NYC Sights and Nightlife Calamities

Even though we're totally broke and set to move back to California in two weeks, M and I decided we should see NYC at least once before we go. A birthday celebration of sorts, since I just turned 34 on Friday. Luckily, we have some friends who have access to an apartment in Korea Town and we were able to make it a cheap trip by going there via bus. So our friends (a couple) and us made our way up there and took in the sights on Saturday. 

We went to Times Square, where I got to go to the Harry Potter Exhibit (really cool). We walked up to the Guggenheim from there by strolling through Central Park. After the Guggenheim we took a cab back home to relax and freshen up for dinner. We took in the sights of the city from our apartment's roof top first:

We headed down to Chinatown for dinner and had dumplings and other glorious things at Shanghai Cuisine.

After stuffing ourselves, we walked through Little Italy and made our way to an amazing dive bar called St. Jerome's on the lower east side that fulfills the five basic dive desires:

1) almost no lighting
2) small and cozy, with booths and plenty of bar stools
3) cheap drinks. Yeah, I found cheap drinks in Manhattan. $6.50 for a call cocktail. Not bad.
4) great music chosen by the staff and/or DJ (not patrons)
5) good bartenders, who know not to pour too heavy of a drink, and who aren't wearing tight polo shirts.


There were totally bizarre fashion mistakes in this bar that I have to detail here just to make sure I remember them years from now. First of all, culottes. I have mentioned to everyone who will listen that this "shorts" thing is totally out of control in 2011. In Philadelphia, short shorts are worn by everyone. EVERYONE. From 11 year olds (inappropriate) to large moustachioed dads (inappropriate) to 400 lb 45 year old ladies with bad wigs (inappropriate). The short short (like with the pockets that come out the bottom) is de rigeur. In New York City, there is also a shorts thing happening. Now, maybe my survey only consisting of one dirty dive bar on the lower east side is not accurate, but damn, at least 4 ladies wore culottes. You know what they are, right? A high waisted short (blah!) that is flouncy and almost skirt-like. I remember them from being a five year old girl.

So, ladies were walking around in culottes. There was a guy wearing what I believe were striped pajama bottoms and a vest. Just a vest. Like an outfit a performing monkey would wear.

He danced like a nutjob right next to our booth along with his friend, whom I refer to as "the sacrifice" because she had super short hair and wore a white muslin dress that seemed to me to be  "potato sack" in design. She danced like a total maniac. The kind of dancing that consists mostly of jumping and twirling and kicking. Yes, kicking high kicks. They were having a great time, but they were dangerously (obnoxiously) close to our table, so I changed places with my friend and was Lady of the Jutting Elbows for the rest of the evening. My elbow just so happen to graze those who entered the circle of space. Anyway, the ladies all looked like they had raided Sabrina the Teenage Witch's closet. Lots of pastel flouncy printed pattern things. But it was such good entertainment! And the music was great. The DJ would periodically go behind the bar to get a drink and comb his bangs over his perfectly placed bandana. The bar back looked like a cross between one of the Daggers from Thrashin' and one of the Ramones. Completely amazing.

Ah, a good time was had by all. Despite my "dive bars shouldn't have dancing" rule, I actually eventually participated. My group was enjoying the music, getting up next to our booth and dancing to songs I can't even remember now but seemed like completely inspired choices at the time. We were laughing, having a few drinks. Even M was dancing. That, my friends, is a little Big Apple miracle. And then, the calamity happened.

Remember last year when I fell comedically because my dog saw a squirrel? I laughed at it even then. It inspired me to do a silly cartoon of myself. Yeah, this fall didn't have that same devil-may-care attitude about it. Mostly because something totally DISLOCATED.

Ok, so let me back up. It's like 1:30am. We're dancing. I'm teaching my friends the gothic dances I learned in college (bats around my face, vacuum the floor/dust the ceiling, stacking the CDs, you know, the basics). I was in the same spot, enjoying the music, doing my thing with a limited range of motion because I'm between the bar and the booth and I'm also chatting. And either someone spilled a drink or the storm that had just begun outside was tracked in, wetting the floor. Because I slipped.

