Updates!

Hey everyone  – sorry it’s been such a long time since I last posted. But the truth is, it’s time this blog got a revamp, and I hope to spend the next few weeks sharpening it up and making it a bit more streamlined and easy to read/navigate.

As for me, I’m ridiculously happy with life and New York in general. I could see myself living here for a long, long time. It’s just been such a whirlwind of activity and fun and work and basic awesomeness. Anyway, that’s all for now, until I get this new Web site off the ground!

<3

Oh Hai!

Hola faithful readers – it’s been a while! 

For the past month, I’ve been working my tail off and basically just enjoying the beautiful spring weather. Spring in New York is a heady thing, and so far, I’ve nearly completed my newcomer’s love affair with this city. I’m not sure if it’s just because I moved here, but so far, five months in the city has been a happy blur. Maybe the shiny wrapping of the city will eventually dull and fade, but for now, I’m content as can be, with a somewhat unsteady job and a massive rent bill to pay. 

So, super-fun activity of the month: hiking in the mountains outside of Philadelphia with Tara and Tim. 

Tara is my sister, the darker-haired one, and Teddy is the cute blob of black-and-white sitting on the log staring up at us in adoration. Getting the dirt/sticks/mud/leaf bits out of his fur was a pain in the ass, and ultimately resulted in over $100 at the groomer. It’s very easy to appreciate the prices of things OUTSIDE of New York – hair cuts (for dogs and people) being one of the pricier things. 

I’m set to move into the ‘Burg in less than a month now! I can hardly wait – I need a change, a place that feels a little more like home. Right now, the room I’m staying in isn’t much more than a box to sleep in and keep my stuff. 

A short post today – I’ll have my camera ready and be taking more pictures in the future. I’m also seriously behind on book and movie reviews, and I promise to remedy that soon. But for now, I have to tackle this novel-in-progress. Adios!

The Beginning of a Beautiful Friendship

What did I tell you??

I got a new camera! It’s a Kodak EasyShare – and while I don’t have the money to get the truly artistic camera I wanted, this one will serve.

This is a picture of Wyckoff Avenue in Bushwick, right outside the Dekalb L stop. The first time I saw the Empire State Building at such a distance, I was nearly floored. The Brooklyn street runs right down to the Manhattan skyline. I love it.

And right beside the subway stop is one of my favorite lunchtime destinations: Taco La Hacienda.

These are the “tacos al pastor,” and oddly enough, they taste far, far better than any Mexican food I ever ate in Arizona. Maybe I ate at the wrong places, but this delicious, spicy creation is a must-have about 3 times a week for me.

Two of these babies, paired with an authentic Mexican coke (made with real cane sugar, not the cheap corn syrup in American cokes), and you’re good to go.

I wasn’t at a very good angle to capture the Times building, but there’s the top of it right there. A very lofty home for a newspaper.

And the intersection outside of the Times. Needless to say, a big change from the mostly deserted streets of downtown Phoenix. The blare of car horns and whiz of taxis and ridiculous sounds and smells and sensations of Times Square are indescribable. If you like loud electric forms of advertisement, this is your place.

Why, hello there, New York Times!

This park is a few streets from work. There’s a good Cuban food vendor that parks his cart near here, and the trees against the building were too good to pass up for a quick snapshot.

The Union Square L stop – on the way home after a busy day of work. If you look closely down into the tracks, you’ll find…

RATS!

These greasy little critters pretty much thrive in the subway. This is a smallish rat, compared to some of the ones I’ve seen. He has a small friend right behind him, if you look closely. Imagine the size of the rats in the deep abandoned subway tunnels…I hear some of the homeless folk that frequent those tunnels call them “track rabbits.” Shudder.

