Weekend Report

Friday- Took a relatively uneventful ride to NYC on the Fung Wah- no fires, but my seat was stuck in the fully reclined position, so the guy behind me could have easily performed dental work had he so desired. I headed straight to my friend Amanda’s apartment in the financial district, where I met up with Ern, Liz, and Beth. We ordered pizza and sat around talking and catching up for a long time. I then snuck out to meet up with a couple of Peace Corps friends, Rich, and Dan, who I found in a Japanese restaurant in East Village, accompanied by a dog and a mandolin. Here they are with some dude named Mario who told me several times that I was “muy bonita.” I should have taken another photo, because Dan bears a strong resemblance to Ignacius Reilly in this one.

We moved on to a coffee shop and hung out there for a while, and at 1AM (only in New York does one actually go out at 1AM. Boston is still very puritanical in some respects), I left to meet back up with the Notre Dame girls, who had joined Ern’s brother Timm and two of his buddies at a bar.

These are the kind of guys who, when buying a round of drinks, buy two drinks each for the girls and three drinks each for themselves. Which translates to lots of alcohol. Here's a picture of us, and a normal picture of Ern and Timm:

Here's another picture of Ern and Timm, in which Timm looks like he's a character in a musical saying "Oy! Is that a newsie?" in a British accent:

Saturday- Slept in late, then Liz, Amanda, Ern and I went to a Scandinavian restaurant for brunch. Fittingly, the restaurant played nothing but Rod Stewart for the full two hours we spent there. At one point, we were discussing a very intellectual subject and Amanda paused and asked “When we were nineteen, did you ever imagine that ten years later, we’d be sitting around debating whether it’s better to throw up the night of or the morning after a night of drinking?” Hmmmm….no. Walking home from brunch, we suddenly noticed that the narrow, cobblestone street would be perfect for a newsie-inspired dance number, and amused ourselves with moves like jumping in the air and clicking our heels, twirling around a street sign, and leapfrogging a fire hydrant. (I have the feeling that this is one of those "had to be there" stories that sound plain retarded in the recount. Blast!) Due to the cold weather and our general laziness, we ditched our plan of walking around the city and went back to Amanda’s apartment to hang out and watch The Office.

For dinner, we met up with Beth and Diane at Eight Mile Creek, an authentic Australian filled with Australians, and with a menu that offered such delicacies as emu, kangaroo, and kiwi martinis. I did try the kangaroo and found it to be similar to venison. We did some bar hopping with a couple of Liz’s friends from business school, and had an impromtu extended photo shoot. We decided to pose for mug shots…mine came out very Courtney Love-ly.

Afterwards, we met up with Timm and company again at his friend’s apartment. Instead of taking two taxis there, Amanda convinced a limo driver who was idly waiting for his passengers to drive us there for a small fee. He accepted, and it was a bit odd to ride around in a limo filled with strangers’ coats. At the apartment, the good times and goofy antics lasted way into the early morning.

Sunday- Woke up after what seemed like a brief nap and rushed out the door to catch the bus back to Boston. Slept for the entire ride. So yes, I spent an entire weekend in New York without doing one remotely cultural or touristy thing, but since my objective was to spend time with friends, I was quite satisfied.

I went to Framingham to watch the Superbowl at my sister and bother-in-law’s place, which was fun, although they game itself wasn’t too exciting. I was hoping that the Bears would crush Indy, but it seems that a functioning quarterback is indeed mandatory for success in the NFL. I liked Prince’s show, but I did think the Foo Fighters cover song was an unusual choice. Well, there’s no predicting when it comes to the prince of purple. As for the commercials, I didn’t think they were that great this year. I had already seen most of the Coke ones, and the only other ones that stuck out were the men stripping for the Chevy (hilarious) and the CareerBuilders.com office survivor ones- loved the man covered in yellow sticky notes blowing a horn to start the battle.