function for the shopper and a smooth glide function for your cart to go up and down. 

  I went downstairs with my shopping cart to begin in the fresh produce and meat department.  The place was jam packed with people.  Mom's pushing strollers and pulling small carts, seniors in their hover rounds, young professionals dashing through with their hand held baskets, and the rest of us with large carts trying to find dinner for the family.  I was in the fruit and vegetable area and there was complete grid lock.  I saw an opening but I was going to have to push past an older Jewish woman who was slowly and purposefully looking at grapefruit.  I smiled and said, "Excuse me" as I pushed my cart past hers.  I was expecting the cart handles to bump each other, but nothing more.  As I passed I saw her finger when it was already too late.  She had her left hand all the way to the far edge of her cart and he pinky was on the outer edge of the handle.  As our carts made contact she screamed, "My finger!  I think she broke my finger!".  Needless to say I stopped my forward motion.  I apologized.  She did not acknowledge that I was even speaking to her.  I offered to go the fish counter to get her ice for her finger.  She just kept saying, "I think she broke my finger."  Just to clarify, there was no blood and although I knew that it hurt (it REALLY hurt) I knew it was not broken.  Remember, there was a major traffic jam and now our interaction was just compounding the situation. I apologized profusely again, and then I just moved forward. She was not acknowledging that I was even speaking to her and I knew, although it hurt, she had not "broken". 

   I made my way down towards the dairy aisle.  I could still hear her talking about her finger.  I wondered who she was talking to and guessed that she had cornered a produce stock clerk to retell her story to.  I was about to round the corner back towards the meat counter when I heard her say, "She broke my finger and then she just strolled away!"  Ok, now she is retelling the story and making it sound like I had crushed her finger without even stopping.  I didn't dare round the corner to see who she was talking to.  Paranoia set in and I was afraid she had managed to get the attention of a manager.  If feared that if they saw me I would be escorted out of the store.

  I saw an elevator open and rushed forward to get in.  I didn't dare take take the escalator where I would be exposed for her to point out and identify. 

  Although I needed cheese for a quiche that night I made a bee line for the registers.  Thank god there was a lull and I don't think I stood in line for more than five minutes.  All the while I was expecting to have a tap on the shoulder and to be escorted from the store. 

  I once I'd finished with the register I rushed to my bike and quickly balanced my bags between the two handles.  I sped home and did not stop to look back until I was safely on stoop.

Melinda verses the New York State Department of Unemployment

    After 12 years with the company on March 21, 2014 was my last day with HRPLus .  When I hired on in 2002 it was a Mom and Pop owned business out of Evergreen, Colorado.  Since that time we have been acquired three times (I may have lost count).  In this last "merger" Sterling Infosystems acquired the small background screening company.  I have loved my time at the company.  It has been an amazing and legitimate work from home job that was perfect for me while I raised my children.  But honestly I have been looking for something else since I moved to New York City.  I did not move to NYC to work out of my apartment..  Yes, I have had the part-time job at "un-named retailer", but the dream was to find one full time job here in the city.  So when I got laid-off I actually breathed a sigh of relief.  Now I could collect un-employment, work part-time at the "un-named" retailer and finally have time in the day to really look for that dream job. 

  You cannot know your unemployment benefits until you actually apply and you must be laid-off to apply.  You apply the first Monday after your last week of work.  I did the online application but I still had questions.  On Tuesday candidate's with the initial J-N were allowed to call and speak to a human.  I spoke to Jim who has to be the friendliest and most informative government worker I have ever encountered.  I explained that since I still have a part-time job with "un-named" retailer I was not sure how much I would be eligible for in benefits.  He asked how many days a week I work for the company.  I said I work about 20 to 25 hours per week.  He said, "No, how many days?"  I said four or five.  He said he get benefits based on the days you work not the hours.  You can work one hour a day and that counts as a full day.  You can show up for work if the employer scheduled you and he sends you home due to lack of work and that is considered a day of work.  You can work strictly on commission and work all day and make no money and that is considered a day of work.  He said basically you are screwed.  He said that if "un-named retailer" only schedules me for three days I can then apply for unemployment.  I explained that HRPlus had laid me off of work after 12 years and 34 hours per week.  He said it did not matter.  He said, "You should have quit this part-time job before being given a lay-off date and you would be making more money on unemployment than if you work all week."  Are you kidding?

Trying to see the blessing for the trees

We have been in New York for 2 1/2 years.  Basing our time here on Cameron's expected date of high school graduation as June 2016 we are exactly half way through our adventure here.  Time has flown by and stood stagnant all at the same time.

Fear not, I am not going to blither on about how blessed we have been or how I've grown from this experience (although both are true). In June during a period of feeling particularly overwhelmed I told Jeff and Cameron that if I had not found one job by December I would no doubt vote for a retreat back home to Colorado where the cost of living and employment opportunities would be more abundant.  Well... here it is and I am still working 65 hours per week between the two jobs to keep ourselves solvent. Somehow time has marched on and turning around seems almost impossible both financially and emotionally. 

In early October Jeff flew back to Colorado and emptied our storage locker into a U-Haul truck and drove it  back East.  Having our things (boxes of photos, china, children's keepsakes, camping equipment, etc.) tangible again has had a huge calming affect.  Instead of feeling like half of my life was across the country I have it at my fingertips.  Last weekend we drove to the locker in Connecticut and brought back our Christmas decorations to the apartment in the city.  It sounds small, but just having the family keepsakes with me makes me feel more grounded. 

Turkey retrieved from storage locker.



For two years Cameron has participated in our church's annual pie baking for a local charitable organization.  The first year she was invited by a friend and she told me about the wonderful community she had discovered, last year I was working at "un-named retailer" and I had to work, and this year I requested the time off and was finally able to participate in what is now our family church community.  Tonight as I rolled pie dough with both new and old friends I realized how far we'd come and yet still how far I needed to go to make our New York City dream a reality.
Looking back on some of my first blogs from the fall of 2011 and I see how far we have come.  Honestly that first Christmas here felt like such a failure.  Although we want to believe that the Christmas season is more than the buying and the bows, I'm afraid my experience confirmed that for me without the financial means to "do Christmas" I felt like I had not provided for my family. I've had two jobs since January 2012, so we have kept our heads above water and enjoyed a livable household income, but I am still working too many hours for me to be much more than an observer in Jeff and Cameron's life on the Upper West Side. 

On Thursday we will venture out into the fore casted wind and cold to see our third Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade just blocks away from our wonderful duplex apartment.  We have been invited to share a feast with friends in an amazing townhouse.  And we will wear new clothes and bring food and wine to share.  We are blessed.  We are the picture of the American dream and yet I feel it is still just out of my reach. 

Not sure what this says about me.

Dog Days in the City

My  brother, Clinton, was visiting in August.  He is both a dog person and an early bird, so he and our dog, Oliver, quickly bonded over early morning coffee and newpapers.  Clinton is also a smoker so he would go out to the stoop in the morning for a smoke.  This evolved into him taking Oliver out for an early morning walk.  What Clinton discovered has been a blessing for Oliver and a pain in the butt for me.

