Month: November 2016

NYC My Heart Got Caught on Your Sleeve Part 2

What to eat

New York City- Street Art and Color

In front of Little Cupcake Bakeshop
We could all use this.
Chinatown

Bubby’s in Tribeca

Bubby’s Best Photo Booth Ever
Tribeca Hudson St.
The far left and far right are the photos from Bubby’s. The ones in the middle are us in our younger years.

 

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A moment of silence in the Big Apple
Seattle Folks taking Anny’s Tour for the 4th time
Moe’s mama
Cappuccino that Moe picked up for me
Moe and Anny ❤
Pizzaiola Friend at Emporio
More friend love

I wish I could take him home with me.

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Down the street from Moe’s Butcher Shop.  Referencing the election results.

Anny’s Food Tour was amazing.  We toured NoHo and Nolita.  That’s me in a food coma at the end of the day.

Yeah, this really happened:

So New York, My Heart Got Caught on Your Sleeve.  I so much loved getting to have a taste of your life in NYC, Anny.  It hasn’t been easy.  You’ve foraged a life for yourself in one of the busiest chaotic places in the world.  Thank you for sharing this place with me.  I love your heart and I loved that you shared this quote with me.  Keepin’ that quote and sharin’ it out because I’ve shared plenty of uncool moments with you over the years, Anny.

“The only true currency in this bankrupt world is what you share with someone else when you’re uncool.”

My final adventure on my way home, suitcase rolling down Bleeker Street, waiting for Amy’s Bread to open so I could get a cup of coffee before I hailed a cab.  As I’m standing there waiting for the employees that were hustling inside, the sign read, “Hours Open 7:30” and it was already 8:00am.  A woman out for her morning walk, stops at the door of Amy’s Bread and tries to open it.  She sees the women inside moving about and makes eye contact with one of them.  “Are they open?”  She says to me. “Uh, I don’t know, it says they open at 7:30.”  After waiting like 15 seconds and getting the clear blow off from the employee inside, she says in authentic New York form, “Well, fuck you then, I’ll get my coffee somewhere else!”  Then she stormed away and continued her walk.  So there ya go.  That was one of my last interactions in the Big Apple.  I traipsed across the street with my suitcase in tow and stopped at Rocco’s for a Cafe Au Lait.  Good choice.

New York City is like a lover, as the song below describes.  If you live there, NYC is more than a city, it’s a relationship.

Until next Friday.  Love you loves.

Gastric Bypass Update:

I made it to 20,000 steps for the first time in NYC.

NYC- Food, Friends, and Fun: Part 1

Relationships, What to eat

So, once we were on the my dear friend’s street in Greenwich Village, the cabbie said, “Are we here?” when he thought we’d arrived at the proper address.

I said, “I don’t know if this is it, it’s my first time here.”

He said, “Oh, I thought you lived here.”

“Uh, no, I’m just a really good faker.”

We both had a giggle.

I arrived here last night to visit with my dear friend, Anny. It’s so good to love on the people you love, people.  Do it.  Life is too short not to.

This morning, she made me a lovely decadent egg scrambled magical goodness extravaganza with artichoke truffle paste, Portobello mushrooms, and zucchini.   Meanwhile, I complained about how freakin’ hot it is in her 6th floor walk up apartment and how I can’t imagine not controlling the heat in my own house.  You’ve heard before how I have issues with heat.  Now, back to the egg extravaganza (Um, can you say delish? I had seconds. Did I mention that I’m in NYC because Anny bought me a flight, but I’m also here to eat something naughty whenever I’m hungry and not feel a bit of guilt.)  

We headed off shortly after 11am, and popped into Amy’s Bread in GV for a cup of coffee and a pistachio twist.  (GV- Now we’re on initial terms because writing out Greenwich Village is too much work to spell out over and over.)  We hoofed it to the Subway headed to Central Park. CP in autumn has to be one of God’s favorite places on earth.  (Really, God, yes? I wouldn’t mind if heaven was just like this place, with a constant temperature regulated at 60 degrees.  Are you taking notes?)    

Central Park has such gorgeous fall colors and we dressed just perfectly.  Anny gifted me this fanTAStic sweater that complimented this enchanting day.  I was camouflaged.   I Spy with my little eye, something, orange.  Ah, oranges, and reds, and yellows and rustic browns.  Did I mention that fall is my favorite?   Hover over the pictures to see little snippets of my adventures today.  What a lovely day.  I get to do this again tomorrow.  Don’t hate.

Peace on Earth
Matchy
Rays
The Mall
Touching the Empire State Building
Rowing fun at Central Park Lake
Washington Square Arch, Empire State Building- wee image in the background
Me, ordering Hot Nuts, only 1 bag please
Central Park
Holding hands with a freaky translucent tape guy in the park
Central Park Bow Bridge
Home Slice
Bethesda Fountain
Washington Square Park
Subway ride to CP
This is how you must eat the pizza.
Cannoli from Rocco’s

(Oh, and God has told me there will be cannolis and NYC pizza in heaven, because all the streets aren’t made of gold, in the literal, like, gold-chain sense of the word, nah, the streets of gold are really streets of dough.  Golden luscious wheat dough of all shapes and sizes.  Savory and sweet. Pure Heaven.  There will be no calories or badness associated with this golden dough.  The pot at the end of the rainbow in heaven will be filled with golden dough. Can I get an amen?)

