More Snow! Happy Holidays!

So after the first exciting snow, we got a lot more! It snowed all day - giant snowball-size flakes! Very thrilling for these California girls. We even braved it and went on with our plans. I thought the snow building up on the garbage on the street was very picturesque.



But not actually as pretty as the snow on our neighbors shrubs.


What can I say - I've never lived where it snows. Even footprints in the snow are interesting.


I love Christmas lights and thought this tree was so pretty. Christmas in the city has been so wonderful.


Merry merry Christmas to you! Looking forward to New Year's - we have friends visiting so there should be some great photos to follow...

It Snowed!!!

*Note* I meant to publish this post over a week ago, and forgot. But the sentiment is still there! (= Whoops.

News so exciting it deserves its own post! The weather took a turn for the very cold this past weekend, and the stars finally aligned for it to SNOW!!! I can't even tell you how incredible it was. Simply beautiful. It didn't go on for too long, and didn't really stick, but it was enough to pile on the parked cars and enough for this California girl to get excited. I'm not so sure about the cold yet, but if it means snow, I'm on board!


The pictures don't do it justice, but if you look at the light you can kind of tell how hard it was snowing. It even kind of stuck! I can't wait till the next snowfall.



Bring on the cold! We're ready. Christmastime and winter in the city are so much fun. We both ordered ice skates and are anxiously awaiting their arrival because the city is full of places to use them. We'll keep you posted...

I Know, I Know...We've Been In Hiding!

Sorry! But we've just been having so much fun (and such unreliable internet access) that we just haven't been able to share with you what we have been up to. Suffice to say it is cold but things are wonderful! But here's some catch-up:

We are all about the themed restaurants - we finally found our way to Peanut Butter and Company - a PB restaurant! They serve all kinds of crazy PB sandwiches, and even a crudite platter of sorts with celery, apples, carrots and crackers! Oh the excitement. And of course big glasses of milk to go with the feast! It was pretty tasty and we will gladly take any visitors needing a peanut butter fix.


In November we went to check out the anti-Prop 8 rally going on at City Hall here in NYC. A little taste of home. Nice to feel like a part of it even from across the country. We got there a little late, but there was still a huge turn out.


People had very clever signs and posters.


On to Thanksgiving! Happy (belated) Turkey Day! Hope everyone had a wonderful day and tasty meal with family and friends. I know we are very thankful for all of you, and wouldn't have made this move out here without your love and support. This turkey was our thank you gift to our gracious Thanksgiving hosts - Adam's grandparents. Having no family of our own to be with this year, our friend Adam invited us to join his family in Philadelphia. It turned out to be a great trip! We took the Bolt Bus Thursday morning, which is a pretty fancy bus and only takes 2 hours! Coming from a state as large as California, this was miraculous to us.


We spent Thanksgiving day driving around the neighborhood and spent sometime in the town of Narberth. It was pretty much deserted, but nice to hang out for a bit in the quiet, not surrounded by tons of tourists like in NYC. Such a change of pace!


And oh my gosh! Nature! Who would have thought? We ended up in a very cute park with trees and a creek - I know we have Central Park here, but for some reason a park surrounded by cute, old houses seems more nature-y than one surrounded by sky scrapers.


Credits to Colleen for this pic. Thanksgiving was filled with good food and meeting lots of Adam's family, and we definitely had a great time. Thanks for including us!


Friday we became tourists. Had to take in the history of Philly while we were there. (= Saw the first, and second, national banks, as well as the Liberty Bell. Can't go to Philly and not see the bell right?


City Hall at night - this picture is a little blurry, but believe me, it was very pretty. The east coast definitely has the historical edge - so many old, fancy buildings that you just don't find in California. I still love you west coast, but the east coast certainly has its charms.


Bring on Christmas! We went with a friend of Colleen's to see the Radio City Rockettes Christmas Spectacular! Touristy, yes, but we heard it was one of those things you just have to do once. Seeing Radio City was reason enough, but the show was fun too. A little over the top perhaps, but fun all the same. Gets you in the Christmas mood for sure!


Leaving the show we walked by NBC and they were filming 30 Rock. I don't watch the show really, but it was still exciting. You see quite a bit of filming around the city, but this was the first time I saw actual filming going on, and not just set up. I know he's small, but that's Alec Baldwin in the overcoat, to the right of the center. (I know, which one right?)


We couldn't help but get a Christmas tree, no matter how small our apartment may be. We did it up right - hot coco, holiday music, and even matching pajamas! Oh goodness. I think Colleen and I really do spend too much time together.


So precious. And please note the impressive scarf collection we have on the door in the background - gotta stay warm somehow!


We even have presents under it already! Happy Holidays everyone!

My Favorite

Butch came to visit us last night. He was fantastic. We are happy.

Autumn in New York....

