New York, New York - We made it! (#1)

I had been to New York City (not counting the airport) just once before, during my Middlebury days.  I spent about 8 hours there, and didn't really see anything.  I was determined that this trip would be different.


Someone once called Doc "the Devil"
while in this suit
We road the bus from Pennsylvania through New Jersey and in to New York City.  I woke Doc up about 30 minutes before our scheduled arrival time so he could change.  My attempts at changing in the bathroom failed, resulting only in me hitting my head and getting motion sick.  We got dropped off around 6:45pm.  Dominic immediately turned back in to the New Yorker he is inside, and took off for the exit, with Doc and I scurrying to keep up with him.  He expertly hailed a cab that takes us to the Lincoln Center.

Since we were not that far off, it only took about 10 minutes to get there.  We lugged our bags out of the cab and tried to figure out where the opera house was.  After wandering around a bit and getting some much needed hydration, we found the Metropolitan Opera House.  It was about 30 minutes before the show was to begin. And we had all of our bags. Dominic, being the amazing friend that he is, volunteered to take all the bags and drop them off at the apartment where were were staying.



Bags!
Our seats were amazing.  I never want to sit anywhere else at the opera.  I was able to see the orchestra pit for the first time.  The opera itself was very good.  Lady MacBeth was far and away the show-stealer.  MacBeth was ok, but was overshadowed consistently by both MacDuff and Lady MacBeth.

I learned later that you are not allowed to take pictures inside the opera house. I'm glad I found that out after I took all of these.


The gorgeous ceiling

The auditorium.  We are sitting in the equivalent of the
3 box back of the bottom tier of boxes

Me!

My view

The front of the Opera House
Artsy shot

Artsy shot part deux
We didn't want to just go home after the opera, although both Doc and I were exhausted, so we met Dominic outside, and headed out.  We ended up at a bar called The Fat Black Pussycat in the West Village.  It was a nice chill bar, and pitchers of Yuengling were $10.  So, we had our first draft Yuengling ever and caught up.
The Dude

The Man
We went back to the apartment we were borrowing from my lovely high school friend Kurt Ma.  Fantastically convenient location, and so nice of Kurt to let us stay there while he was gallivanting around Australia.

The next morning Doc slept in while Dominic and I went to the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum.

The Guggenheim!!




















I am a huge Frank Lloyd Wright fan, and I was so excited to go visit this particular museum.  Their featured exhibit was of John Chamberland's works, an abstract artist working in a 3-D medium, mostly using metal and plastic from pieces of vehicles.  His works were pretty, but didn't really move me very much.  'Twas not a big deal though, because the architecture of the building was more than enough!

An hour or 2 later we got moving to meet Brian Gruters, a friend of mine since 1998.  Well, I should say that we've known each other since 1998, and probably became friends went attending the University of Arizona together a couple years after that.  Brian lives in Brooklyn with his fiancée Hilary, who is also a Flagstaff girl, but one I had not had the pleasure of meeting.  With the exception of the sad occasion of Steven's funeral in January, I hadn't seen Brian in probably more than 8 years.  A former roommate of Dominic's as well, we were both very excited to have the chance to get together with Gruters.

Brian and Dominic chose the East Village for our rendezvous, and we met at a bar called Solas.  It was happy hour, with cheap margaritas and mojitos, so we sat and had a drink.  Which turned into another as we found out the Japanese place we wanted to check out was 2 doors down, and only a store front.  Luckily we could eat in the bar, so we all gorged ourselves on mediocre okonomiyaki and takoyaki.  Mine are better.  Hilary's friend joined us for a bit, and then the 2 ladies adjourned for the evening.
St. Marks Area/East Village
Coolest building EVER



We the remaining four of us went out for another drink at a slightly more exotic location: Otto's Shrunken Head.  A Tiki bar, and venue as we discovered with tasty but high priced drinks.  I would go here a lot if I lived in NYC, I think (and supposedly it has a goth night?), but we wanted conversation, not loud music, and we moved on after a single beverage.
Otto's Shrunken Head

We ended out night back in the East Village at Crif Dogs, a hot dog place with a lot of raunchy attitude, aka right up my alley.  Hot dogs, tater tots, video games, brick walls, and a speakeasy where one enters through a telephone booth.  Yes, my kind of place.  We ate and laughed and joked, having a great time.  It was great to see Brian.









2 comments:

  1. new york looks so fun i've always wanted to go there

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    Replies
    1. I loved it so much. I would go back in a heart beat.

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