I totally freaking slipped. I decided, as I fell, that I should under no circumstances FALL IN A BAR. So I reached for the table, which was not at all bolted to the floor. I then managed to pull all the drinks and the votive candle right onto my brother in law as I hit the floor and landed on my bum. My knee twisted on the way down. I got help up and sat in the booth when I realized that my right kneecap was way too far to the right. I had dislocated my kneecap. Brother in law kindly looked at my knee and tried to calmly explain to me that now we had to go to the emergency room. And I frowned big time. I've never been to the emergency room. I've accompanied others, but I've never had a medical emergency. Baby's first medical emergency at 34 years (and a day) old.

I made peace with the utter awfulness of having to go to an ER on my birthday vacation, and stood up, when it popped right back into place. A miracle! A New York miracle! Alicia Keys is right. It's a concrete jungle where dreams are made of! There's nothing you can't do! And then I tried to walk. Not happening. I couldn't put weight on it. M was beside himself with worry. I never do this kind of thing.

Ugh.

After hobbling through a torrential rain storm to hail a cab, we got home. We all started to wake up around 11 am the next morning. It was pouring rain and encircling our apartment was the Dominican Pride parade. So we woulda been trapped anyway. I'm glad I got to do a bunch of cool things before it happened, because there was no way I was going to be able to get around in the rain on my bum leg.

I convinced myself that going to my doctor on Monday was a good idea. We got on the bus and went home. After a visit to my doctor and then shuttling over to an orthopedic surgeon for a good look at my knee, I'm currently in a big brace that protects my kneecap from slipping out again.

Someone's totally worried about the new leg brace

So the trip (for the most part) was awesome, but the slipping thing totally blew.

Not only did I fall, in public, in a bar. I did so without any kind of grace or endearing clumsiness. I wasn't even all that tipsy. I just fucking fell. Boom. And since I've gained weight since my last public fall, I immediately felt embarrassed and horrified. Fat girl falls. Hahahaha! Right? I refused out of sheer stubbornness (and probably shock) to cry. Not only am I a bigger girl, I'm an older gal too. Tick tock, right? Now falling equals expensive treatment and lengthy rehab time. And probably a hilarious YouTube video.

I'm supposed to be able to walk on it and heal up in about 3-4 weeks. During that time, however, I'm moving across country. Including driving across country. Now M. has to bear the burden of a lot more physical labor and our limited budget just went to copays and a full day off work. Plus, we're probably going to need to pay movers for our unload.

I want to be happy about the good things, that I had a great time in NYC before the fall. But damn I am totally hating myself for really messing the next few weeks up by not being athletic enough to catch myself on the way down. I'm plagued with thoughts that had I been healthy and thin, I could bounce around like that whirling dervish girl, who had been laughing and dancing so dangerously carefree not an hour before. I would have blushed and been helped up and had continued dancing. I get that it's an accident and that I didn't do it on purpose. But maybe I could have prevented the situation by taking more responsibility for my health, being more aware of my surroundings, having good reflexes. Maybe sitting out the dancing portion of the evening.

So that happened.

Tomorrow I go in for an MRI before work. Here's hoping it's just a sprained knee. No fractures or breaks showed up on the x-ray, but the orthopedist wants to make sure I didn't do too much damage to my tendon. But I'm in that sexy brace for another 3 weeks at least. No crutches, which is good. I hope things look up as I make my way westward. I think the east coast has really done a number on me this past year...

Can I move here?

I got a bunch done yesterday, but it was such a hard day for writing. I don't know why, but I would start these long sections and then get to the end and not have a way to connect them to the thesis. I couldn't remember why I went down the road in the first place. And I hate not having transitions in place as I'm writing, so I just got very frustrated and had to take a couple breaks. I made some headway on another chapter though, so that's good. This one was a "from scratch" chapter too. But I feel behind. Mostly because I set these unreasonable goals for myself. But still. I want at least two chapters that I can hand in to my committee next week. I hope I can make it happen. Today is the day, so keep your fingers crossed for me.

