Uptown Girrrrrllllllll

I have successfully made it through my first week in NYC. One week in NYC feels like a month. Life as an intern is never dull, no matter what we're doing. I've gotten to listen listen to demos that have been solicited to our company and categorize them, do a lot of mailings, running to car dealerships, lots of random things. We had a special guest speaker, Marc Geiger come in on Friday and give a talk on the future of the Music Industry. It was so interesting and it really gave me a good perspective on what I'm going to be dealing with when I enter the industry as a professional. The day before, me and two interns had to clear out a closet of old CD's and what not. We probably threw away $15,000+ worth of music and merch. The good thing is that I came home with about 50 free cd's and music dvd's. I'll definitely put some good music suggestions up here once I've listened to them all. All in all, I'm really enjoying my time there and getting to know everyone.

Update on the homeless people situation:

There was a guy out side of a take out place that I was grabbing dinner from the other night. He had a cup and was asking for money. What set him apart from every other homeless person that I had seen during the day was that he was really being creative in his attempts to gain sympathy. He has one arm tucked in his shirt to look like he only had one arm. The only problem was that he couldn't keep the arm that he had tucked in his shirt still, so I could see that he was faking it. I decided to give him money though because I applauded his creative efforts.

Last night my residence hall had an outing. We went to the NBC Studio's Top of the Rock.
My suite mates and I went and we also got to meet a bunch of people from our building which was great. After the Top of the Rock, we all went down to the West Village and went to some bars/clubs. It was a lot of fun, and the people at the places we went were all really down the earth, college age-ish people. Definitely a good time.

I got a job at Victoria's Secret at Herald Square so I can start making some MONEY. I'll hopefully start working sometime this week, just in time for the semi-annual sale.

For lack of a good conclusion, I leave you all out there with pictures of recent events:

Some movie being filmed up the street from our building, look at the bridge.

More of the movie being filmed.

Farmers Market on the street.

Produce at the Farmers Market

Plimpton Hall boys

View from the Top of the Rock

NBC Studios

Radio City!!

St. Johns the Divine

Flowers at the Bible Garden @ St. John the Divine

Random Peacock at the Church

The Apollo Theater

More thoughts on NYC

There are a lot of poor people in NYC. I mean, everywhere you turn, someone is asking for money. Personally, I don't really know how to handle it. I mean, you can't give everyone money, but you can't deny help to everyone, right?

Poor/homeless people provide a lot of entertainment though. I've seen crazy people obviously talking to the voices in their heads, I've seen people that hold signs saying they need the money for beer, etc.

I have had a few great experiences however. Take today for example:

I was on the subway heading towrds 34th street/herald square. Homeless Man #1 enters the trian and announces that he would appreciate any loose change. Now, from a PR/sales perspective, he really was doing a bad job. His marketing plan lacked any form of stratergy; he simply walked down the car shaking his dirty starbucks cup, hardly saying a word. boo.

Not 3 minutes later, Homeless Man #2 enters the train and greets all of us who are aboard. Enthusiastically, he intives us to join him on the Gospel Train! In the blink of an eye, he breaks out into a gospel melody of old southern gospels. And he wasn't just standing there and singing either, he was clapping, snapping, and jumping around.

I could hardly contain myself! It took everything in me to not burst out laughing.

All jokes aside, I really am torn and I don't know how to handle these homeless people. How can I help them w/0 giving them money? I think I'm going to carry around extra granola bars and information for local shelters or something.

K, thats about it for now. Tomorrow is day number two at Universal! Here are few pictures from a late night Macy's trip my suitemates and I took last night. We went to the Macy's on 34th street and its huge! It pratically takes up the whole block and the escalators are wooden!
very cute.

I found a city loooooooooove

Here are a few pictures from the last couple of days in NYC:

Emma, Scott, Me, Christina @ Toni's Pizza. Delicious!

Scott in front of his future place of employment, Price Waterhouse Coopers, 300 Madison Ave.

NYC's Finest!

Me and Emma @ Washington Park in SOHO where we had a picnic!

A Jazz-ish band (of probably NYC Students) that we listened to during lunch.

The intersection of my (hopefully) my new place of part-time employment.

The Empire State Building!

Nuts! (for Emily!!)

A Neon-Electic Guitar.

Times Square

Kyle Watson, an aspiring comedian I met. :)

Check him out at www.myspace.com/itskylewatson

The Teachers College at Columbia, right acrost from my resident hall.

My building!

Plimpton Hall!

A group I saw playing in the subway station.
(its a short 30 sec movie, click on it!)

Start Spreading the News...

I'm in NYC!

Things that I have come to realize as a New Yorker:

-MYSTERY WATER. ew. This is water that drops from above, from an unknown source. Whatever it is, it is not rain. ew.

-WALK LIKE AN EGYPTIAN err, NEW YORKER. Even if there is a blinking red hand, if you're at the begining of the the pack at a cross walk, you better walk if the people behind you are!

