Field Trip: Wave Hill, Bronx NY. . . with Bees

Last weekend, CityBoy dragged me out of the City for one last, pre-winter hurrah. As you probably know, Jho and cold weather do not mix. I am a very unhappy camper. CityBoy jokes that it’s always too hot or too cold in New York for me. Which is almost the truth. There are about four weeks each year that I enjoy. Two weeks of spring/heading into summer and two weeks of fall. Otherwise, it is an abominable mess out here.

But back on topic, being the impressive planner that he is, CityBoy realized that last weekend was going to probably be one of the last nice weekends we’ll have for a long while (how depressing is that?), and he decided that he really wanted to get outside of the city for some Nature, with a capital N.

the Pergola Overlook

Which is how we ended up trekking out to Wave Hill, a gorgeous public garden and center set atop the cliffside in way upper Bronx. If you’re familiar with the area and/or have taken a MetroNorth or Amtrak train heading north from New York, you’ll remember seeing these amazing red cliffs from the train as you’ve speed along the Hudson. That’s where Wave Hill is. 

Did I Mention They Like Statues?

Statues of horses. Or horsepeople, to be precise.

Yup - those are giant horses waiting to trample you from on high.

They are lording it over massive fountains.

Horse King of the People

Charging over the tops of municipal buildings.

It's a bird. It's a plane. Nope, it's a giant statue of horses.

And rearing triumphantly over their self-named parklands.

Where's my charging-horse, spear-in-hand statue, damn it?

In general, swanning about, making you feel tiny and insignificant. Because they have been immortalized in marble, granite, or limestone. More than life-sized and flexing their artist-enhanced biceps.

Makes you want to go out and commission your own sword-wielding, chariot-driving, wild-stallion-driving statue, no?

Wedding gift, anyone?

I’m Alive…and Have Been to Europe!

[First off, my sincere apologies! A draft of this post has been sitting around in cyberspace since June 12th. June 12th! "Joder!" as the Madrilenos like to say. Some important things have changed in my life - more on that later - but for now, I give you this old, but still pertinent, blog post.]

Yes, faithful readers (if there are any of you still out there). Jho In The City lives. And she’s experienced Europe firsthand (Madrid, Spain to be precise).

Back in May, I visited one of my favorite people in the world, Ms. D, in her happy new home of Embajadores, Madrid for a blissful week of overeating, overdrinking and oversleeping. I wish I could go back right now and do it all over again.

I’m super backed up on things to tell you about, so I’m going to be snappy here.

First, a few things I learned in Madrid:

- Lisping is sexy. Especially when done by very beautiful Madrid boys. Hello, boys.

- Madrileños have a special relationship to ham, or jámon as they call it. I don’t know what pact with God they’ve made, but it was a good deal. If you go to Spain, eat the jámon, as much of it as you and your salt-craving palate can stomach. Then wash it all down with a local beer. Deeeee-licious.

Bellying up to the bar at Museo del Jamon

Jamon-flavored Ruffles?? I think I've found my homeland!

- Tapas cannot be fully appreciated outside of Spain. These people have got afternoon drinking down to a decadent science. Order a cold, frothy cerveza at any sidewalk cafe and they will give you free nibbles. Sometimes lots of free nibbles.

- Did I mention the free nibbles? Baskets of homemade potato chips, olives, chunks of ham or salami, bread with olive oil. It goes on and on and on. These are good people, my friends. Good, good people.

It should go without saying that we saw some beautiful things in lovely museums – the Goya room at Museo del Prado is a visual stunner I will carry with me forever – and laughed at many ridiculous things on both Spanish TV and YouTube (I now have even less reason to trust ducks).

But most of all, I’ll miss the impossibly long talks with my friend. There are people in this world who just get you, you know. They’re like your sisters but better, because they didn’t try to steal your clothes when you were young or get you in trouble for picking on them. Time with these people, these fabulous go-to-the-end-of-the-world, help-you-bury-a-body people, is so precious, you have to just forgo sleep and reasonableness and saving your voice in the name of soaking up all that good time, all those amazing stories, all that laughter, and bottling them up for the next time.

God help us, let there always be a next time.

Hasta luego,

Jho

Check a Bag? Hell’s No!

I travel a lot less these days, since I’ve only been working part-time for the past seven months, and before that I was unemployed for a year. But I have traveled a lot in my time, for work and for fun, so I thought it might be helpful to share how I roll.

My #1 rule is: Never Check a Bag. Never. Just don’t do it. Because checking a bag means that you’re okay with never seeing the possessions in that bag ever again. You may think I’m being overly dramatic, but according to Gadling.com, airlines lost 3,000 bags per hour in 2009.

Three thousand. Per hour. That’s insane. If you’re like me, you’re traveling with some of your nicest stuff, because you’re going on some fun weekend vacation, or you’re heading to a work-related tradeshow and you want to look good. I like my stuff. A lot. So I’m sure as hell not taking my chances.

So how do you pack for a week with just one roller bag and your purse/backpack/duffle?

Planning and coordination.

Let the Games Begin!

We’ve been doing themed holiday gift-giving in our household for a few years now, mostly because I never know what to get CityBoy (other than the odd non-fiction book or documentary DVD – what do you get for the guy who already has all the gadgets and doohickies he wants?). And because the holidays are so expensive, what with all the traveling, dinner dates, and family gift-giving, we usually impose a $25 gift limit on each other.

