Tag Archives: adventure time

Adventure Time with Kat and Kam: Princeton

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When we met six and three-quarters years ago, Kamran told me that he had gone to school “in New Jersey”. Later, I found out that he had spent six years at Princeton, getting his PhD in physics before deciding to go into law. The first time he took me to visit the campus was magical, since:

1) I had only lived in a NYC for a year and had never taken NJ Transit, which was completely different from the subway in that it was expensive and comfortable, and
2) living in NYC for a year was long enough that I’d forgotten what nature looked like.

Waiting for the dinghy to take us from the Princeton campus back to the Northeast Corridor station on that first visit, Kamran asked me to “go steady” with him after a month of trying to convince himself that he didn’t want to be yoked exclusively to this lady ox. Aww.

So, all these years later, we decided to go back a couple of weekends ago to relive his golden years and the birthplace of our looooove. We were supposed to leave Penn Station on the 11:15 a.m. train, but of course we got there at 11:16, so we made a stop at the Tim Horton’s inside the station and then casually watched a guy threaten the life of his girlfriend in the midst of a fight while we munched on a bagel in the alley out back. On the 12:15 train, we tucked our tickets to Princeton Junction into the slot on the back of the seat in front of us and alternated between solving the mysteries of the universe and napping.

Princeton, NJ

We took a cab straight to the graduate college (Kamran wanted to show Princeton that he’d left and conquered the world and didn’t need to wait an hour for the dinghy to campus), which was, um, gorgeous.

Princeton, NJ

Princeton, NJ

Princeton, NJ

Princeton, NJ

On our way down to the D-Bar in the basement of the grad college to see where Kamran drank tens of beers during his tenure, we went inside to the dining hall, where adorable/smelly/geeky grad students were eating bananas with their parents and stopped to stare at us, the stylish/successful/handsome people they hope to someday become.

Princeton, NJ

Then we walked up the hill

Princeton, NJ

to the main part of campus

Princeton, NJ

to begin the real reason we’d come: to eat everything Kamran remembered from his six years there.

The first stop was Hoagie Haven, where Kamran got a cheesesteak and I got a meatball hero, and he was so sure everyone inside was going to be like, “Hey, Kamshaft! Kameroon! Kamburger! What are you doing back here after all this time? Didn’t you go off into the world and make something of yourself while we stayed here slinging hoagies?” But no one was the same, and no one was there to congratulate him on becoming The Most Excellent Physicist-Lawyer Princeton Has Ever Produced™.

Princeton, NJ

Next, we walked up to the electrical engineering building to burn off our hoagies and then circled back to Zorba’s Grill for chicken gyros, where the guy in front of us was super rude to the kid behind the counter, and I said we should publicly shame him, but Kamran didn’t want to get knifed.

Princeton, NJ

Next door was Thomas Sweet, where we got cake batter ice cream with Butterfinger and sprinkles, because that combination makes sense.

Princeton, NJ

Princeton, NJ

This is Kamran eating ice cream just like Einstein, who lived/worked/died at Princeton. Only I had handed him both of our spoons to keep my hands free to take the picture, and you can see he’s using both of them at once. And that there’s no ice cream on either of them. Also, there’s a huge glare on Einstein. This could not have failed worse.

Princeton, NJ

But the ice cream was awesome. And then we were full and were mad at how old and small-stomached we are.

Continuing our walk through campus, we came this crazy fountain

Princeton, NJ

and these way crazier heads of animals, which we decided were Chinese zodiac symbols. And we were right (of course). It turns out they’re Ai Weiwei’s “Circle of Animals/Zodiac Heads“.

Princeton, NJ

It’s hard to describe how huge and affecting these were.

Princeton, NJ

Cutting down a side street on our way to the physics building, we passed by the Princeton eating clubs, which are like the frat houses at your college except classy/elegant/full of much more money. I mean, but still not immune to keg parties in the backyard. (Two weeks later, Kamran is still bringing up “the time we went to that keg party with the live band at the Princeton eating club”. I’m 99% sure he’s joking.)

We stopped to pet the tigers outside the stadium

Princeton, NJ

and then walked through this huge Richard Serra sculpture called “The Hedgehog and the Fox” made of giant panels of rusted metal where one path gets wider and brighter and the other path gets narrower and darker. And where the immaturest of the Princetonians hang out, evidently.

