a new yorker day.

yesterday me and the roomie had a typical new yorker day.

we ate lunch at the shake shack, then went shopping for the rest of the day. later that evening we met up with some friends in the LES and saw some "OAR"ish bands play.

here are some pictures:

my new purse!

christmas tree at the place where we saw the bands play.

friends

thanksgiving, nyc style.

so I spent thanksgiving here in the city, however I did NOT go to the macy's thanksgiving day parade. (so don't ask about it ;) honestly, I even hate it when it's on tv and my fam makes me watch it... so why would I want to go stand in the freezing cold with 1000000 billion people and watch it from afar? no thanks! :)

instead, I just had a kinda chill day. everyone I know was out of town, so I spent the day.. well, whole weekend by myself. I went out for indian food in this random little indian area (ha, it was the only section of town that was open other than chinatown) then worked on my internship portfolio for the rest of the day. the indian food was good, and it was nice to finally relax for once...

I also went shopping this weekend. I realize that I am addicted to clinique, uggs, and express.

in other news... for those of you who I don't talk to via phone that often, I decided that I'm coming back to NC for a while. I really don't want to start a school counseling job during the middle of a school year/be committed to a certain school, and I really want to spend some time with my g'rents... (oh, and there's the whole "I don't really know where I wanna go and what I want to do with my life right now anyway" part of me ) so I will be back in NC on december 20th. I really need a job, so I'm looking at a few different options. I think it'd be fun to work at a coffee shop or be a flight attendant for a bit... however I found a more practical one related to my field that would probably pay more and be a better option.

actually, now that I think about it... I'm kinda excited about it. there is potentially a position as a "day therapist" open at an organization called "youth opportunities" in winston salem. I mean, who knows exactly what I'd be doing as a "day therapist" but the organization sounds pretty cool. the organization is a united way agency and provides residential, school, and community based therapeutic services. here is a link for those of you who want to check it out: www.youthopp.org

I get excited over the most random things.

I made a really cool bulletin board today after school about the top 10 reasons to talk with your school counselor.

this evening I planned a community circle and awards ceremony for next week.

yay!

mini photo shoot.

I took my holga and digital out to central park yesterday on my day off to get some fall pics... here are a few of the digital ones:

moving on... moving on again... in other news...

so as you all may know from my previous posts, I started running. unfortunately though, I had a minor set back this weekend. I had a ridiculous accident and hurt my back pretty badly. don't worry though, I'm ok now. I freaked out and thought it was my spine, however it ended up just being a muscle.

yall are probably all wondering, "OMG!!?!?!? what happened!????"... it's kinda a lame story. I really wish I had a cool one to share... like I was running, and in the process, I saw an old lady getting mugged, so I dove and tackled the criminal and saved her life... in reality though, this is what happened. I had JUST started to take off in a run, and I turned towards the ipod on my arm to switch songs... somehow that twisting motion screwed everything up, and my muscles contracted the wrong way resulting in a spasm. told ya it was lame! I mean, c'mon, who injures themselves changing a song on their ipod!

moving on...

I am so burned out at my internship right now. I'm doing some cool things, however it's just becoming too routine. also some of the teachers are starting to get on my nerves cause they complain about the kids a lot. granted, I'm not a teacher, so I have a different relationship with the kids and see them in a totally different way... but the things people complain about are ridiculous. for example, some complain about student behavior and are soooooo surprised the kids don't behave. it just baffels me... we work at an alternative school, which is a suspension site. OF COURSE the kids are gonna have behavior issues. that's why they were suspended in the first place, and that's why they're with us now. ok, enough of that...

moving on again...

my roommate alicia got a job at MTV!! I'm so excited for her! we went out last night and also celebrated via dinner at a mexican resturant. her boo is coming to visit this weekend for his birthday, so she's making him a pretty sweet gift at the moment. I helped her cut out stuff for it, but now I've moved on to blogging while she's finishing up some gluing detail.

in other news...

I bought taylor swifts new album... so good!
the panthers are doing really well this season... yay!
I thought tomorrow was friday, alicia just reminded me that it wasn't... boo!
I'm getting a tattoo soon... maybe!

BARACK the VOTE.

so I voted today and just want to let yall know that I lovvvvvvvvve OBAMA. I hope he wins.

I FINALLY set up my nike+ on my ipod nano. I then ran 5 miles... well, ran/walked. here is my nike+ mini that I made. It's soooooooooo cool! when you run, it gets sooooooo excited, however the days that you miss, it gets sad and supposedly has a loss of energy.

