Poor Blondie

I think Blondie is questioning why moving to the city that is home to Broadway was a good idea. I love musicals with a flaming hot passion, and Blondie quite honestly does not.

I managed to convince him that seeing Hair on Broadway today is a fabulous idea. We are going to the 3 pm show.

At least there will be naked people to take his mind off all the singing.

I'm thankful I have Blondie because this will be our 3rd Broadway play since we've been here, and 2 of them will be musicals (the 3rd one had Scarlett Johannson in it though so I guess we are about even).

--K

Fleet Week, summer Fridays, pedicure, and a hangover

Oh My!

I feel off this week and I have Fleet Week to blame for it. We had Fleet Week in San Francisco also, but it was at the beginning of October. So I'm wandering around this week, sweating my ass off b/c summer has finally hit and hit hard, and everytime I see a sailor or a marine, I'm like "Huh. It sure is hot for October".

I'm an idiot sometimes.

So the ships are docked, our armed forces are in town, and it's Memorial Day weekend. It's a great day to be in NYC.

Yesterday started summer Fridays for me. This is a 1 pm end time on Friday, making your 8 hour day a 4 hour day. And you don't have to make up your time. I love summer Fridays. Love them. Like I'd totally drop Blondie for them.

To celebrate my first summer Friday, Blondie met me at a local burger joint I've been wanting to try (Mother Burger). They have a huge outdoor patio which is very important since one of our favorite shared activities is people watching. I got a wing burger which is a burger doused in buffalo sauce covered in blue cheese dressing (um, OMG, so freaking yummy!) and Blondie got a BLT. They also have $2 cans of beer. Which started us off drinking, ahem, rather heavily.

We also started the "Imaginary Dinner Party" game - which is pick a theme, and then pick 5 people dead or alive who you would invite to that theme. We went through everything from sports stars (Brett Favre was on both of our lists) to movie stars (ScarJo was on everyone of Blondie's lists and Jonny Depp was on everyone of mine) to exes to political figures to ... We literally played this game all night - that I can remember.

After Mother Burger it was off to Rudy's - home of the $7 pitchers of Rudy's Blonde Ale and free hot dogs. 3 pitchers later, we headed home. I think we got in around 9 pm, we had skipped dinner, and were completely toasted.

Somehow we managed to split a meatball sub that I had leftover from a few days ago, which I guess was smart. I woke up naked this morning with no memory of removing my contacts or clothes.

I huddled in a little ball on the floor for most of the morning, before finally giving up and starting to workout. The sweating was what I needed b/c I feel right as rain right now.

I headed out around noon to get myself a pedicure (somehow a foot massage seems to cure everything) - we're off to Philadelphia next weekend, so I wanted to have good looking feet when I see my friends. Can't wait for the trip! Afterwards I called Blondie and he met me at our local BBQ restaurant Daisy Mays, where I induldged in mac&cheese and creamed corn. Hello carbs! You are my friends! The best part is the leftovers are in my fridge to eat with homemade crab cakes tonight!

Knappy has invited us over to Bklyn for a party on his rooftop, but after my hot date with beer last night, I think an invitation to go to bed early is going to be accepted.

Happy Memorial Day everyone!

--K

Today's going to be a good day!

Let me start by saying - I need another weekend! Thank god this is a 4.5 day work week with a 3 day weekend coming up. OMG. I'm going to be counting minutes until Friday at 1 pm. Also - this Friday starts summer Fridays, so let's say it together - "WOOOOOOO HOOOOOOOOOOOO". Summer Fridays are half day Fridays that you don't have to make up your time for. So our work weeks become 36 hour work weeks.

It's the small things that make me happy.

My week and weekend have been ON THE GO. Blondie came and met me on Wed night for some shopping and dinner on the UES. He needed new jeans and I needed a new handbag. Then we both needed pizza. Then, of course, Dylan's Candy Bar (Ralph Lauren's daughter's candy shop) was calling our names.

Who's bright idea was it to have an entire wall of different flavored gummy bears? Those are my obsession. $15 worth of gummy bears later, my shame kicked in. But they were soooo good!

Thursday I made it to LES for lunch with CChu - another friend from work who was visiting her offices here in NYC. We ate at Ippudo, which is said to be the best ramen bar in NYC. It was definitely good, but I've also definitely had ramen I liked better. 5 hours after lunch, I was still stuffed to my eyeballs and it was TIME TO BOWL! My workgroup headed over to Chelsea Piers to bowl and booze, and finally hit up the arcade. I had a total blast - from games of flippy cup, to "Let's not aim for the pins, let's just bowl the fastest" to The Vadge putting on a devil voice and screaming "I'm the LOUDEST drunk alive!"

Which leads us into the weekend...

I have a slight obsession with SNL digital skits - the Lonely Island guys that make those videos are genius. A friend of mine from work told me about their latest video - "Today's Going to be a Good Day" - and we ended up watching it like 50000 times at work this past week. Check out Hulu - it's SO WORTH IT!

