Oh, the decisions of life.

I’m sorry to have been so absent the past few months! Truth be told, I have been job hunting day and night. The ONLY bad thing about this city is the fact that there is always someone who is better than you at what you’re trying to sell as your specialty. That and the occasional whiff of sewage you get when walking along the street. 

A few things have happened since my last post. A few potential job opportunities, a few life plan changes, a few concerts. Mom and sister visited, dad visited. It has been a whirlwind of activity, and I absolutely hate that my time here has been overshadowed by the looming cloud of unemployment. It seems like all of the entry-level positions require 2+ years of experience, and if that’s the case, I will be blogging as a job for the rest of my life. (Not necessarily a bad gig though…)

So here I am, 13 days away from having to move back to Atlanta if I don’t find employment. This notion simultaneously give me a head and stomachache, but I figure, either I can wallow in sorrow about it or do something about it. The only question is…where to begin?

Characters!

I’ve decided to take on YET another project up here. Stumbling upon this cute little art store yesterday, I purchased a small 4 x 6″ sketchbook and decided to use it strictly for character drawings. I’m going to try to do one every morning with my coffee. “They” always say no matter how busy you are it’s good to take a little time to do something you love each day. Whatever it takes to remain sane, right??

“Creation is an act of sheer will…”

-John Hammond, Jurassic Park

 

Here is today’s drawing. I saw this guy in the Times Square subway station a few weeks ago, and to be honest I’m still not sure of his gender (I’m assuming he was male due to the shaved head and strong jawline but I didn’t stop or stare long enough to actually find out if you know what I mean). He was fully suited on the top with tight tight tight grey leggings and was reminiscent of Nathan Lee Graham. Here’s how I remember him… (Hands are my current achilles heel, but I’m working on it!!)

 

Sleepy Saturdays

Today we woke up to snow. Not on the ground or anything, but it was definitely falling! I decided it should be a cookie/coffee type morning.

Oh my gosh this cookie. Levain Bakery, on the Upper West Side (W 74th and Amsterdam), makes the greatest cookies I have ever tasted in my whole life. Shoutout to Eli who has been singing the praises of this place since the day we met and now that I finally went I can totally back her claim up. Each 6 oz hunk of love is indescribably decadent, reminding you of a simpler time when happiness could be evoked by pure taste. Levain offers four types of cookies, and numerous types of pastries, breads, etc. We got the chocolate chip walnut, oatmeal raisin, and dark chocolate and peanut butter chip cookies (pictured above is the oatmeal raisin). These aren’t cookies, they are experiences.

After an incredible lunch at Ca Va and a stop of at Levain, Rick, Teresa, and I went to visit Felicity at the Ralph Lauren store on Madison Ave. Words cannot describe the beauty of this place. We felt like we had waltzed into a scene from The Devil Wears Prada. The store is INCREDIBLE (needless to say I didn’t want to be that person obviously not buying anything and taking pictures).

Afterwards we went to Central Park. It was starting to get dark but we ventured in anyways wanting to see the Alice in Wonderland statue. It was quite picturesque!

We then ventured to MoMA. Admission is free on Friday after 5!! We saw a bunch of cool paintings, Monets, Dalis, Van Goghs. I won’t post the pictures here because…well…you can look them up online and they’ll look exactly the same but in one of the galleries there was a work that was super unsettling to me. It’s weird.

Twilight Zone-esque huh??

Coming of out MoMA on a side street we stumbled across none other than THE Manolo Blahnik store.

Another great start to a New York City weekend!

Concrete Jungle Livin’

Soooo…..sorry for the absence! Things are moving so quickly up here, it’s hard to make time for anything. Example: I bought a bedside table a little over a week ago and just assembled it yesterday. The clutter is diminishing infinitely in my room, but it’s still not totally gone yet. All the good flea markets are on the weekend too, so if you ever have any plans and can’t make it you have to wait another week to go! One INCREDIBLE little furniture place I found is called Nadeau’s. They have vintage-looking and unique furniture for affordable prices. I’m planning my next trip back there to get a few more pieces! 

So cute!

A couple of big events are approaching. The people from my studio are all going to the Grammy’s, so I’ll have the weekend off and want to find an efficient way to use my free time. Planning things to do in this city is tough! Part of me wants to wander the street and randomly find hidden curiosities. Part of me wants to plan every minute down to a tee. What to do, what to do?

The second event is VALENTINES DAYYY!!! Eli, Rachel, and I are going to make a nice gourmet dinner for ourselves and indulge in some romantic comedies aka the perfect valentines day for “aallll the single ladies…aaallll the single ladies…”

I’m anticipating some awesome pictures from this weekend, stay tuned!

