american 75

One thing I will miss about the city: daily post-work shopping. We are so spoiled to shop our way home on 5th avenue every day, which is exactly what we did on Thursday. Actually, we headed to Soho after work and spent a few hours sorting through the cheap stores for the great finds that don't look cheap.. which can be quite exhausting. After coming home and eating a giant bowl of Ramen, we put in a movie and were asleep by 10:30-it was fantastic.

Friday morning we headed to Diana's place in Long Island City for a much needed day of laying out by the water and cooking out on the rooftop.. it was a fabulous way to kick off the 4th of July weekend. Friday night, Kathryn and I headed to Candela, which is an outdoor Cuban Italian restaurant and Mohito bar that has wonderful Margherita pizza. We were pretty drained from our CRAZY sunburns and decided to call it a night pretty early.

We spent most of Saturday in our pajamas, but decided around 3 that we couldn't waste the beautiful sunshine by sitting inside. We braved the patio in our swimsuits for about an hour before deciding to head to Urban Outfitters and Pinkberry. As the 4th of July is my most favorite holiday, I felt the need to buy a dress for the occasion-and Kathryn bought a skirt. Saturday night Diana treated us to dinner at Abe & Arthurs, if you are visiting New York-this is somewhere you need to go! We saw Jamie O'Neal, which was cool, I used to LOVE that song "why does the color of my coffee match your eyes..." Next, we took Diana to one of our favorite places in the East Village, and spent the night soaking up our last Saturday in the city.

HAPPY FOUTH OF JULY! We headed to the Shake Shack around 4 for a very late lunch of some much needed greasy hamburgers and milkshakes. We looked quite festive in our red, white, and blue and shocked to find out that New Yorkers don't care too much about the holiday... which was a little depressing. Later tonight we headed to the Hudson to watch the fireworks that were shot off of 6 barges. While trying to decide our destination, a cab pulls up and ZACH BRAFF gets out (he's the main character on Scrubs). I mean he's literally just like 4 feet away from us and we are just staring at him and he's kind of looking at us and then I pulled a quick one and got a picture! The fireworks didn't compare to Fox Den, and I will admit that tonight I was really missing Knoxville.

welcomed visitors

Much like the rest of my stay here in NYC, this past week has been packed full of laughter, unforgettable moments, and good company. Matt arrived on Friday night and we stayed pretty low key, just walking around the East Village and showing him some of my favorite places to go. We started off Saturday by having lunch at Chocolate by the Bald Man. Matt has had to listen to me talk about this place for 4 weeks now, so I was happy that he got to experience it for himself! We then headed to Battery Park, Ground Zero, and Times Square. We figured we would stop in for a drink at ESPN Zone, but were surprised to find locked doors and a notice explaining that ESPN Zone has closed down. As Matt turned around, there was immediately a camera in his face and a reporter asking him questions trying to get a reaction on the matter. I took pictures and laughed. We spent the rest of the day walking through the city, shopping vendors, and enjoying each other's company. Saturday night, I put on my new dress and we went out to The Benjamin for an AMAZING dinner. A few weeks ago, Matt wasn't sure if he was going to be able to come-I AM SO GLAD HE DID! I was so happy that he could see where I live, where I go, where I eat, where I work, and meet all the girls. He left way too soon, but at least he got a taste of what my life has been like here for the past 4 weeks.

Whitney arrived on Sunday morning and we all went to brunch at the Grey Dog's Coffee. I immediately loved it when we walked in the door and they were blasting oldies, oldies are such a good mood. Now add some french toast to those oldies and life just doesn't get much better.

From Monday to Thursday there was some serious girl time going on. It's hard to NOT have girl time when you live with 5 girls, but add an old girlfriend into the mix and it's unstoppable. I would have to say that the best night was Tuesday night, when we headed to McFadden's. We got lucky and found 3 seats at the bar, which we didn't know would soon be right in the middle of all the action. I would go to this place every night just so that I could sing to Spice Girls, Justin Timberlake, LFO, and TLC with the rest of the girls in NYC. It was just one big singalong, until the lights dim and it becomes this Coyote Ugly style place except there are 3 guys up on the bar instead of girls. They proceed to do a choreographed performance and lip-sync to "I'm on a Boat." I realize that any way I try to explain this it's going to sound totally lame-but let me just tell you that it was anything BUT lame, and you should be jealous that you were not there.

