whirlwinding

I did not wake in time for my 7:15am flight.

I fell asleep at 2:30a after walking back to the mission from potrero and woke at 7:15a right as my flight left. luckily Virgin airlines is quite awesome with their policies -- they said if I got to the airport within 2 hours of the flight, I could go standby on the next flight. I checked in at 8:42 and got on the 9:05 flight to nyc. my luggage didn't make it with me, but it was not only understandable but a blessing in disguise. As I was two hours later than I anticipated, getting to jeff's concert that night was going to be a tight affair and carrying my backpack through the streets and subways sounded even more miserable than my already heavy load of laptop plus puppydog.

While waiting for the train at JFK airport, I saw a familiar face float by. Alfred is a guy who lived in colonial house with me during my freshman year of college. He's also a quite well known and awesome dj/musician who goes by Daedelus. We hadn't really caught up in years but the hour plus train ride into the city gave us time. Turns out the guy was flying in to play a show at the Knitting Factory that night and then flying back to LA immediately following the gig. That's insane to me, but admirable. He put me on the guestlist for +1 to his show that night and even more luckily I was able to use his iphone to find out where I was supposed to be for Jeff's show -- something I conveniently did not note in my haste to get out of town. It seems like faces from college keep popping up everywhere. I never really enjoyed USC while I was there, but I certainly have enjoyed the many awesome people I met there.

A quick above ground google maps check in lower manhattan, and I was back on the train to uptown where I arrived right at 8pm for the concert's start. Sake was her usual rock star self. We took a 6 block potty walk from 59th to 67th St and then she sat through the new music Columbia Composers concert, only popping out to wag when I took her out at the reception. The concert was amazing, but in that way where I felt it was amazing more for my exposure to something valuable and cultured than pure enjoyment for its own sake. The music was beautiful, but in starts and stops and an atmospheric sense. Jeff has designed and made his own instruments and they were being played in a piece he composed for the first time. I really enjoyed checking out where his music has gone. I could easily trace it back to the roots in the music he made on his Akai synthesizer way back when we dated in high school.

After I met up with Emmett and we headed back to his place. Unfortunately, he wasn't feeling very well so we didn't go to the Daedelus show that night. Hanging out and checking out the view from his rooftop was a good consolation.

The next day Jeff and I spent the day walking, talking, and eating -- three very enjoyable things! We met for brunch at Clinton St Baking Company where I made the mistake of ordering the overpriced subpar omelette instead of the pancakes and baked items that had people waiting 2 hours for a seat. We walked from the lower east side across the williamsburg bridge to Brooklyn, and then around the area checking out the hipsters for a couple hours before heading back to the lower east to pick up sake-dog and have some indian food for dinner. Damn, the lower east side is not the prettiest looking site from williamsburg waterfront. From our vantage point at a park created from a revamped industrial site, it was filled with brown brick high rise apartment buildings that look like they'd be more at home in eastern europe or russia with their uniform height taking up an insanely large swath of the horizon.

The next day presented more opportunities for this comparison to soviet style to be proved out. Oh, the mistakes of 70's architecture.

Emmett and I went back to the same place for breakfast, which I felt like I had to give a second chance to live up to the hype. The banana pancakes were indeed the most extraordinary thing I've ever tasted. I would recommend even the wait for those, and I anticipate repeating that breakfast at least once more before I leave. We then road bikes out to Coney Island, past more brick high rises darkened by exposure to sea salt and whatever else. Men who looked like they should have been working in a factory somewhere were playing handball under the shadows of these identical behemouths and I felt like I was in Poland more than anywhere else.

Coney Island half deserted on a monday afternoon, we found our way to a waterfront bar that had several patrons that looked like they had been there at coney island's heyday and never left. The beer selection didn't appeal to emmett, so we convinced the food vendor to open up the bar and had our vodka soda at 3pm while we picked out music on the juke box. A odd mix of 50s, early 90's and country music proved to be way too much fun, and we ended up chair dancing to milli vanilli, johnny cash, patsy cline, paula abdul, journey and poison, rushing to shove our dollarbills in the machine.

After having our fill, we road through what appeared to be a carribean immigrant neighborhood ("African food and stuffs" read one store sign) and emmett purchased a hat and gloves to protect from the cold sea breeze. We then headed down Brighton Beach Avenue to the "Little Russia by the Sea" and had russian food at a restaurant on the boardwalk called Tatiana. More vodka was had in keeping with the theme, as well as borsht and chicken kiev.

The train then took us back to manhattan where we rested up for a bit before meeting two different groups of people at two different bars. There was pool and pinball at the first bar, but as neither emmett nor I are particularly pool rockstars, the sleepy train started to hit us. Emmett was texted by his friend Seth on our walk home and tempted to continue the night. The second bar, Vasmay, is about 3 blocks from emmett's house. The bartender is this very cute blonde girl who has clearly figured out the recipe for packing the bar -- she is extremely liberal with the free drinks and very flirty. The bar was a sausage factory. There were maybe 2 other girls in the bar in the 4 hours we were there, and at least 15 fairly attractive guys attracted like bee to honey to this bartender. Very chill, punk music on the jukebox, and very friendly. The whole bar was chatting with eachother and 3am came before we knew it. Unfortunately, I hadn't been in the mood for drinking so I only had diet cokes at both bars, but for some reason, none of the bartenders (either our friendly lady bartender or the one at the first bar where we played pool) wanted me to pay for my diet cokes. A very good way for NYC to ingratiate itself to me.

New York never feels like america to me. Born and bred in the midwest, spending my adult years in the west, I think of america as wide open spaces and newness. The arch by the Brooklyn Art Museum and Prospect Park celebrating the returning veterans of the civil war looked like it belonged in Paris not the US, and the tall apartment blocks look far more eastern european than my conception of american. Things are so old, dense, and cultured.

I've never had a great impression of NYC before this trip. It's been fun, for sure, but trips in June and July when the weather is hot and sticky and the streets smell of urine and so many other pungeant smells while buildings are so tall they block out the sun and every bit of grass seems to be behind fences made me think it was far too intense for me to ever habitate. April is a great month. Somehow the 45 degree weather feels bracing and refreshing, and the trees all seem to be sprouting beautiful white flowers.

Lots of plans for the next couple days, and I might be doing some design work for two days this week which is good cause I need the money and Emmett will be motivated to do some of his own work. Luckily it's a flexible 2 days of work in 3 days time, so I'll still have plenty of time to do more touristing and hanging out -- On the schedule is an exhibit at MOMA, and awesome sounding exhibit at the Cooper-Hewitt Design museum, an interesting sounding small theatre show through the public theatre and possibly a broadway musical. It is new york, after all, and patti lupone is getting crazy raves for her role in Gypsy. That plus making dinner with friends on Friday at Jose's house and meeting David Estis, another LA transplant friend, for drinks on Wednesday night, and working, and the week will be over before I know what to do. What a brilliant trip.

New York, you win.