Retroblogging: Summer Fridays 2013

Sometimes trying to keep up on this blog can be a real bear. I know it's easier to do it as things happen, but then life and projects get in the way. Life just roars on by and trying to claw out time for intensive posts can make me snarl.

Ad from the railways

Take blogging this summer. I had a project list that I was trying to tackle and prioritize around. And, added to that, the summer heat - while not as bad in years past - was still a bit oppressive due to the humidity. It was NOT a treatwave, contrary to what McDonald's would like to you to believe.

Really advertisers. Does this work?

The summer, and all of it's wonderful Summer Fridays, flew by. I outlined some of them already, and I was organizing, cooking, packing, or cruising on others. 

On a few of my other Fridays, I found myself heading in and out of the City running errands related to some of my other organizational projects. 

Things look lovely from the inside of an air-conditioned train, don't they?

The one treat I did indulge in a few times was a combo of a spicy Jamaican patty and an icy cold Diet Coke from Golden Krust at Grand Central. Don't mind the lap full of crumbs.

So good. Now I want one RIGHT NOW!

The Fourth of July weekend rolled on by and somehow I ended up getting the summer sickness of some sort. Nothing like a fever of 101+ to celebrate a three day weekend. Not only didn't I get up to Caramoor for the fireworks, but I wasn't able to help a friend move.

Instead I felt super crappy and decided to try and cheer up by doing a thematic mani/pedi - with varying success.

My feet are gnarly. I need professional help.

After so many years of having super short nails due to piano and then food service, and also not being able to wear polish due to the aforementioned food service, I feel weird with polish on my nails. It also chips and smudges and snags within seconds of application - on me, at least.

I also enjoyed watching the Twitter feed of the Boom Box Parade from ye olde  hometown of Willimantic. Social media is great for bringing far-flung community members together. Some of us started reminiscing about parades and politicians of yore and I pulled out the last of the family souvenirs from and snapped a picture to share. Talk about memories. The family used to have a HUGE stack of these potholders from Sam Gejdenson.

The one surprise I stumbled upon on these summer Fridays was exactly what these Fridays were for - finding the little secrets of the City that I've missed after over 20 years in the area ...

Library Way, at 41st Street

According to an article in Library Journal:

"The two blocks of East 41st Street that lead to the landmarked Stephen A. Schwarzman Building, the largest of The New York Public Library (NYPL)’s research libraries, have a tale to tell, but to read it, you must walk with your eyes cast down at your shoes. Inset in the pavement are 96 beautifully sculpted rectangular bronze plaques with literary quotations and whimsical illustrations."

 

 "Each plaque has a passage from a writer and a related artwork. For example, for Francis Bacon, two books are set at sharp angles to one another and each book has a “bite” taken out, accompanied by the quotation: “Some books are to be tasted, others to be swallowed, and some few to be chewed and digested . . . .” Each bronze plaque is rectangular, and each is approximately two and one half feet by one and a half feet in size.  Other quotations are from Descartes, Emily Dickinson, E.B. White, and Virginia Woolf, among many others."

The full article in the Library Journal can be found at: http://lj.libraryjournal.com/2012/07/library-services/library-way-my-way/

I need to go back when the light isn't so blinding, now that it's not so hot, and with my real camera. Most of these pictures are from the iTouch and they and I couldn't see what we were shooting for the most part.

I miss three day weekends. I will ALWAYS miss three day weekends.

Retroblogging Recipes: Potato Salad (Sunday)

The summer got away from me, so I didn't have a chance to post updates about all of my activities. One weekend in mid-July, I packed WAY too many bags for an overnight trip to stay with Christine and hang out for a concert/picnic reunion at Caramoor. I spend most of one Friday and Saturday making four kinds of salads and two kinds of desserts for the trip.

In JULY.

Needless to day, even with air conditioning, it got a bit steamy in the Attic. You would think that making salads wouldn't make one uncomfortably sticky, but boiling water for potatoes, pasta, and eggs makes it HHH: hazy, hot, and humid.

Recipe in Raw form

And then baking.

Oh well...

It was totally worth it. I didn't have to cook for the rest of the week. And there were leftovers for other people. LOTS of other people. At multiple organizations.

And, more importantly, I finally got to try out my great-uncle's potato salad recipe from the family cook book. 

TILLERY'S POTATO SALAD

Cook 5 to 6 potatoes in boiling, salted water, til tender when pierced.

Boil 4 to 5 boiled eggs in salted water.

Chop cooled potatoes in large bowl. 

Add chopped, boiled eggs.

Put in 1 stalk celery – chopped fine. 

Added a small yellow onion - chopped fine. 

Add pickle relish to taste (about ½ cup).

Add Miracle Whip to taste (about ½ to 1 cup). [I used a flavored MW product, I think the dijon mustard one.]

1 tsp mustard.[skipped]

Added salt and pepper to taste.

Chilled so the flavors could meld.

