With Bonus Duck

Home from my weekend in New York! drvsilla lives in a teacup-sized spot on a lovely tree-lined street less than a block from Central Park. I got into NYC Penn station on Friday evening in the rain. Dru took me to a diner that was quite close for dinner and we sat for *hours* enjoying dinner and we were there long enough that one of Dru’s NYC friends came in with her mother after a movie (after I teased Dru about being a “regular” at the diner since one of the wait staff brought her a large mug for her third cup of tea instead of the small cup the previous guy initially put down). I tapped this young woman on the shoulder after she sat down in the booth directly behind me (at Dru’s urging) and we spent more time just conversing back and forth over the seat.

It was lovely. We left the diner quite late (I think it was midnight-ish? 11:30pm?). Back into the weather we went and decided getting me and my things to the upper west side via taxi cab. Dropped off at basically the corner of Dru’s block.

Five flights of stairs later and we come into the Teacup.

Saturday morning we woke early, but lay about for a couple of hours just talking and waking up. The rain had stopped, sun was shining, and we wandered out and into Central Park. Central Park was lovely – I’ve never explored the park before, so Dru took me wandering the paths and avoiding the crowds. We saw dogs and families by the dozens. We passed by a father playing with his son, and Dru pointed out that was Mariska Hargitay’s husband and child. No sooner had she done that but who comes up the path pushing the stroller? Mariska Hargitay!

She is quite tall. And her kid was adorable. Apparently, the child has (quite literally) crashed into Dru before in Central Park while racing around like toddlers do.

We marveled at the remote control boats. And tried to figure out if Hans Christian Anderson had an abnormally large head or not. Alice was absolutely *covered* with small children, so while we saw the wee snail, the caterpillar, the dormouse, March Hare, and Mad Hatter... Alice herself - we couldn’t actually get much of a view of under the squirming mass of *kids* climbing on the mushrooms.

We saw the Literary Walk with bronze sculptures of Columbus(!) and Shakespeare (who has amazing legs – and his pedestal tells you who he is while you are facing his backside so his calves are RIGHT THERE), Burns, Scott and one more I don’t remember (ah, wikipedia, how I love you! It was Fitz-Greene Halleck). We saw the Turtle pond (with bonus ducks) and a white heron from quite a distance.

We left the park to find lunch, and took a detour to see Thumbelina, the smallest horse in the world (17.5 inches tall, 57 pounds) who was an honored guest at the opening of the Wild Horses exhibit at the museum of Natural History. After lunch, we wandered through the street arts booths along Columbus, I think? And then we dove back into the park to find a nice spot for an afternoon snooze – which in our case was more a sit in the shade and people watch.

Back to the Teacup for a little while, and then to check out a neighborhood bar Dru noticed while walking home. With the unlikely moniker of “Dive 75” we weren’t sure if it would be skeezy. Not at all. It was a little bit pub-like, and there were kids games everywhere. As well as a huge fresh-water aquarium with very pretty fish.

Dru soundly trounced me at Connect Four (best two out of three) I was able to finally win the third and last game (if you threw it, Dru, I don’t want to know!). Then we quizzed each other with trivia cards while contemplating Parcheesi.

In the end, we left to find dinner around nine pm. As we left, there was a foursome playing Scrabble, a trio with Jenga blocks, and two other couples playing speed Connect Four. We got dinner at a diner we wandered by, and afterwards we meandered through the streets around the natural history museum back to sit on the roof of her building and chat ‘til midnight, looking in the windows of the building across the way (I think that guy is naked. Nah, maybe not.).

Sunday we woke early (but not as early as Saturday) and lay about for a couple of hours. A check of places to find brunch in Manhattan, and we went out the door not knowing where we would end up for food. We’d been fairly successful at the “lets go thataway and maybe we’ll find something.” On the corner of Lexington and 75th (I think) was a lovely French restaurant serving ... wait for it ... BRUNCH! We went in and sat right down and were served a beautiful brunch (fixed price). The restaurant is the Orsay, and the food was delicious. It is a lovely place to dine, but I bet they get really busy. I had the assortment of pastries/breads (for the table), a yogurt/granola/fruit dish, and an omelet. Dru had the same except her egg dish was eggs benedict. They brought both a fancy butter pat and a small dish of what seemed like strawberry preserves, but it wasn’t pure strawberry – it included maybe plum? Something gave it an interesting twist.

We went from brunch to the Metropolitan Museum of Art, specifically for the “Superheroes inspire fashion” exhibit.

It wasn’t as interesting as it could have been, which was too bad. Some of the actual costume pieces were really neat to see (the Michelle Pfeiffer catwoman costume, but not the Halle Berry one. The Christian Bale Batman, but not the Michael Keaton or Val Kilmer (or television one). The Christopher Reeve Superman, but not the Dean Cain or George Reeves. And it wasn't that they were specifically using *movie* versions of things, because the (quite faded) Wonder Woman costume was from the 70's tv show). And they surrounded the authentic costumes with art-concept fashion pieces from through the ages that had somhow been inspired" by the superhero costumes. Some of these were more convincing than others.

They ended the exhibit with a line of original comic books encased in plexi or lucite boxes on the wall. While the art-concept outfits were interesting – none of it was street-wearable. Or even red-carpet wearable. These outfits were for the runway only. And oddly, even when the exhibit was super*heroes* they included the applications they’d pasted on Rebecca Romijn for Mystique (villain, right?). While Catwoman started out as a possible-villian, she never did anything truly evil, just morally ambiguous. And some of the parallels were really reaching to be included in the exhibit.

So while I am glad I went – be warned that it took us less than an hour to see the whole thing, and plan other stuff in the museum you want to see (and it was incredibly crowded so go on off-peak times). Back to the Teacup to pick up my stuff and we braved the rain to get to the subway back to Penn station. My train was late (weather? Sunday traffic? Dunno) and after a last hug-see-you-in-August I descended to board the train home.

The train trip home was eventful only in that it was 40 minutes late, and then we were stopped on the tracks for a couple of hours because they were down to one track, and opposing traffic needed to be carefully let by before we could be switched to the working track. And that delay delyed us long enough that in Providence we had to wait for new crew, as ours had been working too long for the day. I got home ‘round midnight (instead of 9:20ish which would have been if the train was on time).

So thanks, Dru! I loved my weekend with you! It was AWESOME (boom!). And here:

Moosebutter - http://www.moosebutter.com/orders/index.php (scroll down to listen to the song “Star Wars” – it is on the “see dee” album).