What day is it?

[trinityvixen]

I spent a good chunk of the absolutely GORGEOUS Sunday we just had in a goddamned car and a subterranean arena to attend my sister's sort-of graduation from occupational therapy school. I doubt I would have been so irritated by this if a) she'd actually been getting her degree (her school won't finish for months yet--all the people attending had asterisks next to their names in the bulletin to this effect), b) she's wanted to be there, and c) it wasn't Mother's Day. I'm not a mom, but I hated that they forced the day to be about the kids in school instead of the moms who made sure they got there. To be fair, some of the graduates are moms themselves, but still. Mother's Day! It's their day! And, yes, I pouted because it was a beautiful day out and I was stuck in a car with the windows up. I'd have happily had wind-blown hair and been a mess for pictures (I was anyway!) for the windows to be down. My parents are officially "old" in that they now and forever prefer air conditioning.

More than that, I think the nicer weather is turning me into a basket case. It's not like we even had a particularly brutal winter, but the promise of seventy-degree days and sunshine makes staying indoors for graduations (or re-arranging one's room, as I did Saturday because I'd shipped so many boxes to my parents' house from my apartment, I couldn't get around there) nearly impossible. I think I need to get my bike back from the shop where it's being tuned up and having its brakes replaced. I need to hop on it and go for an hour's ride. I need to be outdoors. That's a strange need for me. I'm a homebody and a lazy ass, and yet I go home to my parents and am like a terrier on PCP about how we! need! to! go! for! a! walk! My friend Mrs. Beans is dog-sitting for her brother and she keeps inviting me on dog walks and I rush over there because dog walking! Outside!

Last weekend, I was upstate with fairest who shopped for an entire day, but as long as I could loaf outside in the sun, I was happy. As long as I was outside. I was able to restrain myself with practicality enough to go out of the sun before I burned, but that  was as far as I got. Outside! Wanted outside! I bought a cheap bike so I can go biking up there without hauling my nice bike back and forth. If I hadn't had a less-experienced rider with me, I might have biked all the way into town (and been royally fucked when I had to bike back the same distance, most of which would have been uphill).


Some of this is undoubtedly related to my anxiety/euphoria over leaving my job, too, I realize that. I'll soon be really free to do whatever the fuck I want, and I'm straining at the bit to get there. I have a bucket list for leaving New York. I keep adding to it, but 9 out of 10 additions are part of the Outside! All the time! mania. To whit:
1) Go to the Highline Park.
2) Ride bike over the Brooklyn Bridge (presumably to Brooklyn where there may be still more paths to take).
2A) If not a total chicken-shit, bike over the GWB, with its much scarier low rails and traffic.
3) Take the Staten Island Ferry.
4) Go to the Cloisters.
5) Walk the length and/or circumference of Manhattan (I did most of this one day with fairest and cagexxx, and we covered a good chunk from 116th to Canal Street).
6) Go to the Brooklyn flea (ew, so much Brooklyn stuff).

These are the additions that I made recently. The list includes going to the Guggenheim (never been) and a massive three-day-at-last binge where I tour the entire Metropolitan Museum of Art. I keep going to the Met for exhibits and then fucking around visiting this or that of my favorite places (arms and armor; the Egyptian Wing; the rooms of furniture). I want to spend like three-to-four hours a day, making sure to take my time and not to get too burnt out with museum fatigue, over a few days, to really take it all in. New York and DC are the places to go for museums, and I need to absorb some of that before I peace out of here for a substantial portion of the next four years (at least).

Anything else I should consider? Let me know!

Comments

[ivy03.livejournal.com]

I spent the ENTIRE WEEKEND INDOORS. Saturday because I opened my balcony door and started sneezing and then got INCREDIBLY PARANOID about allergies messing up my voice before the concert. Sunday because I had laundry and cooking and having to do the proofreading job that I really shouldn't have taken cause I don't have time and need a break, but then I looked at hotel prices in SF and took it. I feel like I am missing spring. I keep spending entire weekends inside working.