Sorry for the long silence - we've been so busy (read: tired!) that pictures have been less frequent and updates even more scarce. So let's play catch up!

In mid-October, we ventured down to Brooklyn for the farmers market there. Why all the way to Brooklyn when there are perfectly good farmers markets all over Manhattan? Well look!

The market in Brooklyn is right at the arch at Prospect Park. I had no idea this arch (as seen in When Harry Met Sally) was in Brooklyn until I was in a taxi and we passed it, but I wanted to see it again close up! Pretty cool. Not as good as Arc De Triomphe, but I'll take it.


Why go to the farmers market? Well to get mini pumpkins and Indian corn to make pumpkin people! We spent the perfect fall day: take in the outdoor market, collect pumpkins, corn, apple cake and fresh fruit. Run into our friend Adam, who happened to be on a bike ride in the same park. Get soup and sandwiches at a local cafe (called "Propect Perk" - almost like Central Perk!). Then we went home, made apple cider, and carved mini pumpkins!




The final results:

Yay fall! See Colleen's way cool witch and broom? She fashioned it from the corn husks! And the scarecrow with his pitchfork...looks like they did something bad to that poor guy in the middle, huh? (=

In other news, we recently discovered a new restaurant called S'Mac - a mac n cheese restaurant! See our excitement!


Mmmmm.....delicious.


There was a pumpkin festival at Central Park, so we had to go! I think they were going for a world record for number of carved pumpkins. It was soo cool! Orange pumpkins lining the pathways...it looked like something out of a movie. If you can't tell, I happen to love fall and Halloween and carved pumpkins (= This picture just screams fall...changing leaves, rain and all!


Look at them all! This stand was really tall and full of pumpkins! I have no idea who carved them all....surely the pumpkin fairies. No other explanation, clearly.


Obama and McCain were even there!


Next is Halloween! We dressed as the subway lines - Colleen was the 6 train (local) and I was the E train (seeing as I conveniently have a green wig and a blue wig). Brant helped edit the graphic to make our way cool shirts!



Here we are after fighting the crowds at the parade. We gave up and ended up at our usual bar. But overall a good night.


Then most exciting of all - election day! We voted (can you guess who for???) which was quite an experience. We went to the polls bright and early and even figured out the crazy old voting machine. First time for both of us to actually go to vote instead of absentee. Then we got our free Starbucks! What a great day this turned out to be, huh? Little bit of history. We took in the sights at Times Square and everything. Total craziness.




Next up....Christmas! Really looking forward to holidays here. Lights are already popping up and ice skating rinks are open. Check in again soon - we'll be better updaters if you leave comments so we know people are still reading! (=

Smells like fall...

Hello! Fall is starting to show its face around NYC and we couldn't be happier! Having lived in San Diego for the past 5 years, we've had perpetual spring and summer, so fall is mighty exciting. It was really cold (hah, "really" is so relative...I think it was in the high 50's) for about a week, and we got very nervous that we weren't going to last this winter if it was already that cold in September. Luckily, it has warmed back up a bit, but it still has that crisp fall feel to the air. We have had fun wearing scarves and jackets, and went out to buy big wool coats so we can survive the winter! This past weekend we decided to go for another adventure in Central Park, to see if the leaves were starting to change! They are only starting the yellow, but we had a good time nonetheless.

Yellow leaves! I know they are a little hard to see, but this was the first tree we saw with signs of fall, so we had to get a picture in front of it.


So picturesque...something about the red berries on the tree and the classic lamp post were irresistable.


We finally made it far enough north to see the reservoir - I had no idea there was a body of water this big hiding in Manhattan!


We walked all the way around - it has a nice 1.3 mile walking path around it.


Yay reservoir! Nothing cooler than a large body of water, surrounded by trees and skyscrapers.


Our other favorite thing at the park on weekends, is the random dance roller skating rink they set up in the mall. We found out it is actually a full organization called the Central Park Dance Skaters Association, and they are there all summer and have special events. The season is about to end, so we took in our fill and took some video to share with you!

Our favorite, is an older woman we have named "Hot Betty." She is just so classic and looks like she had some career in ice skating or ballroom dancing in her past.


Some of the other skaters - they are just so much cooler than we are! Some people just skate, but most of them are dancing as well. We are too white to even dance as well as they do, let alone on skates. Maybe someday we can join them...


We'll keep you posted as the leaves keep changing and the temperature drops. Wish us luck - our thin San Diego blood is scared!

Adventures in Brooklyn...

...and gay piano bars.