Before 9 a.m. Central Park allows dogs in the park off leash.  We live half a block from the park. Clinton and Oliver, enjoying an early morning smoke and walk, discovered that in a five minute stroll from our apartment there is a dog jamboree going on every morning around 8 a.m. at The Hill (a wide grassy open space at the top of a hill overlooking the city).  I would estimate on any weekday morning there are 20 dogs and on the weekends there are 35 to 40. You get a wide assortments of breeds and muts, as well as scruffy and well groomed, just rolled out of bed, owners all congregating to let their furry friends socialize.

 

 

Just a side story - for several days Clinton came home to tell me about a single gal and her dog, Biscuit, who he and Oliver had befriended.  After Clinton left, I showed up at the park with Oliver.  I saw a very attractive women in her early 40's there with her dog Biscuit.  She saw me with Oliver.  I never saw her again.  I think she had assumed that Clinton was a single guy who had chattered her up.  Suddenly Clinton is gone and another woman (me) shows up with the dog.  To this day I have never seen the woman or Biscuit at the park.  I think Clinton left a broken heart on The Hill.

There are so many personalities there.  Dishevelled Columbia students with their rescue dogs, burly black men with their pit bulls named Tiffany and Diamond, elderly Jewish women with their toy poodles, childless women with their "babies" Edward Ruban and Timothy, retired men with their cocker spaniels and collies, and gay men with their miniature greyhounds and labs.  This is just an example of my dog park and is not meant to suggest that all Columbia students rescue dogs or all women longing for a baby name their dog after the child that they hope for. 

They say that people look like their dogs.  Our beloved Oliver is mix of Jack Russell Terrier and Shih Tzu. His hair is white and wirey, and his  belly is pink and bald.  Hmm... I think in this case, Jeff and I would agree and deny that he looks like a combination of both of us.

We have lived in this apartment for just over a year.  We have had a dog since February.  And since February we have lived in ignorant bliss about the dog social hour in the neighborhood.  But now that we know it's there, and Oliver definitely knows it's there, not taking him seems cruel.  Since Clinton left, there was one morning that I did not take Oliver to the park.  I  had taken him out of his crate around 6 a.m. to use his piddle pad, but I did not wake up for the walk.  When I did drag myself upstaris to begin my day I was greeted with a whole role of paper towels that had been on the bathroom floor shredded across the living room. I think he was being not so subtle about his disapproval about me sleeping in.  Telling him that Clinton is the morning person, not me, seems useless.  Pandora has been let out of the box.

Ride at Your Own Risk

I work at un-named retailor a mile and a half from my apartment.  The M-7 bus literally stops in front of my apartment building, but with all the stops and starts and the nanny's with their charges and the seniors with their walkers (and dont' even get me started with the wheelchairs) the ride can take 20 to 25 minutes.  If I ride my bike it takes 15 minutes easy.  The problem is fighting the taxis, delivery trucks, messenger bikes, and pedestrians. 

Without getting too detailed, let me explain the bike route.  The most obvious route would be to take the Columbus Avenue bike lane from 108 to 83rd, but much to popular belief, Manhattan is not flat. The road from 108 to 93rd is very hilly with a lot of major uphill battles.  Remember, I am on my way to work. Showing up perspiring, with my hair plastered to my head with sweat is not ideal.  Central Park West has the flattest terrain, but the bike lane is only going south (perfect for riding home, but not getting there).  This is my preferred route, but going against traffic is against the law and some bicyclist will go balistic on you for riding in the wrong direction. 

Once a month I go into work to do an update of the store with new merchandising.  We arrive at 6:30 a.m.  It would seem that at 6:00 a.m. going the wrong direction in a bike lane would not be an issue, but you would be surprised.  One morning I was riding against traffic and the bicyclist coming towards me said in a very cheery voice, "Good morning, Salmon."  I wasn't sure what he had said.  The second month I came across the same guy on a Sunday morning at 6:15 a.m. "Good morning, Salmon,."  I was trying to figure out why he was calling me "Salmon".  Then it struck me - salmon swim upstream.  I appreciated his humor much more than I appreciate the insane, self-appointed bike lane police who cuss you out.  And no, I'm not exaggerating.

TAXIS STOPPING IN BIKE LANES




The other night I was riding a few blocks up the Columbus Avenue bike route heading home.  There is a grocery store on 91st and Columbus so I was riding the wrong direction on the downtown path.  Most of the cyclists I passed were delivery messengers who regulary go whatever direction gets them to their destination fastest, so they don't say anything, but this one guy caught me at a stop light.  He started screaming at me, "You are going the f#$@ wrong direction.  What the f*^%$ do you think you are doing.  Get off the f^%&# path."  (you get the idea).  I honestly thought of getting out my cell phone and calling the police telling them I was being assaulted, but the light changed and I was able to peddle away from his tirade.  It's really hard to shake off a madman screaming and cussing in your face, but I get cussed out at least once a week for my direction choice.   Don't think that I am alone riding in the wrong direction.  I see law breakers riding towards me all the time when I am in the right, but needless to say I don't say a word to them, because I understand their fear of riding with the motor traffic with no skinny white line to set a boundry.

DELIVERY TRUCK BLOCKING BIKE LANE FORCING CYCLIST TO RIDE IN TRAFFIC LANE


 

On the days that I do ride down Central Park West with traffic and go without the safety of the bike lane line to keep me safe I come across all sorts of obstacles.  The biggest object is the double parked delivery truck.  That forces me into the fast lane with all the other street traffic racing down the road. Another hidden danger is the fear of a driver who has just parked on the curb opening his door, so that you are suddenly confronted with a wide open door blocking your way.  I've heard of bicylcists going crashing into the door and over their handlebars, a term in New York called being 'doored', but I've never had the encounter myself  (fingers crossed).

I WAS ABOUT TO GET A GREAT PHOTO OF THIS WOMAN RIDING NEAR LINCOLN CENTER, BUT SHE ABORTED HER MISSION AND JOINED THE PEDESTRIANS BECAUSE THE TRAFFIC WAS SO HEAVY 

Last summer I didn't have a helmet or bicycle lights.  I have since added a helmet and a front and rearlight to my bike.  Forget reflectors, you need battery operated lights in the front and back so that both drivers and other bicyclists can see you blinking in the distance.  I must admit that I don't always wear my helmet to work because, as I said before, I am trying to get to work looking pulled together, but I always wear one at night when I ride home.

 

October will come and, with it, cold weather.  In a way, it offers a sense of relief not having the option to ride the bike, because to say it's dangerous is in no way an exaggeration,  But on an afternoon when I'm running late switching gears from one job to another and I need to get to un-named retailer in 15 mintues or less there is no subsitute for riding Jordan's lime green Townie to work (she gave me permission to ride it while she is in Japan).  Riding my bike to work has become part of my New York summer.  Someday I will look back and wonder what the hell I was thinking at 50 years old, fighting traffic and insane bicylists, but for now it's all part of the adventure.

Melinda Malcolm Neiblum verses NY State DMV

I have held onto my Colorado license for two reasons, 1) it's a good photo and 2) having it still makes me a Coloradan, but time marches on and license expire.  So... in May I headed off to the DMV to officially become a New York State resident.  I read all of the reviews on Yelp and thought I knew the ins and out of getting a new license at the Herald Square DMV. I arrived 30 minutes early per the Yelp instructions and stood next to a very irritated Asian woman who told me that she is a plastic surgeon and she had received a DWI after only a few glasses of wine and was now being put the ringer by he court and the DMV. After a long 30 minutes we were let in. Per the Yelp instructions I skipped the wait in the information line and headed straight to the line for photos.  I showed my identification papers to the disengaged girl who accepted what I had as proof of identity.  She then asked me to read a yellowed eye chart on a pillar behind her.  I was wearing my mono vision contacts.  In Colorado the test is a simulated road test which the mono vision would have worked well for, but an eye chart? tried and failed.  She said I could repeat.  I sluggishly continued. She said, "If you can't read it quickly you fail."  I replied, "Then I fail."  She gave me a form and told me that I could have my optometrist fill it out if I have current prescription for eye wear.

