I'm a typical New Yorker. Art lover. Cultural fanatic. Subway enthusiast. Chain restaurant hater. Drag queen lover. When I visit other cities, I'm always afraid of what boring restaurants I'll have to dine in. On a recent trip to
Texas,
I realized how absolutely spoiled with culinary delights my life has been in
New York.
I was also crippled being a vegetarian...let's just say I ate a lot of baked potatoes at Texas BBQ joints.
So I went to
Denver.
Bars are plentiful, as well as bar food. Which is fine, but not exciting. Then I was taken to brunch at the Bump and Grind. A rainbowed interior filled with pop art and collectibles greeted me. How cute! - I thought...
Read the rest of: "Nothing Wrong With a Little Bump and Grind"»
If you've read the New York Times recently, you can't help but notice the craziness going on at the auction houses in New York. Paintings are selling for all time highs- I'm talking hundreds of MILLIONS of dollars. Meaning, the richest jerks get to enjoy the world's finest art- all to themselves. Imagine a Picasso or a Cezanne hanging in your living room?! Unreal. Unfair!
Well, thanks to a trip to Sotheby's with my grad school class, this outsider art lover found out something I'd wish I'd known years ago...
Read the rest of: "Secret Museums"»
The Lower East Side is a great area to spend an evening, peppered with divey bars, music venues, boutiques and cafes. The West Village is home to more French Cafes, but The Pink Pony on the East side is one not to be missed...
Read the rest of: "Pink Pony"»
Window dressing seems to be an art form that is taken very seriously only in New York.
Bergdorf Goodman's window design department not only occupies an entire floor of their 57th Street store, but also inhabits a large warehouse across the river in Queens.
Each season, Director David Hoey's elaborate visions enliven the corner of 5th Avenue and 57th Street- adjacent to Central Park and the Plaza hotel. The windows have become more than just a place for showing off the wares for sale at Bergdorf's, but a venue for exquisite installation narrative art. Using designer clothing, antiques, original art works and other borrowed props (this Halloween features a skeleton horse!), the windows are somewhat of an art gallery on their own.
I am a big supporter of art for art's sake, which seems to be less common in the United States as opposed to Europe...
Read the rest of: "Windows"»
The title makes it sound as though you are about to view some B-movie about a perverted Dr. Frankenstein who gives life to zombies on other planets, but in actuality it was named by a German scientist who pioneered the process of plastination, which essentially means turning corpses and body parts into something more permanent. So basically, not too far off from my initial impression.
This exhibition at the museum of science in
Boston
is not something i would have gone to a few years ago. I've never had a strong stomach and
I am a sympathetic barfer. I even threw up at the alter during my own wedding! In recent years I've toughened up, to the point where I can clean up after the dog, bandage a wound, and scare away wild animals (well, at least the
odd moth or two). And so I thought I was ready for Body Worlds...
Read the rest of: "Body Worlds 2"»
When you look at a list of the world's top paddling spots, it's unlikely that you'll find Brooklyn, New York.
And it's even less likely that you'll find the Gowanus Canal, a narrow sliver of water that cuts its way from Gowanus Bay through the industrial zones of Red Hook, South Brooklyn, and Park Slope. It's not exactly what you might call scenic, at least not in the traditional sense of the word. It's lined by crumbling warehouses, generating plants, shadowy factories, Coast Guard fuel depots, and even a Home Depot. It meanders beneath the Gowanus Expressway, one of the busiest highways in New York City, and has been referred to as the most polluted waterway in America. A slick, rainbow film of oil and other chemicals gives the water in the canal a colorful, shimmering candy coating that would be beautiful at sunset if it didn't smell like cold metal and gunpowder and leave a disturbing acrid taste in the air. Visibility in the water is almost zero, and any trip across it is highlighted by an overpowering fear that you might get some on you. And yet still, people put paddle to battery-scented water and get both a unique view of New York and a first-hand understanding of how a neighborhood and an ecosystem can flourish, die, and then struggle to be reborn...
Read the rest of: "Drifting Through Brooklyn"»
Thanks to Sex in the City, Magnolia Bakery in the
West Village
has a permanent line around the block. I'm not joking.
The first time I attempted to go there, I assumed because
of the line they had table service. Nope. Just a line to
get cupcakes! $3.50 cupcakes. Beautiful, big, amazing cupcakes!
But seriously, what local would wait in an hour line for a
sugar fix? OK, probably me, until I decided to seek out other
sources to satisfy my sweet tooth in this town....
Read the rest of: "Cupcake Quest"»
Forget the Alamo.
San Antonio
is about Mexican food. Specifically: Tex-Mex.
More specifically: the indulgent bliss of the #3 lunch plate special for $4.99 – two cheese enchiladas, one beef taco, refried beans, rice, two flour tortillas and iced tea. Chips and salsa come free.
When friends come to visit
San Antonio, the proud epicenter of Tex-Mex food, it is usually their wish and certainly my duty to introduce them to the local flavors. I promptly direct them away from the River Walk and into one of the older neighborhoods of San Antonio, where the best restaurants are – the ones that serve handmade tortillas with that perfect fluffiness-dusted-with-flour texture.
Read the rest of: "Tex-Mex - Food of the Manteca Gods"»
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