There is a point to this - the video was actually filmed in the West Village area of NYC, close to NYU campus, so I drug Blondie down with me to revisit the area this weekend. We had gone down when we first moved here, back in February, and we completely loved the area.

This time down we went ahead and visited Washington Square Park - home of the famous arch (see my NY blog - nynoob.blogspot.com - for pics), and then poked around the NYU campus some. Afterwards, we headed over to this bar we found from our previous trip down - which is home to honestly the best burger I've ever had in my life.

We headed there for lunch after our touristing activities, and I was so worried that maybe I had made the burger out to be way more than it was in my head. Fears were overcome though - that burger actually makes me want to cry it's so good.

About 7 beers into our afternoon, Blondie suggested giving the Knapster a call. Knappy was one of my BFF's from SF, who was actually in the process of moving to NYC when I was in the process of moving to SF itself. I heart me some Knappy but you have to have a certain amount of energy to keep up with him.

We determined we had that energy, the call was made, and the next thing I know, Blondie and I were on a train to Brooklyn to party it up Knappy-style in Williamsburg. It was the first time we've met up since we've moved here, which is actually totally my fault. We had a great time, and ended up back at his and his roommate's apartment drinking beers on their rooftop patio which had the most awesome view of the NYC skyline I've ever seen.

In a completely random happening, it turns out that Knappy's ex gf, the lovely Yo, LIVES IN OUR APARTMENT BUILDING! WTF? Of all the buildings in NYC, we moved into the same one in the same timeframe!

So last night when we were ready to leave Brooklyn, we hired a "livery cab" (I'm still not sure what this means) and Knappy came with us to visit Yo.

Today was spent dying. Blondie made me pancakes and turkey bacon for breakfast, and then I finally got a workout in. We made it out to Subway for lunch, and now I'm going to curl up in a ball on my floor and sweat the rest of the beer out.

The weather has turned crappy today - you'd never guess it was almost June out there right now, so this is a perfect day to be a lazy-ass. I'm going to try and convince one of my cats to take a nap with me also. We'll see how this goes.

--K

Laziness personified

My cats would say "HI" but they are too busy sleeping. And they could care less if you are offended by them not greeting you.



--K

The calm between the storms

A nice down week was what was required for us. After 2 straight weeks of visitors (WOO HOO! We LOVE you guys!), we needed a few days of being lazy asses to recuperate.

Ironically, another set of people from my old division were in town again, but this was not a crew I partied with, but one I had definitely shared many projects with instead. I have great respect for them, but our interactions were limited to lunches, and not bars after work.

So this week was Blondie's birthday!!! My hottie turned another year older, and still looks just as good as when I met him (10+ years ago!). He decided to celebrate by selecting cajun food for dinner. Blondie picked a different place than the one we normally go to though, and this one RULED.

The decor was amazing - you honestly felt like you were sitting in a bar overlooking Bourbon St - and the food rocked. We split an order of spicy red bean dip, and Blondie had fried pickles (there are not many foods I don't like, and even fewer I won't try - but pickles/cucumbers are not tops in my book). Then Blondie got a plate of crawfish etouffe and I had a plate of shrimp creole.

Many glasses of $5 hurricanes and Abita were also involved in this venture.

Afterwards, a long walk was required as Blondie was feeling extremely full. Our walk took us the roundabout way home, and soon we had pulled up in front of our 24 hour deli. Of course, ice cream sounded fabulous at this point, but true to form, I didn't even touch mine once we got home. But that was my birthday gift to Blondie ;)

The rest of the week was mild. Blondie got out of the apartment yesterday and hung out tourist-watching in Times Square for awhile. He's completely burnt now. I had of course work. Yay. Work. Woot.

Next week, yet another friend of mine from SF is pulling into town for work. I can't wait to see CChu and hang out! And my work group is going on a team outing for bowling on Thurs. This ought to be fun. We bowl everytime we go back to KY to visit my family, but that always involves about 20 beers - it will be interesting how I do with only a few in me.

Cheers to everyone and have a great weekend! I'm off to convince Blondie to go outside with me and enjoy the sun!

--K

HAPPY BIRTHDAY BLONDIE!!!

I love you Chompers!

We belong to the night, we belong to the thunder!!!

OMG. A whirlwind week that ended in karaoke bar in Koreatown trying to get out of the way of a girl who was about to projectile vom all over the bathroom.

It started, again, with friends (this time coworkers). The division I used to work for in my company also has an office in NYC (not just my new division in the same company) and some of my old coworkers were out this week to work out of the NYC offices.

On Tues Blondie and I met up with one of the guys - he was one of my BFF's from work, and an integral part of my "crew" in SF. We had a blast - we hit up a bar around my hood that was very similar to The Flying Saucer (a chain bar in TX and Memphis that had about a billion beers on tap). For those who don't know me, there is nothing I like more than grabbing some friends, finding a bar, and having some beers and good talk. And maybe some bar food.