I went to the eye doctor.  He tweaked my prescription but told me the DMV should have passed me with my mono vision contacts. But now I had the current form filled out.

I returned three weeks later. 

Again I arrived at 7:30 a.m. to get in line.  This time the man I was standing next to was the embodiment of Ed Norton from the Honeymooners.  He talked non-stop about having to take time off of his construction job for the city to get his license renewed.  I had on my headphones but he ignored them, so I eventually just took them off and listened to him drone on.   Let me just add the building had scaffolding on the outside so the line was under the scaffolding.  When he ran out of things to say he would do pull ups on the scaffolding.  He was 40 if he was a day, so the pull-ups added to the absurdity of the situation.  Ok, 8 a.m.  We are let in.   I went directly to the photo line.  The woman asked for my identification.  "Sorry, this is not sufficient.  You can see a manager and see if they will accept it."  I was sent to another window and a manager reviewed my documents.  She looked at my birth certificate, marriage, certificate, social security card, and Colorado license.  She said, "How did you get that social security card?"  I told her that the baby Melinda Diane Malcolm married Jeff Neiblum, and the social security administration saw fit to issue me a new social security card with the name Melinda Malcolm Neiblum.  DENIED.  She needed more proof.  I needed to bring in an addition piece of documentation to prove who I am.

Really?  Really? (I never even got to the eye exam)

I went to the bank and had my debit card re-issued with my full name and I had my life insurance policy add Malcolm as my middle name. 

To be honest I was in no rush to go back to the DMV.  Two early mornings down and still no new license.  I wasn't really sure that three would be a charm, but I was going to Missouri for a vacation and I wanted to have my New York State license in tow.  After two years living here I wanted to prove to my family that living in the city was not a lark but in fact I am a legal resident.  So I trudged down to 34th Street one more time.

I got there a little late so I didn't have time to befriend another DMV weary friend.  I got in quickly.  I showed my id to the first window.  She accepted what I had.  She asked me to read the chart. I showed her my documentation from my eye doctor.  She told me to stand in front of the blue wall for my photo.  Not really believing I would get this far I had on no make-up and my hair was flat, so I still wish I could have used my old Colorado photo.  I was sent to the next window.  I showed my paperwork.  I laid out my birth certificate, my wedding certificate (which he eyed for several minutes before approving), my social security card, my Colorado license, and my bank debit card and statement.  Slowly, very slowly he stamped my new paper license.  He said the photo id would be in the mail within two weeks.

I left the DMV on cloud nine.  I rode the subway home.  As soon as I stepped back into the sunlight I shouted, "Oh, @#&!."  I was flying to Missouri in three days and I had just traded in my only legal form of picture id for a paper document saying I had a license.

Here we go again.  This time - Melinda Malcolm Neiblum verses the TSA.  Sigh....

Uncle Sam and New York City, the tax man

A friend recently made a visit from Evergreen to New York.  It was wonderful to see Sue's smiling face at my apartment door.  We had arranged to meet for breakfast, but I wanted her to stop by the apartment so that she could see our new digs and report back to my book club on my living conditions.  I hope she liked it and the review was good.  $2,600 a month for my apartment is hard to swallow unless you live in NYC and have a handle on what rentals look like.

I gave Sue the tour of my neighborhood including a walk by St. John the Divine and Columbia University. We ended up at my favorite breakfast spot, La Monde Café.   We spoke candidly about my experience in the city and Sue asked whether or not my lack of finances had actually hampered my original idea of what we would be able to experience in the city as residents.  I think I answered with a pat answer of "we love the city and there is so much to do here that is either free or practically free to residents if you know the right person to talk to or the appointed day to go".  And that is true.

But it's April.  Tax time.  And the Big Apple is giving our Colorado butts a serious kick this year!

Somehow my second job to make ends meet put us into a new tax bracket.  Really?  Really?  Somehow Uncle Sam thinks we are part of the 1%, ok, not the 1%, but somewhere that I'm not.

I saw a news feed on MSN that gave the 10 states with the highest taxes.  No surprise New York was numero uno - #1!. Sigh...

So back to Sue's question: after all is said and done can you afford what you wanted to do when you moved to New York City?

The answer is a resounding Yes and a  humbled No.

There is a lot to do for free.  Museums (entrance fees are for the most part "suggested donations), bike paths all over the city, free kayaking on the Hudson, Central Park, free days at the Zoo, free Shakespeare in the park, etc..., but every day living expenses will kill you.  Metro prices just went up from $2.25 per ride to $2.50.  Grocery store prices are high because all items are full price and name brand - nothing generic..

Jeff and I tried to pin point our largest expense that we have in New York opposed to life in Colorado. It was an easy answer.  Eating out.  Back home we ate out every weekend at Tokyo Joe's, Panera,  Qdoba, etc... For holiday and birthdays we would go to places like Macaroni Grill or PF Changs.  Because life in NYC is so confined to small apartments people tend to socialize in cafes and restaurants.  You may have lunch in a café and linger over a coffee, passing the time of day people watching.  It's just different. But financially it's a big difference.  It's not something that we added to our budget when we were calculating things before our move.

I work from 8 to 3 Monday - Friday for HRPlus and I work at "un-named retailer" 30 hours per week.  When I do have time off I don't want to sit in my apartment.  I want to be out and about.  Certainly in the cold winter months relaxing after work in a restaurant where there is no shopping to do and no dishes to clean up is a very desirable option. Hey, don't lecture me.  I know it doesn't make fiscal sense, but what's the point of working two jobs if I'm not getting some reward for all of my hours of labor. Unfortunately, the tax man decided that between Jeff s salary and my two jobs we have become the elite bourgeois and we need to tally up. But... I'm not sure how to cut the fat without becoming the working poor.

It's getting harder to justify life in here in New York. I love the city, I love the people, I love my friends, and our community, but at what point do we decide that instead of taking a bite out of the Big Apple we are being eaten up ourselves. 

A Weekend Away

Last weekend my baby girl, Cameron, turned 15.  I took the weekend off of "un-named retailer", we rented a car and headed for Princeton, New Jersey.   I had not been out of Manhattan except for some Saturday train trips to the beach since last May when I went to St. Louis for my brother's wedding.  Everyone else in the family has been on several long weekend or weeks away visiting friends or on business trips, so they have all tasted suburbia or small town living within recent memory. 