I took a walk around 3pm to get coffee and clear my head. It was worth it, but I still didn't figure a way to link that section I worked so hard on. Maybe today. I did notice on my walk that rent in this city is out of control. Here is one for rent sign that actually seemed reasonable:

"Beautiful 3 bedroom, 1 1/2 bath, March 1st, $2975."

Every time I come here, I want to move here.

In the evening, I met up with CW & Tiny Heat. CW is a friend of M's from college, so that's how I found Tiny Heat's blog. Her blog was/is so funny that it inspired me to start doing this one, and you all are paying the price! Seriously though, we developed an online friendship so it was nice to finally meet in person. She's awesome, as expected. Any friend of CW's is a friend of mine.

We went to a great pasta place where I had eggplant lasagne. And I stuck to my diet pretty good. I ate all the vegetables, I didn't eat the whole thing (so unlike me), and I didn't have dessert. So afterward we went out for cocktails. So what? Tiny Heat's friend met up with us at dinner and joined me in a cocktail after. Even her friends are nice.


So now it's back to the grindstone. Sometimes I don't know if I'm going up, or coming down.


But I do know this: If I don't finish this thing, I will hate myself. Unless someone wants to offer me a job that will make all those feelings (and loans) go away? Anyone? No? Ok, then. I will get back to work.

Day 1

Dissertation Writing Trip Day 1

9am
The plane ride to San Francisco was short and sweet. Thankfully. I turned on my iPod and listened to an interview with Alan Ball about next season’s True Blood. FYI, if you are into spoilers and have been checking out the casting sheets for next season that are going around the web, they’ve been throwing in fakes to mess with fans. I totally love that. The interview lasted the whole trip and I didn’t have to be annoyed at the chatty young ladies next to me at all.

11:30 am
Since my flight arrived earlier than expected and the whole ride from SFO to the Powell Station took like 10-15 minutes, I was at my hotel at 11am, way early. I checked into my room, which was super tiny, had no desk, and a view of the exterior wall of the next building. So I lugged my bags downstairs (I carried 13 books in addition to my laptop, clothes and other junk) and asked for a room with a desk, which meant I had to wait a while. I went to Bristol Farms and had a nice sushi roll and a diet Pepsi. I asked where the spicy tuna rolls were and the lady at the counter said "Don't worry, I make roll for you fresh," which makes this the best Bristol Farms ever. When I got back they gave me an upgrade (which I cannot even think about now without hearing Beyonce’s “Upgrade” song that is used in that Direct TV commercial –ugh) to a king sized bed. My new room looks out onto Ellis, has a colossal TV, and a nice desk with a li’l fridge in it!

I promptly went out and filled the fridge with 7-ups and a small bottle of vodka. Because writers write, but they also drink. And I had to buy a razor and shaving cream because I forgot, and I’d already let it go a few days. I only brought jeans, but still, I have my standards. And I bought some teriyaki rice crackers. It was a Walgreens. You get shoppy at a Walgreens, ok?


12:36 pm
Sat down to write. Got all my notes and books out and wrote for four hours straight. Did good work too. I may have a chapter done before the night is out. I can hear the cable car’s bell every now and then. It’s very charming. Not as charming however, as the lady singing “How Will I Know?” by Whitney Houston on the street below. Or the booming system that is playing some sort of robot rap song. But it feels good to be in a city. The City. I love it here.

4:45
I got stuck on a section that I kept revising and turning it into mush. Thought it would be a good time for a break. I went around taking photos of various street things, stopped into an H&M and bought nothing.

After walking for a bit, I decided to try King of Thai Noodle House for dinner, which was very tasty (thanks to Tiny Heat for the reference).

