Day 12

Bought flowers this morning for my boss's boss because she had to euthanize her cat, Willow, yesterday. She was pretty upset. She says that she loves animals so much that she doesn't even eat them. She said that they gave Willow tons of pain killers, and Willow seemed like she was better. She said the hardest part was wondering if it was too soon to make the call to euthanize her. That's probably the best reason to not get a pet.

Speaking of pets. The people on our floor with a patio are quite young looking and have two dogs. They look my age, if not a year or two or three older, but these patio apartments must be excessively priced. Like, I've never even seen these people in the hallways or elevators. And they're home at 7:30 on their patio. (Their patio is at least as big as our bedroom.) What the hell?!
Dinner in an hour for our monthly dinner at Kajitsu. Corn soup!

Day 11

It's Dani's birthday! We went to Landmarc to celebrate. Watermelon martinis and cheeseburgers, sangria and carbonara, mussels and a julep. "Happy Birthday" was sung and the table's candle was blown out in lieu of one stuck in the diverse array of desserts. Caramel drops to finish it all off. Lots of laughs and recollections. Some napkin folding art was done by the table too: baby seal, baby doll, a bra, and a pillow.

Happy birthday, Dani! Also positive thoughts on Charleen's knee surgery. High kicks soon! Birthday!

Day 10

Well, this may or may not be the last post from the old Hudson Place apt. It was a good apartment aside from the: crazy landlord, running toilets, leaking bathroom ceiling, no light in the shower, soaking tub we only ever used as storage, broken air conditioner in the living room, and black and green mold growing behind our dressers on the wall. Oh and lately the commute to/from work. The balcony, view, overall rocking on the porch, .5 bathroom, parking spot, and extra overall space will definitely be missed. Plus some fun memories like St. Wolfgang's Feast, seeing fireworks for the NYC Marathon pasta meal and new year's from our porch and July 4th fireworks from the roof, eating on the porch and roof with friends, swimming in the pool and reading/gazing at clouds on the roof, having family over and being near to them daily, surprising people with our return to NJ from VA, the geese babies, Mitsuwa dinners and Mitsuwa babies, the Asian babies in our building, and making our wedding thank-you cards and Christmas cards, and creating Doris's surprise shower invitations, and numerous other little creative things. I'm probably forgetting a lot, but overall it was a good apartment with neighbors who at worst smoked pot and stunk up the hall and .5 bathroom. It's only been nine days since we've been living in NYC, and while there are tons of great memories we are leaving behind, there are memories to now be made in NYC. Hopefully mostly good ones. Edgewater! Good night!

Cucaracha!

Oh, my, God. My coworker, John, just put a rubber cockroach that looked so freakin real on my desk. I didn't notice it for awhile. Like, he hung out in my office for a bit and then just left it. (My desk is dark brown, like a cockroach.) When I was about to put my papers down on it, I noticed it. It was the most terrifying moment of my life in awhile. Nevermind the tremor or hurricane or other natural disasters we've endured this year. This roach on my desk was the scariest.

Day 9

We survived Irene! Kinda pissed off that more people aren't grateful for the downgrade of the hurricane and the minimum damage and fatalities/injuries. I appreciate the precautions the city and public transit and businesses took to ensure a safe weekend for everyone. Hopefully the next time this happens people aren't more stubborn because they weren't killed this time. Rant. Rant.

Spent most of today unpacking. I have too many clothes. Jon has too many Japanese snacks. We have too many books. We are purging a lot of it. There's no room.

Walked outside to get dinner and was nearly blown away--I was airborne more than normal briefly when I tried jumping over a puddle. Saw a man with a dog trying to take a taxi. The man got out I'd the taxi. Gave the taxi the finger. Then either lost his balance or was blown over on the sidewalk. The dog was okay. I hope the man was just drunk. Got tacos from Tehuitzingo for dinner. The best! Tacos!

Blue Skies!

8:55 a.m.

Trees are still (as in still there and not moving) below and foliage on Manhattan Autos' roof are subtly swaying. Thank goodness we didn't wake up to the end if the world as we know it.

Day 8

IRENE! Find the apartments with the taped-up windows.

Our building us shutting down the elevators at midnight.

This morning Jon and I went to City Lights Diner and got a huge delicious diner breakfast. It didn't have a TV, which was pretty nice. I feel a lot of establishments have TVs nowadays. Then we took a nap and made a small attempt to unpack our apt. Small, like tiny. We ate leftovers from M. Wells and the diner. We have some other food to pick at. I think everything/everyone should be fine as long as a) electricity runs b) water runs c) we avoid being crushed to death like the poor souls who have died due to this hurricane already. Prayers and hope for the next few days that this is just something we were just overprepared and overhyped for.

Earthquake today near Albany (2.9).
IRENE!

NYC: Night Before the Storm

Day 7

I guess this is the last of the sun for a couple of days. I kind of wish we were hunkering down on a NJ hill top vs. being across the street from a Zone C and two blocks away from the Hudson River and under a tower crane that has been suggested to be secure by our building's management. But there're boxes to unpack! Lots and lots of them. And maybe next time our Zone A friends can party and fear the crane with us instead of heading home to NJ.