On a happier note, I’m leaving Bushwick, which has been a good home for me for the past 4 months. In June, I’m moving into Williamsburg, which is one subway stop away from Manhattan, and a hotbed of activity and cool little bars, boutiques, restaurants and wineshops. And here is the view from the roof of our apartment:

No zoom was used on this – the red railing there is the railing of our roof. Our jaws dropped when we saw the view. Here is a classic jaw drop:

The roof is going to be a communal zone, with a bocce ball court and maybe some grills up there. We’ll be throwing a few parties, for sure McKenzie is my new roomie – she’s the one in the beige coat. Yancey is in gray beside her, and our real estate agent is Brian, in the black coat.

We’re all very excited to move into a new neighborhood, but I’ll definitely miss Bushwick. It’s so warm and welcoming, and such a family atmosphere. The only thing I would change is the amount of trash in the streets – I almost tripped over a milk carton the other day, and Teddy frequently freaks out when a wad of trash comes swirling in his direction.

Anywho, more photos will be forthcoming! Right now, life is very, very good – with only one hiccup. There is a strong possibility of layoffs at the Times, so I’m keeping my fingers crossed that I actually have a job in order to keep paying the rent. I wish for once I could just have a total peace of mind concerning money matters, but unfortunately, in this current economic climate, that’s just impossible. We can only keep hoping and praying that it gets better.

‘Til next time, dear readers!

Hiatus

It’s been a while since I’ve written!

I know, I know – I keep promising to buy a camera and actually post real pictures on this site, and now I plan on doing that. Tomorrow, in fact. I’m making a venture to the store and purchasing a brand-new digital camera!

I’m very excited about this. There are so many moments when I’ll be walking around, just enjoying the scenery, and realizing how much I’d like to share those moments with family and friends. So, since I’ve been working quite a bit (yay! happy jig!), I’ve gotten to the point where I’ve saved a good chunk of money and can buy something nice with it.

The weather is steadily growing warmer here, which means a number of things in Bushwick: a) suddenly, the streets are much noisier in the morning, b) the tamale lady hangs out on the corner of my block, using a shopping cart to grill skewers of very tasty-smelling pork and beef, and c) the frozen ice vendors have emerged from their winter lairs and are hawking little cones of shaved ice about every 15 feet.

As much as I love Bushwick, I’m most likely going to be moving from the ‘hood at the beginning of June. I’ll either be getting a one-bedroom of my own somewhere in Brooklyn (God, I love Brooklyn), or I’ll be shacking up with Yance and her friend in Manhattan (preferably in the East Village). Either way, I look forward to a change (though quite honestly, the next place I move, I want to stay long enough for it to begin to feel like home! Right now, I’m sleeping on a queen-size mattress on a full-size frame, with bare walls and no carpet – not ideal. The mattress situation makes it impossible to lie full-length on my bed without raising my feet up, and this creates very sore legs in the morning).

A few days ago, Meredith, Delinda and I discovered the roof of our building. I’d never been up there before, and it’s quite clear that I’ve been missing out. From my roof, you can see the entire spread of Bushwick, as well as the distant skyscrapers of Manhattan. I’ll hopefully be posting the picture of this soon. 

And now, off to bed before a rewarding shopping excursion – which, I hope, will make my blog  little more enjoyable to read.

West to East (A Photo Essay)

Yes, yes, I know. I’m egregiously late on the photo thing. And since I don’t like posting new things without a photo or two to go with it, I’ve been slacking off on the blogging department. But I’ve meant to post the photos of our journey back east, and therefore, I’m ganking my sister’s photos and posting them on my blog.

She’s a lovely and talented photographer, my Jojo

The above photo was a beautiful shot taken in New Mexico. I’m especially happy at how these turned out taken from inside of the car. Pure talent, Jorge.

You can see my sweatshirt through the window of this one, and possibly Teddy perched over my shoulder, being a thoroughly adorable and pugnacious co-pilot. 

There is such a spiritual, beautiful serenity to the Phoenix and New Mexico landscape. And what an evolution to simply drive through Arizona…one minute, there were crags and painted rocks and cliffs of cactus, and the next…

SNOW!!

