Tuesday, March 17, 2009

Over the Rooftops!

This past weekend was my last in The City (for now), so I definitely wanted to make the most of it. Luckily, it was one of the best weekends yet.

Friday night I decided I really needed to see Slumdog Millionaire while it was still in theaters, so from work I went up to the AMC in Times Square (one of the few theaters still showing it). I grabbed some quick and delicious hot dogs on the sidewalk then went in to see if it deserves its spot on the pillars of the Kodak Theater.

As I was told I would, I definitely thought the movie was great. I loved the framing of the story around the interrogation. The acting was top-notch, too, especially from the young kids at the beginning. Of course any movie that ends with a dance sequence and awesomely designed closing credits is sweet in my book.

Wouldn't it be fun if the movie inspired abc to bring back Regis and Who Wants to Be a Millionaire in primetime? I'd watch sometimes.


Saturday morning Joan and I went to Times Square to try and score lottery tickets to the new West Side Story revival. It wasn't to be, however, so we took the subway down to the financial district and checked out Trinity Church before making our way over to the South Street Seaport, an area I can see from work in Brooklyn and have wanted to go, mostly because of the sight of old ships.

As we walked through the area, I was amazed at how cool it was. Cobblestone streets, old brick buildings. This is the kind of historic city area that I love. Walking through here was like stepping back into the early 1800s, as long as you keep your distance from the Gap, Abercrombie and Sharper Image, that is.


Looks like it could actually be an old photograph, doesn't it? Nah, I took it myself on Saturday. Isn't it wonderful what a minute of photoshop can do?

Joan and I had lunch outside in the sun on the pier. It wasn't super warm, but it was warm enough for a lot of people to eat outside. It felt great, and gave me a little taste of how amazing it must be here in the Spring.

The rest of Saturday consisted of some hanging out in Prospect Park back in Brooklyn, a delicious dinner at Joan's apartment with Gabe and Dan, all of us playing a few hands of Bananagrams, and watching "Big." I was surprised I actually stayed up for the whole thing, but it is a great movie. Unfortunately though, this time while I was watching, I couldn't stop thinking of how messed up both of the main characters were going to be after living through the events of the movie. It would definitely take a lot of psychiatric help to resolve all their issues.

Sunday, Mom flew in for the day! She got in around 10:30, and we headed off to Chelsea Market, someplace I knew she'd love. We found out it used to be an old Nabisco factory, and the market has only existed for about 10 years, which was a surprise. It is so cool. Mom ate what she said was some of the best Lobster Bisque she's ever had, and I had a delicious cup of Chicken Pot Pie Soup. Mmmm.

From there, we took the subway up to the Metropolitan Museum of Art, another place I was sure Mom would love. The museum is pretty ridiculous. It is all so well-kept with some incredible pieces. We took about half of a free museum highlights tour, then ducked out to join an Old Masters tour, which is some of my Mom's favorite work. Our tour guides in both cases were older New Yorker men with great accents. I actually learned a lot and was shown some great paintings on the Old Masters tour.

We also checked out a few other things, like some of the American Landscape paintings. Those are some of my favorites. There's just not much more artistically impressive to me than a beautiful mountain perfectly painted.

From the museum, Mom and I had a fun Italian dinner at Carmines on 44th and ended up with a huge amount of leftovers. From there, it was time for the Theater!


We walked over to the New Amsterdam Theatre, the theater Disney owns. Apparently the theater sat vacant, decaying and falling apart for something like 15 or 20 years before Disney bought the historic property in 1993 and began their renovation.

The renovation work is pretty amazing. You can see some before and after pictures here.

So how was Mary Poppins? Well, there's really only one word to describe it...

Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious. There you go, enjoy my cheesy-ness.

I love the self-awareness of Mary's comment at the beginning of that song, "Of course it's a word, and unless I'm very much mistaken I think it's going to prove a rather useful one."

Truly though, Mary Poppins is an amazing show. The music, the performances, the sets, are all awesome. Don't even get me started about the theatrics and effects of it all. I knew most of what was going to happen before I saw the show, and I was still very, very impressed. Even knowing as much as I did, I was still surprised by a lot and even got chills during a few scenes, including one involving Mr. Banks and the children near the end of the show. And the entire "Step in Time" scene above the rooftops of London has got to be the greatest dance sequence I've ever seen.

