All Hallows Eve...

I've lost count of the number of Americans who have described Halloween as their favourite holiday of the whole year, I suspect it's got something to do with everyone losing their inhibitions when in costume...and an excuse for the girls to dress slutty, obvs. New York goes crazy for it, you can't move for Halloween references! So it was with great excitement I agreed to join a group of friends on an ultimate pub crawl around the uber-cool LES (or Lower East Side to out of towners).

Now I'm not traditionally one for fancy dress...I didn't go to a campus uni so it wasn't one of those things that was done regularly and I always felt slightly awkward dressing up with the same enthusiasm as a 5 year old...plus fancy dress is expensive! But when in NY...I decided to embrace it. After planning to create a black swan/dark angel style costume several weeks in advance I failed to actually purchase anything. Upon the arrival of Saturday...designated bar crawl day I realised that it was time to panic buy (with no money left in the bank it had to be cheap)! 

Luckily my housemate was just as unorganised as I am and had also left the costume till the last possible moment...never fear we thought, to Hoboken and the infamous Ricky's warehouse we shall go!

What we hadn't counted on is the fact New York was experienceing a freak snowstorm! It was FREEZING! We walked 10 minutes up the road in heavy snow and wind pounding against us whilst the man upstairs threw in thunder and lightning for extra effect! Pub crawl was beginning to sound like the worst idea we'd ever had!

Having ventured to Ricky's in the snow to purchase black items I was distinctly unimpressed with both the selection and the prices...yet the child costumes were all 50% off. Now I'm not usually one to force myself into a dress that would be too small but budget limitations combined with me being a short arse and sticking with the assumption that American kids are fat I decided to risk it and purchased an Alice from Alice in Wonderland costume for a 12 year old...it fit!

In the end I went to a flat party with friends which was every bit as fun as I had hoped my Halloween would be. It wasn't quite the tour of LES i had hoped for but it was really fun nonetheless! Everyone had made a real effort, there was a Cleopatra, a One-night-stand, a golddigger, a fly, a beetlejuice, dr love, and a pirate (to name a few)!

I think I get why Americans love this holiday!

XOXO

Chasing them away...

I'm not one of those mental girls...I'm truly not. I don't chase guys, I don't call them first, I don't text when they're out, I don't call to 'chat' all the time, I couldn't care less if a boyfriend went on a guys holiday or to a strip club...so why did I go a little crazy last weekend?!

This is something I can't answer because I woke up on Sunday with a splitting headache and very little recollection after 4pm when I had been forced to take myself home from brunch having fallen asleep in Agave where we were brunching! 

Anyway I won't go into the painful details but in one evening I managed to scupper my chances of ever seeing model boy again via the simple telephone, I called him...a lot! In my defense i was in Broioklyn down the road from him and he had said he'd try to see me, but that doesn't excuse ALL the calls.

And that was the end of that love affair... damn!

XOXO

The difference between a date and a booty call...

When does a booty call turn in to a date?! Previous to Friday I would have said that a 1am call is definitely a booty call...now I'm not so sure!

If you read back just a few posts I had completely given up on Mr Gingerbread Man assuming that if he was at all interested he would have made the effort to set up a date. However I clearly changed my mind on Friday night. 

Having enjoyed a free mojito on a rooftop off Times Square we hit Tippler, a fantastic new bar under the gorgeous Chelsea Market.

After a few too many drinks of the cocktail, wine and bubbles variety I thought it would be a genius idea to message him at 12 to ask what he was up to that evening...I was obviously booty calling. . To my shock he was free and I braved the pouring rain to join him in Soho...model boy is back on! 

I might be old fashioned in my opinions but a booty call is just that, it generally happens after a night out and mostly requires no commitment and only pleasantries the next morning. A date is conversation, it's fun and you actually care about what this guy thinks of you at the end of the evening...the two should not be mixed!

This booty call turned into a drink in a bar in the Meat Packing district, nothing flashy just a great low key space. And most surprisingly he was incredibly good company. I was having so much fun talking away that I was actually caught off-guard when he kissed me...although that lasted seconds as we engaged in a serious dosage of PDA. We made it back to his place in Williamsburg around 5am, continuing the serious making out before falling asleep, all items of clothing remaining strictly intact (disappointingly). It was the perfect date...and a incredibly unsuccessful booty call!