4 states, one weekend.

states 1-3: new york, through conneticut, to massachusetts!
if you know me well, you know that I lovvvvvvve visiting new cities... so the other week when my friend mike invited me to go to his sister's halloween party and visit his lovely hometown of boston... I couldn't say no!

so on friday after school we got on a chinatown bus and headed to boston! it was a lot of fun and I really liked the city. his mom made pumpkin pancakes for breakfast one morning, yay!

state 4: new jersey!
as soon as I got back from boston, I hopped on the PATH train and headed out to newark, NJ to see a concert. my roommate, AWESOME alicia, works for MTV and helped out with all the licensing for the game rockband, so she used her connections and got us some AMAZING tickets to the rockband LIVE tour featuring DASHBOARD, PANIC at the DISCO, plain white tees, and the cab. it was sooooooooooo good and a lot of fun too.

after the concert, alicia was curious as to see how far backstage she could get using her charm, intellect, and mtv ID... so we ventured around the venue in search for a way to accomplish her mission. this is probably one of those "you had to be there" stories, but it was hilarious. first we walked up to one of the security guards, who she told some random elaborate story to about how she's writing an editorial for the show... who then directed us to someone else, who we talked with for a bit, who then directed us somewhere else, then somewhere else. to make a long story short, she pretended to interview security and stage hands and anyone else involved with the show for a "behind the scenes" look at the rockband tour using her cell phone as a pretend recording device ... and we eventually ended up backstage. (mission complete!!)

however it wasn't that exciting. none of the bands were back there. so then we just went to the parking lot where the buses were and ended up talking with some of the guys from the cab for a bit as part of her "interview."

here is a pic from the show that I took on my phone... not the best, but here it is anyway:

dashboard!!

in other news... the private room is free for the next three days, so me and alicia are taking advantage of the TV in here. I just saw a commercial for a new show called WHALE WARS on animal planet... we both are really excited about it. I mean, I'm not one for the discovery channel and shows like that, but this one looked really really exciting. here is a link to it, check it out: http://animal.discovery.com/tv/whale-wars/

whale wars.

my milkshake brings all the boys to the yard.

ok, so the title of my blog for today is super lame, but I think that song is funny, and eventually my blog will relate to it.

my internship went really well today. the other counselor was gone for a majority of the day so I got a whole lot done for once. everyone also seemed in a somewhat good mood.

last night was my first parent teacher night ever! I was so excited about it!! I'm such a dork when it comes to stuff like that. I even had my first parent teacher conference ever!! luckily it was with a student that I really like... ha, well... I really like all of my students a lot, but this one is my favorite one for some reason. It think it's because he was one of the first ones I met who has been with us long-term. anyway, it went well.

this evening me and alicia were both bums. it made for a very successful evening though. we experimented and made mint chocolate-chip milkshakes, ate extra butter popcorn, and watched gossip girl all night. yay! I really value nights like this because they make me feel normal. I feel like I get so wrapped up in being busy here in the city and going out to do stuff so often that I forget how nice it is sometimes just to stay in and chill out watching tv with a roomie.

booo for today.

well... there's no point in denying it right now... but I was severely disappointed with my internship today. don't worry friends, I'll be perfectly fine and back on track/motivated tomorrow (hopefully), but today I got really bummed out by it.

It's just so easy to get discouraged and annoyed when you know for a fact that what you're doing is the right thing, but others are too close minded and jaded to realize it.

I'm a smart person, I know that... and I know and understand my role as a school counselor. I'm also the kind of person who is going to advocate for myself AND my students instead of being walked all over. At times, I feel like this causes more trouble than it's worth... but at the same time, if someone doesn't say something... then who will? and how will change occur?


ha, I think I've ranted and shared enough. I miss you friends!

cough. cough. sniffle.

I've had a bit of a cold lately, and it's been hard to get enough rest due to annoying guests here at the loft lately, so this evening after work I got some pizza with my colleague mike, then came back to the loft and slept for an hour or so. the private room is empty, so right now I'm just in here chillin' on the couch and watching tv.

the pick up artist 2 is on VH1 right now. it's probably my favorite show ever because it's so absurdly hilarious.

here is a picture from when my sister came to visit. I was impersonating the statue of liberty at the time, but she kinda didn't take it where you could see all of me. regardless here it is with a few other random ones.

me and ms. liberty

random door in chinatown I thought was cool

since I'm from the south, my school made me go through here before I was allowed to live in NYC.

me and the brooklyn bridge <3

fall leaves @ liberty island

sunday.

my sister is in town visiting... more details later.

me and alicia were dying to see the panthers game, so we, along with my sister searched high and low for a bar that had it on. we FINALLY found one. it was a lot of fun cheering for our team... we were the only ones in the entire place who were rooting for them. too bad they lost. here are some pictures from it:

take 1

take 2
(I thought take 1 was too close, so the guy who had the camera thought he'd be funny and take this one)

take 3 (much better)

these wings kinda sucked, but we at them anyway.

(the loft where we live)

(random pic in the elevator)

(random pic in the lobby area)

the students I get to counsel.

so I love the kids at my school.

most people would probably be annoyed with them because they are "seemingly" difficult, but I could probably laugh at some of them all day, cause they try to pull some of the craziest things on you. it's funny how much kids can lie sometimes or play dumb like they don't know what's going on... but in reality, they TOTALLY know whats up. I can't really say what exactly is happening or where these thoughts come from due to the whole counselor confidentiality thing I have going on... but I still wanted to type my thoughts about it anyway, even if I have to be vague.

so yeah, the kids are hilarious to me... but they have no clue that they are!

