from diet coke to the food network

so i promised i would give up drinking diet coke after we moved and i have. i have not had one since we got here on tuesday. as many of you know i could not have caffeine for much of my grown life because of my stomach problems and then strangely over the last year or so i have been able to have one, sometimes two diet cokes a day (not every day, but some times). once the diet coke with lime came out i felt like i was having one all the time. what is great is because i haven't had much caffeine in my body for over 15 years, the diet coke really perks me up- this really helped me through the marathon weeks of garage sale, packing, hanging out with friends and driving across the country twice in two weeks. but now that i am settled, there is no need for it and i swear my body became addicted. if i did not have a diet coke, i would get a real bad headache AND a number of my friends and family members of my friends know folks who got real fucked up on diet coke, so i decided i don't need it. so i stopped.

i have replaced that addiction with a primary addiction to the food network (rachel ray anyone?) and a more secondary addiction to HGTV. good googely moogley i could watch that shit all day. for reals. today rachel (we are on a first name basis) made some dark meat boneless chicken legs (no thanks) laid up on some delicious "smashed" red potatoes. i am *so* going to ask jes to make those with the red potatoes we have. i mean they looked GOOD. and while we are talking about food... this morning i had a delicious garlic bagel with cream cheese (asked for butter, but whatever) from terrace bagels. apparently everyone and their brother goes there at 11am on a sunday. jes got an everyting bagel with butter (she got cream cheese too) and hers was divine as well. that whole thing about bagels are better in new york is true yall. while in line i thought about how during my masters at ohio state my roommate alyson and her sweetie (now wife) nicole and i would make a run to the bagel joint as sustenance while we "studied" (which meant play tombraider and pretend to work on the master's thesis). alyson would always get lox and cream cheese and nicole would get some pastrami or meaty something. they would LOSE THEIR MINDS in this bagel place b/c its all about the lox and the meat. another neighborhood place i have fallen in love with is hot diggity dog (i SWEAR that is what it is called). anywho they have veggie dogs there so jes and i got some last night for dinner. she went with the brooklyn dog which conists of sauerkraut, onions and mustard (gas anyone?) and i got the CHICAGO dog which had onions, relish, tomatoes, and a pickle spear. and we got a large order of cheese fries- the kind with pump cheese. oh my god i love those. seriously, i felt like i was 12 years old at this place in niles, illinois called "the works". they had some of the best pump cheese fries you ever tried. surprisingly none of it made us sick. hard to believe, but true. we are so going there again soon. we ended up staying home last night b/c we were supposed to go out with nifa but then she cancelled because she was too tired (she did take a red eye in yesterday morning for the record). hopefully we will see her tonight.

yesterday we met up with nifa and all her ridiculously hot and smart friends at the great lawn in central park. it was a delightful sunny afternoon and i really enjoyed just people watching and catching up with her. she is in town to help out her friend nicole who has one cute baby boy named kai. he had the longest legs and completely edible feet. he also has excema and was itching so she had to put these little sock/gloves on his hands. this, of course, made him ten times as adorable. now pretty much everyone that joined us went to stanford or harvard or princeton or whatever, and lets just say there was not a whole lot of ugly going around. my favorite group that joined us was these two women. one was named ebony and i missed the other woman's named because her taut muscular arms distracted me. ebony has recieved or is receiving her phd from stanford's modern literature program (this amazing interdisciplinary program i DID NOT get into). her friend is working on her doctorate in history of consciousness at santa cruz (and did i mention her advisor is gina dent? she just calls her "gina"). so as if their brains and beauty was not enough, they also brought wine, apple pie and my favorite ice cream-vanilla swiss almond to the picnic. who brings ice cream to a picnic? they do and it wasn't melted a bit which is hard to believe b/c they were so fucking hot. anywho, jes and i left around 4pm to hit china town to pick up a few things and then headed home. i was again completely exhausted from jaunting around the city and had to take a nap before going to get our hot diggity dogs. i have heard my body will adjust to all the walking. i am not sure how long that will take but as of right now, it knocks me out.