[trinityvixen.livejournal.com]

Yeah, it was not a good day for seasonal allergies on Saturday.

What are you needing a hotel for in SF?

[ivy03.livejournal.com]

I am going to SF in August. Ostensibly for a cousin's wedding, but I'm extending it since I've never been to California. Or seen the Pacific. Hence, hotel.

[xannoside.livejournal.com]

This is a really bad time of year to look for hotels in SF, unfortunately. Right in the middle of tourist season.

If I were leaving NYC, I would (outside of your list, which I would definitely include at least the biking stuff from)

1) Go to the top of the Empire State Building
2) Go to Peter Luger
3) Go on an NYC zombie walk
4) Make sure to visit every single corner of Central Park
5) Go to one of the famous comedy clubs (Gotham Comedy and Caroline's spring to mind)
6) Find some somewhat unconventional physical activity that no one believes could fit inside an NYC building, and go do or watch it.

Gotta be some more in there somewhere.

[ivy03.livejournal.com]

I happen to know where a trapeze school is. *eg*

[trinityvixen.livejournal.com]

Trapeze has never appealed to me, but bouncing generally doesn't given my size.

[trinityvixen.livejournal.com]

1) Done!
2) I don't know what that is.
3) Do they have scheduled zombie walks or is this a flash mob thing? Also, I try to steer clear of those things for obvious reasons (i.e. my control over my panic attack mode is not great).
4) I think I've covered a large portion of the park over time, which I'm pretty proud of. This is largely thanks to other people getting me out there, but I'll make plenty of trips around it, to be sure, before I leave.
5)I've never gone to a comedy club. I guess I could do that.
6) I don't think anyone will like me pole-vaulting through our lobby, but it's worth a shot.

[xannoside.livejournal.com]

2) Famous NYC steakhouse in Brooklyn
3) It's definitely scheduled, but people just show up in costume, afaik
4) I am so bad at this one, I really need to take the time in summer and appreciate it more.

[shell524.livejournal.com]

Soooo yeah, the first time I ever heard of the whole Zombie Walk thing was on Castle. Where people died. I think I'll pass. :p

[mithras03.livejournal.com]

I highly recommend the High Line - if you can, do it at night. It's not as crowded and you get this hushed feel of being above traffic, and a gorgeous view across the Hudson. The Cloisters are also awesome, but rather an ordeal to get to (I went in college on a bus trip for a class on art conservation, so we had a bus take us right there).

[trinityvixen.livejournal.com]

I thought going during the day would be better--fewer people outside as they are working--but I could try at night as well. I have time!

I've been to the Cloisters by bus (NYC bus), but I'd probably just walk or bike up to it. It's nice, I just didn't get to spend the time there that I wanted to.

[shell524.livejournal.com]

If you do the Cloisters on a weekend, I should much like to join you, as it has been on my NYC bucket list since before I moved here. :p I would also be up to joining you for the Brooklyn Flea, as it's really kind of awesome.

I don't know how you feel about zoos, but I'd probably add the Bronx Zoo to the list, as it's arguably one of the most famous in the country.

[trinityvixen.livejournal.com]

Ah, I will definitely take you along for these if they're on weekends. I could use the tour guide for Brooklyn especially.

I've been to the Bronx Zoo many times--I grew up in this general area, and we went on a series of trips to it when I was in grade/middle school, and I've got back a few times as an adult. Maybe I should check out the one in Central Park, just to cross it off the list.

[jethrien.livejournal.com]

I've never been to the Brooklyn Flea. Interested.

[trinityvixen.livejournal.com]

Ooh, okay, well we need to start planning out Saturdays then :)

[ecmyers.livejournal.com]

lnbw often walks the length of Manhattan for fun. I bet she could be persuaded to get a group together for this.

[lithoglyphic.livejournal.com]

Your list has a lot in common with my bucket list before leaving Princeton. Brooklyn Bridge (sans bike) and Cloisters were on it, but I didn't make it to either. I half-visited the Guggenheim; it was being renovated and very little of it was open. The High Line, I knew about and wanted to visit, but it wasn't finished yet...