I won't go into any details about what magic stuff actually does happen in the show, because I don't want to ruin anything for anyone, but it really is all great. Our Mary and Bert were absolutely fantastic. During the bows, Mom and I rose to our feet from our seats in the front row of the mezzanine when Bert ran out, while most of the rest of the audience stayed sitting. The lady behind us said "Down in Front!" but one second later, the whole audience was standing as Mary came out for her bow.

Normally, I try to avoid doing things that take away from other peoples experiences at shows and theme parks and whatnot, but look lady, your kid was kicking the back of my seat during the entire show. I'll give my standing ovation to whoever the hell I want to.

The actor playing Bert just seemed to be having the time of his life in the role, and rightfully so, considering all that Bert gets to do in the show. In fact, seeing Mary Poppins made me want to be Bert. Not really play Bert in a musical or anything, but to actually be him.

You know, I think good Digital Designers are actually a lot like Bert...but that's a conversation for another time. I do think I'll make a great Bert on some future Halloween, though.

After the show, Mom and I went down to the basement of the theater to see this beautiful room called "The New Amsterdam Room." I'd expect it's used for special events and parties, and anytime Bob Iger is in town. Here's a shot of the amazing ceiling in the room. As you can see, since the renovation it's pretty awesome. It's nice to know Disney is capable of doing some really classy, good things in the world.


Good work, Disney.

As you can see, my last weekend in New York was a great one, topped off with what was probably the best show I've seen during my time here, Mary Poppins. The first few days of this week have had significant events themselves, but I'll save that for later.

For now, have a great week, everyone! I look forward to seeing many of you soon back in the Nati!

Wednesday, March 11, 2009

A Stack of Playbills

I have a week left in New York, and as I look back on the quarter I've spent here, I can't help but ask myself one question.

Has this quarter amounted to more than a stack of Playbills?


There are a lot of things I wanted to do this quarter that didn't happen, namely volunteering and connecting to both a community and the city itself. Those things happened fairly easily and naturally in Los Angeles, so I just expected the same here. Well, that just wasn't the case.

On the other hand, there were plenty of things I hadn't planned on. For one, I've been able to spend time building friendships with some great people I didn't know well before this quarter, like my fellow Cincy co-ops Joan and Drew, and Amber, my LA roommate Garrett's older sister (She made me dinner last night, it was very delicious and fun!). With the case of Joan and Drew, I'm looking forward to spending some time with them both next quarter when school starts, and I will definitely be staying in touch with Amber to keep her updated on my time in Africa.

Somehow, I've actually kept The Good Morning Experiment going every single day I've walked to work for the last three weeks. I've gotten the whole range of responses, from big smiles and a "Hey, how's it going?" to people completely ignoring me. So far I don't think I've actually seen anyone twice, but it has been great to walk to work with a goal in mind, so much more perceptive of the people around me. Even when I'm feeling worn out or empty myself, saying good morning to someone and getting a happy response gives me a jolt of energy. I hope for at least some people, my good mornings do the same for them.

Losing my wallet, I was forced to rely on other people and I got a taste of what it is truly like to have no money for a while. If I had forgotten to ask Dan to borrow some money for the subway, I don't know how I would've gotten to or from work. What do people do when they don't have anyone to help them out? Maybe I shouldn't be so resistant to give people money in this city. Sure, sometimes they'll just use it to get high, but sometimes they might actually need it.

In any case, something amazing happened. Prayers were answered. The person who found my lost wallet actually returned it. There really are unbelievably good people in New York City. Who would have thought?

Tonight after work it was something like 55 degrees outside and I didn't have anywhere I needed to rush to, so I decided to walk down to the Brooklyn Bridge Park at the end of the street. As I looked across the river at the lights of downtown, I actually thought to myself, hey, I really do like it here. I've survived winter in New York. The toughest time of the year to live here. I could do this.

The other night on the phone, Nate asked me if I thought I'd miss New York. It was a weird question to hear because it really wasn't something I'd thought about. I don't know when it'll hit me, or why, but I do think I will miss "The City," and it will be interesting for me to see when and why those feelings arise.

Who knows what the future holds. I definitely don't. But I can probably concede that this really is "The Greatest City in the World." Does that mean I'll live here again? I have no idea.