Tonight should be a Waffles & Dinges dinner to use the livingsocial coupon and then mini reunion with Aditya and Sam and Elizabeth in Hoboken. There's something about this apartment that makes me so sleepy. Irene! Mooncake Food! Zzz!

GE BUILDING

Did you know that they use gold leaf to fill in the "GE BUILDING" engraving on their building (30 Rock)? They do! I saw a man this morning with gold leaf paper brushing it into the letters. So wasteful, so decadent! I'd have taken a picture if I didn't think I'd freak the man out or made him freak me out with a weird pose. Or possibly charged me for taking a picture of him working. Who knows?

Day 6

We don't have internet yet, so when I'm home I have to use my cell phone for most things, like Pandora for music and Twitter for news. Anything else is just painfully slow to do, so I read e-mails but don't respond. And I see tweets with slideshows but don't click through, so I retweet it, mostly for myself. (Those children's clothes for petite women slideshow was weak. J.Crew Cuts definitely aren't more affordable than their adult clothes.) Anyway, we may have internet on Monday, which will be so nice!

Tonight was M. Wells dinner with the husband on Long Island City. (Queens!) Most delicious rib eye! We got a compliment on how good our steak looked. Why thank you, stranger. The steak was rare and tasty and came with a bunch of chanterelles. (We've leftovers to eat with our hands, as meat and mushrooms were meant to be eaten!) Ate raw steak and a Caesar salad too. (It was better than it sounds--not boring at all. Trust me on this one.) Topped it all off with pineapple upside-down cake with a scoop of vanilla ice cream. (Doggy box #2. The cake wasn't a slice--more like a personal-size pizza than prompted memories of personal-pan Pizza Hut pizza and my favorite childhood friend of Jon's that I've never met before--Coreysmith! I've forgotten his real name.) What I took away from M. Well besides leftovers to look forward to was that Quebecers can definitely cook well, even in an old diner in Queens. Meanwhile I accidentally made our fridge into a freezer. Ice milk sculptures!

Day 5

There's a big building in front of us with huge porches of astroturf and laundry, tiny jutting air conditioners, and random Christmas lights. There's a good chance that at the right angle we can be seen in inappropriate attire since at the right angle we can see well into our neighbors' apts within our own building and see them, thankfully, so far fully clothed. There are built-in shades that kind of block out some light. Well more like filter it. It's fine for now. Modest peep shows for unsuspecting neighbors all around!

In sum: Fabulous Boat Basin dinner with Dani and got a postcard from Croatia! Beautiful night in NYC. Haven't unpacked one box for a week now. Worried that this stupid hurricane is going to ruin everything this weekend. Fred?

Day 4

Still rocking. But this time the city as well as much of the east coast rocked with me. How bizarre. Bought food to cook for dinner from Whole Foods. $12 cheese. Need to find a pot. Can't find any dressing. Dizzy. Feel like I can't concentrate on anything. Lots of e-mails and planning. No Internet at home yet. Verizon strike done at least. Miss watching The Daily Show (filmed down our block) and Colbert Report and Being Erica on hulu. Kitty Glitter.

Better Late Than Never

Good afternoon - please see the notification from our property manager, Tishman Speyer, regarding our building:

There was an earthquake reported in mid-Atlantic states. News agencies report that the NY area felt a shock. At this time there is no adverse building condition and the building remains open. As more information becomes available, we will update you accordingly.

5.8 Earthquake!

Sent at 1:48 PM on Tuesday

me: i feel like there was just an earthquake

Jonathan: holy shit

there totally was

http://twitter.com/#!/search/earthquake%20nyc

Sent at 1:54 PM on Tuesday

Jonathan: yeah

me: did you feel it?

Jonathan: fucking craaazzy

totally

I was like holy shit am I like hallucinating

and then my monitor was like swaying

me: i heard the office above me move--like crumple

Sent at 1:56 PM on Tuesday

Jonathan: man that is some scary ish

me: totally

Sent at 2:00 PM on Tuesday

Day 3

Back from cruise. Still feeling the sea rocking me. Trying to finish a kinda boring and confusing proofread. Doris is visiting next month!! Yay!!! Apt looks like our boxes exploded. Got a D'agastino rewards card. It's an expensive mkt. $8 for a pint of blood orange juice. Intrigued, but did not buy. The rocking motion is side to side like saying no, so it's easy to be down on things. Am I bossy?

View from Our Wraparound Porch on Boat

NYC Day 2

Our northeast view includes the north tower of the TimeWarner building. Ran into Lina and Mihir on 8th Ave. and 50th. Small world!

NYC Day 1

We'rrrre back!  A snag in moving in, but we've got most of our crap with us and are trying to unload it from the 50+ boxes we've got stacked up. (A little over 30 boxes are of books.)

This is part of our new view. We can see our old apt. The floor above us can see the river, but better a partial view than none at all.

NYC Is Back!

Will there be a rainbow?

NYC Disappearing

Sunny 10 minutes before.
Now there's a downpour.

Time to Get Packing

Big, Bright Moon

Such a nice night! Going to miss rocking on the porch. Look at that reflection on the water!

Shrimp and Spam

Mmmm