Bikers On Halloween

Last Saturday I had a bit to do. I woke up and met up with Andy for a lunch date. We went to the wonderful Veselka and caught up. It's so nice to see my little boy all grown up and at med school now! The talk was full, and I enjoyed it a lot, but I had to cut it short (so did he...) for a business meeting.
The business meeting was...not so fun. We have to write a 20-pager about the book industry. That my story about that.
I ran home to meet up with Aaron, who came over to make dinner with me (my concoction, as usual) and watch "À Bout de Souffle". VERY French movie. I thought it was alright, classic indeed, and I think he liked it, too. We talked a bit, but he ended up having to leave to work and I had to get ready for the night's festivities.
So, it took me about 40 minutes to get ready for the Halloween party that Mariam held. Deej was a ghetto carrot, and I was a motorcyclist (see image). A tight, spandex 1-piece, and a mask of makeup? Not my normal getup. Walking around Manhattan in that outfit was life changing, indeed.....a good group of men were eying me and occasionally made some forward comments to me. Flattering, sure, but also petrifying (if you're me). The entire way to the party, Deej was all smiles because of the outfit, and I was griping the entire time, regretting my outfit choice.
The elevator in the building, we met up with 2 other kids from our law class. Henry didn't even recognize me, and started introducing himself to me, when I said, "Henry! It's Kim! I'm the one behind you in law! You know me!" And his face slowly changed to shock, and replied, "KIM?!" This happened a lot that night, actually, mostly the guys had a problem. Apparently I was completely unrecognizable. More makeup, perhaps?
We got to Mariam's, and it was PACKED with costumed kids. Lots and lots of kids. Think a big drinking party in a frat house, only in a girls' apartment in the middle of NYC. It was really crazy! I didn't stay very long because I promised some other kids to go to a pub that night, but when I was there, it was pretty nuts. A highlight of the evening was when Deej and I started dancing to the music playing, and Henry (same guy) wound up and slapped me in the ass! In the middle of the song's lull. Really hard! Everyone in the party stopped and looked! Lots of pain. That was pretty ridiculous. I ran away quickly after.
I went to the pub to visit the music kids, and wasn't there very long. But they thoroughly enjoyed the outfit. Pictures were taken, obviously, and walking home was full of men offering to me. Fun fun fun.

Sunday was tiring. Chambers practice, dinner, called mom, and had a business meeting. Though, this was a fun meeting. We didn't end up doing any work, but we all got to hang out and get to know each other more, which was great! Really bonded with them all. And to boot, I got some Wendy's on the way home. Breaking rules left and right!
Aimee ran her first marathon and FINISHED it that day, too! I'm soooo proud of her!

Monday was fine. Just classes. That's about it.

Yesterday, I was running around a bit. Yoga was particularly hard, actually. Classes were boring like always.
I had a French Internship workshop to go and listen to. Basically, they were telling us to apply for internships in France. Not very thrilling. Afterwards, I went to the law party at Murphy's and Gonzalez (Irish-Mex restaurant and pub.....weird!) and talked with Denysha for a little bit before heading home.
Christina came over for a little bit to try on one of my costumes I had for Halloween. We had a fun time for about an hour goofing off. She's a sweetheart, and a senorita for the parade! Appropriate, since she's Spanish.

Today is Halloween; HAPPY HALLOWEEN! Stern had a party where I ate pizza and candy (healthy) for free. Neil came over for a bit so I could put some makeup on him (he's a gothy girly boy...) I am now ready to get on my outfit, again.....be prepared....

Desserts and Shoots

I've noticed that I don't write for a long time when things actually happen in my blog, so that's why my entries turn out to be so long. I'll try to be brief.