today we will head to the co op for two hour long orientation (you are so jealous) and then to the metropolitan for some all you can eat/drink bbq with christian. i feel like all i do here is eat, walk, and drink water. quick side note: on our way to terrace bagels, we saw our neighbor milton- the one who did not know us from adam, but still helped us move in in 100 degree heat- yeah i think i am secretly falling in love with him (not really) but he is an artist and when he hits it big and is coming to your town, go to the show and tell him donna sent you. i don't know his last name yet, but when i do, i will let yall know so you can look up his shit. he is a darling.

so i have three goals for this blog over the next week:

1. learn how to download photos. i am certain jes the techie can help me with this

2. begin one of two special features: calf update. because we walk so much now, jes is certain our calves will grow to enormous sizes. i do think they will grow, but i am not sure how much. either way, we will give yall a weekly update, so you can analyze the data yourself.

3. begin the second feature which will be a guest posting by my friend sarah, who has her finger on the pulse of popular culture and gossip. i mean she is the one who told me about how tom cruise is paying katie holmes ten million dollars to be his wife to cover up the fact that he was doing it with the lead singer of matchbox 20. no, she will not uncover her sources.

so stay tuned for that yall. and a big love shoutout to alyson and nicole (my bagel friends) i think today is their sixth wedding anniversary. let love rule.

no beyonce but maybe some cindy sherman

so the plan this morning was to get up *early* and head to rockefeller center to see matt, katie, ANN CURRY (i have a huge crush on her) and al roker, oh and did i mention DESTINY'S CHILD? yeah they were the summer concert on the today show. totallly free, just hop on the f train and we would be there. but, alas, we stayed out too late last night and i did not wake up until 8am. this ends up to be a good thing b/c i watched it on television and they didn't do any songs i like AND nine million people were there. that would have made me very very cranky.

so yesterday we did a little exploring of the neighborhood. i sent off some software to my friend dawn (along with a piece of the deck box we gave her; jes assured me that they got the piece and then when moving our stuff in the other night there it was in the trunk) and we dropped off our disposable digital camera at CVS. we also checked out a hotel for jes's folks when they come to visit. the first one was not so much for them. jes called her mom as we left the post office and said "mom, i don't think that hotel is for you, i think its rented more like by the hour." then we did a tour de markets around our neighborhood. they were all way overpriced, so thanks to jes's "Not for Tourists" guide we found a Key Foods Supermarket about three blocks down on Prospect. Now this is what I wanted. Call me little city or midwestern, but I love me some wide aisles and flourescent lights in my grocery stores. We figured between this place and the Park Slope Co-op, we can get our groceries done. I picked up one of those little hand carts and Jes was like "Should we get a cart?" and then we remembered we had to WALK home, so she just got a little hand cart too. The only thing that really hurt my feelings was how expensive orange juice is. They have no generic store brand. I need to find a better way to get my Vitamin C I think.

After grocery shopping we came home and had lunch and then headed out on a bike ride to check out a few more hotels for Jes's folks. We went to a Days Inn up on 39th that might work and then tried to cut through the huge cemetary and got yelled at by the groundsmen. Then we tried to cut through Prospect Park (which is truly lovely) to get to this other hotel. At about the Children's Zoo, Jes stopped me and asked if I wanted to keep going. She showed me how much more there was (I had *no idea* our plan was to go that far) and was like "hell no". DT is so out of shape it's RIDICULOUS. But we did finish up around the park loop which was delightful- a little up hill, but delightful. It was so breezy and cool yesterday, it made it easy to fall in love with this city.

