sometimes.

Sometimes when you live in New York City they do construction on the subway on weekends so you spend most of your day trying to figure which subway will get you out of Manhattan. Then you sometimes get on 3 wrong trains in wrong directions and end up standing by yourself on a platform in the 100 degree weather until you ask the subway driver how in the world to get home and in between announcing the next destination tells you to just get on the train and take the next stop.

Sometimes when you live in New York City you have to do laundry at a laundromat. Sometimes the laundromats don't have air conditioning. Then you may sometimes get all the way up the street and to the doors and realize you forgot your detergent so you sometimes have to walk all the way back home in the 100 degree weather to get it. Sometimes you also have no idea how to work the washers and dryers so you stare at other people doing their laundry until you figure it out. And sometimes people might think you're a little creepy, but they smile at you anyway. 

Sometimes this happens, too. I don't know what it is, but it happens.

Sometimes when you live in New York City you go to the beach and eat pretzels on Saturday. And sometimes you really want ice cream so you walk to the store in the 100 degree heat to find that a pint of Ben and Jerry's costs $6.75. Sometimes you buy it anyway because some people will do anything for ice cream.

today has been brought to you by the letter h.

 
Help: Today I got lost. I decided it was a good idea to take the Metro to Trader Joe’s. It wasn’t. For one, I really wanted to buy ice cream, but I couldn’t because it would have melted before I got home. Then I got lost. First I got on the wrong train and ended up going to Times Square until I asked some girl for help. Then I switched, while carrying my heavy groceries (it was also not a good idea to buy beer. Holy heavy) and had to ask this guy for more help.  Then I got off at the wrong Metro stop where I consulted my phone for assistance (there is no cell phone service in the Metro dungeon). Fortunately, I was only about a mile from home so I could give up on public transportation and walk.

Heat: Today I actually ate a real lunch! It is so hot up here in my non-air-conditioned apartment that I literally just lay on the wood floor in my underwear while someone fans me with leaves and feeds me grapes off the vine. And by that I mean I point a fan at myself and feed myself cherries then try to spit the seeds into the trashcan across the room. I have a lot of time on my hands. I was supposed to start my job on Tuesday, but then they had trouble getting my background check put through, so I don’t start officially until Monday. Thus, I’ve been lying on the wood floor in my underwear with a fan and a bowl of cherries. Anyway, today I ate a Trader Joe’s Spring Onion Rice Noodle Bowl; however, in retrospect it was not my brightest lunch idea BECAUSE IT IS 100° OUTSIDE. Note to self: stick to cherries.

Hello: Today I went running in my neighborhood and despite the fact that I almost passed out from heat exhaustion, I realized that I live in probably the most exciting place ever. Seriously. I’m right in the middle of everything. Shopping, grocery stores, Laundromats (my computer just capitalized Laundromats.  Am I missing something? I had no idea that was a proper noun! And to think I won the spelling bee in 5^th grade. I definitely would have lost if I had gotten that word…a capital L? Really?!), tons and tons of bars and restaurants and coffee shops, fruit markets, bagel shops. And I’m right in the middle of two Metro stops.  So, this is your invitation. Come to me. But the heading for this paragraph is “Hello” so I bet you’re wondering where that comes in. Well, while running, this little boy on a stoop (Stoop Boy! Leave your stoop!) yelled hello and asked me if I was in a race. I told him I was racing myself. But that must mean I look fast!

Holla: And finally, an orchestral version of Big Pimpin’ is currently playing on my iTunes. Holla.

bagels are my aeroplane.

Recently, I’ve been thinking about carbs.  So what else is new, right? Anyway, my friend Abbey and I have devised an all-encompassing bread question that we are determined to ask of everyone we encounter: if you could only eat one bread product for the rest of your life, what would it be? Here are your options:

A.     Loaves

B.     Rolls

C.     Pastries

D.    Bagels

E.     Pretzels

F.      Flatbreads

I choose bagels. I love bagels with all my little heart and, fortunately for me, I just moved to New York City. And you know what the best part of NYC is? The bagels. Sure, there’s the skyscrapers, the diversity, the opportunities; but I choose bagels. I may or may not just eat them every day. And, since NYC loves bagels, too, I could probably eat at a different bagel shop every day for every meal for years. But, to make things easier, there are 3 bagel shops on the block that I now live. God is good. And you want to hear my other favorite part about bagels? Cream cheese. And by “cream cheese,” I mean that when you order a bagel at a bagel shop, you get to choose from approximately 25 different kinds of cream cheeses, from flavors like fresh berry to roasted artichoke to sundried tomato. The possibilities are endless. Bagels, you are my favorite carbohydrate. Always and forever.

bagel, I will eat you every day.

I thought about ending this post here, but I guess I’ll tell you about the non-bagel part of my life, too. I just signed a lease and moved into my big-girl-grown-up NYC apartment! I live in Astoria, which is a neighborhood in Queens with a friend of a friend from Buffalo, NY. I ride the subway. I go shopping at fruit stands. I do the New York Shuffle. You know, the walk/run that New Yorkers do in their business suit with shoulder pads and their briefcase and cell phone in hand, as they wave down a taxi to get to some very important meeting that determines the future of some very important business. It’s all the rage.

Something very important is about to happen and the shuffle will commence.

 

 Look at all the shuffling! I can hardly contain myself!

Yesterday, I went to the opera with my friend Laura. Then we went to a townie bar to watch the women’s soccer finals and random people talked to me the whole time. So, nothing has changed at all! My life is very much the same; I’m just not in Missouri. That, and the only furniture I have in my apartment is an inflatable mattress.