Tuesday 6 November 2012
Sunday 4 November 2012
boston back to new york
woke up to a glorious sunny morning in boston. stayed in bed in my nest of pillows for as long as possible then checked out of my lovely fancy hotel and decided to do the rest of the freedom trail as it was such a nice day. that was until i got to the scary bridge... beautiful blue sky, gorgeous blue water, bright shiny city, bridge made of metal mesh stuff - which you can see the gorgeous blue water through... so i totally bailed out - what a wimp! it really gives me the heeby-jeebies - i do not like to see water miles below rusty metal grating that i'm walking on... so, sorry but i didn't get to charlestown - i'm sure it's lovely though...
tried to go to a little printing museum where they printed the declaration of independence but annoyingly it closed at the end of october so i missed it by a day - grrrr! so i mooched about boston and came across a fabulous second hand bookshop called brattle book shop where i spent a happy hour or so. the shop has a vacant lot next to it and it was full of bookshelves filled with second hand books - bliss! i bought michael chabon's first book 'mysteries of pittsburgh' for a dollar and a book of grimms fairy tales illustrated by maurice sendak for 3 dollars - bargain!
went back to the hotel to pick up my bags and headed off to the bus - dreading it a bit but it was much better on the way back - phew! and we didn't get stuck in traffic so we got back on time. nice to see the power back on in downtown new york too! took the bus uptown back to the apartment and had a catch-up with sue, then off to bed...
today i did some laundry then went off to the new york historical society over on central park west where they have an exhibition of how world war two affected new york - phyllis has been included in this exhibition because of her radio show back in the 1940s which was a request show - phyllis would sing songs that were reqested by servicemen who would send letters to her, she was known as the 'canteen girl'. there were a couple of videos of her talking about her experiences on a video screen. i managed to record them both on my camera, but when i tried to record one of them again with the sound recording, a security guard came and told me off for recording, so i turned off my camera - but ha! i'd already recorded the videos - just without the sound...
then i headed downtown and finally, finally got a ticket for the imax screening of 'cloud atlas'. now, i think everyone knows how much i love love love the book and how worried i've been about the film and whether they're going to screw it up... well, the film is a bit different from the book but i LOVED it and i was very prepared to hate it! the film is a bit over-ambitious but it's a pretty ambitious project to start with! they don't pull everything off 100% but they've made an amazing film - great cast too - ben whishaw, jim broadbent and james d'arcy are particularly good.
can't believe my time here is nearly up... i'm gonna be home on thursday! eeek, i gotta fit in a lot more stuff to do...
tried to go to a little printing museum where they printed the declaration of independence but annoyingly it closed at the end of october so i missed it by a day - grrrr! so i mooched about boston and came across a fabulous second hand bookshop called brattle book shop where i spent a happy hour or so. the shop has a vacant lot next to it and it was full of bookshelves filled with second hand books - bliss! i bought michael chabon's first book 'mysteries of pittsburgh' for a dollar and a book of grimms fairy tales illustrated by maurice sendak for 3 dollars - bargain!
went back to the hotel to pick up my bags and headed off to the bus - dreading it a bit but it was much better on the way back - phew! and we didn't get stuck in traffic so we got back on time. nice to see the power back on in downtown new york too! took the bus uptown back to the apartment and had a catch-up with sue, then off to bed...
today i did some laundry then went off to the new york historical society over on central park west where they have an exhibition of how world war two affected new york - phyllis has been included in this exhibition because of her radio show back in the 1940s which was a request show - phyllis would sing songs that were reqested by servicemen who would send letters to her, she was known as the 'canteen girl'. there were a couple of videos of her talking about her experiences on a video screen. i managed to record them both on my camera, but when i tried to record one of them again with the sound recording, a security guard came and told me off for recording, so i turned off my camera - but ha! i'd already recorded the videos - just without the sound...
then i headed downtown and finally, finally got a ticket for the imax screening of 'cloud atlas'. now, i think everyone knows how much i love love love the book and how worried i've been about the film and whether they're going to screw it up... well, the film is a bit different from the book but i LOVED it and i was very prepared to hate it! the film is a bit over-ambitious but it's a pretty ambitious project to start with! they don't pull everything off 100% but they've made an amazing film - great cast too - ben whishaw, jim broadbent and james d'arcy are particularly good.
can't believe my time here is nearly up... i'm gonna be home on thursday! eeek, i gotta fit in a lot more stuff to do...