Flagstaff is something else. Pines and high mountains and a few inches of snow on the sides of the road. I was a little worried driving through this area before I set off, but the snow was extremely non-dangerous, the roads were non-icy, and the views….well, I’ll just say that it was very hard to unglue my eyes from the majestic peaks in the distance and concentrate on the road in front of me. Driving through this area was definitely one of the highlights of the journey. 

After a while in Flagstaff, the countryside transitioned back into the usual Arizonan scrub and dirt. New Mexico was much of the same (there are a few New Mexico pictures scattered into the Arizona ones at the beginning). You didn’t see much of a change until Texas, and because Texas was the most awful place to drive through EVER (reeked of cow shit, barren save for abandoned cattle barns), Jordan and I chose not to photograph it. Hehe. Sorry Texans.

One of the three sunsets we saw whilst driving

This was in Oklahoma. The land there was so ridiculously flat, and the wind turbines were really something else. The renewable energy of the future! Woo! 

Around this time, Teddy began to get truly miserable. 

We built him a little palace of blankets and pillows in the backseat of the car, because I refused to shut him in his crate for the entire 32-hour journey. So basically, he slept most of his way across the country. For a dog as rambunctious and strange as he is, he was oddly calm the entire time, and halfway through, he just started looking…hungover, or something. I think he may have gotten a bit carsick, though he never threw up. Cute little trooper. 

This was the bridge over the Mississippi River (and into Tennessee, obviously). Arkansas was pretty unremarkable as a state, so we refrained from taking pictures (once again, sorry Arkansans). 

Around this time, the land started looking like the country where I grew up – kinda hilly, with lots of pine trees. I can’t tell you how happy I was to see TREES. 

And then, of course, the signs that DEFINITELY pointed to being back in the South. My sister nearly cried after seeing this as she’s become a vegetarian. As for me, I just scoffed and said, “Pshhh, they were only four-pointers.” Hopefully the hunters have a whole fridge full of venison now and weren’t stupid and shot them only for their rather pitiable antlers. 

Ah, yes. It had been a while since I’d seen one of those. Definitely in the “former Confederacy.” 

This photo was crossing from Tennessee to North Carolina. Beauteous. 

By this time, Jordan and I were pretty much going crazy. It’s only a matter of time before two people and a dog holed up in a packed Honda Civic are going to snap. We began stopping multiple times in the mountains pretty much just for the hell of it. We stopped in one mountain town that literally was nothing more than a gas station, a shabby diner, a smattering of houses and a one-lane road. I really wish we had taken pictures of the gas station, because it had a lot of really interesting items for sale, including: rebel flag do-rags, real crocodile heads, giant bull horns and the like. 

Finally, the last leg of our journey. The North Carolina mountains. This photo pretty much looks like the cover of the book, “Cold Mountain,” but I promise it’s Jordan’s. 

We were both really looking forward to taking a lot of pictures of the mountains here, eager to see the contrast between Phoenix’s crags and the older, more serene Carolina mountains. Unfortunately, we got to the mountains RIGHT at sundown  

Which put me in an awkward position, because the highway that runs through the mountains and into the Piedmont is ridiculously twisty, curvy and otherwise terrifying to drive at night. I had to put all of my concentration into driving, because the possibility of running off the road and over the side of a mountain was very real. But clearly, we made it – we were home in Thomasville around 11:00, where I immediately cracked open a fresh brew and collapsed on the couch. 

If you’re never taken a trip cross-country, let me tell you – AMAZING. I wish we had a thousand more photos of the experience. 

There’s really nothing better than driving on the open road in a soft sweatshirt with a Coke and a bag of Twizzlers – and the deep, sweet feeling that you’re coming home after a very long vacation.

L-I-V-I-N

Hola, folks who read my blog. I think there may be about 3 of you out there, and for your benefit, I will continue to update this thing as I go about life.