XOXO

Pre-weekend gaming...

Keeping a blog is much harder than I first expected. Early last week I didn’t update because I had very little to say then once I started doing things I suddenly didn’t have time to update it.

Thursday I have class right next to Grand Central Terminal. Normally this wouldn’t be worth noting but for the fact that I was joined by two lovely ladies for a trip to the Campbell Apartment upon the completion of two pointless hours of chat (or a seminar as some individuals might call it). For those of you with the good taste to watch Gossip Girl you’ll know that the Campbell apartment is the bar in which Nate and Sereena get it on, for those not in the gossip girl loop it is a beautiful old school bar with dark wood, a fair and great cocktails. It has the feel of sexy old money yet is helpfully positioned within the terminal.

Friday the venue was an altogether different style of venue...after leaving work late and joining some friends near Times Square for some very happy hour cocktails and a burger we headed to the New York dive bar institution Rudy’s! This is the kind of place where they use sawdust on the floor rather than wiping, where pitchers of beer are $7 and you get a free hotdog with each pint. This is not a classy place and definitely not the place to meet someone...god knows I would never give my number out, well apart from the guy who called me on Saturday to invite me out for his birthday! I can’t seem to help myself it seems!

Saturday and Sunday I brunched...but I will detail that in a separate post. I also drank, we hit beer-pong bar Three Sheets and finished up in Cafe Wha. I was drunkety drunk! I’ve decided that it is time to leave the West Side and begin to sample the offerings of the East Side next week...wish me luck!

The first 5 days in New York City...

Where to start...it’s such a blur! Okay after typing out a longggggg summary for each day I realised that it’s massively boring for everyone to read (although I still have it saved if anyone can’t sleep at night)...so I have decided to bullet point and summarise it a bit, still really long though! Damn shouldn’t have left it 5 days. They won’t all be like this...just catching up.

D1

·         Arrived in New York

·         Hotel is ummm...interesting (and I’m sharing with two other girls)

·         Walked the highline from one end to the other

·         Drank at the Standard’s Biergarden...somewhere that most of my visitors will probably find themselves being lead to because it’s amazing...and they have ping pong tables...not cheap though.  

·         Visited a dingy Irish bar which was offering awful glasses of buy-one-get-one-free wines

·         One of the ladies in the group was given a Yankees hat and jacket by a stranger...$80 worth of free swag...done!

·         So hot!

D2

·         Had planned on sleeping/sorting phone/pulling life back together

·         Started Work...did none of the above

·         Went for a leaving lunch for the guy I’m replacing...had a drink

·         Went to a the leaving party of the guy I’m replacing...had lots more drink

·         Played flipcup (all about downing beer and...wait for it...flipping cups!)

·         Left at a reasonable time and crashed out

·         So hot!

D3

·         First day on my own in work, everyone around me was suffering

·         Friday night was the beginning of the weekend...wait, does that mean drinking?!

·         Take over the 8^th floor of the hottest (not in a fun way, in a stifling heat way) hotels ever with the other 80 people who have made it post-hurricane

·         Headed to a bar afterwards...drank

·         Left at a reasonable time again...over the jetlag but just generally tired

·         Struggled desperately to remember people’s names

·         So hot!

D4

·         Saturday! Got up early and headed to Bryant Park for free wifi usage

·         Got chatted up in Bryant park (date arranged for the 12^th)

·         Back to the hotel to shower and out for a spot of lunch with my roommates

·         Sorted phone...thank god!

·         Evening spent with the lovely Mrs D, a New Yorker by now...amazing food and great drinks...but the company was the best bit. After spending 4 days desperately trying to remember names and having the same conversations it was great to just relax, and Mrs D is the best company!

·         Practically fell asleep in the last bar and headed home

D5

·         Sunday! Slept in...yes!

·         Headed downstairs to find a group of people headed off to Governor’s  Island...so I joined them

·         Found out it was free to hire bikes so did that...cycled around a little bit of the island with beautiful weather and beautiful views

·         Got a little bit sunburnt

·         Again very hot!

·         Chilled out and had a beer...yes me on the beer

·         Headed back to the hotel

·         Changed and went out

·         Got called a hipster because I was wearing my geek-chic glasses

·         Drunk

·         Bed