Last Wednesday night I went to an African Drums at Steinhardt for a little bit. They had some nice refreshments, but I felt like the band was really lacking. They weren't really African, except the 2 leaders of the band; it was a bunch of white guys who couldn't dance and asians who could play the keyboard. The Africans had the soul needed for the song, but the rest weighed it down with something unwanted.
On a plus note, I ran into my ex-suitemate, Izzy, at this event. It was kind of funny, and we basically just said "hey", but I haven't seen her in 2 years, so it was interesting! Oddly enough, I've ran into her 2 other times since Wednesday, and we're both wondering what the hell because it was 2 years of nothing and now we're constantly running in.
I ran into Knight that night on the way to get something at school. We chitchatted and booked Tuesday night to talk about doing an event together.

On Thursday, I helped out Lauren with casting for her final film project. The film's an experimental film, which makes it interesting to see who might fit the roles or not. There were some really good actors, but a lot of really bad ones. It was....kind of like experiencing a casting for a circus, I think. By the end of it, we were stumped for some of the roles.

Friday was a fast day. I helped Lauren with casting in the morning, again. This time, her friend Tristan came in to play the role of the brother to the main character, because he will be the brother. Let me tell you, this man was pure gorgeous. The kind that shocks you. Spartan god, perhaps? Just, unbelievably hot. Married? Still hot. It was really funny because we used him for the female auditions, and it became easier to see who to cut because the girls would just crumble as soon as he looked at them.
Afterwards, Lauren and I went to Spice to discuss who to she should cast for her film. And it was pouring out. Ran to do laundry, and started packing my bag.
I RAN to Roosevelt Island (via the F line) to meet up with Dad so we could drive back up to Boston for the weekend. We actually talked a lot during the drive! It was neat. And when I got home, I hung out a bit before sleeping.

Saturday was glorious! I went shopping with Mom and Andrea to get clothes, and i ended up successfully restocking my wardrobe that had dwindled to mere threads. We went all over the place, too!
We ended up at night in Boston to meet up with Jeff and his girlfriend, Caroline. It was hard to find a restaurant because of the Head of the Charles (everyone and their mother were out), so we had to go down the streets until we finally found a cute underground Japanese restaurant. The food was actually pretty good, too! They had Bibim bop, for some reason, so I ended up getting that and Spicy Tuna. We had a nice conversation, and afterwards, Mom and Andrea left me to go to Harvard with Jeff.
At Harvard, we met up with a bunch of people at Harvard Pub. Now, Harvard subsidizes its own beer pub, so that the drinks are all of $3.25. It could be cheaper, but then the kids would drink too much and have to go to the hospital. We met up with most of the friends of Jeff that I met and like a lot, and that was really nice. Including Chris and Jorge!! Alex actually came out for a little bit with us, too, where we talked about the differences between nights in Boston and NYC. Then he scooted out. I'm still upset that I missed David because we were planning all week to meet up, but he was out of Cambridge and I had no means to meet up with him.

Sunday I just did little chores around the house before getting in the car with Dad to drive back. I slept a little, there was a LOT of traffic, but we still managed to have some really interesting and good conversations. I'm glad to see that we're getting along better now that I'm older.
It was really upsetting, though, because we were stuck in traffic from Connecticut, and I had to start going to the bathroom then. And there was no way or exit or place to go to help me out with it. So, by the time Dad drove me into the city and to my apartment, I couldn't think straight and BOLTED to my apartment.

Monday was fine. I met up with Shana for about an hour at Pommes Frites where we discussed our current love lives (or, for me, lack thereof), and what was going on for our futures. I left her when Alex came to get her for a concert. It's nice to be able to see my friends once in a while, even if I haven't seen them in QUITE a while.

Tuesday was an intense night with Knight. We met up at Think Coffee and ordered some desserts while we talked a bit about our causes (mostly, though, about human trafficking). By the way, their vegan brownie was AMAZING! I loved it! Anyways, we've decided the event will be in February, but we don't know how we should spearhead it. What can be done for it? We're discussing more later.
We ended up leaving Think to walk around a bit, and we planted ourselves in WSP, where the conversation became intense and we talked about really heavy matters. It was a great conversation, though, and we were both trying to feel the other one out before admitting to anything in the conversation. Don't worry, that might not have made sense in such a vague manner.