NYC Playlist:
Cecelia
December, 1963
I'm on a Boat
Can't Be Tamed
repeat.

stuyvesant town

The mouse has now figured out how to get on top of our desks, and has chewed through a bag of Cheeto's and a box of Teddy Graham's. We have almost 10 traps set out with peanut butter and Cheeto's on them.. and he is still alive and running the show. Risky little fellow, not scared of us anymore and makes appearances quite often. Keeps me on my toes, that's for sure. What else... I'm sick of getting dripped on while walking down the street, and I feel like this happens way too often (multiple times a day). Also, I've realized that I say "I'm sorry" way too often than needed. Today I got my third, "for what?" Kathryn and I went running by the Hudson after work yesterday, it was hot but not too bad because we were mostly in the shade. On our way home we have to run through Stuyvesant Town-which is an interesting and odd little community full of people that eat and sleep all things Stuyvesant. They were having a big party and there were TONS of families and kids and food. They also had a band-but it was like creepy music that you would never want to sit and listen to, soooo that was weird. I have the day off tomorrow (yay!) so think Isabel and I are going to lay out and get some sun for the weekend. Matt's flight is supposed to get here around 12:15, so I will be waiting at home for him to arrive! I absolutely cannot wait to show him all the places I've been going and things I've been doing!

cecilia

Last night me, Kathryn, Eleanor, and Isabel headed to Whiskeytown-which is an actual place, not just a state of mind. They played super great music and we danced until the sun came up. Today we all went down to get some sun on the patio in the back of our dorm. It's called the Garden and it has tons of room to lay out, tables, and a huge brand new grill. We are planning to go spend an evening cooking out down there... the only problem is that none of us know how to work a grill-so that should be interesting. Tonight we are headed to the Frying Pan, which is a historic lightship that spend 3 years at the bottom of Chesapeake Bay before being salvaged and brought to Chelsea Piers to become the ultimate dive bar. Missing my dad today and sad I can't see him on Father's Day. I'm so thankful for everything he does for me and I am so blessed to have such a wonderful dad. Love you dad!

Tasty additions to life in NYC:

Serendipity: we went there after work one day to try and beat the crowd. We were pretty successful and had to wait only 30 minutes. Kathryn got frozen hot chocolate and I got the "can't say no" sundae. I would say that is the happiest my taste buds have ever been.

applause for being rich

I am getting so lazy with my posts, but it has been a wild week!
My wonderful dad came to visit on Monday, it was so good to spend the day with him and he treated me and Kathryn to a wonderful dinner at Frankie and Johnnie's Steakhouse.
The entire office went out for Ada's 21st birthday on Wednesday. We went for Mexican and ended up staying most of the night there-it was a BLAST.
Thursday we went to dinner with some friends that were in town from Knoxville, Mindy & Stacey. We took them to Chocolate by the Bald Man-which has become our favorite place to eat.
Friday we got up at 3:00 a.m. to go to the Miley Cyrus concert in Central Park, it was amazing. We were like 15 feet from the stage and I got really good pictures. Also, Bret Michaels was there and they performed together, which was cool. I sort of think he's... ya know.. but then I think he's awesome because he won the Celebrity Apprentice which is my fav show ever.

rock top what?

I realize that this is slightly turning into a blog about food, BUT I am in New York City and there are so many wonderful places to eat! Here's the latest:

Chocolate By the Bald Man: Suggested to us by a random man who heard us talking about Crumbs. We decided to stop by on our way home from work on Thursday to grab something sweet for later on. We walked in expecting it to be a bakery or a candy store, and were surprised to find it is an actual restaurant. Since the only thing waiting at home was laundry, we decided to get a table and share a dessert. We got a dessert pizza with chocolate, marshmallows, and peanut butter, and it was just as good as it sounds. All of the food looked and smelled wonderful, so we plan to go back there for a meal sometime.

Papaya Dog: These are everywhere, and we finally went there on Friday night for some dirty late night food. They have hamburgers, hot dogs, corn dogs, french fries, etc. It's so cheap, and so good!

La Palapa: We stumbled upon this place in the East Village. It's an open-air Mexican restaurant with really wonderful quesadillas.