I really enjoy being a professional school* counselor. :)

*please DO NOT confuse a "professional school" counselor with a "guidance" counselor. they are two totally different things!!

the subway.

today after work I was a guest at the new york institute of technology's internship class. to get there, I had to go towards the upper west side. I decided to take the W train to get there quickly, and found a seat. I was just about to turn my ipod nano on when all of a sudden I hear a booming voice scream,

"allllllllllllllll aboarrrrrrrrrd! I hope you guys are all ready for the party train this afternoon, cause if not... you picked the wroooooong boxcar!"

then all of a sudden these three somewhat elderly men break out into a acapella bee-bop type of song and dance in the aisles. see, random things like this happen ALL of the time here in the city... there are always people walking from car to car. usually they just beg for money, or play some crappy little diddy on the violin... but these party train guys were hilarious. they were sooo overly cheesy too. I mean "party train!??" who seriously says that. I don't know if words can fully express the whole situation and what it was like to be there... but the moment they actually used the word party train, the whole car of emotionless looking new yorkers dressed in all black suddenly transformed into a car full of gleeful individuals who looked curiously around, smiled, and even exchanged eye contact and giggles. a business man and two ladies who didn't seem to know each other even broke out into a dance. it was a magical moment in time. bizarre, but still cheeseily magical.

then I got off the party train.

ok, the ending of my story was a bit abrupt, so here is a picture of me at my internship. I made the bulletin board:

I'm either really super lame, or overly dedicated to learning more about counseling...

so today was quite the lazy saturday... at first.

I stayed out way later than I should have last night showing the german guy who was staying here some cool places in the east village and teaching him about american culture... so I woke up fairly late then just layed around and watched a movie. eventually I ventured out into the daylight for some chinese food. after that I decided to try out a new coffee place I had saw on 3rd ave and read a bit from this book that rivers suggested I should read. I think I may have FINALLY found a decent coffee shop! it has good coffee and good lighting. it could use some more comfortable seating, but they play old 20's and 30's music in the background, so that makes up for lack of couches and comfy chairs.

after that, for some reason I was highly motivated to become more organized. (this is the part in my day where I turned super lame... maybe it was the coffee?!??) soooooo, I bought some post its tabs and a new notebook to keep track of the things I need/want to know about my students, and the counseling services I am providing for them. I wrote a lot of stuff in that, then decided to look up stuff on the internet about group counseling and counseling in alternative schools. I found tonsssss of things online, and pretty much just read research articles for the rest of the night.

yeah, so despite my saturday sounding way more dorky than I intended for it to be, I had a very good day and feel like I got a lot of things accomplished.

proof I am actually here in nyc.

so my homegirl a-dawg reppin' from da HPC informed me that m-cat didn't really believe that I was in nyc cause I never have any pictures of myself on here. here is PROOF that I am in fact living in manhattan:

me!

me and autumn!! :)

good week.

I've had a really good week I'd say. I've been really really busy though, so sorry for lack of interesting updates. yesterday we pretty much doubled in population at the school were I am at... so we are ridiculously busy. I like it though :)

I'm so exhausted from the week that I really can't remember what all I've done. I've been addicted to the shake shack, so I've eaten there a lot when the line was short. I think I may go eat there right now instead of sitting around the loft.

the night before last me, alicia, and laura went to cafe wha? in the village. (I'm so 'new york' now cause I call all the areas in manhattan by their names... ie. the east village, midtown, hell's kitchen, gramercy park, tribeca, flarion, etc...) it's a cool little place that has an AWESOME house band, so it's fun to go to and listen to cover songs. (and make a fool out of yourself as you sing and dance to them)

alright, I'm done with typing, I'll mayyyyyyyybe update again soon... stay tuned!

this post shows just how much of a dork I really am.

I don't have work tomorrow or the next day, so right now I'm gonna stay up late and download the movie camp rock to watch cause I still haven't seen it from this summer.

update.

sorry I've been slack with this thing lately. I've just had a lot going on lately. my grandma is in the hospital, so that's been kinda not that great... but she's doing better now. it's hard being up here when something like that happens.

my internship is going great now, and i love it!!

me and my roommate have been going out a lot and doing fun random things. here are some pictures from the san gennaro festival we went to in little italy:

me and a chili pepper plant

the church

alicia and the italian sausages we were brave enough to eat!

statue at the church

the festival!

me and alicia are supposed to be doing something super awesome right now... but she's stuck out in the common area talking with the directors, so she may be a while... so for now, I blog!

today one of my students taught me how to beat box... ha, well... he "tried" to!!

counseling, wings, and bad music.