This past week has been fun! On Thursday we went to see one of our favorite musicians, Jarrod Gorbel (aka boyfriend number 2, right behind Butch) from the Honorary Title. He played at the Cutting Room which is owned by Chris Noth (and for those of you not in the know, that's Big from Sex and the City). The place was pretty cool and reminded us a lot of our favorite spot in Hollywood. Although it was a little bigger and had a few more tables than the Hotel Cafe, the small room, red curtain behind the stage, and intimate atmosphere was very nostalgic. I thought that one of the hardest parts about moving from San Diego would be the distance from LA, but we've found another piece of home here in New York. And now we don't have to drive 2 hours home at 1 in the morning anymore :)

Then Friday night, we went out with our new friend Dan who's only here about once a month for work. We headed down to the West Village and ate at this place that supposedly has the best burgers in town. The bar/restaurant was packed and we waited in line for about 45 minutes to get a table, but the burgers were good! I don't know if they were worth the long line, but definitely tasty once we finally got to eat them. After dinner we headed to Yogurtland, which is exactly like one of our favorite yogurt places in SD, Yogurtworld. Self serve, pay by the ounce, lots of toppings, and a REALLY good dark chocolate flavor. Genius. Once we were fully satisfied with our yogurt concoction, we headed to Marie's Crisis, a piano bar (that is nothing like the Shout House) with lots of gay men and showtunes. We had a great time! We didn't know most of the songs, but the men that did sure knew how to belt them out at the tops of their lungs! And two of the bartenders would sing duets beautifully while everyone stopped and listened. I think the best part of the night happened when we heard one guy say, "Ugh, there are too many straight women here." Thanks, dude.

And as for Saturday, we took a little trip across the Brooklyn Bridge. The bridge is gorgeous once you get close and the views of Manhattan are unbelievable. We even timed it so that we'd be walking back at sunset...doesn't get much better than that.


Not too bad for an amateur :)


I'd read in a book that there's a good pizza place where you can get a pie and eat it in the park under the bridge. We tried to go to this place, but, again, there was a HUGE line to get inside. So instead of standing there like chumps, we walked around the corner to another pizza joint, walked right in, and had great food.

When we first got down to the Brooklyn Bridge park, we stumbled across what looked like a photo shoot. We were hoping it was from America's Next Top Model, but had no such luck. But there were hot girls in lingerie suspended high above the park in a plexiglass box!

Pretty cool, right?

And another couple pictures, just because they are cool:


Who's jealous?


Me, Kendra, and Dan with the Bridge peeking out from behind.

So now it's once again Footballday and we are about to head down to the Still to watch the Chargers. Go Bolts!

Stitchin' and Pitchin'

What a fun week and it's only Thursday! Work is still lame, but the evenings have been eventful! That's my favorite thing so far about this city: it is so easy to go out at night because no one has to drive, you don't have to worry about parking, and there is always something to do. Monday night was spent at The Still again, our beloved Charger bar. It was made even better because the Chargers were playing the New York Jets and DOMINATED! And our fantasy team won too, so it was an all-around awesome football night. We also met another guy visiting from San Diego who lives in Pacific Beach - turns out those PB boys like to come to NYC. We took another group picture too, so hopefully I can get a copy. I can't get over how many Charger fans show up to this bar!

Tuesday was a little quieter, spent catching up on some TV shows, but Wednesday night we met one of our new friends, Dan, for dinner on the Lower East Side. Whoa! Venturing out of our comfort zone! It's like a whole other world down there - the streets are less straight and not all numbered, so it is a bit confusing. It's also NYU land, meaning college students everywhere. It's very trendy and loud, but fun. Got a recommendation from a co-worker for an italian restaurant that was very good, but very small. There are just a bunch of tables pushed together, so you are basically eating with everyone else in the restaurant too. Then we went for frozen yogurt at "16 Handles". Hah! It's a self-serve place with 16 flavors, so tasty! Nice to make a new friend and explore a new area. He is just here for the month for work training, but then will be here one week per month. We're working on getting him to move here full time, but we'll see. (=



Tonight was Stitch n Pitch at the Mets game - that's us at Shea Stadium. It's this organization that hosts one night at each baseball stadium around the country where you buy tickets in a certain section and everyone is knitting and crocheting! So exciting, let me tell you. We went in San Diego with our group (The Clairemont Hookers - miss you!) and had so much we had to go to the one here. The cool thing about tonight (for me at least) was they had "knitting celebrities" at tables by the section! I met some of my favorite designers, including Debbie Stoller who wrote the Stitch n Bitch series and Kay Gardiner, author of the Mason-Dixon Knitting series. We went to our seats and chatted with some of the other knitters.

The problem? New York is already SO COLD!! We were absolutely freezing. I was working on gloves, and just wanted to knit them as fast as possible so I could put them on my freezing fingers! No such luck. So we froze for a while, got hot dogs and nachos, then left because it started to rain! I was so focused on my knitting I think I saw one pitch, a play or two and no hits. Whoops. On the subway home we ended up in a car with 4 other knitters who bailed early, including the one author so we talked with her some more and inspired 2 other girls on the train to learn. Oh the excitement, I know is what you are thinking. But I love it!