I took my noodles back to my room, watched Giada stir some soup on the Food Network and then took a long hot shower. Called M. on Skype and finally figured out how to talk using video phone for free. It was really cool. Everyone who reads this should download Skype and use it. Everything is totally free, and you don’t even have to use the video thing. You can just chat. No money required! I thought my dog, Radley, would be really into hearing my voice and seeing my face, but he didn’t get it at all, and was kind of annoyed that we interrupted his sleep to push a laptop screen into his face. After we hung up, I uploaded some pics on Flickr and wrote the bulk of this stuff. I feel like I have to do some of this kind of writing everyday or I will fry my brain. Dissertation writing is like writing in a different language, full of constraints and hesitations. I enjoy my work a lot, but the writing isn’t as fun as the teaching. Especially when you are wading through reviewer comments. Sigh...

6pm
Sat back down to work in my jammies, wearing a bandana. M. hates when I wear a bandana. Don’t know why, but his mouth becomes a straight line when he sees me in a bandana. I love that my wavy floppy hair is out of the way.

8:30pm
Went around my whole floor looking for the ice machine. There wasn’t one. That’s strange. I poured a drink anyway. It was chilly, but I pretty much just sipped it forever because without ice, it’s not that great.

9:20pm
Ok, seriously, what’s up with no ice machines? I left my soda can out and it’s warm now, so I called the front desk. They don’t have ice machines here at Hotel Abri, but they will send a bucket right up for me. Awesome!

12 am
Whoa. I worked a bunch. Did you know Thursday is the new Friday? It is at the bar downstairs. Woo girls are everywhere. There are even some Woo Guys. I am too enamoured with the idea of progress to be distracted. I'm doing good folks. Just a couple more revisions before lights out, I think.

1:15 am
I am finally about to sleep because I made some great progress today. Tomorrow I will be moving on to more interesting material to write about, so maybe it will be easier. Plus CW and Tiny Heat are meeting me for dinner. Wish me luck!

A Request

Ok, folks. I had a bit of drama with my trip reservations because I went to the hotel website and it turns out they are undergoing a bit of noisy construction in the lobby (noisy from 8am until 8pm according to the site). So I had to call Travelocity and hope that they would change it. They did it without even raising a fuss, which was cool. My new hotel is actually a lot nicer and has a mini bar, iPod dock, and free WiFi, which rules! I am packing my comfiest shoes and softest socks.

I'll be staying on Ellis & Powell (ish). So here's what I want to know. I am probably not going to subsist on room service, and they don't even offer breakfast, so I would like to know:

a) a good place to get a quick coffee and breakfast
b) a good place for lunch (preferably not burgers)
c) a good place that can do take out for dinner.

I like all kinds of food (except pickles), I am trying to be relatively thrifty, and I will be eating alone. I don't want to walk a ton of blocks. Don't pretend that it's only a "10 minute walk." You mean a 20 minute hike? All uphill? After which I look gross and sweaty? Oh cool. Thanks! Remember, I'm from a place where you drive even if the grocery store is only a few blocks away.

I have stayed in Union Square about 5 or 6 times in the past few years, but I usually had someone with me with either "preferences" or a vast knowledge of the city and thus willing to travel further for choice spots.

If you comment and I actually go, I will promise to post photos of what I ate and review the place as well.

Please comment!

Dispatch from Las Vegas

Ok, so what are the odds of coming to Las Vegas during the National Cheerleader Convention and also having it held at our hotel? Pretty slim! You know what's weird, walking around a little bit tipsy and having to dodge 8 year-olds that are dressed in ways that are highly inappropriate. Don't even get me started on the "cheer moms." Ugghh. Also, do you know the sound of 10 14 year-olds giggling, laughing, and doing gymnastics at 2am? I do! Today they all go home, thankfully.

Other than that, I'm having a good time. I'm up instead of down, which is nice. And I'm up way too early for this place, but it's good.

Rulingest thing that happened while I was here (besides winning money, obviously)? Walking past the teen all-male cheerleading squad with their giant trophy. They had hoodies that said "All Male" on the arms!

What? It's true!