I sat through more PD again today... ha, of course it was awful. I loathe PD. (what else is new!)

however good news!! I met with a student today! naturally of course I can't talk about what we talked about on here due to client-counselor confidentiality issues... ha, he actually was really non-talkative anyway... but yay, it was awesome to interact with one! I feel like students at my school are rare little alien creatures you never see around...

so me and the roomie decided the other night that we need to get out more during the week to help uplift our spirits. this evening we went out for wings at dukes, watched a little baseball, then decided to go to this place called zebulon in brooklyn to see some bands play. the location and venue was super awesome, however the music from the first band seriously hurt our ears it was so horrid. it was like some sort of experimental "lets bang on pots and pans" type of indie circus noise. the last band, "motel motel" sounds pretty ill on myspace, and I wanted to see them, but I seriously didn't feel like waiting around all night listening to bad music before I could hear them... so we left! and back to manhattan we came! I really wished I lived in brooklyn... the area is so much cooler and so much more "homey" than the part of manhattan I live in.

more PD tomorrow, so don't expect an exciting update...

internship.

ok, so my internship was a lot better today. I was VERY pro-active. (as mike--my co-worker/the teaching specialist at the school would say) I talked to some students in the hallway and during the fire drill (woo-hoo, exciting!), made a bulletin board, lead a teacher training, put files in boxes, collaborated/consulted with a few teachers, and started making plans for the semester... b/c I'm now the new counselor for all incoming 9th and 11th grade students! yay! I'm excited about that... now only if they'll hurry up and get here!

I can't wait for taylor swifts new album to be released.

hello readers! (and allison who I KNOW will be happy that I finally am making an update!! :) I am having quite the lazy sunday and am waiting on my laundry right now, so I thought I'd take the time to blog!!

lately I've been busy, but have also felt like I've been in some sort of a rut. my internship has been beyond horrid for many reasons, mainly though b/c there have been no kids there and I have felt useless/unwanted there, especially around my direct supervisor... which has bummed me out quite a bit.

however, fear not... it's changing! after some insight provided from one of my co-workers, and a conversation with the AP, the structure of things is going to change, and I feel better about it. now however, I must completely be pro-active and find things for myself to do, which is going to be hard at first due to 1) there are not really many kids there and 2)I'm still a bit unsure about how the school runs. despite it being hard at first, I think I am going to learn a lot from the experience. I have a lot of great ideas, and things I want to do... however I don't know if they'll work yet or not b/c I haven't been able to quite feel out what the student population is like, or what it is they need the most. the AP and other staff members seem really supportive so far, so I'm at least greatful for that. wish me luck for next week!

after the week was over, me, alicia, and laura went to brooklyn. I really like brooklyn! we were in an area called williamsburg, which is overly trendy and up and coming... oh, and totally overpopulated with hipsters! even so, it was a nice change from manhattan. it was a nice break from the city for a while. to give yall a better idea of what the two areas are like, I'm going to compare them by using the typical guy pickup line you'd hear from each area:

manhattan guy (wearing a suit, has overly gelled back hair): "hello! I'm a stockbroker, want to go out with me on my boat in connecticut for the weekend?" [guy then hands a plain white business card to you with a fax number, cell number, phone number, and email address on it]

brooklyn guy (wearing a vest, skinny jeans, and hat... hasn't had a haircut in months): "hello! I'm a freelance artist! I own a gallery! want to come by sometime? [guy then hands a business card to you made out of some wood grain, colorful writing, and myspace address on it]

it's funny to me how up here how segregated the different communities in the area really are. it seems like brooklyn guy and manhattan guy would never be caught hanging out in the same place. it is more diverse up here, however the diversity is spread out into little patches all around, if that makes sense.

on saturday I was going to go to little italy for the San Gennaro Festival that the loft directors wife told me about. it's some sort of religious feast of sorts, so I was pretty much just going to little italy to eat lots of food. I didn't have any other plans that day so just decided that I would take my time, stroll around, and walk there. bad idea! I ended up getting lost somehow on the outskirts of chinatown in some sketch neighborhoods. one of them ended up being some sort of kitchen equipment district. here is a weird picture I took while being there:


usually I'm awesome with directions and finding my way around here, but I ended up really far south where the streets and avenues stopped having numbers, so I got really turned around and confused. after wandering the streets for hours, I finally found an area I recognized, and made my way back alright.

ok, I think that is all I feel like typing for now! have a good evening everyone!!

it's about the strength of your heart.

so I started running yesterday. there's this park that goes along side the river, so that's were I went. it's sooooooooooo pretty at night, and so cool to run along next to it with the all buildings lining the skyline of the waterway. maybe not the safest idea to run at night (sorry mom and dad!) but again, it's pretty out.