-TAXIS will hit you, or at least come really, really close.

-DO NOT smile at strangers, they will think you're weird (I still smile at strangers).

-AVOID Times Square if you're not there to be touristy. It is crowded, people are lost and confused, and everything is over priced.

-STARBUCKS is everwhere.

-THE SUBWAY is not as scary or confusing as it appears to be.


Thats it for now. I'm off to explore the city I'll call home for 2 months!
Updates and pics later!

I am a very good friend.

My friend has been in a lot of trouble lately, and she is actually going to jail.
Its a real sad story and I've been taking a lot of time to keep up with her happenings.
Honestly, I think she has a lot of potential and is probably a really nice girl, but she's had a few phases of bad behavior and she is finally going to pay for it. Recently she made an appearance at an awards show and was made fun of terribly, but she handled it like a pro. Check out this link and please keep my friend in your thoughts and prayers.

I did it.

...after 9 years, I finally did it.

I ate eggs!!

My family will attest to this, but I hate(d?) eggs from about the age of 12. I remember it clear as day. I was at my grandparents house where I've spent many Maine summers and I was reading the newspaper. I read an article where this guy basically questioned why/how people started eating eggs. He was like, "did a caveman just watch an egg drop out of a chicken and say to himself 'gee, that looks tasty!'"

At 12 years-old, I think that made sense.

Plus, one egg is a single cell and that kinda grossed me out too.

Today however, I was feeling pretty bold. One of my housemates and I ventured down the the L & S diner and I ordered a ham and cheese omelet. It was delicious. :)

Cat calling...

If there is one thing I absolutely LOATHE, its cat calling.
ewww. just the though of it gives me the chills.

Honestly, can anyone tell me why on earth men (ok, not all of them...) feel as though it is their God-given right to remind me to "shake what my momma gave me?" Really. It happens everywhere, and I don't know one woman who hasn't fallen to victim of it.

Most men who stoop to the level of cat calling are usually pretty desperate.
((Yes, I just made an obviously blatant generalization))

Lets take today for example:

I spent 40 intense minutes minutes on the elliptical machine at the gym.
I left drenched in sweat (yes, i know, very attractive).
As I'm riding my bike back home and stopped at an intersection, this 40ish year old man on a moped passes me slowly and stares me down. Oh! and he honks his horn that sounds like it came off of his 6 year-old sons bike.

gross.

It gets better: not 20 seconds pass and I'm honked at again.
Can I remind you that I look like crap?
Since its summer time and until I move to NYC, my wardrobe consists of exercise shorts, t-shirts, pony-tails, and the rare appearance of makeup. Heck, wearing jeans is dressing up.

Apparently red in the face, sweaty 21 year old bike riders are in these days.

As for myself, I'm not sure how to respond to cat calls. Personally, I'd flip them the bird if I could, but I can't bring myself to actually do it. Heres how a few other people have responded:
SF Gate Article
Cat calling and different cultures


My housemate got hit on by someone today too.
She described him as: "older, gross, fat SantaClaus-ish man"


Yep, sounds about right.

Mostly thoughts on the future...

I guess I should actually write in this thing. I really don't know how long this is going to last, but ah, we'll see.

So my family and I just got back from the Carribbean and it was amazing to say the least.
84 degree weather, sunshine, pretty people, pretty places. Oh and not to mention the fact that when you're on Royal Carribbean, they treat you like royality.

Most of the tirp consisted of eating, laying around on the beach, exploring the islands, and reading, and sleeping. My body felt so relaxed, something I haven't felt all semester long.

As good as the vaction was, I wish that I had more alone time. Being alone is something that i've really come to value. Nothing particularly astounding happens when I'm alone, but it has become something I need.

Being home in Fairfax is kinda weird though. I feel like there isn't anything here for me anymore. Yes, family who I love of couse. But the rest of my life is back at JMU, and the weird thing is, is that its only there for 1.5 more years. After that, I'm starting something totally new. And if that something new turns out to be what I hope it is, I am totally excited about it. I'm not going to worry about that now. I'm going to focus on the here and now.

Next semester I hope to accomplish a lot.
I'm going to call them life enhancements, not resolutions.

1) Spend time in the Word and really allow the Lord to guide and direct my life. That being said, I have to:
2) go to church. Find a chruch and commit to it. In order to grow spirtually, I need to be surrounded and encouraged by other Christians.

3) Get a regular excersize routine. Work out 3 days a week.
4) Eat better (along with the rest of America, right?)

5) Reduce Stress (not really sure how this one is going to happen, but lets keep our fingers crossed)

6) Have healthy relationships with members of the opposite sex. Or in other words, don't freak out about stupid boy situations. They're always fun to begin with, but me and my complicated nature just make things really messy. This will be a challange.

I hope to actually enhance my life this semester, seeing as last semester was pretty much a disaster. The way I see it, things can only get better from here.

Thats all. Good luck with your "life enhancements" to all of you out there!