For now, all I know is that the quarter has been significant in many unexpected ways. Should I have put more effort into finding a community and volunteering? Definitely. And I know my love for the theater was a fairly selfish reason for me to try so hard to get a job here. Regardless, I can't regret anything now, as I have become connected to this place, and although I've loved seeing some great shows (and am extremely excited to see Mary Poppins with Mom on Sunday), they haven't been the most important part of the quarter. I've learned a lot and have hopefully even learned many things I haven't even realized yet. Although I haven't been sure what my answer would end up being, now I can confidently say it.

This quarter has been much, much more than a stack of Playbills.

Tuesday, March 3, 2009

Boys Becoming Men, Men Becoming Wolves

So my 22nd birthday is about to come to a close. I can definitely say it's been a birthday to remember, both in good and bad.

I'm not going to go into the details of the bad very much, simply because I don't feel like it. Basically today at work, the dire state of the economy took it's toll in a way no one had expected it to. It was a definitely wake up call, after feeling like the design and advertising industry was fairly protected from economic woes for the past few months. Things really do suck, and they might not get better anytime soon.

My birthday wasn't all horrible news, though.

Today I got some cards, facebook posts, and phone calls from many people I love very much. Thanks to all of you who helped make my birthday great! The best thing I got today, however, came from somebody I don't know, and will never know. On the phone, my brother told me that a package came for me today, and that inside was my lost wallet. Everything was intact, minus the 22 or so dollars that were in it at the time. I couldn't believe it when he told me. How ridiculous. The person probably used some of the cash they found just to ship it back to me! And was it a coincidence that it arrived on my birthday?

These are questions I'll probably never get the answer to, but it's amazing that my social security card, license, insurance card, school id and more are all still there in the wallet. I won't have to go through any of the pain and stress of getting those things replaced.

Over the last week, I've had the idea of someone sending my wallet back to me in the back of my mind, but I didn't think it would happen and didn't want to get my hopes up. The people in this neighborhood really are great people. My good mornings will be especially sincere from now on.

Whoever you are, thank you so much for returning my wallet. You are amazing.

* * * *

Well, I'm going to have to go to bed soon. I just got back from dinner with some of my favorite people in this city: Dan, Kristen, Emily, Joan and Drew. Where did we go to celebrate? Why, the Life Café, of course! Where else would I celebrate?

At the Café, who should walk in but the curly haired guy with glasses from 30 Rock! His name, I've found out, is Judah Friedlander. We didn't bother him or anything, but Emily did take a stalker picture while her camera was sitting on the table. Man, 30 Rock is an amazing show. As we left the restaurant, I couldn't help but sing the themesong to Werewolf Bar Mitzfah, hence the title of this post.

After dinner, we grabbed some giant oreo cookies from this hip east village restaurant that was annoyed by all of us coming in for cookies, then headed home.

Thanks again to all of you. I have some more exciting news I'll be sharing in a few days. Until then, have a great week. I love and miss you all!

Sunday, March 1, 2009

Blame Epcot

It's been quite a while since I wrote a blog post. A lot has happened, both good and bad. Here's an abbreviated explanation of the last two weekends, interspersed with some photos of the trip I took this aftertnoon to Flushing Meadows, aka the site of the New York World's Fairs of 1939 and 1964.


Last Friday night night, Emily and I went to the Allen Room for Lincoln Center's "An Evening With Alan Menken." For anyone who doesn't know, Alan Menken wrote the music for almost every Disney animated movie in the last 20 years, and other cool things like Little Shop of Horrors. First of all, check out the ridiculous performance space here. It's gotta be the coolest space in the city.

As for Alan's performance, it was amazing. He played every song you could want him to, including some great and less popular stuff like "Out There" from Hunchback and a whole Newsies medley. He performed some songs with a backup band and 3 female backup singers he referred to as his "Menkenettes," and some were just the man and his piano.

In between songs, he told short stories about what was going on his life when a certain song was written. Some of the most interesting stories came when he mentioned that his late lyricist partner Howard Ashman had wanted to work on Newsies, but he was too sick in the late stages of AIDS that he simply wasn't able to. Another interesting insight was the story that when he was writing the beautiful song, "Will the Sun Ever Shine Again," (from Home on the Range) in the months after September 11th, that everyone at the studio connected with the song and really felt like it put into words what everyone was going through.

Basically, it was probably the best night of the quarter. Needless to say, I got chills when he performed one of my all time favorite songs, "Suddenly Seymour," and the night made it very clear, Alan Menken is Seymore Krelbourn.