After we checked into our hotel we  headed out for a lovely dinner downtown and then to our ultimate destination, Wal-Mart.  I have not been to a Wal-Mart in the year and half since I left Colorado.  Now, this is not a conversation about the pros and cons of the mega store.  This is just an insight from someone who has spent her life having access to the convenience and low cost that the store has to offer.  I got my shopping cart, took off my coat, and began the fun!  We started in cosmetics and spent a lot if time browsing nail polish and make-up concealers before heading onto shampoo and toothpaste.  The only litmus test for prices that I conducted was L'Oreal hair color.  It was $7.95 per box, which is the very low end of the price point that that product goes for.  After that, I put whatever I wanted in the basket knowing that I would never find it in Manhattan for less.  We did not frivolously fill our basket, but I did buy things like a three way  outlet plug, a pair of pajama pants, a picture frame, birthday wrapping paper, Nestle's semi-sweet chocolate, and computer paper which I knew we needed  but that I had waited to buy, or didn't buy, because I was looking for the odds and ends at a decent price. When we checked out I piled my goods on the counter with glee.  The person at the register was a man in his mid 50's who looked like life had passed him by and his words were as empty as his gaze, "Did you find everything alright?" he asked and I replied, "I had the most wonderful shopping experience.  I found everything I was looking for and some things that I didn't even realize that I needed.  Thank you."  I told him what had brought us to Princeton on this rainy January night and then he began telling me that he had lived in Germany for a number of years and that his life in Princeton was just a brief stop on his life's journey as he raised his three daughters. Wal-Mart never disappoints

Now you would think that living in Manhattan shopping for clothes would be a joy.  Variety is abundant.  The latest trends and fashions are available.  But....  the masses.  There is always a crowd.  Your idea of holiday madness is every day in the city.  Some days you just want to buy a pair of jeans and some t-shirts.  So we headed to Kohl's.  Cameron needed new jeans and tops.  We left the store with clothing essentials for Cameron to get through the spring. I'm not so naive as to think that she isn't going to have many, many special occasions, but the jeans and t's are taken care of with no overcrowded fitting rooms and impossibly long check-out lines. 

We had lunch at Panera.  I live across the street from two delis that are both insanely inexpensive (by New York standards).  I can get a foot long Italian for $6.50 at the Dominican bodega or a turkey/avocado sandwich at the Indian corner store for $6.00.  But there is something to be said about knowing that if I go into the Panera at Southwest Plaza in Denver or a Panera in Princeton, NJ the Chicken Frontaga is going to be exactly what you expect it to be.

Ok, I can hear my locavore daughter and Manhattan friends railing against what I've written.  Hey, I get it.  I understand "viva la difference".  I live it and I love it.  But this blog is about stepping back into the ease of living outside of Manhattan..  And there is no denying that living outside of New York City is easy living.  Access to a variety of products and services at reasonable prices is at your doorstep and there is a LOT to be said for that.

It was foggy and cold on Sunday when we came back into the city, so Manhattan looked dark and dreary.  Jeff dropped us off at the apartment and he drove the few blocks to the Hertz garage to drop off the car.  I love living in New York, but on this particular night coming "home" was hard.

I'm in love with my exterminator!

   The first week that we moved in I was walking down the spiral stairs to the downstairs bedroom and I heard squeeking at the baseboards on the first floor. Squeeking like a nest of baby mice. YES!  Please feel free to feel my horror!  We went out that weekend and bought several RidX plug-ins (they emit a high frequency that is supposed to irritate rodents, hence shooing them away).  And... it worked.  It worked for about a month.  Then the scurrying noises began.  Sounds of tiny feet running along the wall.  We have stairs that lead half a flight up to Cameron's bedroom and you could hear them scrambling under the stairs.

  Please don't think this wasn't upsetting, because it was.  Our apartment management company changed in September, but when we called the old managment company in July with our complaints (we moved into this apartment in June) they sent a guy out.  He was a nice enough fellow named Jonathan, but he brushed it off as life in New York City in an old apartment building.  Well, if you think about it that's stupid because almost all apartment building in New York are at least 100 years old and not all of them have rodent problems. But because he was the exterinator "on staff" in the building I just went with it.

  Last month the problem worsened.  The sound of the mice in the wall was more constant and the sound under the stairs sounded like larger bodies (I won't say the word).  One night we were watching TV and we heard a thud.  We all stopped, looked at the stairs, looked back at each other, and said "s*&^%, that was big!" 

   The kitchen opens up into the living room so if you are sitting on the couch and something in the kitchen happens you can hear it.  A week later, and again we are watching television.  In the middle of watching "Jeff Who Lives at Home" there was the sound of a pot lid in the cabinet falling.  We put the movie on pause.  We looked at each other with wide eyes and I probably screamed, although that is a blur. 

  Jeff went over to the counter and opened the bottom cabinet doors.  He stuck his head in and looked around with the flashlight.  The cabinets are deep so he looked back towards the wall were the pipes come into the apartrment.  There, perched on a cooking pot in the direct beam of the flashlight, was a little mouse staring back at him.  He said there was a moment of recognition and then the mouse scurried back into the hole in the wall.  All the while I am sitting on the couch frozen with fear.  I can't believe it.  It's one thing to hear them in the wall, but now they have infiltrated.  There is no safe place.  Jeff found some steel wool and stuffed the hole.  We go back to the movie.  Suddenly we hear the cabinet door shut as if something was trying to push it open but was unable to succeed.  Dear god!  They are trying to push their way out of the cabinet.  Forget the frickin' movie.  I am over the top!  Jeff returns with the flashlight.  He examines his steel wool work and sees that the mouse (mice) have pushed it out.  We tied the cabinet doors closed and decide to call the exterminator the next morning.  When we move away from the cabinet and start getting ready for bed the cats lie down in front of the cabinet with their eyes fixed on the door.  Really?  As if I don't know the mice are in there the cats are now going to set up camp to remind me that they can smell the little critters just inches away in the cabinets.

  The next morning I called the new exterminating company contracted with the new management in our apartment buidling.  They guy showed up mid morning, so that was fantastic.  I telecommute and my desk is in the living room.  The cats were still staring at the cabinet and every time the heating pipes knocked I felt my heart race, so the exterminator could not get here fast enough.  When the guy got here he introduced himself as "Fida".  He was a good looking young Pakastinian in his late 20's.  I told him what had happened and I told him I was FREAKING out.  He stayed calm and spoke in a soothing manner.  He said his company had just acquired the exterminating contract on the buidling and they were keenly aware of the rodent problem.  He said that they were working on the laundry room and the courtyard for, dare I say it... rats... and the interior for mice.  He said it might take a few weeks to complete the job in my apartment but he would work with me directly and get the job completed.  He went under the cabinets and filled the holes (yes plural, he found three holes) with steel wool then put a sheet of sticky mouse trap paper up to cover the hole.  He said that even if the mice pulled the steel wool out, they would be confronted with the sticky paper which they would not like.  He then drilled several tiny holes in the wall where we had heard noises, he shot poison in, and then put little green stickers on the holes so that he could come  back in two weeks and put more poison in.  He wrote his name and number on a piece of paper and he told me to call him any time if I wanted him to return before the prescribed two weeks was up.  I immediatly put the number on the fridge.

  During the week we did hear some scampering behind the walls, but it was much diminished from before.  I wanted to call the exterminator, but Jeff said that he had said to wait two weeks.  Much to my surprise and delight a week later I got a knock on the door.  It was Fida checking in.  He had been checking some of his work in other parts of the building and wanted to see if I was ok and if I'd seen any changes.  Ok, now THAT is service.  I told him I'd heard some slight sounds near the stairs so he shot some more poison in that area of the wall.