My earlier prediction about Bushwick has held true: this neighborhood is filled with sweet, kind people. Already, I’ve already been greeted so many times as I’m out and about on errands in the area, and the passerby really seem to adore Teddy. Little children always dance around, asking politely if they can pet him, and Teddy is only too happy to oblige by sitting calmly while they hastily give him a few pats. I’ve had a little old man wave merrily at me and say, “Have a good day!” with such sincerity that I couldn’t help but grin ear-to-ear in return. What a day brightener. One of my neighbors who owns the Spanish restaurant down the street from me shook my hand and entreated me to come into his place sometime and chat since “we’re neighbors now.”

Overall, I feel safe and welcome here. The only thing lacking is a decent furniture store, so I can actually purchase lamps and such for my room. I need a desk, too – I’m hoping to do a little freelance work as soon as I’ve saved a bit of money and have all of my big purchases in order. I also want to buy a large Mac screen to hook up to my laptop, so I can see things a little better and don’t have to strain my weakening eyes too much.

The writing is back on fire. Apparently I needed a change of scenery – there’s nothing like the energy and constant motion of the city to get you enthused about some serious story-telling. Simply riding the subway can give me inspiration for a number of different subjects. Though I’m pretty much working four and five days a week, I hope to find time to join a writing circle, where I can learn with other writers and hear some constructive criticism. I’ve also given thought to joining a drama class – four years without acting has been rough, and God, I loved it in high school. I can’t stress enough how nice it is to be in a city where classes like this are readily available and just waiting for you to join.

And finally, let me tell you – I thought I spent too much money on food in Arizona. Now, in New York, I’m burning through food money like nothing else. There are currently no cooking utensils in my new kitchen, which is a shame since the kitchen itself is big, nicely decorated and conducive to all sorts of culinary wizardry. Right now, I have a 12-pack of Coke in the fridge, a box of Strawberry Pop Tarts, a box of Teddy Grahams, 3 packages of Oriental-flavored Ramen noodles, cheese Bagel Bites, and a package of Goldfish. You do the math.

Thankfully, I’m walking everywhere, otherwise I would be in serious danger of gaining 50-plus pounds by eating this cardboard junk. Doing so much walking has severely impacted my shoe choices – wearing heels here is a no-no. When I interviewed with the Times a few months ago, I made the horrid decision of wearing brand-new leather boots. By the time I picked my way back to Lauren’s apartment, my toes were a bloody mess and my socks were ruined. Now, I’m about to purchase a new pair of black Uggs (ugh), and Yancey was kind enough to buy me Converses for my Christmas present. Sweet!

And for now, I’ll leave you until my next life update.

Oh, and GO TAR HEELS!! That’s four wins in a row against Dook at their disgusting rat-hole of Cameron Indoor Stadium. Mwahaha!

From Midwood to Bushwick

On Sunday, I finally made the move to my new apartment, Teddy in tow, and with my meager belongings lugged up the stairs by me and my friends. 

I’ll tell you what – during this “move,” I finally realized how few things I really have up here. 

The biggest thing I brought was my large red suitcase, full of weather-inappropriate clothes like tank tops and sundresses. Then there was my bag of toiletries and shampoo and razors and things like that. And then Teddy’s crate. And a borrowed comforter from Delinda, since Mom is bringing my own trusty comforter up to me in a few weeks and I needed something to sleep under. Oh, and the Xbox. 

That’s about it. 

Suffice it to say, my room is pretty empty. Luckily, I was able to get a good deal and keep the furniture there, so I have a queen-size bed with drawers built into the base, a large armoire and a bedside table. My room also has two tall windows that let in a lot of light, and an air conditioner/heating unit that makes a water fountain sound at night. Intriguing. 

Since I have to work 5 days this week (yes! – and yes, I’m truly excited about this, as the more I work, the better), I plan on visiting the mysterious Bed, Bath and Beyond to furnish my room. It needs art on the walls – badly. Right now, I can’t stay in there for very long because the walls are so blindingly white. 

I had my first Bushwick exploration yesterday. The street I live on is one of the busiest streets in the neighborhood, and home to a zillion shoe stores and bodegas. There’s a supermarket not far from me – it’s no Whole Foods, but it has Wheat Thins and Coke, so I’m set. A park is about two blocks from me, where I imagine I’ll be walking Teddy quite a bit. On my way around the ‘hood, nothing much was remarkable except for a group of guys making kissy noises at me as I passed. I just tried not to laugh and kept walking. 

