Saturday-Monday

Saturday, Joel and I explored Roosevelt Island. We took the air tram over to the island then walked/road the red bus all around - to the Octagon, Manhattan Park Apt, the one and only Gristedes, and the beautiful riverwalk. It was a nice step away from the busy life of the Upper East side and it's nice to know that that green space does exist.

Sunday was two notable item - new tennis shoes from Easy Spirit, YAY! and... A hotdog and smoothie from Gray's Papaya. Maybe I didn't get the right thing, but I am so not impressed. Will have to try again at a different shop.

Monday - I explored Carl Schurz's park - beautiful flowers and then headed along a different riverwalk (running some) and walked over a bridge to Ward's Island. Once crossing the big blue bridge for walkers only, it is green and there are ball fields and people fishing. Closes at 1am. Would be a great place for a picnic if you didn't mind the walk. I also experienced my first 'missing store'. I thought I'd head out to Godiva and Walgreens. I took my notes on where these places were and set out. Passing walgreens on the way, I headed to my farther destination of Godiva. Once I arrived at the location, I searched and searched... to no avail. This is wonderful chocolate you understand and after circling the area a few times, I admit, I had to give up and say, it isn't here. I'm not sure Where it is at, but I will try and find another one on Tuesday.

Day 5

Yesterday, I encountered the DMV... and the RMV for that matter. I tend to think about an episode of 'Two and a half Men' when I think about the DMV and my encounter with them yestererday. In that episode, Allen gets in line early in the morning and waits all day and then gets duped in to giving his good spot away to some pretty girl. What I'm trying to do is no less than top Mount Everest with these guys. Getting them on the phone is a challenge in and of itself. I tried three times earlier in the week, including Thursday afternoon and was encountered with this message: if your call is not urgent, please consider calling back at a later time in the week. Isn't Thursday at 3 late enough. Guess not. When I actually heed their request and call at 5:00, oh no, they're closed. 9:00-4:00. Must be a nice place to work, well, minus all the grumpy people who have to stand in line to see them with the shoebox full of identification they must track down. Really???
I guess I shot myself in the foot when I wanted to do more than a 1 step process. Move my license from MA and change my name.
It could be as long as 2 1/2 months before I end up with my license as I tote the 14 pieces of credit cards/passport/misc. certificates/esc. over there to prove who I was and who I am. 14? Yes. 14.

Blah.

Days continued...

Day 3 - It's been raining most of the day, so I stayed in until 5 working on more name changing shenanigans, it's a pain and also not new in NY. After the rain I headed out to Rainbow Hardware with a S hook in hand hoping to add some more hanging places in the kitchen. What I found out when I got there, was that I'd already been there with Joel! Foiled! Doubly foiled in that they didn't have any S hooks - Pots, pans, ice cream, shelving units, toiletries and a pharmacy, and more. That's a strange Hardware store. In my search through every aisle though, I did come across something super beneficial for the sink. It's a flow meter. While I'm not super concerned about how much water comes through the sink, it will at least assure me that it comes out in an even flow and downward - not some funky angle that always hits whatever is in the sink and coats the front of me... I like! After the 'hardware' store run, my new adventure took me up to the AT&T store. After a 25 min wait in line and almost getting turned away with a smug look of, honey, it's a setting on your phone, it isn't hard to fix... I can now receive MMS messages - pictures! Somehow it had gotten disabled on their system and Ha. Not. My. Fault. But that's it - that was my adventure for the day, I went to the At&t store.

Day 4 - Today I did something new and hopefully non-recurring. I woke up late (not new), decided to head out to Central Park and read (not new), picked up my phone and my book and walked out the door. Something in that last sentence is new. Phone - check. Book - check. Self - check. Keys - ? um. NOT CHECK!!! AGHGHHGH.... Things start swirling through my mind. It hasn't been even 5 seconds since the door has locked - can't we institute the 10 second rule you know? Like when food falls on the floor, you have 5 or 10 seconds to open your door again before you are locked out. I had no inspiration for what today's activities would be originally, but I do now. Today - I locked myself out of the apt. without keys or a metro card. So, new plan. I called Joel and met up with him at Rockefeller Center and made myself walk home too just so that maybe it'll sink in that it is a bad idea to walk out the door without ones keys. Bad. AKA, do not do again. On my walk home though, I got tired and say down in the park to read, so all was not lost. I even got my ~5 mile walk in for the day. Maybe I should put this day back to bed and take a nap.... :)

1 New thing...

Perhaps I have let this little guy go too long, and perhaps not. It's been a pretty hectic last.... um, gulp, 9 months. Now, it seems a daunting task to update my 'life story'. I think that's why I haven't written as I'm not sure how to jump from where I was in September and properly do justice to all that has really happened and is currently happening... For heaven sakes, I got married - it's not official you know, until you announce it on facebook and on your blog. 2 1/2 weeks ago now and I can't say as it has really set in. For all I know, I'm just visiting New York like I have 5 or 6 times in the past 9 months - minus my stuff sitting all over... and the fact that I have to make lunch for Joel in the morning and dinner at night - that's pulling on the reality string a little. I can at least do that as I'm a homemaker now, stopped the job at the end of April. All the wedding planning and stuff is over, minus those darn thank you notes - I shall start them soon. In the mean time though, I've issued myself a bit of a challenge. We are in this apt. until Sept 1st at which point we will be moving to somewhere yet unknown (that's a tricky little unknown right there) in the city. Since it might not be in as ideal location as this Upper East side - 15 min from everything - I have got to take advantage of where I'm at, by force if necessary. So, starting 2 days ago on Monday June 22, I started my pursuit.
Day 1 - I went to the post office. Blah blah, easy peasy you might say. NO! USPS was holding a package for us while we were gone and with the address and hopstop.com, I found it. I then stood in a line for 20 min only to find out I was in the wrong one and needed to go through the doors to the right and then make two lefts, OH, and I needed my ID and his. Sure. Couldn't they have mentioned that somewhere? A sign or something...? That and the ID thing - who else gets the mail that only I have a key to. Bah. So, with nothing in hand, I headed to Central Park for a walk and a read.
Day 2 - Target. Remember the good old days of jumping in the car? Yea, no. Another visit to hopstop - which will be my best friend - showed the closest in Brooklyn, so there identified where I was headed. 45 min there, 30 min back and not a wrong train taken yet. I did walk around for 20 min in the Atlantic Terminal as there was construction and about 5 unmarked dead ends I managed to find... but I did find the Target. I bought up as much as I could carry and then walked around outside just a bit before heading back on a new route that I may have had to call Joel to get. What would I do without him? I must have been hankering for sweets as when I unloaded at home, I had 3 boxes of cookies.

And now I sit here on Day 3 uninspired. Old Navy downtown? New York Public Library? There has to be something... I guess I will have to decide by the time the FedEx guy gets here - waiting on a package today and tomorrow...