I also ran today! this time lance armstrong was my personal trainer, so I almost died. I downloaded this lance armstrong running mix thing from itunes... it plays all these song segments, and at certain intervals lance either tells you to run faster, or encourages you with some line like "it's not about the strength of your legs, it's about the strength of your heart... so keep running!" lance is a pretty hardcore athlete, and I had a hard time keeping up, so maybe I should download a different one, until I can work my way up to lance armstrong speed... I was thinking something more along the lines of richard simmons.

today we gained two more students at our school and I got to do my first intake!! yay!

the weekend.

so this weekend me and alicia did the whole crazy “going out in new york” thing.

we’re lucky to still be alive.

however it was a lot of fun and we made a lot friends in the process… bryan who has the thickets glasses and thickest irish accent ever, dan the trumpet player and the rest of his ska band, amad the egyptian falafel maker, a stalker who alicia beat up, lots of guys with gelled hair that I hope to never see again, reefer the homeless man who’s not homeless, rob and lee, “paolo is awesome”, and gill.

here is a picture me and alicia discovered at the local mcdonalds this weekend. it's cool to be artsy up here, so this place had ridiculous artwork like this:

ohhh, and I forgot to update yall about my internship!! we had a student come on Friday and I got to learn how to do an “intake” with him! I was ridiculously excited about it b/c I was starting to think I’d never see any kids. It was also my last day of PD, which I was soooo thankful for.

and last but not least, I discovered a new favorite store of mine… anthropologie! not for the clothes, but for the housing stuff! I spent over an hour in there looking at cool things. I was soooooooooo close to buying these really cool sparrow door knob things for dresser drawers, but then I realized 1) I don’t have a dresser here and 2) I don’t even own one at home that needs new knobs… so I made a wise decision and used self-control by not purchasing the coolest thing I’d ever seen.

watching water boil.

so I'm sitting here in the kitchen waiting for this super lame pot of pasta to boil (see above)... it's taking so long that I decided I'd take a picture of it, then blog about it and other things that have been going on recently.

it's been almost a month since I've moved here and I'm FINALLY starting to like it better. I mean, it was cool and all at first, but then it was just hard to transition and get used to it. regardless, today it felt more like my home.

I went to my internship and worked today. more BORING PD, blah blah blah. while the presenter was blabbing on about stuff that hurt my head too much to listen to, I did a lot of thinking. I realized that this is only the 2nd year of existance for the alternative school that I'm at, so I thought about that some. The PD we were doing is about this thing called Advisory that I won't bore you with, and since our type of suspension school is so new, the consultation group has no clue how to implement it at our sites, so pretty much what we're doing is creating our own programs out of thin air. I LOVE the idea of that though... cause I'm not really the kind of person who likes cookie-cutter ideas that are sold to you, and have been around for years and years, just cause that's the way things have always been. there still aren't any kids at our school yet, but we're supposed to get 3 of them tomorrow... who knows if they'll show though.

one of my co-workers is teaching a class on hip hop and how it relates to changes in our society and culture. today he showed me his syllabus, and told me alllllllllll about it. it was actually really interesting, so I think I'm gonna go out and buy a book about it since I'm not a student and can't take his class.

let's see... what else is going on. me and my roomie (alica the new intern... who will now be referred to as my roomie, instead of the new intern) went running today at the park by the river. well, you guys all know I really walked... but anyway, a guy tried to say hello to me as I was walking, but in the process he tripped over his own two feet and then ran away as fast as he could. I guess he was just really embarrassed... to me though it was HILARIOUS.

my stupid pasta is STILL not boiling. how lame.

ohhhh, the roomie introduced me to a new band that I'm loving right now called "she and him." if ya got myspace, go listen to them NOW. http://www.myspace.com/sheandhim

she likes good music, so we're gonna go to lots of good shows up here!! yay! old crow medicine show is playing twice, so we're def. gonna make it out to one of those and potentially tons more we looked up the other night.

ok, so my food is starting to cook, I think I'm gonna go check on it now...

my fort.

I had to sit though more PD (it stands for "professional development"... new yorkers are all about abbreviating everything so I've learned) today. again, it was quite ridiculous and overwhelmingly boring, so I won't talk about it. the worst part is that I have to sit through it ALL week.

we had one student show up for the first day of school. it was really exciting, at least for me... because I was beginning to doubt that any students would ever show up. I've been a bit concerned lately about not meeting my direct internship hour requirements for my class (due to the fact that there are no students to work with) but my supervisor assured me today that they'll all get suspended from their home-school sites this week, and we'll have never-ending amounts of work to do soon enough.

in other news, me and alicia worked on our forts today! (aka, our bunkbeds--as interns, we're allowed to hang out fabric to create make-shift rooms for privacy if we don't want to see the guests all of the time.) she built hers, and I made some additions to mine, including a door section that now slides.

here is a picture of my "room"--in the picture, the "door" is open, but it can slide all the way across for complete coverage. one thing you can't see in the picture is the little pockets on the backside of the curtain that faces in towards the bedroom. the pockets are convenient little storage places for things like earplugs (when annoying guests are snoring) flashlights, my phone, etc. also notice the lovely windowseal that i call my own (even though technically I'm not supposed to) on it sits a even more lovely lithograph picture of the jonas brothers, which I inherited from a guest who left it here. :)--

pictures. (finally)

these are from my phone, so the quality isn't the best, sorry!!

derek jeter @ the yankees game!

graffiti art me and another artist made

my "tag" name... ha, how emo right?

my friend kraig in little italy

my internship site

yankees.

today I did lotssssssss of stuff!!