Take to the picnic.
Share.

Clockwise: pesto tortellini salad: marinated dill cucumber and onion salad; THE potato salad; Thai peanut butter sesame pasta salad

Not shown: Lemon bars and chocolate brownies

Also not shown: The WHOLE GANG!

Summer 2012: Island Hopping, Part 5

After leaving the Ferry terminal I headed up Broadway to find the second of my "islands" for the day. I felt so welcomed by the open arms of Saint Elizabeth - who apparently was the first American born saint (according to the sign there.)

I don't feel as comfortable below 34th, or 14th, or Canal Street, for that matter - so lower Manhattan is way out of my comfort zone. Added to the fact that the landscape of lower Manhattan was changed irrevocably in 2001, there's the added psychic weight that we all try not to deal with while being downtown. Perhaps regular visitors have built up a level of comfort/coping mechanism, but I haven't been downtown often enough. Now that I know how ridiculously easy it is to do the Ferry, and how much I need to be on the water more often, I'll be down a lot more.

By the time I reached the corner of Broadway near the Museum of the American Indian at Bowling Green, I was ready to be distracted by the bright colors of a street market. After being on the water, peering through the haze, bright colors were good to shock my senses back into a state of awareness.

I was initially drawn to the ruched flowers on the red scarf and that drew me into the other wares. Then I found the hand-crocheted embellished (but made in China) wraps. It's a seriously good thing I only had $12 on me for the whole day - and that was earmarked for the last part of my daytrip - so I had no money to spare. There were so many pretties and this magpie wouldn't have been able to resist.

Ooooooh. Glass. OOOOOOH. Blue baubles!

I am seriously going to have to blow this one up and frame it.

Then I found more scarf stalls. Was I in Manhattan or in India at a bazaar?

There were so many tables and racks just full of stones. I love these hanging displays. I just wanted to brush them like harp strings. I also really liked these stretchy bracelets. I have large wrists, so stretchies are better for me. Not that I would wear them. I have my heirloom that I wear every day without fail, so I don't wear additional bracelets. But don't they look inviting?

I couldn't stare at these too much. I was getting sleepy.

So many colors. So many patterns. So much fun. I think I'll play with these pics and make some new cards and prints. I'm lucky these came out. It was so hazy and bright, I wasn't able to see anything on my little screen, with my shades on or without. I had a headache from the heat, humidity, and haze and all the squinting.

I had to pull myself away from the stalls and head back up the Canyon of Heroes. I'm sure I looked like an idiot, but I was totally reading the inserts into the sidewalk. So many historical names and dates - as well as a familiar name. Why Hello Mr. Cliburn. (Yes, I was one of *those* people. I totally stopped in the middle of the flow of traffic and shot these. I do realize the irony of me acting like a tourist.)

The more north I traveled on Broadway, the more I really remembered why I don't like lower Manhattan. Narrow streets. Wall Street. Traders. Tourists. People doing obscene to the Bronze Bull. Tramps aka the Occupy Wall Street "protesters" hanging out at Trinity Church. The construction vibe due to the rebuilding of the Trade Center areas, not to mention the huge transit project expanding the Fulton Street subway hub. I think I might also have been the teensiest bit claustrophobic. The towers in my area just don't seem to hem me in the same way as the walls of this "canyon."

No matter how beautiful the skyline contrasts are (r: St. Paul's dwarfed by skyscrapers and One World Trade) it was hot and I was sticky. I was also way out of sorts to realize that a) my "island" destination, Cookie Island, had been pushed out by the Fulton Street hub construction and the website didn't tell me that [freakin' Google] -- it's a Payless now and b) I couldn't find the subway entrance because of the scaffolding for the Fulton hub and I walked around the block 3 times until I found it.

All the cheery street art in the world didn't cheer me up, but a long cool subway ride north to "island" number 3 of the day did help. I headed up to another unfamiliar area of NYC, the upper reaches of the East Side, to El Museo del Barrio for the exhibition, Caribbean: Crossroads of the World. Pardon the lack of pictures, but El Museo is wrapped up for reno of its own. They also didn't allow photography in the exhibition (which is a shame because I don't draw).

I'll have to do a review of the exhibition at a later time. It's actually a three-parter, spread out between El Museo, the Queens Museum of Art, and the Studio Museum in Harlem. I have a passport to the other 2 now, since I paid admission to El Museo. I can see getting to Harlem, but I don't know about Queens yet.

1 day trip = series of islands
Manhattan
Staten Island
The "lost" island - I think it's on Long Island now, but I'm not heading out there for a cookie
artistic renderings of the Caribbean Islands - Cuba, Puerto Rico, and all the St.'s etc.

Pretty good for:
unlimited trips on my monthly MetroCard
$5.00 student admission to the Museum, cash
$3.75 beverages, cash
And some plastic money in the Museum Gift Shop for trinkets for the kids and to make-up for saying I was a "student."

Better than airfare and accommodations, right?