On Thurs, I met up with one of the other guys who had flown out. I was also friendly with him and partied so much at his old apartment - he's the one that had the giant patio and threw parties all summer long last year. We ended up in on the east side (Midtown) and basically had a signoff to the jukebox. It was disastrous.

This leads us to yesterday... Me, Blondie and my 3 best from the city decided this was a fabulous night to slam some Soju, eat some wings, and then we ended up in Koreatown. Karaok'ing. In a private karaoke room. Drinking Sake and beer.

I was under the impression that the rooms were soundproof and let me say, I took advantage of it. I WAS ATROCIOUS. Video from Bacon will prove that. Um, also my impression? COMPLETELY F'ING WRONG. You could hear every other room from the halls. Luckily I was so far from being the worst person singing.

So I'm drunk, go to pee - 1 stall bathroom. I get done peeing, and all of a sudden someone starts yanking on the door - screaming "OMG, is someone in there?!?!?!?" and I'm all like "Yeah, just a sec" and then the screaming goes "Just hold it in Kate (I'm making up a name, I can't remember the name they used), HOLD. IT. IN!"

So I go flying out of the stall, with my pants still down - my big old butt on display - to find this girl who looks completely toasted, make-up smeared all over her face, and her friend who frantically shoves this girl into the stall where she immediately starts vomiting her brains out.

Standing there, still pants not up, and of course that's when I realize that they've brought a male friend into help *AND* more importantly, that the door from the bathroom to the hall is wide open.

Disaster.

But that's the beauty of being drunk. I was embarrassed for about 2.5 seconds, and then thought "that's what you get for getting so drunk. Silly people".

Last night seriously ranked up there as one of the 5 best nights I've ever had in my life.

On another note, a huge shout-out to Mr and Mrs Pooh (my brother and sis-in-law). They are running a half-marathon today. Mr Pooh has lost over 100 lbs over the past 1.5 years, and this will be his 5th or 6th half (he took up running when he started losing weight). Mrs Pooh, who does NOT have a weight problem, but has a job that makes it VERY hard to find time to run (stay-at-home mom to 2 of the Cutest Kids In The World, both under 5) will be running a half for the 1st time.

GO TEAM POOH!!!!!

--K

The city of brotherly love

Tickets bought to visit friends in Philadelphia in a few weeks. We are going to Amtrak down, and do a day of touring and then spend the weekend catching up! We haven't seen this crew since about 2006. Can't wait for our mini vacay!

I've been to Philly before, but Blondie hasn't, so if you have any suggestions for things Blondie might like, let us know.

--K

SF invasion of NYC!

It started on Monday. The fabulous Ma-Peng returned to her old stomping grounds for a week of work. She had worked in the NYC office for years, and had transferred to the SF offices about 2 weeks after I transferred into NYC.

Then on Tues night, Sweetie J called - she was waiting for her red-eye to the city! So excited to see her. Blondie and I immediately jumped into a night of housecleaning to get things ready for her to stay with us.

I had a VERY boring banquet to attend on Wed morning for work - work rented out a huge space close to Grand Central, and we spent 4 hours listening to this awards ceremony. I was disappointed b/c I didn't get to see Sweetie J - she didn't arrive to our apartment until after I had to leave for work.

Wed afternoon, I got the email from the K's that they were getting on their bus from Boston (they had flown to Florida and then done some touring up and down the east coast - but they are from SF also) and heading to the city. They were getting in really late Wed night, so we weren't going to meet up then.

Instead, we got some drinking in with Sweetie J on Wed night.

And Thurs night turned into a shit show. I called Blondie and he came and met up with me, Ma-Peng and the other cool people from my work. It seemed to be a fabulous idea to slam down sangria and margaritas - and then to meet back up with Sweetie J to start pouring beer down my throat. I was a train-wreck.

Friday was a horrid day. I had to bail on a HH with the K's and on a BBQ with Sweetie J - I have also never been so grateful for an office with a door. I had to lie down on the floor, complete with shakes, and try to recuperate. It's been one of the worst hangovers I've had in awhile.

Yesterday was much better though. The K's and Blondie and I headed over to the Bronx to the new Yankees stadium to watch the Yankees play. True to form, since Blondie and I were watching, the Yankees lost (adding them to the Knicks and the Rangers who've lost while we've watched them). Our subway train back was all sorts of delayed - it turns out there was a bomb in Times Square last night and we think that was what caused the problems.

It turned out ok though, b/c we slowly meandered our way home - the weather was gorgeous and perfect for a walk!

Everyone has left today to head back to SF. So it's just me and Blondie on our own again. We do have a date with my coworkers this week to hit up Koreatown for sake and karoake, so be prepared to read about bleeding eardrums (what will happen when I start to sing!).

--K