We have so many thoughts for outings this weekend, so who knows where we'll end up! Colleen wants us to go see an Irish movie, but we'll see if that happens....

Weekend with friends, and Central Park wonders

Sorry we haven't been updating as much, but really it is a good thing because it means we are settling in. Living here is starting to feel more normal, and as such we have a little less to say right now. But our apartment is all settled (aside from the 2 boxes the post office can't find) and we're trying hard to figure out our jobs. They are fine, and finally working again is nice, but both of our jobs are a bit disorganized and we are having a hard time figuring out exactly what we should be doing everyday. I'm still not convinced that research is going to be my thing, but I'm going to give it my best and will hopefully start doing real lab work soon.

This weekend was great though. It seems that all of our friends from UCSD have either stayed in SD, moved to the Bay Area or moved to New England - it's great! That means Colleen and I finally had friends to hang out with - imagine that, real friends! Not that we don't love spending time with one another, but it's nice to add some others into the mix now and then. Friday consisted of pizza, beer and a med school party. Then Saturday we went to check out MOMA finally (Museum of Modern Art, for you non-NYC-ers) and it was really fun. I love museums, even when I don't truly understand the intention. My favorite was this mounted display of post cards someone had sent that simply said, "I got up at 9:17am today" and "I got up at 10:08am today" and so on. I've already promised Colleen that if we ever don't live near each other, I'm totally doing that to her.



I'm sure there is a deeper meaning to the whole thing, but I found it very entertaining. Unfortunately we didn't get to see a whole lot of the exhibits, but that's the beauty of living here - I can go back!

Here's the painting for Colleen and her love of cats:


Apparently it's a line from an old mob movie indicating that some dirty job had been completed - I want to figure out an adaptation for my own life. (=


Saturday night we finally ventured down to Brooklyn where our friend Adam lives to check out the bar scene down there. We ended up at a Cal Berkeley bar of all places, and felt very at home. They even have a variety of board and card games that you can check out from the bar. Another bar has bocce ball courts in the back, but it was too crowded to play. I have to admit, Brooklyn is much cooler than I would have thought. It's funny, because it isn't so far out of Manhattan (although WAY far from the Upper East Side!) and yet it feels like a whole other world. There are actual houses, and people drive places. Imagine that! The funniest part is how quiet it is - in Manhattan, you don't even realize how loud the general background noise is until it's gone! All in all a good outing, so I think we'll be venturing down there again for sure.

Today was spent being very lazy, but finally at 5pm Colleen rallied me for a walk in Central Park. I just can't get over how great the park is - every time you stumble on interesting things, interesting people. There are these 2 guys who set up a show of sort by the fountain where they jump over people. They talk in unison and are very entertaining - good showmen. The best, however, was the random roller rink we found. Just along one of the wide paths was a large group of people skating (on old-school roller skates mostly) around a make-shift oval. They were playing music and most of the skaters were dancing as much as skating. We watched them mesmerized for a long time, marveling at how they are better dancers on skates than we are at all. Just not fair! It got us talking about how lucky we are to live here, how grateful we are that we actually made this move, and how great this city really is.

Hope you all come to visit us soon!

San Dieeeego SUPER CHARGERS!

So we may have moved from the world's finest city, but our hearts still belong to the San Diego Chargers. Sadly, we do not get ESPN at our apartment, and given the likelihood of an east coast team playing at the same time as our beloved Chargers, we are generally out of luck for watching them from the comfort of our apartment. Plus our TV just can't compare to the giant HDTV we watched all last season (thanks Brant!).

But no fear, we have found the ultimate thing in NYC - a Charger bar!!! I know, unbelievable. We didn't think it could exist, but near Union Square is a bar called The Still. When you walk in, you'd think you were back in SD - it's packed with San Diegans in Charger jerseys, singing the Charger song and talking about Hodad's hamburgers and Phil's BBQ. Too good to be true! Sure, there are other people there too, but the bar plays the Charger game on a huge projection and actually plays the sound for the game (which helps a rookie like me figure out what's going on). We made some new friends (including a couple we met on the subway there) and even ran into some fellow UCSD alumni. Given that it is again Footballday (what some people call "Sunday"), we are about to put on our jerseys and head back down. Check out the fun we had last week and why we can't wait to go again today!

The bar - woo Chargers!


The whole boisterous group - I still can't believe how many there were...


Soooo cute - which means a lot coming from me! This mom and her 8 month old daughter in matching jerseys! And every time we all cheered, she started to cry. Whoops. And poor Conor was here to visit, only had 2 days in the city, and we made him watch the Charger game. Sorry!


It was someone's birthday...that's how dedicated this group is!


The game got intense...and sadly, the Chargers blew it in the last 2 seconds! But no fear, there is always next week. (=


Alright, let's go Chargers - win this one! Off we go....