Friday 2 November 2012
rainy boston
woke up in my lovely squishy hotel bed (do you think they'd notice if i nicked one of the pillows?) and then walked down to the start of the 'freedom trail' which is a path through the city stopping off at all the historical places of interest. i started on the freedom trail but i got about halfway before it started raining so i gave up and went shopping instead! but i did learn vaguely who paul revere was - up until now he's just been a lyric in a beastie boys song - who knew!
walked down to the beautiful boston opera house to go to the ballet this evening. i'd been trying to book a ticket online but the site didn't work and when i got to the box office all their computers were down - so they were only selling $20 tickets - so i bought one of those and went up to the circle and got a pretty good seat. the ballet was a mixed programme and the first section was called 'rooster' and it was set to 8 rolling stones songs and i loved it! the next two pieces were ok, very contemporary which isn't my favourite kind of ballet, but i really enjoyed it - i hope my horrendous cough didn't annoy anyone too much!!!
right, i've got most of tomorrow here in boston, then i've got to get back on the awful bus back to new york... god knows what time i'll get back to the apartment...
walked down to the beautiful boston opera house to go to the ballet this evening. i'd been trying to book a ticket online but the site didn't work and when i got to the box office all their computers were down - so they were only selling $20 tickets - so i bought one of those and went up to the circle and got a pretty good seat. the ballet was a mixed programme and the first section was called 'rooster' and it was set to 8 rolling stones songs and i loved it! the next two pieces were ok, very contemporary which isn't my favourite kind of ballet, but i really enjoyed it - i hope my horrendous cough didn't annoy anyone too much!!!
right, i've got most of tomorrow here in boston, then i've got to get back on the awful bus back to new york... god knows what time i'll get back to the apartment...
Thursday 1 November 2012
sandy's doing my head in, so have gone to boston...
phew! hate to say this but it's nice to be away from my beloved new york city for a few days! bit fed up with the hurricane sandy aftermath - i feel for all the new yorkers who have to deal with it, but i'm supposed to be on holiday! so, i've gone on holiday!
few more bits from the last few days:
friday - the day of the yorkville masked ball, which is a big fundraising event for search & care. all the rich types from the upper east side get properly dressed up (and i mean properly - gorgeous frocks for the gals, dinner suits for the guys - masks for both - and pay a lot of money for tickets to go down to an old-school english style gentlemen's club and get smashed at a free bar. i was there helping out but it was fun and we could take advantage of the free bar too - yes, i did have a couple of glasses of champagne - would have been rude not to! i spent most of the evening greeting people coming in and directing them to where to check-in for their tickets. so i got to see what everyone was wearing... perfect job for me! earlier in the day i had to go down to the garment district to pick up some fancy jewellery and silk scarves that had been donated for the silent auction - so it was a busy day!
saturday - late start this morning due to last night's festivities. went off to do some laundry (oh, my rock n roll lifestyle!) then went off up to target in harlem for a spot of shopping, then i had been invited to dinner at phyllis's apartment so i headed back over there and had dinner with phyllis. i took my laptop as i'd asked her if i could make a copy of a cd that she has with some of her radio shows from the 1940s, so we listened to them and now i've got them on my laptop - hurrah! she sounds so different on the shows and her singing is just lovely.
sunday - went over to williamsburg to do a bit of shopping and hang out, but it was all cut short as i found out that the subways and buses were shutting down because of the impending hurricane - boo! i didn't buy much, but did manage to get a gorgeous little blue cashmere cardy for £10 from a vintage store - nice! lots more lovely vintage shops there this year than in 2010. got home to find everything closing, including the movie theatres... double boo!!!