Wednesday I had a midterm in Marketing Research. I think it went pretty well, but not fabulously, probably.
After, I met up with Nate to eat lunch at his studio. I was pretty mentally fried from studying and testing, but I think we still had an alright time hanging out. I ate Chipotle for the first time ever, which was kind of exciting. And I stole a lot of great European chocolate at his studio.
I left him to run to an interview at Arnell Group. This is a funny situation; Nate's friend, Melissa, called me and asked if I wanted to apply for an internship at her company, which I didn't get the name. I said sure why not. So, I get there just assuming that it'd be this chilled out interview. Then I find out it's Arnell Group, which is actually a rather well-known branding company. Uh oh. I get into the interview, where the HR lady grills me for about an hour. I, luckily, am pretty good at stretching observations and making it look like I've researched what I'm talking about. However, this means after the HR woman is done with me, she sends in 2 other people to grill me for another 30 minutes. I think it went pretty well, considering it was so last minute, but JESUS! I really wasn't prepared for that at all...
I met up with Aaron for all of 10 minutes to say hi after my long interview. I was frayed around the edges by now.
I ended up trudging to East West Books to pick up some sage for my apartment. As soon as I walked into that place, I felt so relieved and comforted that I basically just crumbled a bit. I couldn't use my words very well, but the people there were amazingly wonderful and helpful. And they have a lot of things I want to use sometime, so I'll remain a loyal customer there.

Thursday rolls by, and I am falling asleep all day! By the time Chambers comes up, I was delirious. As soon as it was done, iran home and hopped into bed. I was asleep by 10pm.

But one of the reasons I went to bed so early was because I was waking up early to help Lauren out with her film shoot. So, I went to the gym at 5:30am.
The film shoot was really fun! Granted, it was all outside, and it was so cold my feet went numb in 20 minutes, but I still had a good time with the other people on set. Caroline, the main actress, was amazing and we joked around a lot. There was this other guy on set named Matt who was a riot, too! It was funny, because he looked really familiar the moment I met him, but I thought nothing of it. Then, a bit later, he goes, "Do I know you? I swear I have." After that, we bonded a whole lot, and the whole atmosphere was wonderful!
I got tea at the Tea Spot (amazing, highly recommended), and the rest of them all deemed me as the "Keeper of Things", which I took as a nickname for a leprechaun-type person. So it was all very joyous.
We moved into Lauren's flat, finally, where we set up some shots to film before stopping. But, a few of us weren't needed, so I started making an apple pie from scratch, where Matt and the other assistant came and helped me peel the apples in their fridge. It was hilarious because we were on a film shoot, making an apple pie. But everyone got along so well, it felt just like a bunch of friends making pies and movies! The pie ended up being in a loaf pan because they had nothing circular, and we joked about how we were making an apple loaf, but with my magical ways, it tasted really great! Even the crust!
I left for 2 hours to meet up with Sean and Deej for a pint on the West Side. We joked around for a little bit, and then all agreed to get ice cream at Mary's, next door. Sadly, it closes in 2 days! But at least that meant for us that we'd get super super cheap ice cream ($2 per bowl, any toppings free!). We decided to do beer and ice cream again sometime soon.
I went back to bond some more on set. Matt and I went to get some oatmeal stouts to make floats, and we bonded some until Lauren's roommate, Jenni, insisted that we go to a bar for her 21st birthday. I won't lie, I wasn't really feeling it, but I went anyways. This guy started to hit on me at the bar, and I decided that was my cue to scoot out and go home to sleep.

Today, I'll be busy from 2-2, so don't expect anything for a while.

You've Got To Be Kidding...

