We stopped at Chelsea Market, which is sort of like a giant glorified food court, but there is no Corn Dog 7 there. Instead there are quaint bakeries and lobster shops. We shopped a little around Soho. I passed David Schwimmer on the street. I had my palm read at a little setup on the sidewalk, which may have been the best $30 I've spent in a while. She told some really wonderful things, but said I worried too much. I was skeptical about that - she probably just saw my fingernails and made that assumption. Then we stopped at Dos Cominos for passion fruit margaritas and freshly made guacamole in the early afternoon.
After Dos Caminos, we headed to Wall Street at 5 p.m. when everyone was getting off work in the Financial District. It was pure craziness. The were police officers in tactical gear at every corner with automatic guns. It gave me a slight idea of the commotion that had to have occurred on September 11 after witnessing the craziness in the area. This was just a typical Friday and it was insane. Ground Zero was sobering. I couldn't bring myself to take any pictures and was disgusted at the people trying to sell pictures of the tragedy.Probably one of the biggest highlights of my trip was our trip to Brooklyn Friday night to surprise Russell of RePOP. Russell and I worked together for 8 months at Dingle Dry Goods, my brief venture into the antiques world. I disliked the job very much, but Russell made the days there very interesting to say the least. He once dressed as Frida Kahlo and played the part to perfection. He flourished in the antique business and now has a very successful shop in Brooklyn with his partner, Carl.
We were determined to ride the subway to Brooklyn, but the concierge seemed a little unsure about how safe the neighborhood would be once we got off the train. So, we found a driver named Gustavo who drove us to Brooklyn in his fancy black Yukon with tinted windows and shiny rims. No big deal. We walked into the store and Russell's reaction to seeing me pretty much made my day. "NO F*&%ING WAY! Cassie Lane!" he screamed to an entirely packed store. We chatted. Drank some wine. I left with a $45 monkey puppet hand mold. What? Exactly, but it will always remind me of Russell.
Gustavo picked us up in Brooklyn and dropped us back off at Times Square. It was really late, but we hadn't had dinner so we went to John's Pizzeria - a restaurant inside of an old church. We ordered a giant calzone with fresh ricotta and mozzarella and a carafe of wine. Shocking. As we left the restaurant that night we saw a flurry of women with cameras and Harry Potter (aka Daniel Radcliffe) coming out of his Broadway show.
This is the best of about 25 pictures that I took of Chris and me in Times Square. I seem to pretty much always look the same, but Chris usually has his eyes shut or tries too hard to keep his eyes open and ends up looking like an owl. It probably doesn't help that I give him a hard time about it.
After our impromptu photo shoot of ourselves in Times Square, we sat and watched this group of boys gather and dance in the middle of Duffy Square. We sat and watched for about an hour as these boys, with nothing other than the clap of their hands to dance to, mesmerized hundreds of people. Eventually someone in the crowd yelled that they would put $500 on the line in a dance off. Everyone got a little excited and things escalated. Words were exchanged. Chris and I still sat and watched and eventually the police broke it up, but it seemed like the most organic New York experience of the trip.
This was our second night in a row to stop for a pretzel and a Sunkist with a straw.
1 comment:
how fun that you're still doing cinder block! it was great to read about the rest of your trip in NYC. happy holidays!
xo russell
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