Music GALORE

There is one main musical difference I have been able to tell between Atlanta and New York City, and that’s the volume of musical traffic that comes through New York. Atlanta seemed to be more of an “eh if we have an open slot on the tour we’ll make a stop there” -type location whereas everyone and their cousin plays in New York. This means a few things. 1. You can literally see ANY performer you’ve ever wanted to see 2. A concert ticket portion has to be considered in building the monthly budget (and if you’re wondering, yes, I will eat oatmeal for a week to save money in order to see a good show). Exhibit A: I have loved the Asteroids Galaxy Tour ever since their song popped up in the Heineken commercial a while ago, and they played in NYC last night. They’ve never stopped in Atlanta so I jumped at the $27 opportunity!!!

^(I have no idea if that embedded link is going to work!!)

Sad enough to say they wouldn’t let me bring my big camera in, and my phone took better pictures than my baby Nikon.

I also really love going to small shows. They’re way more intimate and you can get a better sense of the emotion the artist puts into their music plus crowd interaction is a big part of the success. Our friend Mike Jaggerr, Myra Flynn, and Audra the rapper performed the other night at Santos. It was awesome to see them at work!

Side note…the room is taking a little longer than planned, but updates to come soon

Operation Room Reorganize

Today’s goal is to decorate and organize my new room. I am OBSESSED with the new apartment; dark wood floors and trim, white walls, exposed brick, this is NYC heaven!

I’m sitting here watching the Bachelor and blanking a little on how to decorate. Do y’all have any ideas what I should do? I want to use the exposed brick in a trendy yet classic way, maybe a couple of street-like lamps in the corners and some globe lights on the brick wall with the window. Let me know what y’all think!!!

 

(Pictures of the process to come )

Wanderings

Today was the perfect day for exploring. Sunny and 46 (a gift from the weather gods), I decided to go antiquing for my new apartment. It has exposed brick, pipes, dark wood, is teensy tiny, basically EVERYTHING I always imagined a New York City apartment to be. But how to decorate it?

My friend Eli and I decided to take a look at the Hell’s Kitchen Flea Market. Both of us got a late start so we didn’t get to see the market at it’s peak, but we could instantly tell this place had character. Between the racks and racks of vintage Coach bags to the previously worn Burberry coats and fur jackets, you would think someone robbed a late 60′s fashionista and put the spoils up for sale here. I just ended up getting two empty wooden picture frames due to my lack of ability to foresee to bring cash. 

As sunset was rapidly approaching and the vendors were packing up, Eli and I headed to the highline. Lesson learned for the day? The highline is WAY prettier at dusk than it is at night (referencing previous experiences here…)

After the highline we headed to Union Square to shop and eat. We ate at The Smith, a place to see and be seen! Tasty food, tasty wine, tasty eye candy. Oh and they have an adorable little photo booth downstairs! (photo to come soon. trust me, you don’t want to miss this epicness…)

Next we ventured to Momofuku, the hyped up milk bar. It was definitely unique, offering non-traditional sweets like the compost cookie, and crack pie. It was yummy, don’t get me wrong, but $5 for a “jug” of cereal milk seemed a bit steep, especially when I could make a months worth of my own cereal milk for a grand total of $5. Momofuku: been there, done that, got the t-shirt, as my father would say.

 

We finished the evening with a trip to the cinema. It capped off a wonderful day of New York City-style adventure, and set the tone for more good times to be had. Next up, moving day!!!

Getting it Together

Today marks my third week anniversary of moving to one of the greatest cities on earth. Only three weeks, but it has already seemed like ten years for one main reason. In this town either you figure out how to blend into the pavement and become part of the routine, or you get left behind. Turn your head left for one minute to take a breath and you’ll be replaced by the 1,000 other people waiting to take your place in society. To be honest I didn’t learn this lesson the hard way. Since day one the pace, expectations, and schedule have all been a natural fit. I think this is why three weeks has felt like a decade; it was so easy to become part of the daily grind, I felt like I’ve been doing it for years. I’m happy about this. Easy transition, easier to not be homesick. (Shout out to friends and family back home…this doesn’t mean I don’t miss y’all terribly!!!)

The only downside to feeling like this is that I already feel behind in getting to know the city. My free time I spend sleeping, but after 4 hours of sleep on Monday night, I woke with a renewed sense of adventure and an “I’ll sleep when I’m dead” mentality. I made a belated New Year’s resolution. To discover or learn something new about New York City every day, whether it be getting on the subway and getting off at a random stop, stumbling into an unsuspecting little cafe, or finding a random new video on YouTube. My goal is to share these finds with you and take you along for a rrriiddeee with no speed limits or street signs. don’t care if you hate my punctuation subject verb agreement or spelling LET’S HAVE SOME FUN!!!!