Day 3 of the Funfetti Hunt, to no avail. I have officially concluded that NYC is an uncultured village with no joy or knowledge of good cakes.
This started when I was dreaming with my native-NYC friend Josh about baked goods. Banana bread, brownies, the lot. Then I brought up my favorite type of cake: funfetti cake. He had no idea what I was talking about! What?! That vanilla cake with the colorful polka dots on the inside?! You must be joking, right?!
Well, I have hunted all of the grocery stores in my area: Food Emporium, Metro, Gristedes, Whole Foods, D'Agostinos, Trader Joes....even Space Market! Nothing. The closest thing they had was Funfetti BROWNIE mix, but not the cake! I didn't even know that brownies would exist like that! And I am not sure how much I trust it...
I guess I must request some boxes before I come home and enjoy them in a week from now.
It shall be a tedious week.

What else have I been up to...hmmm...
Friday I saw Madama Butterfly at the Met. A really great opera! I have been excited about this opera for years, and I finally got a $5 ticket through Stern to go see it! I went alone, yes, but I won't complain!
Of course, there were a few mishaps during the performance, but I'm very forgiving for slight blunders. It's an opera, for goodness sake! And the woman who played ChoCho was from near my hometown! And she was superb. It made me so proud...
The only thing that bugged me were the people I was with; Sternies. The guy next to me "joked" saying, "If I start snoring, wake me up." To which I replied, "If you start snoring, I'll be extremely offended." I was considered an ice queen, and was ignored for the rest of the performance (thankfully). Other kids were talking about how they started falling asleep during the show, and most were surprised as to the ending! She kills herself?! Really!?!?! Ahem, it's Madame Butterfly, people... The thing that bugs me is that it seems that no one there wanted to be there to actually SEE the performance, but more to rack up points with the alum there and to sound so cool because they've been to "15 broadway shows and 5 operas" blah blah blah. Anyone ever heard of art for art's sake?

I met Neil's parents for brunch on Saturday, and they were delightful people! I adore them! His mother is bubbly and talkative, and his dad (much like Neil) was very chill and calm about it all. I am so happy I met them! Neil makes a lot more sense now. And they took me to Norma's! where I got a massive omelet. Mmmm...
The parents were in town, too! To move Dad into Roosevelt Island. I went straight there. The apartment is nice and cozy. We stayed around and chatted for a while before heading back into the city to go to Alice's Tea Cup (of course!). We enjoyed that for a while, walked around the park, and then finally ended up in Union Square (they were screaming at rats running around in the park) to get dinner at Piola's with Deej. Great meal, lots of talk.
Afterwards, I met up with Aaron and we walked to the LES to Neil's place for a little get together for one of his friends. We got there first, and not many people were there when we had to leave an hour later. I hope it went alright.
Aaron walked me up to Molly's Pub and pouted most of the way up because I was abandoning him. But I tried to make him feel better before he dropped me off there.
Another night with Nate and his friends, the whole lot of them. I think there were about 12 people in our party. It was a fun night. Rob came, talked to me for a while, him and Nate bonded about their disdain for France, and then he left early to meet up with some people. I really enjoy that group of people! They're so funny and pleasant and amusing, I truly like my time with them.
A drive home in a taxi late at night to meet up with Rob for an hour to chit chat post-pub was fine. Jeff H's roommate at Harvard, Wesley, came stumbling out of my apartment building, and we shared awkward hellos while he headed back to Cambridge.

Sunday was practice. I wasn't in a super mood all day, but I would be lying if I said Chambers made it better. Darrell snapped at me in a rather offensive and condescending manner, and I'm still bruised by it. It makes for awkward practices, and I do not want to tolerate that.

Monday was Monday.

Tuesday was decent. Everyone's exhausted! I slugged through the day with everyone else, and went to an ELaw party at Apple Bar for about 30 minutes before booking it to FIAF for another Rendez-vous. Met a professor who talked to me most of the time about how much I need to learn to ride a bike. Yeah, I get it, I am missing out, thanks. Funny conversation, though. He started interrogating me with what I could and couldn't do.
Met up with the usuals there, too. They were pep-talking me about my future, and I found it slightly educating, but more humorous.