Last year, it was a CVS Holiday Season in which all of our celebratory presents came from our neighborhood CVS Drugstore. We were traveling to California, so I got CityBoy an assortment of travel must-haves, including hand sanitizer on a clip (for his backpack), travel tissues (unfortunately – or fortunately – I think I used most of those up), and the latest issue of New York Magazine for the plane. I got a travel brush/mirror and a monster jar of Twizzlers (this was in deference to my pathological love of Red Vines, which of course are impossible to find in Manhattan – what is it with you people??).

This year was Game Year. We didn’t have much at home in terms of board games, besides CityBoy’s old Othello set, which I don’t understand how to play, and a Scrabble set, which we can’t play for fear of destroying the very fabric of our relationship, so it seemed like a great idea.

Staten Island and Enoteca Maria

To commemorate our three-year anniversary, I surprised CityBoy with a trip out to Staten Island this July. We’d been talking about taking the Staten Island Ferry for months, which affords amazing views of Manhattan and the Statue of Liberty for free.

Ferry ride - woo hoo!

I don’t really understand how they do it, considering it costs me $2.50 to go anywhere via the MTA (which is still a colossal deal, don’t get me wrong), but it is fantastic.

Hi Lady Liberty!

And gorgeous.

And hello, Sky.

But the true highlight of the evening was our dinner at Enoteca Maria. Featured by the Wall Street Journal here, Joe Scaravella runs a fantastic little restaurant not far from the ferry terminal. Joe reminded me a lot of Frank Zappa, with his little soul patch and his rebel spirit, and he’s definitely a guy who enjoys good food.

The menu is a little overwhelming, with tons of daily appetizers and specials, and a huge variety of wines. But here’s what you do: ask Joe what to get. We were seated right at the bar, in this cozy corner (the restaurant stays busy all night long and can get loud), so we could pester him for his opinion. And boy, did he steer us right.

The menu changes every day, depending on which nonna is cooking, but the night we were there we had these amazing stuffed zucchini blossoms (which CityBoy had never had) and this mind-blowingly rich dish of oxtail:

Totally heart attack worthy

I can’t even tell you what our entree dishes were (I had some sort of pasta and CityBoy had rabbit) because I was so stupefied by the time they came.

You should make the trek because the views and the food are totally worth it. And if that doesn’t sway you, you get to pretend, coming back to The City under that glorious sky, to be Melanie Griffith in Working Girl:

Oh yeah!

Sing with me now: “Let the river run / Let all the dreamers / Wake the nation…” (Damn, I gotta find that on Netflix now.)

Rock on, people.

- Jho

Outdoor Adventure Time: Dobbs Ferry

I think there’s something magical in traveling outside of one’s comfort zone, outside the normal paths we take day-to-day, the ways home, to the subway, to the store that become so familiar, it’s as though we don’t even see them anymore.

The other day, I traveled out of Manhattan, to Dobbs Ferry, NY, about 20 miles outside of the city, to have lunch with a good friend who lives in almost bucolic splendor. My friend J couldn’t live in more opposite ways from the way I live now. She lives alone (but with her regally gorgeous dog Fenway) in a huge apartment filled with antiques and momentos from her many travels, on the campus of the school where she works. It is a beautiful place, with green fields, large homes, and the kind of classic school buildings you picture in Ivy League brochures. We met and became fast friends on just such a campus many years ago.

Touring the Boroughs: Brooklyn, Where Non-Hipsters Fear to Tread

As a means of “getting outside of your head,” a friend recommended getting out and seeing the city. CityBoy and I roam around quite a bit, but there are parts of New York City that we rarely visit. Namely the boroughs, which, as all good Manhattanites know, means those *other* boroughs, the ones off-island or way-way-way uptown. Queens, Brooklyn, the Bronx, Staten Island.

So I packed a bag with a book, a snack, and some water and spent a day wandering.

First stop: Brooklyn (Greenpoint/Williamsburg)

I’d been wanting to visit Word, a quirky indie bookstore in Greenpoint that has a great Twitter presence and some unusual events, so I decided I’d make it my first stop.

 

We're heeeere!

 

Food is Love. Enjoy the Love.

I was in Southern California for a two-week visit recently, spending time with family and friends and generally stuffing my face with every tasty thing that was offered.  These included back-to-back lunch/dinner get-togethers, where I consumed almost 3,000 calories in one day (not recommended for someone who is 5’2″), and multiple visits to my parents’ house, where “no, thanks, I’m not hungry” is considered one of the most inhospitable things you can say.  In our family, food is love, and I certainly felt it this visit.

My brother-in-law scored major points by buying what seemed like 10 tons of dungeness crabs and steaming them for my uncle’s 70th birthday.  Here’s a photo:

My niece Sophia and I having a battle of the crabs. That's her little hand holding her monster up for inspection.

Springbreak for Adults, or A & M Visit

I’ve been dying for visitors, pretty much since Day 1 of moving here, so I was delighted to play ambassador to the Misses A & M during their recent stay.  Much research and looking about online preceded their arrival, mostly by CityBoy, who would have excelled as a travel planner in another life.

I know he was distressed by the lack of “historical substance”to our plans, which, if left to us, mainly involved eating, shopping, eating some more, and lots of gabbing all the while.  What about the famous landmarks, the honored museums, the ages-old transformation of old neighborhoods into the new, CityBoy asked.

their room with a view

I admit I have absorbed very little of CityBoy’s vast knowledge of the underpinnings of New York culture and history.  My version goes something like this:  “Oh, that (pointing left) is a famous building.  Something to do with insurance or banks, I think.  That (pointing right) is the restaurant Charlotte was in when she yelled at Big in the Sex and the City movie.”  My knowledge of SATC is pretty bang-on.  The rise of the mercantile class and the founding of New Amsterdam?  Not so much.