NYC: No time for subpar dining
Last night, I had pretty much the worst dinner out ever (foodwise, not company-wise or conversation-wise, S).
New restaurant, West Village, Italian … how hard can it be?
Your Unemployed Daughter has returned from her international travels! She is, for her, exceedingly tan, exceedingly relaxed, and exceedingly tired. The latter not unexpected, seeing as how she ended (or, perhaps, only just began?) S&B’s wedding soiree with a second tequila shot quickly followed by the intense need to rid herself of the second and first tequila shots in a rather dramatic and projectile fashion. Fortunately, her aim was good, no one was harmed, and, if you’re still at the Rockhouse – be careful where you step around those rocks, k?
(In a visual depiction of how things have that funny way of coming full circle, Your Unemployed Daughter ate this this morning, in the Montego Bay airport, at 10:30 a.m. Thank you, Dominoes.)
In other full circle news:
YUD had the pleasure of meeting a former Forensics (that means debate, not, like, CSI-style digging around in people’s guts and fingernails to solve mysteries) champion this weekend. And not just any champion. The ALABAMA STATE CHAMPION OF 1994 (Correction: TWO-TIME ALABAMA STATE CHAMPION) in LINCOLN-DOUGLAS DEBATE. Which, if you don’t know, was named after Abraham Lincoln and Stephen Douglas, and pits high school and college nerd types against one another to hash out such topics as “Euthanasia – Moral Much?” “Slavery, Schmavery,” and “Resolved: Limiting economic inequality ought to be a more important social goal than maximizing economic freedom.”
View from the restaurant
How things are different in Jamaica:
10 p.m. – go to sleep with my face in Motherless Brooklyn, exhausted from flight and travel plus delicious steamed fish meal (to which I mistakenly applied FAR too much REALLY REALLY hot sauce through nobody’s fault but my own cause it did say so right on the label) and a generous supply of cooling Red Stripes.
I’ll keep this one short, kids, as I am being fed diet cokes by the friendly bar staff as I overlook the blue blue Jamaica water from the WiFi-ified restaurant lounge and I’m going to have to float out of here pretty soon, or at least continue my work on my base tan and take some pictures for you to see for yourself. Flew in this am on the 7:55 (alarms were set and went off; arrival was on-time even though I’d conveniently “forgotten” my travel was international and therefore check-in closed 60 minutes prior to departure time. Your Unemployed Daughter is growin’ up! Sorta?)
I’ve seen a dolphin and several goat packs, spent an hour and a half through village roads with my driver Duane (falling asleep to Bob Marley on the way), hit 3 ATMs before locating a working one that paid in U.S. dollars, learned the conversion rate but not the name of Jamaican money, interacted with a fellow hotel guest who has had her hair questionably braided, found my Internet connection, and, now, completed my daily job search/email check (see Mom? Dad?) to no avail whatsoever.
But in this case no avail is perhaps the best avail, and as good a sign as any that I should put my name in the book for a massage tomorrow, take an open-air shower, and head for happy hour. Half-priced drinks? How could a jobless gal say no? And why would she?
Changing of the Guard
Don’t you find the airport endlessly fascinating? Especially when you are delayed for an hour, and get through the gate more than an hour before your flight would have boarded had it actually been on time? Stranded airport time provides such uninterrupted food for thought (only if you are traveling alone, otherwise you’ll surely be deluged with endless chitchat and meaningless nonsense from your companions who are far less sanguine about their sojourn at PBI, especially as they likely have to get back to demanding jobs and personal lives while your time is an endless sphere from sleep to wake to eat to workout to eat to send resumes and blog post to eat again and drink and then back to sleep. Repeat.)
In such cases, actually, the airport is a wonderful diversion from the mundane. So many people! So many shared restrooms! Such a cross-section of humanity! The airport where I sit, at gate C-5 across from the Miami Subs Bar and Grill, has always been one of my favorites. It’s relaxed and the lines are never very long, people are slow-moving and friendly (we are in Florida, after all, so the median age is perhaps 65), and the sun, visible through the floor-to-ceiling windows, is always out at least a portion of the day, though my delayed departure has to do with one of those daily thunderstorms – it does clear up afterward – that these coastal regions are known for. In addition, there is WiFi! It is a glorious spot, really.
Don't Forget to Hydrate
Last night I met up with a former coworker (there are so many!) for drinks and dinner on the Lower East Side. As is the norm for an evening preceding a morning when I have a flight to catch (why is that always the way?) I drank far too many glasses of white, rose, and red wine, and ate far too few French fries. Despite my own excesses and lack of carbs to temper, I think it’s safe to say I felt better than the guy who kicked this fire hydrant out of the ground last night for absolutely no reason at all. Except that I think he just got fired.
A lovely evening was had by all, if I remember correctly. We coerced a couple of fine young fellows into joining us apres dinner for some drinks at refined institution Donneybrooke (also known as the site of a certain former employer’s faux holiday party, also known as the night a certain former colleague smashed an ornament on my head, also known as the night we danced the dance formerly known as the “Whip” for certain religiously oriented former bargoers.) Oh, memories. Bittersweet, lazy day, unemployed memories. Sometimes they make the heart ache.
The Hills of Tuscany Bibbiano Bunching Curio
I was watching TV last night (I admit, I went back to Jon & Kate, but jeez…they are weirdly compelling in a “Please never let this become my life” sort of way) and suddenly this Thomasville Furniture commercial comes on that concludes with “and we will make your payments for 6 months IF YOU LOSE YOUR JOB.”
Whoa. Wait a second. Did I actually see that? Rewind, Replay. Yep.
No babies here!
Saturday is the loveliest day, isn’t it? (Especially when there’s no Monday to contend with.) It’s sunny and 69 here in NYC. There seems to be a Jon & Kate marathon on TV – they’re gearing up for the premiere in which the couple “face each other for the first time” after news of his affair with a 23-year-old teacher – JUICY! But I will be strong and go outside. I think it’s time to put air in the bike tire. And then, the park.
Ah, the park. The park is something truly special to the unemployed, but it’s less evident on a Saturday, when all are free to roam and grass-sit to their employed hearts’ content. Don’t worry, I won’t deny the employed the right to the park (we can share it!) but I do want to point out the difference between the park on the weekend, and the park, say, on a Wednesday.
an East Village street, 5:30 p.m., Wednesday
Last night, I enjoyed drinks al fresco with some former coworkers. It was a balmy 80-some degrees, perfect for street-watching and beer drinking at an outdoor cafe I’d never have snagged a table at had I gotten out of work at 8 p.m. (Had I, in fact, been Your Employed Daughter.) To one side sat a table of bankerish types in baseball caps and polo shirts discussing COBRA and the benefits of moving home to Jersey. On the other were some smoking East Villagers who generously shared a light with my former EIC and discussed the proper amount of space one should give between tables and smoking area. At one point, a fellow in a pink button-down offered us a dollar for a cigarette. I said, “Can you make it $2? We’re unemployed!” His response: “So am I!” And the former hedge fund manager got a Parliament for free.
Oh, 2009! How you’ve evened our playing field. Unemployment: bringing douchebags and media types together at last!
