Our cousins from Thailand are in town this week so we, of course, have to go out to dinner!! So, we all met up for in the Westminster area for some messy Chinese-style lobster. I didn’t think I liked lobster before but this one was pretty good. Johnny also brought his special “friend”, Joy, who seems to be able to throw herself into our family antics quite well.
We’ve got 20 weeks to go before the half marathon. I ran my four-mile long run today after a week of travelling and no running. I thought I’d be going super slow today but managed to finish with a 10:15 pace including stops at the street lights. Here’s the route I took today. I intended to do an “out and back” but surprisingly the ducks had enough water to swim around in the river so I kept going.
Spring has definitely arrived because the sun was pretty strong towards the end of my run. Pretty soon I’ll be seeing little ducklings swirling around in the river. Can’t wait! Let’s just hope there’s a little more rain in our future. The riverbed was looking pretty dry.
I took the photo on the left last spring. These ducklings were looking more like teenagers.
Last night I started my 8-week darkroom class. I also recruited my neighbor, Jay, to come along. Once I stepped into the darkroom, the smell of the chemicals just gave me a nostalgic feeling of excitement. I haven’t done this in about 12 years but found a bunch of old negatives and some unused paper in my stash so I was ready to go. Last night we got a refresher on how the enlarger works, what the times were on the developing chemicals, and learned where all the supplies are stored. Jerry, our instructor, did a demonstration on one photo and showed us how he makes test strips and how he dodges and burns a photo to get the exposure right. He also surprised each of us with four free rolls of black and white film that he got from a Fuji Film distributor. Sweet! I didn’t get to print anything yet because we ran out of time but we’ll have plenty of time in the next 7 weeks. Our class has only 4 students enrolled and get the whole darkroom to ourselves for 3 straight hours per week. I also got a free pass to the open studio for the 8 weeks that we’re in the course. Let the printing begin!!
Here are all the photos from this past week in New York and Philadelphia.
It’s all 5 albums (250 photos) in a row. Enjoy!
This morning started out pretty laid back. I leisurely woke up at about 10 am EST, showered, and sat around organizing yesterday’s photos.At about noon, I woke Jes up and we ordered lunch. Our flight was scheduled to leave at 4:09 pm EST so we had plenty of time to pack, eat, and Jes even got a little WoWing in his day too.Unfortunately, as soon as we left for the subway, we turned up the adrenaline and my heart was pounding. We left the house around 2:20 (much later than we should have), walked briskly to the subway station, jumped on the R Train and transferred to the E. While on the subway, we totally thought we’d be missing our flight for sure.We arrived at the Jamaica Station at about 3:10 and hopped on the AirTrain. Somehow we misread the sign and got off at Terminal 4 and discovered that we were in the wrong terminal. So back on the AirTrain we went and it was already 3:30!! Surprisingly, security at Terminal 6 went smoothly and we boarded by 3:45. We were one of the last ones on but we made it.Phew!
I had a great time this past week.New York is certainly a great place to hang out and eat. Spending a week here has really given me a lot more time to explore a bunch of different boroughs and areas of Manhattan without racing from place to place non-stop.Staying in Queens was pretty convenient too. Living near the subway is certainly key. We also lucked out on the weather.We got some wind, some snow, and some sun. I really got a lot of use out of the $1 pair of gloves I bought in Flushing and came home with hundreds of photos. Visiting Dayantha in Philly was also a nice treat. Taking the NJ Transit Train was also an interesting experience.
Would I move there? Sure, why not? I’d just need to have an apartment and job near a subway station with a dog park within walking distance. I’m not sure how long I’d be able to live here though…one or two years? It’ll also take a little getting used to. After a week here I’m definitely looking forward to the laid back life I left in Irvine. I’m so glad I still have another 4 days before going back to work. There’s so much laundry and other chores to do.
By the way, the photo on the left was taken minutes before landing in LA. There were some crazy clouds up there!
It was a beautiful day in New York on Tuesday. The sky was clear, the air was calm, and the sun was out enough to keep up warm. I still needed my gloves and coat but it wasn’t uncomfortable like the previous days.
We all slept in and didn’t leave the house until about noon. First stop was another trip to Rizzo’s. I still think they beat out Grimaldi’s for their pizza. We even spoke with the owner’s son who runs the joint now and he described to us the ins and outs of their pizza, which was very informative.
Later, Jes and I took the R Train back into Manhattan and stopped at Fifth Ave. Jes had to check out the giant Apple Store and then we walked across the stree to Central Park. On our way to the Central Park Zoo, we stopped at The Strand Bookstore, which is right on the sidewalk. I got a nifty moleskine that was New York-specific with maps galore and a bunch of pages with tabs to keep track of all the places I’ve visited. I’ve been using a little notebook this whole time and this will be perfect for all the stuff I jotted down.
The Central Park Zoo is located on the lower east side of Central Park. The admission was $8 and it was totally worth it. It was a little weird to be hanging out with sea lions and monkeys in the middle of the city but it was cool at the same time. The zoo was clean and had a variety of animals. The rainforest exhibit was really interesting with a bunch of birds and other animals I hadn’t seen before.
After the zoo, we wandered Central Park. Jes bought a book to read so he found set-up camp on a bench while I went around taking photos. Over by the pond, I met a little Chinese girl who was probably about 2 years old. She had such a good time chasing the pigeons and watching/pointing to the ducks in the pond. She followed me around and would point and grunt each time she wanted to know what something was. She didn’t say much but tried her best to say “duck” and “pigeon”, which came out more like “guck!” and “jija”, respectively. Meanwhile, her grandfather (I think) was seated on the bench behind us making sure I wasn’t going to walk away with her. Haha.
Jason met up with us around 6:00 and we walked down Fifth Ave to grab a snack and pick up Jia from work. We tried the kabobs from the street cart and it was yummy. Imagine cuts of beef on a skewer grilled over a fire and drowned in a sweet hot sauce. They give it to you on a hot dog bun for easy eating while you walk. It was pretty tasty.
Dinner was at Sushi Samba in Gramercy Park. It was our last night in New York so it ended with an expensive/fancy meal. It’s a Brazilian/Japanese fusion place that served yellowtail ceviche and langosteen soup. The food was good but way overpriced, as expected. It’s a trendy place to go after work for drinks and some eel and mango rolls. Definitely not your cheap New York eats fare or setting.
Here are the photos from Tuesday.
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