You don't get to have nights like that one in many other cities. An intimate evening with one of today's greatest living songwriters. Good work, New York.


That Saturday consisted of some fun stuff, including Emily helping me take some pictures of myself in front of the giant Ashley Brown/Mary Poppins poster in the Marriott in Times Square. I also went up to check out Columbia University, and walked through a bit of Harlem on my way to the Museum of the City of New York. After dinner at the very tacky but fun Starlight Diner (The waiters and waitresses get microphones and belt out songs when they aren't serving tables), Emily and I saw Oliver Platt and Lauren Graham in the new revival of Guys and Dolls. It was great. They were both actually really good, and "Sit Down, You're rocking the Boat" brought the house down as it well should. Check out pictures from the weekend in this facebook album.

Then Sunday night, as most of you probably know, I lost my wallet. It was a bummer. I was stressed and never found it. Now it's just a pain having to get everything replaced. Oh, and it was especially bad since I had my social security card in there. Hopefully nobody steals my identity.

I've gotten by borrowing some money and writing Dan a check. Hopefully by tuesday my new atm card and passport will have arrived. Life will be a little easier then. It's weird to not have any identity. If I get hit by a bus, they might not even know who I am.


Let's see now, this weekend Dan's friends Alex and Julia came down from their co-ops in Boston for a visit, and yesterday we met Drew and went to the MOMA, which was quite cool, especially Broadway Boogie Woogie. Is it bad that's almost the only thing I remember from Art History? Just kidding. I do wish I could go here with Cindy Damschroder, though.

After the museum, we met up with Emily and went to Mars 2112 for dinner. Basically its this ridiculous restaurant themed to Mars. You even ride a motion simulator to get into the place. It was very fun in it's absurdity, but service was bad and the food was eh. If I'm going to pay that much for a themed dinner, I'd like to go somewhere I know the atmosphere and food will be good like my old friend, the Hard Rock.


After we wandered through Times Square a bit, we headed down to Soho but I guess technically ended up in Noho. We all got drinks at a cool little place called Think Coffee and played a mean game of scrabble before deciding it was time to head home and crash.

Today I got up and took three trains to get up to Flushing Meadows to check out the old World's Fair site. Most of the buildings and structures were unfortunately torn down after the fair ended, but a few are still around. Also, my pictures don't do justice to the size of any of these things. The Unisphere for instance, the giant steel globe, is 120 feet tall. It's huge!

The ruins of Philip Johnson's New York State Pavillion are pretty crazy too. All rusted and retro futuristic. It's pretty sweet.

What else do I need to explain? Ahh yes, inside the old New York City Pavillion, now the Queens Museum of Art, is the New York City Panorama. It's a 9,335 square foot model of the entire City of New York, outer boroughs and all, in a giant room. It's pretty insane. You could probably stare at it all day. I found my neighborhood and everything. Apparently during the fair, it was a ride and you got in these helicopter cars and "flew" over the model while an audio track explained what you were seeing. Now you walk on a walkway with a glass floor. It's still sweet and very impressive.

Well, after building a little structure out of pipe cleaners and straws to add to an art piece they wanted everybody to add to, I headed back to the train. It was cool to visit the park and see the remnants of something as sweet as the World's Fair. It'd be great to have another World's Fair soon. I guess the internet and Epcot kind of killed the World's Fair concept, though. Oh well. I do love Epcot. I'll probably add these and more pictures from the park to facebook at some point.


While riding the E home I missed the stop to transfer to the G, so I decided to just stay on the train all the way down to the L at 14th street. Instead of getting right on the L, though, I went up above ground in Chelsea and went into Chelsea Market which absolutely blew my mind in it's coolness. I think I'll be taking Mom back there when she comes out for her mini-visit.

I went back to Apostles for church tonight which was very good and it was great to see Amber there. She offered to make me dinner next week! Amazing, I can't wait.

Tonight we're supposed to get like 8 or 10 inches of snow in the biggest storm of the winter. We'll see. I hope not.

I know this post is obscenely long. I'm really just writing it for myself. I had a lot to chronicle. And I didn't even give details!

Oh well, I hope everybody has a great week. I'll try and have a midweek update of some sort, maybe where I can give some progress on the Good Morning Experiment.

Have a great week everybody! I know I plan to!