Interestingly, my tarot reader was right about my trip to the desert! M. whisked me back to the scene of the crime: Las Vegas, where we got married just a couple of months ago. The wedding trip was amazing and wonderful. Imagine being in your favorite vacation spot with all your favorite friends and family members. And we got married, which made it not just a trip but a celebration. But it was a performance being hostess (aka The Bride), so as fun as it was, it was not what I would call a leisurely trip. This one was all leisure. We didn't even spend much money or stay out too late. I had great fun relaxing poolside. There was a Roller Derby convention in town. Derby girls were everywhere. We tried to go see a bout on Saturday planned for Fremont Street, but it was nowhere to be found. We surmised that since it was close to 110 degrees, they may have moved it to an indoor roller rink. What a bummer. When we asked for directions to the event (that was not there), a concierge at Binion's told us that when we got near the place, we should see "lots of different looking folks" that would let us know we were on the right track. I liked his way of describing them, and was actually pretty surprised that we weren't considered "different" in quite the same way.

On the way out there, we made a pit stop in Barstow at the "Barstow Station." It's like a vortex of weirdness. Here you can get food, trinkets, bizarre collectibles like pirate themed snow globes and ninja stars. Golden buddhas make inappropriate semi-naughty requests at you:
Lots of tour buses empty out into the place, crowding it with a cross-section of the most odd people to ever live. I went into the bathroom here and as I'm washing my hands, a tall, mid-30s African American gal was staring at my ass. Sometimes women look each other over as part of the "feminine evaluative process." This is where one gal looks at another to assess whether or not she is lower or higher on the scale of do-ability or attractiveness. I've seen it done to me before. It's part of the Cosmo/Vogue conditioning process and it usually takes only a couple of seconds. But this woman was really looking at me-and seemingly confused. I was about to finish up washing my hands when she said, "where did you get your jeans?" My jeans are gap "curvy" jeans, which are the best jeans in the world if you have curvy hips and a small waist. They are pretty much the only jeans for our kind. I told her about the wonders of Gap curvy, and was glad that I could spread the good word when she said, ""Cause you know, you have a booty like one of us." To which her mother said "Loretta!" Loretta replied with, "What? It's true!" as I walked out, laughing. Pretty awesome.


So thank you Barstow Station, for being weird and offering choices to folks on their way to places less weird.

This week some friends are in town, my In-Laws are coming to visit, and I have two major items on my to-do list before they arrive:

#1) Buy the last book in the Twilight series and finish it before our guests arrive. I read through the first three in about a week and a half because they are absolutely engrossing and didn't give me a moment's rest. There's a whole werewolves vs. vampires thing that is reminiscent of Underworld without all the leather. And if the central character doesn't turn into a vampire in the next book, I will be royally pissed!

#2) Watch The Dark Knight because it's enough already with the waiting.

I also have dissertation writing to do, bills to pay and mail to track down at my favorite post office, the Long Beach East Side Station. Busy Bee!

paranormal wednesday

I went to a tarot card reader yesterday. A friend had just gone to the OC Fair and had a pretty accurate reading, so I couldn't help myself. I basically stalked all over the Fair looking for the card reader and plunked down my $20 for a tarot reading by Eva, who looked to be about 19 years old. Her mom and aunt were doing readings beside her. It was pretty damn cool. Some of the things she said were things that could apply to anyone, but she guessed that I worked in education and that I am stubborn. She also guessed that I need to finish school or go back to school to progress in life and this is something I have been wanting to do but have not been able to do. I am apparently going on a couple of trips in the future. One to the desert, and one over a great body of water. Which is interesting because M. is taking me on a little secret trip this weekend as a birthday gift. He won't tell me where...but I think I'm going to the desert. I hope it is a desert with swimming pools and 7&7s. It's the summer of trips! I'm excited.

I was supposed to go see the X-Files yesterday-as part of my Paranormal Wednesday-but the psychic took priority, and for some reason it's only playing 4 showings a day at every theater, which sucks. That means the prospect of another movie isn't so good. It hasn't been a week yet. Geez. So, to satisfy my movie jones, M. and I decide to watch Harold & Kumar Escape from Guantanamo Bay. I had waited for the release of this film on DVD. I put it on the top of my Netflix queue. It waited there, blinking "coming soon" for weeks.