  Fida could have been like many New York service workers and been curt and dismissive.  Instead he listened.  He promised to do his best to correct the situation.  And he smiled a reassuring smile.  He's obviously not afraid of rodents, but he did not mock my fear and he seemed to understand my inability to live in a house where mice might pop their heads out of the cabinet doors.

  It has now been two weeks; there are no sounds of mice at all.  All the holes are still patched.  No - I'm not confident that the situation is taken care of.  Fida even said that in New York it's not a matter of completing a job, it's all about getting the initial job taken care of then maintaining the property. 

  As you know, we moved from 80th to 108th Street this summer.  Unlike some things, rodents do not pick and choose locations based  upon real estate prices.  As a matter of fact, the rat issue was a huge problem on 80th Street.  I used to sit on our stoop and talk on the phone, but (especially in the summer) the sight of rats scurrying underneath the cars parked on the street was a nightly occurance.  For some reason I don't notice it on our new street at all. About a year ago there was an article on the news about a children's playground on 77th Street and Amsterdam that was overrun by rats at night. The city was working to clean up the problem.  Hmm... I think I may have talked half of the people who wanted to come to New York City to visit out of their trips.  I hope not.  99.9% of visitors will never see a rat in New York City, but 99.9% of the people who live here will have.  My blog is all about what it's like to live in NYC so I guess this is just another part of my experience here.  I'm just trying to take it all in stride, although I have to admit this element of city living is one I'd gladly have skipped.

Let the Season begin...

  This time last year I was looking for a job and trying not to see Christmas happening around me. For the first time in my adult life I did not have any desposable income to spend on decorations or gifts. It may have been the darkest I've ever felt.  But I've been working two jobs since February and although it's taken months to catch up there is light at the end of the tunnel.  Today I was able to begin enjoying our second holiday season in New York.

  Cameron and a group of her friends from her youth group decided to go to Macy's to see Santa. My dear friend, Charlene, said that she was going to accompany the kids since her 12 year old son wanted to go and she didn't want to saddle the older kids with keeping track of the younger youth. Since I had the rare Saturday off from "un-named retailer", I decided to join the merry band.  I was shocked by the line.  The North Pole is on the 8th floor of Macy's.  The line begins in an area of the store that is decorated for Santa's Workshop, but you quickly wind out of the workshop and start making you way back through the human resources and accounting departments. Of course I thought of the offices in "A Miracle on 34th Street" and it looked very much the same as the 60 year old movie. Much to my surprise the line moved very fast, but there was a reason for that.  Unlike mall Santa's where there is just one Santa.... at Macy's there a at least ten.  Once your are ushered into the Winter Wonderland you follow a path that is filled with absolutely breathtaking decorations and murals and at a certain point an elf directs you into a certain line artery.  All of the sudden you are in a cozy room in the presence of the jolly old elf himself.  The elf helper asked if we wanted a photo taken by Macy's or if we wanted to use our own cameras.  We opted for both. The kids handed Charlene and I their phones and asked that we snap a quick pic.  OK, I don't know how to take a picture with these new fangled touch screen phones.  I tried but I think I handed back most phones with blurry pictures, 10 pictures in an instant, or no photo at all. Our Santa was a little lacking in gurth and Cameron later noted from the photo that he had a bit of a comb over in his bangs, but all in all he was a jolly fellow and he took the time to ask each person what they wanted for Christmas.  It was a more sophisticaed list of wishes as the kids are primarily in high school, including wishes for college acceptance letters, IPads, clothes, and world peace.  After spending the later part of the Santa experience in the North Pole I had to laugh when after you exit the room with Santa you are ushered back into an unadorned hallway and ultimately spit out into a room filled with screeens to view your photos with the elves hurrying people to the counters to buy the photo packages.

 




  Jeff and Jordan met me after the Santa experience and we headed off to Christmas shop as the youth group headed back uptown to the Christmas pageant play rehearsal and ultimately to a youth group lock-in at the church. 
 
  Before we began our midtown madness we stopped at a Mexican Restaurant and ordered spciey tacos and margaritas to prepare ourselves for the crowds that we were about to encounter.



   We stopeed at K-Mart first. Let me explain that in NYC, unlike there rest of the country, big box discount stores are rare. Since I've lived here I have only been to Target twice, K-Mart once, and never to a Wal-Mart. Although we ventured in looking for Christmas tree lights and decorations I couldn't resist socks and underwear, which took us through shoes and accessories.  So many little affordable things to buy, but... I stayed focused.  Downstairs we found endless strings of lights, decorations, and holiday sweetes (Queen Anne's Chocolate Covered Cherries, Archway Cashew Nougets, and Little Debbie's - dont' take these things for granted my midwestern friends). One of the apartments across the street from our apartment has a string of lights blinking in their windows and the girls and I have been looking for something to compete, but were weren't able to find anything interesting or worthy of the competition.  We live in a re-gentrified neighborhood, but their is still a strong Dominican presence so we have to make a statement with our window decorations. $160 later, we left with apartment deocrations, Christmas dvd's, secret Santa gifts, and socks. 

  After K-Mart, which does not have a bathroom (really? a three story store with no restroom?) we headed back to Macy's to use the bathroom. We made our way through the crowd of shoppers to the 2nd floor.  The line for the women's restroom was out of the bathroom through the shoe department and into junior clothing.  Insane.  Forget it. 

  Jordan had a gift idea for Cameron at the Disney Store in Time Square so we began to make our way uptown via Broadway.  The night was cold but the streets were filled with shoppers and the windows were decorated with Christmas scenes.  We made our way to the Disney Store.  The sidewalks were so crowded in Time Square that when we stood in front of the store I took Jeff and Jordan's hands and said, "Alright, lets make a break for it" and we pressed our way to the door through the throngs of shoppers heading uptown/downtown. A mall can be exasperating, but these masses are an element to be reckoned with. Once you are in the store you have to stay on the course of the crowd.  You can stop and look, but don't try going against that tide to revisit an item or you will be slammed. 

  I still had to use the bathroom.  There is a Doubletree Hotel on 49th Street and Broadway.  The entrance is a non-descript elevator entrance and the lobby is on the 2nd floor.  When you live in New York you have scouted out the best public bathrooms in the city.  You have a few catagories; quickest access, cleanest, and most secretive.  The Doubletree scores high marks for cleanest and most secretive.  When we sat down in the plush cocktail lounge I felt the blood rushing from my feet up into my legs and when I stood again it sent pins and needles into my feet. While I was in the restroom Jordan went up to the front desk and asked for cookies.  Doubletree offers free chocolate chip cookies to their guests. The front desk agent did not ask for a room number or i.d., but instead asked how many cookies she wanted.  We sat in the peace and quiet of the lobby for a good 30 minutes enjoying the seating, the quiet, and the cookies.  We thought about buying a cocktail, but decided that we would leave the $15 glasses of wine to the tourists.  Jordan stole my camera out of my bag and took this most unflatettering picture of Jeff and me, but since it's out there I decided to post it so that you could feel our exhaustion at 4:55 in the afternoon.



  Ultimately we headed back uptown on the B Train with other weary shoppers heading home after a day in the heat of the holiday season. Choral groups hopped subway cars singing holiday tunes and shaking their hats for change keeping the day lively and exhausting from being to end.

Chose Where You Get Your Flu Shot Based on Zip Code

   Let me just start with this thought.  Just as not every doctor should be a surgeon, not every pharmacist should administer vaccinations.