As for Teddy – all I can say is that the little guy’s had a tough month. So much moving and constant stress has definitely affected him. When I arrived in Philly on Saturday to pick him up from my sister’s house (where she’d been keeping him while I found a place of my own in New York), he just ran to me and proceeded to have a nervous breakdown. It was pathetic. He just sat on the carpet, quaking all over with the saddest look on his face. On the way back to NYC, he buried his little face in my sweatshirt and just cuddled on me the entire way back. Needless to say, if I leave the room now, he freaks out. Poor guy probably thinks I’m going to leave him again  

In good news, he’s learning to pee and poop on concrete – which is a big step for him, as there’s no grass around for a few blocks. Teddy is a bit of a diva when it comes to having the perfect patch of ground to defecate upon. 

Bushwick is going to be a good thing, I’m almost certain. I’ve already found a few restaurants around here that I want to try, and it’s just a crazy mix of people out and about at all hours. Most of the population here is Latino and African-American, with a few “hipsters” thrown in for variety. What is a hipster, you may ask? As far as I can tell, it’s a person who wears a lot of odd Pete Wentz-ish type of clothing and is an “artist” – I use this term loosely because there’s really no telling who’s an artist and who’s a poser. As I fit none of these descriptions, I suppose I’m my own category  

My only concern is that Brooklyn tends to be much, much quieter at night than Manhattan. For some reason, people (myself included) tend to think that more people equals more safety, when that’s not necessarily the case. It was an eerie experience walking the two blocks from the subway back to my apartment at 1 in the morning – there were very few people getting off at my subway stop. But thankfully, my fellow Times employee lives in Bushwick too, so we walked together, which was an amazing help. Being a scrawny, unarmed girl walking alone at 1 in the morning is just not a great thing period, regardless if you live in Brooklyn or Denton, NC. 

Ok, I’ll wrap this post up – lots of random ramblings on my part. I get paid on Thursday, so I’m hoping to have the time and money to spend some time decorating my room, of which I’ll take many photos. I also plan to post some pictures of the city itself, and the area in which I live. 

Until then!

Inauguration Awesomeness and Other Things

Today was an amazing day for America, and I really can’t stop the bubble of happiness from lifting me up and making me want to walk on my tip-toes all day. 

President-Elect Obama is now PRESIDENT OBAMA! 

The ever-lovely New York Times has an impressive slideshow of the events, and here’s the link if you want to take a look (which you should): 

History in the Making

A lot of my friends got to go to the inauguration, and I can’t imagine the atmosphere: 2 million people all gathered together for one common purpose – to celebrate the American dream. And what a dream it is. It was just…uplifting to see so many people united and happy. 

Ahh, so that’s that. I’m excited to see what Obama does in office, and even though I realize that he has a ridiculous amount of obstacles ahead of him, I’m still hopeful that things are going to get better. 

So in other news…

I’m working quite a bit at the Times, and learning a whole lot more about the way they do things – the design staff there is very adamant about keeping plenty of room for photos and graphics, which is great. I’m super grateful to Alan, too, who is scheduling me for lots of shifts. So far, I’ve tackled the sports national edition, which is the edition that goes out to places like Oregon and North Carolina and Arkansas. I look forward to trying my hand at some other sections, too. 

Also, I can’t really articulate how great it is to be back with my old friends. The other night, all of us were in the same room together, drinking wine and laughing, and it was almost exactly like college again. All of us are a little older, and maybe look a little older, but the vibe was the same. It makes me smile just to write about it. 

I’ve been reading a lot – when you ride the subway on an hour-long commute, you get a lot of reading in. So far, I’m on Les Miserables and The History of Love. The thing about reading is that it makes you want to start writing, and so now my brain is filled with ideas for stories, plus more ideas for the novel I’m currently writing (and have been writing since age 17) – it’s a bit of a fantasy-historical type of thing. I sometimes worry that I’ve taken on too much of a project for the first novel. It’s already huge, and nowhere near finished. For all of that, I’m pretty pleased with it, and hope that it continues to get longer. 