Alicia (the new intern) and her family were super nice and invited me to go to a yankees game with them. they had boxed seats, so we had an AWESOME view. it was a lot of fun! we ate hot dogs, popcorn, pretzels... all your typical american baseball food! we also took pictures of derek jeter. I'll try to put some on here, but they're from my phone, so they'll likely be horrid.

after that we did the following things (they may or may not be listed in chronological order):

• empire state building
• grand central station
• sketchy backrooms for purses in chinatown
• food in little italy
• battery park
• statue of liberty
• world trade center (well tried to see it, anyway)
• the financial district
  

JZ.

I saw JZ on the street tonight. didn't know it was him, b/c I'm horrid with knowing who anyone is... but regardless I saw JZ.

the people staying at the loft are soooooooo weird and soooooooo annoying right now. luckily though, there's a new intern here to share the experience with me. yay!

there's someone snoring really loudly and making weird snorting noises right now... thank goodness for ear plugs and ipods. I'm gonna go use one of the two and call it a night... so niiiiiiiiiight!

professional development.

yesterday I ate ate a strange italian restaurant with my friend braden. we had 3 waiters, one who seemed like a robot when he talked to us. another one had a breadcrumb scraper, and the other one was just awkward. it was seriously the strangest italian restaurant I've ever been too. It was so bizzare that I didn't know what else to do other than laugh at everything... poor braden. then I went to hang out in brooklyn, I think I like brooklyn better than manhattan.

in other news...

...today all of the manhattan ALC schools met for a meeting and "professional development." soooo, pretty much I was at my internship all day just sitting there. I enjoyed parts of the day because I met some new staff members and other people from other schools in the area, however some of the "professional development" parts of the day were an absurdly ridiculous waste of time.... I won't talk about them though. I will just say two words: egg-drop and concentric-circles.

there were however some good professional development things... we watched the brown eyes/blue eyes films (that I've seen before) and discussed them and stereotypes/labeling others. the great part about that was hearing all of the teachers at my school talk about how they don't label the kids who come to our site as "bad" and they really try to make our school an accepting place for them to be.... it's re-affirming to know that the staff has that attitude. apparently our school does a really good job at that compared to others in the area, so I'm really glad that I'm at the one I'm at.

:) email me or something, friends! I miss you all!!

so it has been at least 15 days since I've had any sweet tea, and I've been in major withdraw. one of the guys I work with at the school told me I should go to mcdonald's if I ever want any... so I did.

I feel much better now.

someone should open up a southern restaurant up here. I bet they would make millions.

city waterfalls and an outdoor film festival.

today I got up pretty early. I was just going to go to a bagel shop and get a bagel and coffee and read for a bit, but instead I decided to take it to the park along the waterway. I stayed there for quite some time and was gonna go back to my loft, but instead I decided to explore some more. I walked alllllllllllll the way around the southeast parameter of manhattan and found some even cooler places than the one I posted on my blog yesterday. too bad I didn't have my camera with me :( I even discovered two waterfalls!! ha, but they were "city waterfalls." apparently they were recently built, so unless you've been in the city this summer, you haven't seen them!! (cough cough, so come visit me so you can see them!)

one of the city waterfalls

this evening I went to an outdoor film festival. everyone in boone would be proud of me b/c it was all solar powered. the film festival is going on all weekend and tonight's theme was "art and environment." the first film was about an artist named cristo and a creation he constructed called "valley curtain" in rifle, colorado. the second film was running fence and it depicted the long struggle of the same artist (cristo), who built a 24 mile fence of white fabric over the hills of california disappearing into the pacific. here are two pictures of his art:

valley curtain

running fences

overall, I had a good time, and it was a lot of fun to watch a movie outside in between the city and the river.

exploring.

I've been exploring nyc a lot lately. I even ventured out to brooklyn the other night to visit my friend braden for grilling food and spray painting/"tagging" walls on rooftops.

here is a little video I made of one of my new favorite places in manhattan:

the squirrels here are too friendly...

I explored the neighborhood today, and tried to search for a good coffee shop once again. no luck.

for dinner I went to madison square park and ate a shackburger from the shake shack. that place is sooooooo good. I wish the line wasn't always so long, otherwise I'd eat there every day.

while I was there a squirrel decided to befriend me. he first jumped onto the empty chair next to me, which I was cool with for a bit, but then he decided to jump on my table and reach for one of my french fries. I normally don't mind sharing, but the city is kinda gross, and I have noooooooo clue where his little critter paws had been. I told him to go away, but he didn't move at all... next tried to shoo him away with my plastic knife and an intimidating face, but he wasn't scared at all. eventually I tilted my table sideways and kinda pushed him away using a rolled up paper napkin and fork and he fell off then scurried up a tree.