After that I did a little work for my job and then took a nap and then we headed up to Williamsburg for a little fun. Jes is antsy to go out b/c she wants to get the "new york city is about fun and going out" out of her system before she begins law school. This makes sense but I am not sure I will be able to keep up. We'll see. We stopped off first at Barcade for a little Centipede. I sucked ass overall. Then we headed to the Metropolitan to meet Christian for buy one get one free drafts and a little Erotic Photo Hunt. When he got there we headed out back on the delightful patio and chatted with him, his friend Charlie (who went to Emory) his new special friend Jeremy, and this entirely random dude named Eric, who was clearly butt nuts in love with Christian (at one point he asked everyone at the table "so what is your connection to Christian?" clearly only concerned with the men to find out if he was single). We left around midnight and then went to Kellog's Diner (think Majestic folks in the ATL) and got some grilled cheese and fries (i needed neither). Then after a long train ride home, we hit the hay.

Today we will check out another hotel for the parents (the one my ass couldn't make it to yesterday) and about my ass- it hurts as does my girl, i need a more padded seat on my bike or something. We are also going to check out this Cindy Sherman exhibit at some gallery that Jes read about in the Time Out New York. She is one of Jes's favorites. I also need to do some work, you know, what Emory pays me for. If Jes stays knocked out with two kitties on the bed, I can squeeze some in this morning.

Tonight we will head to Cattyshack, this local lesbo bar. My friend from Ohio State named Glennda is having a little get together for her sweetie there. I will also get to see Buckeye alums Monique and her sweetie Nancy, who I like to call Ali (she looks nothing like a "Nancy"). So needless to say, I have a full plate today. It's hard to beleive I think I can finish my dissertation in this city. Cross yer fingers yall.

Two more things:
1. Happy Birthday to my friend Janet Oberle and Pat Feeney

2. Check out my friend and mentor Ara Wilson's blog: www.thebadara.blogspot.com
She will school yer ass for sure.

It's official- we live in Brooklyn

Though we drove up from Atlanta last week in our Penske truck nick-named "tic tac" and set up our apartment then, I feel I can now say we officially live in Brooklyn. Yesterday we got up at the ass crack of dawn, loaded up the car with a bunch of crap, our cats and our microwave and drove nearly 15 hours in stifling heat to our new apartment in Park Slope, Brooklyn. It was an uneventful drive, save our cat Larry meowing almost the entire way while his sister Emily and brother Horace slept. The sky was clear, the gas was cheaper than Atlanta, and the fountain diet coke was delicious. The last hour was hard because we all just wanted to be here, and when we finally got here and released the cats from their carriers they hissed and growled and then used the litter box.

Today was another scorcher, so we only left the apartment to get a slice of pizza at Joe's on the corner (let me recommend the Sicilian cheese) and then headed to the organic market to pick up a few things for dinner. Our internet and my fax machine were not working well so I got frustrated and took a nap. I know, what a glamorous life I lead here in New York, but it is back to work tomorrow and I think I am a bit overwhelmed.

The heat is supposed to break and tomorrow it will be in the 80's. Jes and I hope to do a little grocery shopping, go to the bank, look for a few hotels for when her folks visit from Atlanta, and maybe go to Target and Ikea to get a last few things for the apartment. Friends start visiting next weekend. First Amanda, Lydia and Jay from Atlanta and then Pony and Thomas from Seattle & France. Then Jes's folks are driving up from Atlanta for her mom's birthday. My friend Nifa is in town this weekend to spent time with her friend up in Harlem who just had a baby. We are meeting her for a picnic in Central Park on Saturday. I am excited to see her and spend time in the park.

Other than that, I am trying to get into a flow of work and dissertation writing. Tomorrow I begin. I also need to visit the local yoga joint and find a class I like and can afford. I haven't been to yoga in a week and my body is very sad because of it. The cats seem adjusted. Larry is lounging on the bed, Horace on the floor (he has finally come out from under the bed) and Emily is relaxing on floor two of the kitty condo. Jes is laying next to Larry on the bed with her cute ass glasses on while she reads some Harry Potter book. I think I might go and try to finish watching the movie "Rosewood" so we can send it back to Netflix.

I know its a crime I am not taking in more of the city on our first free night here, but I imagine there will be time for that (Jes has three years law school and then says she will probably practice here "for about five years"). Really, what's the rush?