A Bite of the Big Apple

I am in New York! And I'm exhausted... I had a redeye flight on Friday night that got delayed and didn't leave until about 1:30 am. I barely slept on the flight, but was so happy to have Seth meet me at the airport when I got to JFK. It took us about 2.5 hours to get to my apartment (which I LOVE!) and we pretty much just threw my stuff down (and I showered quickly - I think it's essential after any flight) and headed out again. First stop: pizza. Yum. Then we did a mini "welcome to New York" photo shoot - haha - I'll have to post the pics when I get them from Seth. We met up with Seth's friend Jason, and headed out to P.S.1 in Queens. It's an old public school that now holds part of the MoMA's collection. Mostly contemporary stuff. We went out to watch Iron Artist, an art competition a la Iron Chef. Imagine 200 hipsters watching as two teams create something symbolizing "man's inhumanity to man" in 45 minutes while flecks of styrafoam swirl through the air. That was pretty much our experience.

Then we caught a train to Astoria (a Greek neighborhood) where we decided that our hunger had gotten the better of us. We went to a little Greek restaurant and while I enjoyed the style of the restaurant and people watching all of the "OPA!" Greek families, the food I got was pure nastiness. Sad. I just wanted a gyro, but the place we went didn't have them. I was feeling experiemental and very proud of myself for going out on a limb... but now I just know never to order Moussaka again. As we ventured back to Manhattan, my good friends thought it would be nice to show me where I would get off the train for work. We explored Times Square a bit and went for a quick grocery run at Whole Foods. It's quite the natural and organic, expensive shopping experience. I'm eating Kashi Go Lean Crunch for dinner today since that was the only cereal option I'd heard of that they had at the store.

I visited the famous Manhattan 8th Ward for church. It meets in the same building as the temple, near Lincoln Center. Mostly I went because my ward meets at 9:00 and I wanted to sleep in, and I also wanted to check it out. It's a huge ward - actually slightly overwhelming. I will probably attend my Inwood ward from now on. But I did get to see Sister Andersen, a missionary I taught a few months ago in the MTC! :) She is serving in the 8th ward and it was a treat to see her.

Now if I can just talk myself into going to work tomorrow...