monday - under house arrest, sandy on it's way - very windy, a bit rainy, but not cold at all. i went out for walk around the block and nearly got blown away, was pretty scary. but the apartment where i'm staying is really sheltered so it pretty much passed me by. but the tv news went on and on - i had to end up turning it over as it was getting depressing... the day passed and i think i was mainly in a semi-coma.
tuesday - phew! sandy's passed through new york, leaving a lot of devastation in lower manhattan and new jersey. have been very lucky being up at east 88th street as there have been a few trees blown down, but we escaped the really bad stuff. everything starting to open up too - hurrah!!! robin came over and bought us some lunch and coffee - she always cheers me up! later on i ventured out as i was getting severe cabin fever being indoors... ventured out later to finally see a film - it was worth it too, saw 'seven psychopaths' which was brilliant - great cast; sam rockwell, colin farrell, christopher walken and written/directed by martin mcdonagh - he did 'in bruges'
wednesday - ok, new york is kind of back in business. i had a busy day today, went to visit lovely elona this morning - so great to see her again - we chatted for hours and i wish i could see her regularly, she's so sweet. then i dashed over to moma to see some weird little short films about noise - bizarre but great - a film taken in the streets of new york in around 1920, a cartoon based on a dr seuss book called 'gerald mcboing boing' and a film about three bands who played at cbgbs back in 1977, the film had some live footage, but also had interviews with the fans and people at the club - it was brilliant and funny and it had the ramones in it so of course i was happy! then i went an spent some money in the moma shop which is always an expensive visit for me! then headed down to the imax to finally see 'the cloud atlas' but was very annoyed to find that it was sold out... grrr! i have to see that film while i'm still here! so headed home to find that the entire city seemed to be heading uptown - it was gridlocked on the roads and that was the only option as the subway still closed. i ended up walking about 10 blocks across town to find a bus that wasn't going to be stuck for hours. got home to find out that amtrak have cancelled my train to boston - how annoying!!!! so i have to shop around to find a bus to take me to boston - amtrak are refunding me my ticket cost and the bus is way cheaper - so i've saved myself around $100.
thursday - right, i have to get pretty far downtown this morning to catch my cheapo bus to boston... but the subway is only running to 42nd street - so i get off there and i'm very lucky to get straight on a bus going further south, but that stops at 23rd street. i wander about looking for a cab when another bus stops nearby which is going further down, so i get on it and hey presto! it only takes me to one block away from where i'm catching the bus - hurrah! so there's a massive queue which i just join and stand there for about an hour before we finally get loaded onto a crappy old bus - thank god i get a double seat without someone sitting next to me! it's suppposed to take around 4.5 hours but it took over 6 hours... finally get to boston and i'm too tired to walk to my hotel and i don't really know where it is so i just get in a cab. then it pulls up at this really fancy hotel - the oldest continuously running hotel in the whole of the US - or something like that! so, i've got a huge comfy bed and i was big and brave and went down to the really fancy restaurant and had a big yummy dinner - well, i missed out on lunch, only had a yogurt for breakfast and didn't have dinner last night either, so i figured i was due a proper dinner! and i had a famous boston cream pie - which apparently was invented at this very hotel! and oddly, it's not a pie, but more of a cake - anyway, it was lovely and then i came up to my lovely room and watched tv. right, off to bed...
few more bits from the last few days:
friday - the day of the yorkville masked ball, which is a big fundraising event for search & care. all the rich types from the upper east side get properly dressed up (and i mean properly - gorgeous frocks for the gals, dinner suits for the guys - masks for both - and pay a lot of money for tickets to go down to an old-school english style gentlemen's club and get smashed at a free bar. i was there helping out but it was fun and we could take advantage of the free bar too - yes, i did have a couple of glasses of champagne - would have been rude not to! i spent most of the evening greeting people coming in and directing them to where to check-in for their tickets. so i got to see what everyone was wearing... perfect job for me! earlier in the day i had to go down to the garment district to pick up some fancy jewellery and silk scarves that had been donated for the silent auction - so it was a busy day!
