new york cares

Well I've been all ambivalent about moving back to New York ever since my laziness decided that that's what I am going to do, but after my recent 18-hour whirlwind tour of Sides Upper West and Lower East, I'm getting warm and fuzzy just changing my address online with the USPS, Verizon, and Shitibank and finally signing up for Netflix. (If you get the 3-at-a-time MOST POPULAR!! plan for $17.79, do you have to return them all at once to get the next ones, or can you just return one and have one new one sent? I know I'm the last person on earth to know the answer to this question.) So yeah, my little trip to the city to see Fat Asian Baby before she leaves to rock Bosnia proved more than worth the expense, the 12 hours on a bus, and being really quite fucked up at work the next day, which I knew was going to be the busiest day in the history of the restaurant. (Sorry for spilling that hot coffee on your arm and nicely pressed khakis, Sir.)

The travel gods were on my side from the very beginning. Despite numerous stops to pickup additional passengers, I was the sole person on the bus that did not have to share the neighboring seat. Good to know that my oft-practiced bus riding technique works like a charm. (For those daring enough to try this at home, this method involves piling lots of crap on the neighboring seat, contorting yourself in such a way that it appears your legs have to be on said seat, wearing headphones, appearing to be asleep and/or surly thus making eye contact with no one, and, in the unfortunate event that someone wants to assume their rightful place on the bus, acting extremely confused as to why they might be tapping you on the shoulder. Good luck.) So anywho, I spent the afternoon up and down the Upper West running errands in my old/new neighborhood, catching up with friends R (who has just moved to the city, yay!) and Z in their newly painted apartment, and watching TV with Drone before dinner. Dinner was at one of my favorite hole in the wall Mexican restaurants with friends E and A (who just moved into a place on the East Village/Lower East divide, yay again!). Then Drone and I met a couple of his friends for a couple drinks, after which I parted solo to meet FAB at Mercury Lounge. And thus began the absurdity.

As FAB has a knack for knowing an inordinate amount of people wherever she lives, she of course had befriended the members of Atlanta band Snowden. After their set, we decided to groupie it up and hang out with them. So the band, the lead singer’s electric wheelchair bound brother, a girl in awesomely gold and very high heels, a Heretofore Unidentified Dude, and FAB and I went on a tour of all the stair-free bars in a three block radius (I realized that the Lower East Side is not at all wheelchair friendly, but we made it work, and people totally got out of our way on the crowded sidewalks.) At bar number one, I identified Heretofore Unidentified Dude as a prominent music blogger and my Missed Connection from long ago. (He either didn’t recognize me or didn’t say anything, I guess.) At bar number two, we huddled into a booth and drank our something-and-tonics while a lady in pink polka-dotted lingerie danced suggestively in the window while eating a bag of Doritos. At bar number three, I was pleasantly surprised to learn that Ultragrrrl and Karenplusone were DJing. Despite what anyone says about the legitimacy of iPod Djing, they can shuffle my iPod anytime. Err, what I mean is that they play good songs by bands you’ve heard of that are fun and make people want to dance. As a rule, I do not and cannot dance, but they (ok and a few drinks) make me dance and I love them for it. In my drunken dancing haze I decided to talk to a couple bloggers I recognized and make an ass of myself. Having not made quite a big enough ass of myself yet, I decided to talk to a boy who I knew went to Columbia, was on the crew team briefly, and went out with Julia Stiles. Our conversation went as follows:

“Hey! Did you go to Columbia?”
“Yes.”
“Were you on the crew team?”
“Yes, I remember you.”
“Oh really? Did you go out with Julia Stiles?”
[awkwardly] “Yes.”
“People say I look like her all the time.”
“You don’t look like her.”
“Ok cool.”
“I’m going over there now.” [or something to that effect]

I am so awesome. Anyway, it was getting late/early, and the band had to catch a bus to their hotel and I had to hunt down Drone so that I could sleep in his extremely comfortable bed. Conveniently, Drone and the bus were in Union Square, so we walked and wheeled a mile or so up there. Of course, FAB and I could not make it that far without having to pee, and, unfortunately, the bars were all closing. So we did what any classy girls would do and peed in tandem in front of an apartment somewhere on 6th street, while smoking and without missing a drag! (For experienced public urinators only.) Then it came time to say goodbye to FAB. I hugged her about five times and told her never to leave her residence in Bosnia. Drone and I cabbed it back to his place, and in true New York style, I opened my wallet and wondered what on earth happened to all those twenties I took out at the ATM earlier.

So three more days in Ithaca and then it's time for my little life to change. I'm finally excited about stuff (take that, Cute Canadian...yeah I forgot to mention he ended things a few weeks ago because I was too unhappy and not excited about life...sweet,) including having good friends in close proximity, having new friends from these parts moving to the city soon, getting Netflix, running in the park, getting takeout from Burritoville, walking around naked in my apartment, traveling to Wisconsin and Texas, and dating up a storm (it's Nerve time again...more on this later...much more, I'm sure.) Oh yeah, and finding a job. Or two. Damn financial black hole of a city.