I want to make new friends here, preferably ones without fur that won't steal my french fries...

sunday.

ok, I could have been more creative with the title of this blog post, but alas... I was not.

I slept in till noon today. it was nice not to have to get up at 6am to make it to my internship site on time OR to have to be up by 9am so the maid could clean.

all of my new loft guest friends who had been here for the whole week left today so I had no more entertainment from autumn or random lunch/dinner/tea outings with keenan. I became somewhat bored hanging around here so I decided to take out this deck of 52 cards of things to do in NY that brandtly gave me, and do whatever the card said. I drew one titled "Greenwich Village II" but then took cards "Greenwich Village" and "Greenwich Village III" along with me too.

sooo... with my cards in hand (well, pocket) I ventured out into manhattan, and hopped the N train down to 8th street, the heart of Greenwich Village... well, maybe it was the R or even W train. I'm not sure...I just know it was yellow. I'm still not that cool of a new yorker b/c I refer to trains by their color instead of their number.

once in the village, I walked around a whole lot and checked out some of the things that were listed on the cards... avant-garde bookshops, used record shops, bakeries, parks, etc! I tried out two coffee shops (b/c I'm determined to find a good one) but didn't really have much luck. one place was horrible. the other had an awesome atmosphere, but the coffee wasn't that great. I bought a book at one of the bookshops and plan on reading it this week since I'll have a lot of free time.

I finally found a blanket!

so lately I've had lots of free time, and have used it wisely by RESTING! summer school is now over, so I have off from my internship till august 25th!!

today I ate lunch at rosa mexicano with my homeboy keenan (a guest here at the loft). it was soooooooooo good!! and also a very very cool looking place. they made guacamole right in front of us! it was fun.

after that I decided to go to central park. I walked around forever trying to find a place where there was hardly any people or any concerts going on, but that was impossible. so, I just gave up, sat on the lawn and listened to my ipod for a bit... took a nap... then read for a bit. it was a nice relaxing day.

ha, at least until I went to century 21 to search for a blanket. someone I work with recommended it to me. that places was insane! wayyyyyyyy too many people. luckily, i did find a nice blanket, and some awesome jersey knit sheets for my bed.

yay for starting to get more settled into this place!! :)

update.

to be honest, I didn't really like my internship the first two days I was there. it was cool to meet the rest of the staff, however right now there's nothing to do b/c it's summer school and there are no kids there. I can't wait till school starts after labor day and that there's more to do. Today was better though than the first two... I talked more with the para and some of the teachers about what the school was like, what the kids were like, etc.... so now I'm a bit more excited about being there.

after I was done with work for the day, I hung out with my friend braden who just got back into town. he met me near my loft, then we went at ate pizza. after that we walked to union square, then walked down to soho. since we were already that far down, I was like "let's just walk to 1st street"... but we never found it, and the streets changed to names. then somehow we ended up walking to chinatown. since we were there, I was like "let's walk to little italy" since braden had never been there before... then I remembered a cool tea place I'd been to with my friend kraig, so I dragged poor braden back to chinatown to search for it. after we found the tea place, I drank some wonderful passion fruit black tea, and I was like "let's find some water"... so we went searching for either a giant fountain, a river, or even the ocean. somehow we made it to the brooklyn bridge and just decided to walk over it because neither of us had been there before.

so pretty much we walked around manhattan all evening and ended up in brooklyn not knowing where we were at. it was a fun little adventure, and eventually I made it back to my loft in manhattan... somehow!

I finally know why new yorkers are so angry.

today I went searching for the summer school site of the school where I'll be doing my internship at. I also discovered why new yorkers get the rep for being mean and angry. it's b/c they can never get anywhere they want to go. to get to the summer school site, I had to "cut through" times square. all the tourist were sooooo annoying... not because they were tourists, but because they would just stand in the way and not move. I mean, if you're lost and confused, it's ok... it happens to me all the time. however, please just stand to the side against a building. you don't need to stand in the middle of sidewalk with your entire family of five linking arms like some sort of barricade. in addition to my tourist obstacles, there was something crazy going on on broadway (the street that I was supposed to walk down for many many blocks.) I couldn't figure out what it was, but there was lots of people wearing dominican republic stuff and they were all either singing, screaming or dancing. the police even had the streets blocked off so you couldn't cross them, but eventually I snuck through one cause I had already walked 8 blocks out of my way and didn't feel like walking 10 more. sooooooooooooo over an hour later, I FINALLY made it to the school I was looking and had some coffee at a coffee shop nearby.

this evening I bought some groceries and went out to eat at the famous carnegi deli with the loft director and a few appalachian alumni who were frequent guests at the loft this summer. it was a fun little outing, and I discovered that the deli has AMAZING cheesecake.