   Last week we actually found an evening that we were all home together.  After dinner we headed the two blocks over to Amsterdam Avenue to get our flu shots at Duane Reade/Walgreens. 

    In June we moved from the affluent West 80th and Amsterdam (zip code 10024) to the more, shall we say, culturally diverse West 108th and Manhattan Avenue (zip code 10025). Last year when we got our flu shots in the old neighborhood the pharmacist at Duane Reade/Walgreens was a tall silver haired sage.  He was very relaxed in his manner and put us at ease as he quickly and competently gave painless flu shots. 

  The pharmacist this year was a very young woman with frizzy strawberry blond hair and thick wire framed glasses.  I only note this because I thought to myself that although she was quite young  that she must have spent her college years focused on her studies and not her vanity.  This is a perfect example of "don't judge a book by it's cover".

  I got my shot first.  It should be a quick prick and a Band-aid.  But... this was a jab and a slow release of serum.  Ouch!

  Jeff was next. 

  While he was getting his shot I walked over to see how Jordan was doing anticipating her turn.  Jordan is notoriously afraid of needles.  I have seen her pass out and seizure during a blood draw.  The last time she had a dental filling she told the dentist that she was afraid of needles and he dismissed it until he gave her the Novocaine shot and she was out cold.  She said she remembers getting the shot and the next thing she knew she woke up in a darkened room wearing an oxygen mask, the dentist sitting next to her holding her hand, and the entire staff peering in the doorway.  I told her that she looked rather nervous and that maybe she should wait.  She said she was determined to do it tonight to get it over with. When she asked if it were painful I lied, hoping mine had been a fluke.

  When Jordan sat in the hot seat she told the pharmacist that she was prone to fainting but the young woman just said that she'd never seen anything like that before over something as simple as a flu shot. I walked away so that I wouldn't add to Jordan's nerves.  After browsing the toothpaste aisle for a minute I returned to Jordan's side.  She was still sitting in the chair.  I asked her how she was doing and she said "fine".  In an instant her eyes went blank and she started to have small seizures.  As this was happening the pharmacist who had been chatting with Jordan moments before literally took two steps AWAY from the patient.  I remember thinking, "Wait, you are the medical professional!"  Jordan was out for about fifteen seconds and never once did the pharmacist speak, a lot less come to her aid. 

  Later I asked Jordan what had happened.  She said it was  a combination of the pharmacist saying "oh, I'm sorry" during the shot and the pharmacist asking her to hold the cotton ball while she undid the Band-aid and when she pulled the cotton ball away there was a speck of blood. 

  At the very beginning when the pharmacist put on the latex gloves and her fingers got stuck to the Band-aids she was preparing I should have listened to my instincts and headed the mile and a half back down to 79th Street.  It may not seem very far as the crow flies but in corporate personnel placement, the pharmacist on tony 79th street (zip code 10024) would have earned his cushy location through a combination of experience and excellent service, whereas the more off beat locations, I assume, would be a launching ground for less experienced or less proficient pharmacists.

  Oh, well.  Another valuable lesson learned in the big city: location, location, location.

Big Disappointments and little Blessings

This will be a short blog because it's more of a thought than a full fledged story.

and let me preface it by saying that my sister has told me "enough with the negativity.  I can't take it anymore".  I wanted to say to her "welcome to my world", but I choked back the tears and let her talk.

I have been planning for months a trip back to Colorado in the fall. My Colorado book club is having a retreat to a condo in Frisco next weekend and I have been focussing my dream on going to the retreat to reconnect with my beloved friends as well as to take the opportunity to go to Denver to see Hunter's new apartment as well as to go to our storage locker and ship back to New York some things that will make our apartment feel more like home (Halloween/Christmas decorations, family photos, etc..).  I guess I knew by the 1st week in September that the finances were impossible, but I didn't tell anyone until this past weekened.  I just kept praying that I'd win lotto or some ship would come in.   I even think Jeff thought I was going until I said something to him about my work schedule a few days ago and he said, "I thought you were going home next weekend?"

I had a wonderful birthday on Saturday.  Actually, it was one of the nicest birthdays I can remember.   Very low key.

My friend Charlene and her daughter Jessie invited Cameron and me out to breakfast.  They generously treated us to brunch at my new favorite restaurant The Kitchenette on Amsterdam and 125th Street (shabby chic decor and comfort foods).  We walked home through Morningside Park and stopped by a farmers market near our apartment to buy apples, corn, and eggs. I don't want to gush, but... Charlene and Jessie are earthly angles.   I honestly can't imagine what would have happened to us if they had not taken us on as their friends. 

With my weekday schedule doing verifications for HR Plus, and my evenings and weekends job working for "un-named retailer" I have not  been biking in Central Park with my familly all summer.  I live on 108th and Central Park West so this is riduculous!  I was determined that on my Big 5-0 we would spend a few hours biking come hell or high water.  We did it!  We biked through the park and took a detour via 5th Avenue and 110th to reach the Conseratory Garden which is Central Park's botanical garden. It's paradise in the city.

Afterwards, home.  Nap.  Get dressed for the evening.

I had heard on New York Live, Channel 4 that Max Brenner's was the place to dine for chocoloate lovers.  That would be me.  Jeff made the reservaation. 

We left the house at 7:45 and we had 8:01 reservations down on Broadway and 14th Street.  We never take cab, but... it was my birthday and we were running so late.  Lesson learned.  Take the subway.  $25 dollars and 25 minutes later we made it to the restaurant via yellow cab.   I must admit it was nice being stuck in traffic in midtown Manhattan looking up at St. Patrick's Catherdral and the Empire State as we slowly made our way down 5th Avenue, but the traffic was unexpected and annyong. We made it to the chocolate paradise and had a lovely dinner.  Next time I think we should just go for dessert.  By the time the chocoloate decadence arrived after our meal I was almost to full to eat.  Almost..., but I made room. LOL!

Home.  A nice glass of wine.  And it was done.  Welcome to 50.  It feels pretty good.

Subways, PATH trains, and Rental Cars

On Saturday I had the day off  (Labor Day Weekend).  Feeling like I have been basically cheated of summer due to my work schedule I researched my options very carefully.  In Colorado we loved tubing, be it the Yampa River in Steamboat Springs, the Animas  River in Durango, or Clearkcreek in Golden. And I really missed that last summer.  I think my Google search was river tubing near New York City http://delawarerivertubing.com/.  The search that came up was the" Delaware River Tubing, Co.- Home of the Famous River Hot Dog Man".

We live deep in Manhattan.  And the last time I was out of the city (besides a few day trips to Long Island to Long Beach for a day of surf and sun) was in May when I went to St. Louis to go to my brother Brett's wedding. I had to make this day count. Although I love Camie and would have loved to have spent the day with her going down the lazy river I suggested that she bring a friend to make the day a little more exciting for her.  She invited her friend Carlota, who is a 100% lovely young girl, void of any annoying flaw.  Carlota has lived in New York City her whole live, the daughter of an artist/Soho gallery art director and a fashion designer, so she understands the task of getting out of the city and into the fresh air. The task being the getting there.  I had layed out an affordable plan.  Jeff, Cam, and I understand the art of the budget, so it was wise of Cam to include a friend who does not own a car or have access to a car service to come with us.  When we told Carlota that we would take the #1 train to Chambers Street, the PATH train from World Trade Center to Jersey City, and a rental car from Jersey City to Frenchtown, New Jersey she did not blank an eye.  Like any true New Yorker she appreciated that two and half hours of transportation would transport her from an urban environment to a sleepy Revolutionary War township.