Sorry that this post has been a bit incoherent – the house that I live in with my friends is home to a babbling family of children, and they’ve all been singing in unison downstairs. Distracting.

The BK, Baby – BROOKLYN!

After a very brief search and a goodly amount of time crashing with my friends, it seems as if I’ve found a place to live (for the next 5 months, that is). Through the majesty of Craigslist, I found a very sweet little place in Bushwick, Brooklyn. 

I found that amazing image via a Google search (it’d be very nice to randomly walk past it in my explorations of the neighborhood). The barbed wire kind of sucks, though. 

Now, for those of you familiar with Brooklyn, you probably have heard some bad things about Bushwick. Apparently it’s known as a rough part of Brooklyn, and was hit pretty badly by the crack epidemic in the 90s. Thankfully, it’s recovering – and in the process of becoming the new “hip” place to live and be seen – kind of like Williamsburg or parts of Alphabet City. Either way, you have to be safe in any big city you go to, not just New York – no aimless walking with iPods squeezed in your ears, no loud phone calls without paying attention to your surroundings, no generally stupid actions. The slight twinge of apprehension I feel about living in a new neighborhood is offset by the fact that I’ll have blessed SPACE, and also be a bit closer to work in Manhattan. 

So far, I haven’t been happier about living in the city. There are so many things to do and see here…as soon as it gets warmer, I fully plan on arming myself with my camera and posting pictures on the blog so you guys can see what’s happening. The only bad thing that’s occurred to me in the past two weeks was: 

1. Carolina basketball losing to both Boston College AND Wake Forest. 

2. The Panthers losing to the (jaw-drop) CARDINALS, which is the most ridiculous crock of nonsense I’ve ever witnessed. That having been said, it looks as though I’ll be pulling for Kurt Warner and his boys in the next few games. 

3. It snowed on me. Hard. I was walking to a potential future apartment near the edge of Manhattan when the skies opened up and the snow came down. Unfortunately, I was wearing thin boots, a light coat and no hat. Within minutes, a crust of ice formed on my head, and I topped it off by getting lost, unable to see the street signs in the blinding snow. So that wasn’t fun. 

Other than that, my experiences have been largely pleasant, right down to being quite intoxicated on the Q train back to Brooklyn and watching an interesting man walking up and down the aisle of the train, smacking himself in the forehead and shouting in what I think may have been Hindi. 

Work is fun – I’m still looking for other jobs to supplement the income, but so far, I’m having a blast and just getting to explore the city. Life is good

2009

After a grueling 3-day drive, I’m finally back in the Old North State.

My little sister Jordan was kind enough to drive out with me, and together, we cruised through the austere beauty of Arizona, the mountains of New Mexico, the crappiness that is the top of Texas, the vast open nothingness of Oklahoma, the bland land of Arkansas, the pretty rolling hills of Tennessee, and finally, finally, the grand, awe-inspiring mountains of North Carolina.

So now I’m here, back in Thomasville.

It’s New Year’s Eve and right now, I’m not sure what I’m going to do for the night – probably just kick back with my family. It feels nice and pretty symbolic that I’m setting off the New Year back home, ready to move to a new city and a new job.

It was very sad to leave Arizona. I listened to Sia’s “Breathe Me” as we drove away across the red mountains and buttes. I will miss AZ so much, and I hope to come back someday. If I ever get rich (heh heh), I want to buy a house in Sedona.

Tonight, I’ll be drinking champange toasts to a lot of things. A safe drive, a bittersweet end, and a new beginning.

Also, Teddy has a new BFF – my older sister’s dog Indiana Jones. Right now, they’re pretty much attached at the shoulder. I’ll upload pictures of their antics and of my cross-country drive when I get a chance!

Happy New Years!