I start my internship tomorrow morning at 8am. I'm sooooooooo excited about it, that I probably won't be able to sleep tonight. I look forward to finally meeting the counselor who I'll be working with and getting to meet some of the students as well.

target.

why is it that I can never live in a city where there's a target??

today I tried to "settle in" to my new place... however that's hard to do when you can't buy anything you need. I bought a new pillow at macy's (thanks little bro for the giftcard!) and then tried doing what apparently is impossible... to find a pillowcase in manhattan!! who knew it'd be so hard? I searched and searched all day and couldn't find one. this is why I wish there was a target here.

oh, and I got asked to be a hair model today... it made me laugh.

my address.

if you would like to mail me anything, here is my address:

XXXXX XXth Street
XXXXX, NY XXXXXX

***editors note***
I did have my address listed on here, but then I realized that everyone in the world can see it, NOT just my family and friends who I gave my blog link to... SO, I took it off because I don't need any more stalkers. if you want to mail me something, just comment on here and I can send it to you OR if you want to send me something as a surprise, be smart and figure out a way to get it from my lil' bro, sis, or 'rents.

these vagabond shoes, are longing to stray...

so I made it to NYC!

after the misery of being stuck on the same plane for over 5 hours (a majority of this time was spent NOT in the air) next to a man eating smelly fried chicken out of a plastic walmart bag, I finally made it to JFK!! the airport was confusing, but somehow I managed to find my way to the airtrain, and rode that to jamaica station. once at jamaica station, I met my lovely friend kraig and he was amazingly wonderful and helped me figure out how in the world to get to my loft. pretty much that whole first day was a blur. visiting nyc is lots of fun, but moving here is something completely different. it's kinda overwhelming knowing that you're not going to be leaving for a loooooooong time... there's just so much to do, and I don't know really where to start. I still really haven't gotten settled into where I'm staying yet, but I'm going to try to do that either today or tomorrow.

I started working here at the loft right away. I had to get up really early friday morning and meet with the director and go over policies and procedures. I also met the cleaning lady who speaks only spanish, so that was fun trying to communicate with her. after that, the director sent me on a few errands for the loft... she gave me the addresses of a few places I had to pick things up at (hardware store, the cleaners, etc.) I still didn't know the neighborhood that well, but somehow I managed to find everything. I felt kinda like anne hathaway's character in the movie "the devil wears prada" when she was running around new york on errands, and not having a clue what she was doing.

after work was finished on friday, I walked around the neighborhood for a while just looking at what was around. I then walked and found the school where I'll be interning at, and took pictures of it on my camera phone. it looks really cool, so I'm excited about starting there on monday!

later on that day, I met up with my friend kraig and he showed me some cool things in the city. we went shopping at urban outfitters, american apparel, and some other random places. we also went really far into central park, where I've never been before to this really cool fountain and an empanada stand. we ate empanadas, stared at turtles in the pond, and waited around for this random male violin player wearing a midriff t-shirt and pleated skirt to play violin. he is supposedly really awesome at violin, but he was on a break, so I never got to hear him play. after central park, me and kraig decided that we wanted to go on an adventure in search for the perfect asian tea house, so we were off to chinatown!

you would think that there'd be billions of tea places in chinatown, however there were not! we found one called "teariffic" and just decided to go there. it was very modern looking (so not your typical authentic tea house) which was disappointing, but the tea was really good. i ordered passion fruit black tea! (to all my tea loving friends, if you visit me here, you'd love the tea at this place!)

it was getting late and we were hungry, so we then went to little italy to eat some homemade pasta at an outdoor italian restaurant with checkered table cloths. that was fun too! then we hopped on the subway and hung out at union square park. there we watched this rap group rap for a while as they filmed a video for youtube. they were actually pretty good, well one of the guys was anyway, so I'll look on youtube later and see if I can find the video, and then post a link on here.

overall, I've had a great first two days here... they've felt kinda bizarre, but still it's been lots of fun. right now I'm "working" and waiting for a guest to arrive. if he ever gets here to check in, I can leave the Loft and go explore the city some more.

stay tuned for more updates! I miss you all!!

start spreading the news...

I'm moving on thursday, and then starting my internship on monday.

everything is happening so fast!!

I bought a giant suitcase today... now I just have to figure out how I'm going to fit 5 months worth of clothes in there.

If I can make it there, I'll make it anywhere...

hello my lovely friends and family!

I realize that it's going to be very hard to keep in touch with you all once I move to NYC, (it's already hard enough as it is!) so I decided that I'd create this little blog to keep all of you updated on my adventures while I'm up there.

I'm really looking forward to everything that I'm going to learn while I'm doing my internship in the crazy big city, however I also hate the transition phase and the fact that I'm going to miss everyone from North Carolina so much... PLEASE email and call/text me often!! It'll be nice to hear familiar voices and know that yall are still thinking about me even though I'll be so far away. What would be even cooler is if yall would write me letters and send care packages... I'll post the address on here once I figure out what it is.

In other news... I bought my plane ticket the other day. My flight leaves out of Greensboro on August 7th, around 11:30am. I'm supposed to arrive at JFK International sometime around 3:00pm, and from then on, I have NO CLUE really how to get to the Loft where I'll be living, but I'll figure it out...