Today has gone well. I met up with a retired Foreign Services Officer in the UES (super nice area! and never been beforehand!), and we talked about her job for an hour. She was awfully pleasant, and was a GREAT help for me! Hopefully I will survive this all, though.

Lunch Break

Alright, so I have to recap since...last Wednesday? That's a lot of material to cover. I have 1.5 hours for lunch and a guy next to me who can't keep his mouth closed while eating. Shall I make it? We shall wait to see...

Wednesday I had Senior pictures, which took all of 5 minutes to make. He just told me to move, I moved, he shot the photo, repeat 3 times, I'm out. Simple, yet pricey.
Afterwards, I ran to an audition (dinner in hand, of course) for this guy who wants to be in Chamber Singers. He was unprepared, though sight read like a champ, and was not very knowledgeable on classical music at all, it seems. He was willing to sing show tunes, but we wanted to hear America the Beautiful, which he didn't know (and yes, he was American). He is surely a project, and I vetoed him joining the group straight away. Though Christina seems to want another project...

Thursday was fine. Chambers and I had a fun "after party" of sorts at Max Brenner's. Practice was great, of course, but I really enjoyed the dessert. It was really super complicated at Max Brenner's, though...I made a reservation for 15 (the minimum there is 15 anyways), but sadly about 4 of them canceled on us last minute. I let them know that, and they said it was fine. We got there, and they start giving me crap about how we have a $300 minimum tab, now, for the inconvenience. I told them that I was not informed that it would be a problem, so they lowered it to $20 per person. Not everyone wanted that much stuff, so I went to argue with the manager for about 10 minutes. The bastard didn't budge, "No, the policy is $20 a person, we're sorry we didn't inform you, but we only keep reservations for 15+." I got it, thanks.
Thank GOD the waiter was simply wonderful, and he treated us well AND talked the manager down a bit more at the end of the night, when no one could spend anymore and we weren't at our "minimum" price yet. Let me tell you, though........to keep the resto happy, I ordered more chocolate than legally allowed imported to the states....I had a chocolate crepe, a chocolate shake, and ended with a chocolate martini. All super dark chocolate of course, too. I've never been so HIGH on chocolate in my life!!!
Lauren joined us for the night there, and afterwards I went to hang out at her place for the night. We talked a lot about spirituality, our purpose, men, cooking....all extremely girly things. But it was glorious and I really enjoyed myself until I went home late.

Friday night, I ended up hanging out with Aaron. We went for a walk around the West Side Highway, but I was starving and forced him to get Indian with me in the West Village. I was also waiting for Marion to get into the city. She met up with us at the end of dinner (of which, at the time, Aaron and I were in an argument about the presidential candidates). Walked around for a while, then ordered Insomnia Cookies for a midnight snack (menage-a-trois: Oatmeal Raisin, Chocolate Chunk & M&Ms are AMAZING). Aaron and I cuddled before he left, and us girls went to bed.

Saturday night, I hung out with Nate and his friends. We met up at midtown at this tapas bar called Divine Bar. We all ended up hanging out with 6 of his high school friends (many now think I'm a harp player and a music major....), I drank a nice fruity beer, and we left early to go to a more cozy bar nearby. It was a fun night, I love his friends (some of them are hilarious), and Nate and I split a cab back home after a long night.

I wake up Sunday morning to find many message from Nate freaking out. It so happened that the tapas bar overcharged him by $500...leaving him completely broke, and somehow missing his ID and metro card. So, the morning started with me researching how to get a hold of people to fix this mishap (which, luckily, was solved finally). I went to an intimate Chambers practice, which was followed by us all going out for Vanessa's Dumplings and some dessert at Sundaes & Cones. Both excellent choices, by the way! We had a lovely time killing some time with each other, and we had a fun little discussion in WSP. Marion came home from Philly (since she was there for a day), and we watched "Je vais bien, Ne t'en fais pas" together. Really, really sad movie!