With toasted bagels and Vitamin Waters in tow we headed to Broadway and 110th to the #1 subway to Chambers Street.  We got off on Chambers Street, came up from the subway to walk to the two blocks to the the PATH train entrance at the World Trade Center.  OK, so I digress, but the whole World Trade Center area has a weird vibe.  It has a bizarre muted quality to it.  Perhaps, people are not as loud in that area of the city due the the history, but is has a strange sound quality that no other area of the city has. So we walk the two blocks and look up at the new world trade towers being erected. They are both awe inspiring and terrifying.  I've been looking for a dream job and honestly I'm not sure that I would ever step foot in an elevator in that building.  Too much history or too much fear, I'm not sure which.

On the the PATH train. Four minutes on the train and we were in New Jersey. Actually the view from Jersey City into Manhattan was awesome.  Now we had to walk the two blocks to the Hertz Rental Car Agency.  Understand that just over the river in Manhattan a rental car for one day over Labor Day Weekend is $180 and up, but just over/or under the river in New Jersey the same car is $90, which Jeff had in frequent driver miles.  Hence the subway and PATH train rides.  I don't know if it was the power of Jeff's corporate card or they were simply out of compacts but they upgraded us to a mid size.  The drive was about an hour and a half to Frenchtown, NJ.  New Jersey gets a bad rap due to its industrial area in the north, but the area we were in was gorgeous, old farm houses, old growth forest and historic hamlets.  There was a detour, due to downed power lines, that did take us a bit out of our way, but we found an old graveyard that we stopped at and we met some friendly folks at a gas station that gave us directions to the river outfitters, so it was all good.

The family that owns this company has all bases covered: parking fees, tube rentals, food on the river, and transportation to and from your car.  Actually, it's a brilliant idea.  It's all local and family owned, so gotta give it to the locals for making bank in their own backyard.   I have to say the most ingenious part is the food on the river.  Half way through the four hour tubing trip there is a stop at the "Famous Hot Dog Man".  It is opened to all, but it is part of the tubing package at the Delaware River Tubing Company.  With the package you get a hot dog/or cheeseburger, drink, and chips/candy bar. The stand and grills are set up in the water so that you wade about thigh deep out to the stand to order your food and drinks, which considering the heat was quite refreshing. 

Ready to go!

Cameron has a odd allergy to cold that makes her break out in hives and sure enough when the girls caught up with us for lunch Cam's hands, legs, stomach were bright red.   Of course I forgot to bring along the Benedryl, which made me feel equal parts bad mother and hysterical because I feared what might happen if her hives worsened over the course of the float trip. Spoiler Alert - when she got out of the water five hours after entering she was fine.

At one point I was floating down a particularly lazy part of the river.  I was watching puffy clouds morph into magical objects.  I thought to myself that this would be a perfect time for prayer.  But as I laid my head back and resumed my observation of the clouds I decided I was too relaxed to pray.  And I think that's OK. May-be God's plan for me that day was to do nothing more than watch the clouds.  Sometimes silence is the best form of prayer.

Jeff and I reached the exit points about 45 minutes before Cameron and Carlotta.  Slowly, slowly the girls floated down the river and joined us.  Carlotta had an awesome underwater camera and basically the girls used the float trip as a backdrop for a photo shoot.  Unfortunately, Carlotta has not posted her pics yet to Facebook for me to steal, so I only a one from my lame land locked camera of the girls in the parking lot. 

Five hours after we began the float down the Delaware River.  No worse for the wear.

After we got back to the car and changed out of our damp bathing suits we headed into Frenchtown for dinner.  It's a tiny tourist town, but the historic preservation committee has done an amazing job of preserving this Revolutionary War town.  We found a cafe with outdoor seating which was all well and good until the mosquito started biting me.  After never getting a mosquito bite all summer I was suddenly dinner.  Ugh... The next day I counted six huge bites.  Oh, well, if that's the worst part of any day....

After dinner we headed back to the city.  The girls slept in the car, we stopped and got gas and my 44 oz. diet pepsi, and we listened to top 40 radio.  It was an hour and a half of zen.  We returned our car to the Hertz Agency in Jersey City.  We took a few minutes to observe the view of Manhattan from the Jersy side before re-entery the choas of the city.

Then we got back on the Path Train and headed home via the #1 Train to the Upper West Side. And that's how you do a day out of the city.

                                                                                               

The Best Tourist, and why...

The last time Clinton and I we were in New York City together was in 1985 when I was a single, club hopping, hipster living in Manhattan and he was a college student visiting me from Missouri. I took him to all the hottest night spots and left him to tour the city by himself during the day while I did my day job at Morgan Stanely to support my groovy lifestyle. So being back together after 27 years in the city was rather daunting. Not only am I no longer a hipster but I wasn't sure how I was going to recreate the fun and excitment of our youth.

Clinton has an awesome son, Blake, who helped us move into tiny our apartment on West 80th Street last summer when he was doing a college internship in Albany. So we were looking forward him visiting again and seeing our awesome, new,(spacious) apartment on 108th Street. He appeared to be appropriately impressed and we were glad to have made it through the year to show him that his moving skills last summer had not been in vain.

The trip was a college graduation gift to Blake who just graduated from Kansas State. They made their plane reservations and built on that. Actually, after all was said and done they only set aside the Saturday of their visit to spend with us. They had a big picture plan of what they wanted to see. Of course that is always about 50% more than what is humanly possible to see in city like New York, but they made a valent effort. Blake also had some friends that he wanted to see, so we were not the only tour guides on their agenda.

Now to begin the fun.

I told my brother not to deviate from the plan of getting from Laguardia Airport to my apartment on 108th and Manhattan Avenue (an estimated $30 yellow cab ride). All he had to do was stand in the yellow cab line at the airport and he would be ushered into a cab and dropped off at my doorstep in 20 mintues. At one point I called and asked where he was. Answer "yellow cab line". Second call I asked where he was and he answered "in a cab headed to your house." Third call, 30 mintues into the ride, I asked where he was and he said, "Near Bloomingdales, we took the Midtown Tunnel." Third call I asked where he was and he said, "In front of your apartment." $55 later - a gypsy cab delivered him to my doorstep. PEOPLE - don't get in a gypsy cab!!! Clinton and Blake stuck to the "but he was a really nice driver and the black sadan was really clean" story the whole time they were here. Secretly, I think they learned their lesson when the yellow cab ride back to the airport took 20 minutes and $30 back on the return trip.

