Taking A Bite

I Love New York!
No, I’m not about to go try out for that tacky show on VH1 with that tacky woman with those tacky guys whose biceps are three times the size of their brains. I mean, I really love New York. I was there over the weekend with Brian. It was crowded; it was dirty; people were rude. I loved it!

The Rescue
Friday I drove down and picked up Brian from JFK. Mapquest told me that it would take exactly 4 hours from my house in Stoneham to JFK airport but what the hell do they know? It took me more like 4 hours and 14 minutes. Traffic was insane at some points but I still like the drive down. I’ve done it three times now and never the same route because I’m never going to the same place. The most pleasant drive was when I went to meet Paul when he was staying on Long Island after Katrina. I got to take the ferry from New London, and that was the least stressful trip of all.

Anyhow, I get to JFK and there’s Bub with his Dunkin Donuts coffee (no lid, full to the brim with me about to drive in New York traffic, the boy will never learn) and off we go. Our hosts were Darrin and Kelvin who live in a great neighborhood in Brooklyn with free parking and two blocks from the subway. Because of some incredibly acrobatic moves, Brian never spilled a drop of coffee in my car.

Our hosts

The Accommodation
Darrin and Kelvin live in a third-floor walkup (wow, how New York am I?), and their neighbor Dave gave us the keys to get in since the guys were both at work. Dave’s daughter has to be the cutest thing I saw in New York. When Dave’s wife opened the door, their little girl came running to the door to welcome us to New York. She was just the sweetest thing.

So, we drop our gear and take off for the big city. Kelvin was able to take off from work and meet us near Times Square, then we grabbed some pizza from a place called Bravo and then met Darrin. We went to Rockefeller Center and walked all around that area past Radio City Music Hall, did some shopping, stopped by the Museum of Modern Art (Kelvin had a different name for it), and finally ended up by Union Square where we had some beers and nachos and then met up with some co-workers of Darrin.

The Chat N Chew
After a few cocktails, Kelvin headed home; his workday is 5:30am-1:30pm so he’s up at 3:30 every weekday morning. I could never do that. Darrin, Brian and I headed over to the Chat ‘n Chew for some grub & gabbing. The Chat ‘n Chew is a dive with some great comfort food.

After dinner we were all exhausted so we headed back to Brooklyn and crashed.

The First Noel
Saturday morning Brian and Darrin got up and went for a walk around some park, whatever. No way I’m getting up and doing any kind of physical activity on Saturday morning. Apparently Kelvin feels the same way because he got up and next you know, the apartment is filled with the beautiful scents of Saturday morning brunch. If I ever opened a diner I would tell Kelvin to name his price to leave the marketing research industry and join up. It would positively be worth it.

After brunch Bub and I took off for a cruise around the isle of Manhattan. I’d been on this particular cruise before and it’s pretty cool. It was cold and very windy thanks to Tropical Bitch Noel who was passing through, but not too much rain. Most of the rain fell in Stoneham, MA, where I live. But seeing as I wasn’t where I live that day, the rain didn’t fall on me!

Bub in front of a big clock

Bub in front of The Statue of Liberty

Me in front of The Statue of Liberty

The Tigers
After the cruise we headed back to Times Square to grab a bus and meet Darrin and Kelvin to go watch the Tigers take on the Crimson Tide. By the time we finally made it down to Houston Street (pronounced HOW-stun, I know these yankees!) Kelvin had had enough and headed home, but Darrin guided us to a great sports bar called Phebe’s where we had a couple hours before we had to be at the play we were seeing. We watched the game go back and forth, back and forth, and finally when we left the Tigers were getting trounced. Oh, well, we figured, another loss for LSU.

Darrin’s friend Mindy, whom we had gone drinking with the night before, met us at Phebe’s along with her fiancée Preshant. Mindy was very sweet and a lot of fun. I liked Preshant, too, he’s a great guy and there’s really nothing negative I can say about him, except that he’s an idiot. And I’m not the only one that thought that; Mindy agreed with me. I tried to give him the benefit of the doubt; I interrogated him several times using at least three different techniques, but it became clear to me that he was not on any type of mind-altering substances. This guy honestly believed that the Colts were going to beat the Patriots in the battle of the undefeateds on Sunday. Oh, how misguided these Indy fans can be! He had all these stats and examples and rationalizations and situational assessments and predictions. Mindy, who is from New England, and I just kept rolling our eyes at each other and let him spout off. Mindy and I shared several premature victorious high-fives, just pitying poor, sweet, misguided Preshant.

The Phebe's Krewe

The Line
After Phebe’s, we met Kelvin at an off-off-off-off-off-off Broadway theatre, the 13th Street Repertory Theatre and saw Line, which they proudly state has been running for 33 years. Wow. The plot was interesting, but the actors were absolutely horrible. It was one of those things were you could “tell” they were acting. That’s the first sign of a bad show. Then they kept forgetting lines, repeating the same things over and over. “You bitch” was a favorite that they would say when they forgot their lines.

Darrin had a different view. He enjoyed the production, because he saw the excellence in the story and the dialogue. I just saw the flaws in the production elements. I guess that’s what you get when you spend too much time on the board of a regional theater and have to hear from the artistic director all of the little nuances that go into producing a show.

The Fur Flies
Kelvin and Darrin left us after the show to go to a fur party. I’m not exactly sure what that is, but off they went. Bub and I stopped at the liquor store and then headed back home to Brooklyn, where lo and behold we discovered that the Tigers had staged another major comeback in the fourth quarter to win the game. How incredible was that? I honestly didn’t believe Brian when he told me, but sure enough I went on the internet and verified it.

Darrin and Kelvin came home a little after 1:00 and we sat up and talked for awhile. They’re a really interesting couple, and a lot of fun.

The Departed
We woke up early Sunday morning, and after another delicious brunch prepared by Mr. Kelvin, Brian and I made our way back to JFK and then I headed back to Boston.

Brian with our gracious hosts

What a great whirlwind trip. Great to see Bub again as usual and I made a few new friends, of which you can never have enough. I invited Darrin and Kelvin up to Boston and I hope they take me up on it sometime soon.