Until next Friday.  Love you loves.

Gastric Bypass Update:

I ate tons today.  I also walked a whole lotta steps.  That evens things out, right?

I had a few moments where I realized that I would have really struggled with this trip a year ago.  The walking and the climbing of stairs would have been terribly hard for me.  I’m enjoying this so much more, with 75 less poundage.  That’s like almost 2 of the suitcases I carried up the 6 floor walkup, except that weight was on my body.  Yeah, on my body.  (I just have to say, Anny, you rock those stairs every day.  You kick sass.  For realz.)

Here’s me, huffin’ and puffin’ up those stairs carrying my 39-pound suitcase.  The video quality is poor, but my commentary is pretty funny.  Enjoy.

 

Lost and Found

Emotions

When I lived in Texas during my junior high years, my mom had this houseplant, probably a philodendron.  We have had variations of this plant in the house throughout my childhood.  There was a point in time where every morning a section of this plant would be detached from the mother plant, and it would lay, there, on the floor, ready to face its untimely death.  My mom would walk in on those mornings and say, “Who is messin’ with my plant. This keeps happening! Who’s doing it?”  All the kids chimed in practically in chorus.  “Not me!”  After what seemed like weeks of this, pieces of the mother plant broken off and moved to parts of the kitchen, my mom enraged every time at seeing these sad little specimens, and the mother plant slowly losing all her kiddlins.  Then, alas, one normal morning, a specimen appeared partially pulled underneath the oven.

Mom surprised said, “What in the world?”  Then upon closer observation, she decided to pull out the oven and see why this plant part was pulled under the oven and why her children would do such a thing.  Low and behold, behind the oven was a hole, a hole that had obviously been created my a small animal.  There near the hole, was more evidence, more plant specimens.  That squirrel, rat, or opposum had played a cruel trick on us that day and many days before.  (I bet it was behind the wall laughing hysterically and all of us kids.)  My mama, sealed that wretched hole.  She got the last laugh.  The villian had been found.  Plot foiled at last.

Speakin’ of my mama, I love her to the moon and back.  She loves me more than any human I know.  She gave me my name and allowed me to be my unique creative self (against her better judgment) at times.  Thanks mom for letting me insist on my rad hair in fourth grade.  That straight-no-bang-parted-at-the-side-pulled-back-in-barrettes look was what my little heart desired.  All my friends looked rad with that hair style, me-round-faced-Joy, not so much.  But mama, you let me wear my hair like that because you knew I wanted it.  You bought me barrettes and let me go through that phase. (I also went through a phase where I chewed the inside of my bottom lip until there was a nice, what looked like a tumor, on the inside of my mouth.  Yeah, yuck.  And a brilliant hair-chewing phase.  I’m glad that’s over. So are you, right?  There’s nothing worse than watching an adult chew their hair.  This might be awesome fodder for a SNL skit though.)

So back to my mama, love her, but there’s one thing I don’t love.  Her ability to lose her keys.  It’s like her keys had an evil mind of their own, and they play tricks on her.  They’d laugh hysterically from the crack in the couch or from the pocket of a jacket.  They’d giggle, meanwhile, the rest of the family was interrogating her, “Mom, where did you have them last.  What were you wearing?”  All of us in frantic key search mode because we were late and needed to get somewhere but couldn’t leave because…the keys had gone missing again.  Evil keys.  The ebb and flow of The Lost and Found Keys was a game we played constantly.  (Sidenote: I’ve solved this problem as an adult in my own home, because I hated this game so much.  I have a hook where I hang my keys upon entering the house.  Obsessive?  Maybe.)

 

My house has lost its innocence.  After 11 months of having 16 solar panels atop our home, we are still not able to use them.  Still.  I feel at a loss for how to remedy this.  Architects, surveyors, County representatives, Building inspectors, representatives from complaint organizations and 11 months later, it still feels like we’re lost.  Hopefully this terrible limbo we have been stuck in for way too long will come to an end soon.  I don’t want just any ending, I want a happy ending.  I want my home to be happy again.  Right now, it’s just not itself.  It’s been taking the blame for something that it didn’t do.  The Zero Energy and the County have been playing tricks on us.  I hope we have the last laugh.

Keep your head up and listen to Stubborn Love today Joy.  You’re stubborn and you love.   Hang in there.  To the rest of you, you hang in there too.

 

Until next Friday.  Love you loves.

Gastric Bypass Update:

I’m so enjoying shopping for different sizes again.  I’m down 5 sizes.  It does feel good.