Anyone who reads my blog knows that I work two jobs (blah, blah, blah), but in this case I have to mention it to explain why I took them on a tour of Central Park in the dark. The little time that I did have off during their stay I felt compelled to show them the sights of our neighborhood. So after work one day we set off into Central Park. I had taken a wonderful shot of Clinton 24 years ago in front of the San Remo Apartment and Clinton wanted to reinact the photo. But there were resevoirs to see and bicyclist to dodge, and swing sets to swing on (Cameron) to get down to the West 70's before dark, so excuse the dark shot, but we did our best. By the time we reached Bethesda Fountain it was pitch dark. Lovers and tourist still filled the area and the lights from the Boathouse shimmered off the water, but I was disappointed that we weren't able to see more. We were so hungry. Big Nick's was just three avenues and three blocks away, so I kept the focus on walking. In the defense of all NYC tourist, a block to a New Yorker and a block to a tourist are vastly different. Hunger, thirst and tired feet keep the tourist going towards the promised land and it is up to the local to keep the conversation and visual tour guide ("oh, here his the Dakota where John Lennon was shot. Let's take some photos.")going. Big Nick's is a local favorite and a real bargain in the scheme of the city prices, so I knew that if I could just get them there we would enjoy a much needed sidewalk cafe seat to enjoy the sights of the sidewalk traffic and a large (if not re-fillable iced tea). We made it! And Clinton was so relieved to have found a seat and sustanance that he treated us all to dinner. Thanks again, Clinton!

Clinton and I got up early one morning and went to the Hungarian Cafe a few blocks from my apartment. It's a famous literary cafe that I knew he would appreciate since he is such an avid reader. Our waitress was a beautiful, Hungarian gypsy girl making the experience complete. The bathrooms are usuallyf full of graffeti, except that they just white washed the walls so when Clinton went in with the pen I gave him he had to begin anew. When Cameron and I were there the other night for a late night pastry I forgot to go into the bathroom to see if Clinton's autograph was still the lone name on the wall or if he had spurred the tradition on. Since Jeff and I were both working during the day Clinton and Blake made their own plans. They met a friend of Blake's for lunch one day in the East Village at a Cuban retaurant, and another day they had went to the Lower East Side to see the Tenament Musuem and have lunch at Katz's deli. Their big outing was going to Yankee Stadium to see a game that Friday night. Anyone who knows Clinton understands what a giant check off his bucket list that was.

I had Friday off so at long last I was able to spend a day with them from beginning to end. We started with standing in line for bagels at Absolute Bagels on Broadway and 108th and ended the day eating dinner at a mofia run restaurent in Little Italy. In between I tried to remember "don't over walk". Taxi's are expensive and waiting for a bus or a subway to go 10 blocks (half a mile) is a waste of time, so overwalking is par for the course if you want to see all that you want to see. We had to walk to the marina to go kayaying because getting to the Hudson River is really only accessible via a pedestian path.

Some of the best sightseeing of landmarks is from Columbus Circle to Lincoln Center (and both were on their to do list),and then walking the Highline was a one mile walk were the whole idea is to "walk". So we walked and walked. We spent twenty minutes in front of the Trump residential towers creating our own story based on real estate photos that were posted. We ended up walking near Cameron's new high school so we took a detour so that they could get a glimpse at where Cam would be spending the next four year. And when we finally made it to Lincoln Center we came across a rehearsal for an outdoor theater performance. It was a bizarre aerial silk acrobatics performance with a woman with no legs and her male partner (yes, he had legs). We watched in amazmennt and afterwards Clinton and Cameron tried to explain what we had seen, but nothing can really describe it. But again, it's all about walking and stumbling upon things that you never expected that make New York such a gem. We went to Little Italy for dinner. Everyone knows that you don't go to Mulberry Street to get good Italian food, but there is no denying the festive atmosphere of the neighborhood. We had a medicore dinner, but we got prime seating in an outdoor cafe and "Joey" the matridee was a hoot to watch strong arming the tourist into choosing his restaurant over the numberous others that lined the street. I had heard Kelly Ripa talking on her show about an wonderful gelato shop in Little Italy and so after dinner we set off on a misson to find it. We never did find the elusive "La Cremeria", but we found one eqaully as refresshing on a sticky New York City summer night.

They had wanted to do so much more. But we got home around midnight and they had a 7 a.m. flight. I think they did a fraction of what was on their list, but Clinton was already planning their second annual trip to NYC for next summer. I'm sure he will need to consult the Yankees schedule before booking his flight, but I'm sure they will be back sooner than later.

Oh, so what was the secret to them being the best tourist? They came to see New York. They were outfitted with subway maps, they had researched what they wanted to see, they were able to let go of things that were too expensive or lines were too long (Statue of Liberty/Ellis Island), they were flexible, and they were game for new adventures (the Highline). And they walked, slowly, but they walked.

9 house guest in 900 square feet

Hunter came to stay with us the first of June and left this past weekend. The last ten days he was here he had his three best friends from Denver come out to visit. Logan, Wesley and Chris are like family, so I didn't hestitate when Hunter told us about their plans to visit. The four boys (including Hunter) have piggybacked on our hotel rooms in Durango for years when we visited Jordan in college so I have certainly been in tight quarters with them.

The wrench in the works was when Hunter asked if the Colorado Parkour team could stay three nights at our house which just happened to coinicide with the days that his best friends were already booked as our guests. Let me add that the two groups of boys are all friends in Colorado, so it's not that strange of an idea that they would all "crash" together. If any of my readers are familiar with the show "Ninja Warriors" you have probably seen a number of the Colorado Parkour team on the television show. I still think of Hunter and his friends as "boys", but in fact the youngest was 19 and the oldest was 25, so in fact my house was full of men. They are men who jump on rooftops (roof gaps) and scale brick walls by their finger tips. The testosterone level was palpable in the apartment during their visit. The lucky part was that Jordan moved to Austin the day after the boys arrived and Jeff was in Detroit on business for the week, leaving Hunter, Cameron and I to host. So there were eleven of us in the apartment. Eleven people in 900 square feet. I am actually the control freak in our family, so giving up control of the apartment was hard for me. But to agree to them staying, I had no choice but to let them come in and spread their stuff out. I gave them my bedroom as the dumping ground for their bags allowing the livingroom/kitchen to stay pretty tidy except for the computers and phone chargers that were stretched across the room. I slept with Cam in her room, so she and I did have our little sanctuary. When I agreed to the Parkour team staying at our apartment, Hunter said that they would only be sleeping at the apartment and would be spending the rest of their time out seeing the city and getting footage for the team video they were working on on their cross country tour. It made perfect sense and who would ever imagine that 20 something year old young men would opt to stay in my tiny apartment staring at computer screens instead of exploring New York City just beyond the stoop of my building. I heard one of the young men say "It was really nice of our host in Boston to want to show us the ciy, but they really didn't understand that we need to conserve our energy and all that walking really took it out of me". I wanted to ask what he was conserving his energy for, but I refrained. But that was the foreshadowing for them not leaving he apartment for four days. That is not to say that they never left, but they did spend a hell of a lot more time inside than I had expected. At one point I was at work, the boys were out filming, and Cam was home alone. She cleaned the house, went shopping, made Toll House chocolate chip cookies, and made dinner for me. But by the time I got home the clean house was over taken by large bodies, the cookies were gobbled up, and my dinner was tucked away in the frig to keep it away from hungry onlookers. But I appreciated Cameron's hard work even though it was hard to see it underneath all of our guests sprawled across the living room. And they showered all the time. I felt like a hotel maid taking large piles of white towels and washing them daily only to find them back in a wet pile the next day waiting for housekeeping to replenish them. Honestly, it wasn't that bad. And a day or so after they left Cameron said that she acutally missed the enegy of having so many boys in the apartment. I didnt' miss the laundry or the stepping over backpacks and sleeping bags, but it was rather fun having Ninja Warriors visiting for a few days.