Escape from NY

Okay. Back from NY, and taking care of some odds and ends before heading down to SC to see my folks and get some stuff for the apartment. The weekend was fun. It was good to catch up with Marshal and the cousins. It's funny - everyone's grown up now. All of the cousins are done with undergrad. A few of us are still working on doctorates or MD's. I've got cousins with 10 year old kids. Everyone's getting jobs and being all respectable and stuff.

This week, I pretty much just ate too much. But it was fun. The wedding was this Italian-Chinese wedding out at a country club on Friday evening. The ceremony was pretty simple, but in a nice way. It was on the beach (Long Island Sound, out in New Rochelle), and it was a beautiful area. The cocktail hour was up on the 2nd floor balcony, where they had this huge set-up. There were two tables with Italian food, complete with people making pasta and risotto in front of you. They had all sorts of antipasto, and this awesome tray of cold cuts with different meats and this huge wheel of parmigiano reggiano. There were also two tables with different Chinese dishes. They had a martini bar as well as a bubble tea bar in addition to the usual open bar. And all this was before dinner. Dinner was nice. Fruit, salad, prime rib, wedding cake, chocolate fountain and sorbets. It was pretty nice, and I ate way too much. Which is how a good wedding should be.

The only downside to the wedding? Not exactly a target rich environment. There were a couple of cute girls there, but they were attached to guys already. But that's alright. I had my Heineken to keep me company. But, I actually danced a little bit. I think that the contrast between me and my brother is funny. He's a pretty good dancer for fast, club songs. I'm mediocre at best. I don't know if he dances to slower, older stuff, but I'm a pretty decent swing dancer and I can figure out other slow, more formal dances. But I got to show off a few of my swing dance moves w/ my cousin Lesley, which I think impressed the rest of the family, and was fun.

Saturday, I pretty much manned the grill and ate all day. We had a BBQ for both sides of the family out at Mary's (the mother of the groom) place. Grilled up burgers and dogs, and ate too much, as usual. We took a trip out to the Rockland Bakery, this awesome bakery that does commerical business, but also sells bread and pasteries to the public out of the same building. It's a commercial bakery in the back with a store out front. Very good bread, very neat place. I got a couple Italian cookies and cannoli and wolfed those down, too. Later that night, I went out w/ my aunt and my parents back to Queens and this Brazillian BBQ joint. Lots and lots of meat. Decent enough, but there needed to be a little more variety - all of the meats were pretty much seasoned the same.

I crashed hard on Saturday night, and slept a good 10 hours. Sunday was my day in the city. I wandered out to the Met and hung out for like 5 hours, and got brunch there and saw some exhibits and took a few pics. The big exhibits were the Chanel and Matisse exhibits, neither of which did much for me. However, there was some redemption in the modern art section with Tony Oursler, who did some awesome stuff w/ sculpture and video, projecting these moving faces and eyes onto these bulbous objects. Very fun, and very neat. Of course, I'm all about heading back to see the Monet paitings in the permanent collection, as well as the Van Gogh self portrait with him wearing the straw hat.

After that was Rockerfeller Plaza for a beer and a lobster roll. Then, on to Little Italy for some Italian deli food and a couple slices. I love the contrast between the two meals. It was $45 for the lobster roll and beer, but only like $8 for the rice ball, spinach roll, and the pizza. And it's equally tasty. I like how you can get great food for $2 or $20 or $200 in big cities. Anyway, after that I headed back to Queens to catch up w/ my parents and head out to Jersey to my uncle's place, so I could fly out of Newark in the morning.

Good times. I dig NYC, but I need to go with the right people. I like seeing stuff and wandering around. I'm not for utter chaos, but I'm not a big fan of structure. Just somewhere in the middle. Anyway, it's off to SC in the morning. Until then...

-Chairman