And it was one of the worst movies! I hated it. It's like someone took all of the good things from the last movie and just replayed them in shittier ways. So sad. It had so much potential! It could have been so funny...and it was not. I laughed maybe twice. The X-Treme villains from the first movie were silly, but the inept government villains just made me sad. It didn't work as political commentary. Sorry. I love Kal Pen. He rules. But this didn't. It would have been much better if Harold had become the erratic fuck up (due to finding his self-esteem in the first movie) and Kumar had become the sobered thoughtful one (due to figuring out he does want to be a doctor and won't fight it anymore). But it was a sorry retread. I wish Madam Eva had warned me. I could have watched one of my TiVo'd episodes of My Life on the D List instead...

Denver has the world's largest REI

No really, it does. It has a climbing wall in it. It has a Starbucks in it. It was like the holy temple of outdoorsy-ness.

So the hubby and I set sail for Denver this past weekend. His close friends from high school live there, and we’ve been wanting to visit a downtown that’s actually affordable.

This sign was posted in the Denver Airport ladies room. I started to wonder if we should have just stayed home:
After I was reassured that tornados don’t happen often in Denver proper, I calmed down. I like Denver. It’s got some great things going for it. For one thing, you could buy a whole entire house with numerous rooms, parking spaces, and a basement for like, $230K. Unheard of here in So-Cal. Fancy downtown lofts are also very affordable. I liked the downtown area a lot. People are really nice in Denver. Like really nice. We went to the Denver Modern Art Museum and no less than three people asked me if I had any questions about the art or the stuff for sale in the store. You want to know how many people were working at the Museum? Three.

The Curtis Hotel was great. I recommend it to anyone going to Denver. The themey-ness was not overdone. Our floor was the TV mania floor:

Other floors included the Double Your Pleasure floor, in which the concept of “couples and twins” was really stretched:

And, as I mentioned, they had a 13th floor!


The lobby restaurant and bar is called The Corner Office. And its theme was, I think, "retro urban office romance." The artwork featured couples in office wear on desks in suggestive positions (woman tugging on a man’s tie, man leaning over a woman perched on her desk). But the whole “quitting time” theme of this wall was really neat:


All the clocks are at 5pm always!

The music and bar scene in Denver, however, left much to be desired. Now, granted I only spent a weekend there and my research did not include personal references (mostly internet searches, yelp, and citysearch). We couldn’t seem to find any decent dive bars that didn’t have live music, so we ended up seeing some local band perform at a place called Bender’s. You remember that movie Singles? About Seattle’s grunge scene in the 90s? Well remove all of the heroin and the funky hair color experiments, and you can imagine the scene at Bender’s (and Denver in general really). Lots of tribal tattoos, sandals, mandals, and Birkenstocks. A fair amount of vests and worn-in jeans. The first band sang a song about “golden showers.” And can you believe I stayed for the next band? I know. Crazy! Band #2 went on and the lead singer/guitarist did a sound check forever. Finally, when it was time to start the show, he put on sunglasses. The kind that are almost clear with a bit of purple tint on the top portion only. As soon as I saw that, I told M. we had to try another bar. So a cab ride across town to the Meadowlark, which just sounded cool. Like I could see myself saying, “I got so wasted at the Meadowlark last night.”
It was actually a nice bar. Not a dive, as the internets had indicated, since it was clean and pretty and everyone seemed to be wearing clothes that had been recently laundered. The band wasn’t too bad. It was supposed to be a little indie rock spot, but there were quite a few Dockers and tucked in polo shirts. Yuppies are allowed to run rampant in Denver.

By far the weirdest/most interesting thing about Denver is the Aquarium. It had non-aquarium elements, like birds and a tiger. There was an anamatronic orangutan. And it had a piano bar. This is the mod sitting area in the bar:

I had a great time visiting friends and running around town in Denver, but coming home to Long Beach was very nice. Great weather (it was 100 degrees in Denver), and the smell of the ocean in the air was like a big ol’ hug. Plus this face, which was irresistible:

The jury's still out on Denver as a possible home for us, but it was a nice little trip that was relaxing and just what the doctor ordered.