NYC Weekend March 2010

Photos from my quick trip to NYC this past weekend.

Stoop sitting outside of the Lower East Side Tenement Museum.

How joyous is this scene? You have to go to a Fuerza Bruta performance. I don't want to say much about it because I think it's better that way, but rest assured, it is a spectacle. Also, you may get wet. And that's all I will say.

My friend Amy suggested the show and I said why not, as long as I don't get pulled onstage to dance. Sure enough, a dancer grabbed me by the elbow and tried to drag me on stage. My feet were rooted to the floor, an expression of absolute terror on my face. "No, please, anything but that."

Amy went onstage instead, and she was terrific! A star is born!

My diet over the weekend was not particularly healthy. I give you: pieces of pizza that dwarf Jumbo Slice. (Cell phone denotes a sense of scale).

How can you not be happy while eating a cupcake from a place called "sugar Sweet sunshine."

Homemade Pizza Company

There is a Homemade Pizza Company now in Glover Park - yesterday was the grand opening party, and of course I went and stood in line for 40 minutes (give or take) to get my free pizza.

You see, I'm obsessed with this stuff. As my friend Christine said, I've never met a pizza I didn't like, but Homemade Pizza Co. is especially fun. You buy the unbaked pizza and then make it yourself in your oven at home and they have highbrow combinations of fresh ingredients to choose from.

Total yuppie pizza.

A few weeks ago, I was walking down 14th Street carrying a fancy pizza in a clear plastic bag in one hand and a mustard yellow purse with birds on it in the other. (Put a bird on it!)

The only way I could get yuppie-r is if I had a yoga mat slung over my shoulder.

But I digress. Let's talk Glover Park Pizza Party.

The fanfare.

The line.

The fruits of my labor.

I finally reached the front of the line and was next to go inside the storefront to place my order. I was busily tweeting this important factoid, when I heard multiple voices yelling, "Hey lady, it's your turn!"

I told Joe this, and he said, that was pretty yuppie. Tweeting on my iPhone about yuppy pizza, followed by blogging about said pizza.

Anyway I finally picked up my wild mushroom pizza and left the store with an air of triumph. Free pizza! Free pizza! Only to immediately step in a pile of dog poop on the sidewalk.

Seinfeld was right, the universe does have a way of evening itself out.

Tell Me If You Think This is Funny

Before we went out on New Year's Eve, we went to a nice restaurant for a prix fixe three course menu. Although I've been to many a fancy dinner, I never feel at ease. With my klutziness, I know that disaster lurks at every turn.

So we sit down for dinner, and it's just as New York chi chi as I envisioned. I had my slightly trashy dress on with Snookie-style hair poof and I tried to talk myself down as I perused the menu. "Ok, Adele, you're doing fine, just don't screw this up now," I thought.

It was decided that we would have cocktails, and I just glanced at the menu. "I would like the Stigmata," I told the waiter.

"The cocktail is called the Stigma," he said.

Oh no, I just ordered up the crucifixion wounds of Jesus Christ.Now you've done it!The more I thought about this, I could not compose myself. Debie and I kept laughing, probably making a scene.

When the waiter came back with my drink, he set it down and said - with a completely deadpan expression - "Here's your cocktail. Hammer and nails are in the back room."

Prep Chef

I've volunteered twice this fall at DC Central Kitchen - it's an organization that collects donated food from restaurants, then prepares meals to be distributed to nearby shelters, transitional homes, and rehabilitation clinics.

I've really enjoyed volunteering there. The people are great, you get to work in a commercial kitchen, chopping up celery and carrots, and you get to see the finished process as meals come together. So cool, even for a novice cook like myself.

They ask you to wear a hat when you volunteer in the kitchen. The only baseball cap I own says "Maserati" on it. Ha. Perfect attire for helping the needy. I hope this display of excess isn't an affront.

Celery chopping is the best gig, in my opinion. Last Sunday, I had to strip the meat off half-cooked turkey carcasses. That was a little rugged.

My friend Serena and I worked at the turkey station, along with another volunteer. He said he'd been volunteering there since middle school. Wow! What dedication, we said.

Serena thought about it. Wait, how old are you? she asked.

"I'm in high school," he said.

Ah.