saturday - late start this morning due to last night's festivities. went off to do some laundry (oh, my rock n roll lifestyle!) then went off up to target in harlem for a spot of shopping, then i had been invited to dinner at phyllis's apartment so i headed back over there and had dinner with phyllis. i took my laptop as i'd asked her if i could make a copy of a cd that she has with some of her radio shows from the 1940s, so we listened to them and now i've got them on my laptop - hurrah! she sounds so different on the shows and her singing is just lovely.
sunday - went over to williamsburg to do a bit of shopping and hang out, but it was all cut short as i found out that the subways and buses were shutting down because of the impending hurricane - boo! i didn't buy much, but did manage to get a gorgeous little blue cashmere cardy for £10 from a vintage store - nice! lots more lovely vintage shops there this year than in 2010. got home to find everything closing, including the movie theatres... double boo!!!
monday - under house arrest, sandy on it's way - very windy, a bit rainy, but not cold at all. i went out for walk around the block and nearly got blown away, was pretty scary. but the apartment where i'm staying is really sheltered so it pretty much passed me by. but the tv news went on and on - i had to end up turning it over as it was getting depressing... the day passed and i think i was mainly in a semi-coma.
tuesday - phew! sandy's passed through new york, leaving a lot of devastation in lower manhattan and new jersey. have been very lucky being up at east 88th street as there have been a few trees blown down, but we escaped the really bad stuff. everything starting to open up too - hurrah!!! robin came over and bought us some lunch and coffee - she always cheers me up! later on i ventured out as i was getting severe cabin fever being indoors... ventured out later to finally see a film - it was worth it too, saw 'seven psychopaths' which was brilliant - great cast; sam rockwell, colin farrell, christopher walken and written/directed by martin mcdonagh - he did 'in bruges'
wednesday - ok, new york is kind of back in business. i had a busy day today, went to visit lovely elona this morning - so great to see her again - we chatted for hours and i wish i could see her regularly, she's so sweet. then i dashed over to moma to see some weird little short films about noise - bizarre but great - a film taken in the streets of new york in around 1920, a cartoon based on a dr seuss book called 'gerald mcboing boing' and a film about three bands who played at cbgbs back in 1977, the film had some live footage, but also had interviews with the fans and people at the club - it was brilliant and funny and it had the ramones in it so of course i was happy! then i went an spent some money in the moma shop which is always an expensive visit for me! then headed down to the imax to finally see 'the cloud atlas' but was very annoyed to find that it was sold out... grrr! i have to see that film while i'm still here! so headed home to find that the entire city seemed to be heading uptown - it was gridlocked on the roads and that was the only option as the subway still closed. i ended up walking about 10 blocks across town to find a bus that wasn't going to be stuck for hours. got home to find out that amtrak have cancelled my train to boston - how annoying!!!! so i have to shop around to find a bus to take me to boston - amtrak are refunding me my ticket cost and the bus is way cheaper - so i've saved myself around $100.
thursday - right, i have to get pretty far downtown this morning to catch my cheapo bus to boston... but the subway is only running to 42nd street - so i get off there and i'm very lucky to get straight on a bus going further south, but that stops at 23rd street. i wander about looking for a cab when another bus stops nearby which is going further down, so i get on it and hey presto! it only takes me to one block away from where i'm catching the bus - hurrah! so there's a massive queue which i just join and stand there for about an hour before we finally get loaded onto a crappy old bus - thank god i get a double seat without someone sitting next to me! it's suppposed to take around 4.5 hours but it took over 6 hours... finally get to boston and i'm too tired to walk to my hotel and i don't really know where it is so i just get in a cab. then it pulls up at this really fancy hotel - the oldest continuously running hotel in the whole of the US - or something like that! so, i've got a huge comfy bed and i was big and brave and went down to the really fancy restaurant and had a big yummy dinner - well, i missed out on lunch, only had a yogurt for breakfast and didn't have dinner last night either, so i figured i was due a proper dinner! and i had a famous boston cream pie - which apparently was invented at this very hotel! and oddly, it's not a pie, but more of a cake - anyway, it was lovely and then i came up to my lovely room and watched tv. right, off to bed...
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