Monday was lowkey, but Nate called and let me know that at 7:30 we were getting together for dinner, and afterwards retrieving his license. It so happened he left his license in the cab of the nicest cabby in the world, who called his mother to get his cell phone, and made plans to give him back his ID. So, we ate at Piola, grabbed some Ben&Jerry's, and waiting for about 1.5 hours for the cabby to show up with the ID. Nate hugged the guy, but the guy kind of freaked out and flew away.

Let's see....I got to go on a Norwegian cruise ship, the MS Fram, Tuesday morning! My boss was supposed to go, but she was in England, so I took her place. Most of the time I was just signing in press for the press event on the ship, but I got a tour of the GORGEOUS ship and a free lunch to boot! The guys who work in the NY office for this Norwegian company are great, and we bonded for a few hours (one of them was rather cute, though a bit out of my age range). I even got to hang out with a few Norwegian girls, which was refreshing!
Sadly, I was rejected from a Stern trip to Costa Rica (that would have worked with nonprofits there). I am pretty sad about it, but I'm thinking about spearheading my own thing, now. Who knows?
After all of my classes, I went to FIAF to watch a screening of "Reines d'un jour". It was SUCH a French movie! Really ridiculous, almost formulaic....and so silly!...but regardless I enjoyed myself, and thought in French the whole way home. It was absolutely pouring out, which made it a bit of a challenge to make it to and from the subways.

Yesterday I actually talked to a lot of my Paris friends: Liisa, Peter, and Pierre (of all people). Peter told me that he came online just for me, so I better stay online to talk to him. Pierre was on his way to go to Norway for holiday, so it was a brief chit chat with him.
Last night Aaron came over for a bit, and we hung out. Otherwise, I didn't do too much.

Today will be interesting, I'm sure. A career fair in between classes. Chamber practice. And Aaron and I are going out afterwards.

Let's See...

What have I been up to?

Doctor's appointments to fix some doctor-induced issues....
Career appointments to help me get into something I want to do after school...
I went last night to a Diversity Leadership Career Conference. Free food was great. Conversation was lacking. The companies there I barely had any interest for. But that's alright, I got fed, and got a free Nalgene Bottle!

Saturday, Nate called me and we hung out in his studio all day. He had some musical things to do, and I was writing a report, so it was pretty low key. He wanted to get me in the sound booth, but I somehow managed to delay that fateful day one more.
We ordered out dinner and ate it in the studio, had some wine, and then headed back to Bushwick. I know, I know....
When we got to his place, we watched "Event Horizon", this sci-fi thriller that I actually somewhat enjoyed. We made good hearty jokes during it, making it all the more fun to watch. Then we night-capped with South Park. I crashed at his place, seeing it was too late to leave Brooklyn.
I had a stomach ache most of the night, so the sleeping was an issue for me, but luckily he was out cold.

Chambers on Sunday was alright. We joked a bit, got through almost 2 songs....I'm starting to re-enjoy the group.

A funny story from last week: The day Obama came to WSP, CAS was throwing a little street fair/BBQ. Deej and I stumbled upon it in between classes, while it was ending and they were cleaning up. We walked around it, and found a Health Booth, loaded with condoms. Well, the girls running the booth asked us to clear them of condoms. So, I opened my schoolbag, took their try o' condoms, and wiped them into my satchel. With some lube and Jolly Ranchers, too.
Much to my dismay, I forgot that the place I put them was where I stashed my pens, cellphone, and wallet. And I had class in Stern, where the Puritans live. And I had to get my pen for class. So, I slowly unzipped my bag, stuck my arm way down deep into the bag, and searched for a pen. The crinkle-crinkle noises of the condoms were loud enough for the kids to look at me with shock and slight disdain.