On Friday, Kathryn and I headed to Hoboken, NJ to visit Carlo's Bake Shop (from the show Cake Boss on TLC). It only took about 20 minutes to get there and it was definitely a nice change of scenery for the day. Unfortunately, we had to stand in line for over an hour just to get into the place, but it was well worth it. They had a pretty good system going and our numbers got called really quickly once we were inside. Almost too quickly. I'm not good at making decisions, especially at a place like this! I ended up getting two little pastries and a miniature chocolate cake, which was completely melted by the time we got home. Eleanor helped me eat it out of the bottom of the box with a spoon. Sadly, we didn't get to see Buddy on our trip to his bakery, but we did see "Little Frankie" who is Buddy's cousin and appears on the show quite a bit.

Friday night, we got all dressed up and headed to Stanton Social with all of our roommates. The deal with this place is everything is really small, and you are supposed to order two or three things per person. Everyone orders one thing, they bring all of them, everyone shares, and then you order more. It's a neat idea--- if you're rich. We all got one thing (about $13-$16 a plate), and they looked at us like we were crazy and knew we weren't locals. After dinner, we walked around the East Village trying to decide where we should venture to for the rest of the night. There are six girls total, and I am heading up the back. All of the sudden, I look up and I see this giant, drugged out of his mind, homeless man walking straight towards me. Once again, the indecisiveness kicks in and I'm thinking, should I go left, should I go right, is he going left, is he going right.... andddd he proceeds to run directly into me, causing me to fall to the ground and my platform shoes to go flying. Then he yells and curses at me. Assuming I would look up to my friends in horror of what they had seen, I realize that they are still walking and have no idea what has just occurred. I was a little shocked, and then it was funny, and now it's REALLY funny. My mom didn't think it was funny.

Me, Kathryn, Isabel, and Alex spent today at Sidebar watching the World Cup. Kathryn requested for the DJ to play, yes, ROCKY TOP. He didn't understand what she was saying, so she had to actually type it into the computer for him. He played it, and we sang it, and everyone looked at him-and us-like we were crazy. He turned it off after about 30 seconds and prayed that he wouldn't lose his job.

bucket list

Yesterday was a good day. A long day, but a good one. Diana arrived back from market and it was also Alyssa's first day as an intern with Kathryn and I. After 16 hours of work at the studio, we finally finished our task of calling all of Diana's clients to inform them of the location of her new showroom. I was totally bummed when the final number came to 394... and even thought about calling some places again "on accident" just so it could be a grand total of 400 phone calls. Kathryn and I have found our perfect lunch spot, a little restaurant called Benvenuto. They have excellent food, the nicest little seating area right on Broadway, and it's the perfect distance to get a little exercise and fresh air in the middle of the work day. Also, they serve breakfast all day, who couldn't love a place like that?

Yesterday after work, we headed to dinner with Diana at a restaurant in her neighborhood. We sat outside and had the most amazing dinner while gazing upon the most incredible view of the city. One thing that I couldn't stop noticing was how calm it was. All the perks of the city without the crowds, traffic, and noise. It's hard to explain, but it's just this homey feeling of being able to hear yourself think again. After dinner, we went up on the roof of her building that overlooks the entire city across the water. We had such good conversation overlooking such a beautiful view, it was a really good ending to our first evening spent together. I'm starting to really love the girls I am here with, and that's a really great feeling.

Today was a lot of the same, more phone calls. Kathryn and I made a list of things we want to do while we are here, including going to see Miley Cyrus on Good Morning America, eat a coney at Coney Island, and visit the Cake Boss Bakery. There are about 50 more, but you will have to stay posted for those. We decided to go out and get ice cream tonight except we couldn't find the ice cream place, so we wandered into this huge pastry shop full of delectable desserts. Kathryn got a piece of cake and I got a chocolate pastry. We rushed home to eat dinner so that we could dig in to our sweet cravings, only to find them to be old, stale, and in Kathryn's words "tastes like I licked the bottom of the cooler that these have been sitting in for two weeks." We were pretty bummed, but luckily had M&M's and popcorn handy. If you know me, you know I love this combination.
Me: "Kathryn, do you ever put M&M's and popcorn in your mouth at the same time?"
Kathryn: "Like, every bite."
It's official. I have a new addition to my best friend list.