Princeton, NJ

I saw some nature

Princeton, NJ

and then some more

Princeton, NJ

and then still more

Princeton, NJ

and then some involving Kamran,

Princeton, NJ

and then it was time to go home, so we stopped at another of Kamran’s most-remembered haunts, the Wawa, for some water. (Which I would call wa-wa if I was a child or just that much lamer.)

Princeton, NJ

And then we were back on NJ Transit,

Princeton, NJ

and then NYC skyline was coming into view,

Princeton, NJ

and then we were right in the middle of it again.

Princeton, NJ

And that was that.

A Day in the Life

Filed under a day in the life, adventure time, just pictures, living in new york is neat
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• Tuesday night, my friends Ash and Kim came over to . . . well, I don’t want to say they came over “to” watch The Skulls on Netflix streaming, because it’d be embarrassing to plan a night around a 2000s-era teen heartthrob secret college fraternity movie, but I’m pretty sure that’s what happened. Kim and I had basically spent the entire afternoon having an online argument about the types of people who have a list of celebrities they’re allowed to cheat on their significant others with–apparently this type of person is everyone but my BFF, Tracey, and me–that eventually escalated into Kim and Tracey–who have never met nor spoken before–exchanging words over a Google document the three of us were editing together and then somehow resulted in me telling Kim I’m ambivalent on whether or not she has a brain. Um, but The Skulls was surprisingly entertaining! I thought maybe Kim was speaking metaphorically when she said there’s a duel in it, but there’s definitely a duel in it.

• Wednesday: “Survivor”! “American Idol”! Have I mentioned that I’m aaaaall over this Burnell Taylor kid? He has such an interesting tone that I really think he can make anything sound good, even a song from a musical. This is the performance that really got me. Even Kamran likes him. I downloaded the “American Idol” app so I could vote for the first time ever this year. I haven’t, you know, done it yet, but I could.

• Kim came over again on Thursday night so she could tell me about the first date she had with a guy who asked her what her credit score is as a way of deciding whether she’s wifely enough. I won’t say anything else about the night so as to not lessen the impact of a man asking her credit score on the first date to determine if she’s good wife material.

• Friday night, it was unclear if anything was being done for happy hour, so there were just four of us left at work when we decided to go out. We work in the Financial District, so by the time we got to this new bar I wanted to try, it was so packed with suits we literally couldn’t get ten feet in the door. We went to an old standby bar instead, and my friend Jeff has an amazing way with waitresses without even trying, so we were led to this upstairs room filled with Victorian-ish furniture that was totally uncrowded and where they were playing everything from my iPod at a totally reasonable level: Cold War Kids, M83, Imagine Dragons, Band of Horses, Yeah Yeah Yeahs, Passion Pit . . . it was, um, basically the best time I’ve had in a bar?

Nik and Jeff in repose:


Dranks:


• Saturday night, Kam and I went for a tasting menu at Tocqueville in Union Square, which is one of our favourite restaurants, one of the best restaurants in NYC, and one of the restaurants most deserving of a Michelin star that doesn’t have one. We were treated like a king and queen and then went home to watch “X-Files” and The Game, which I’ve basically been thinking about nonstop since, especially this song, which is so annoyingly and catchily 1960s.

• Yesterday, we watched Safety Not Guaranteed, which was adooooorable, and Midnight Cowboy, which was well done but totally depressing and made me feel like I will pretty obviously end up living in a condemned tenement building someday and almost killing children with stolen coconuts. Also, thank god Angelina Jolie looks like her mother and not her father.

Later in the afternoon, we went on a walk up the East side of Manhattan and into Central Park, which I’m using as an excuse to use my Adventure Time logo:



the Queensboro Bridge at the edge of Manhattan, looking over Roosevelt Island


a modern building with art-tastic balconies and doors


looking down the East River toward lower Manhattan


a crazy wild boar statue surrounded by all sorts of marine life and snakes eating toads and stuff

Apparently this is Sutton Place Park’s replica of Porcellino, a sculpture by Pietro Tacca from 1634. Bill Clinton liked it, too, although for a completely dumb reason.


a Colonial-looking house with a vibrant door

This place had a private drive and a private park overlooking the East River. A Latino-looking person driving a Honda–obviously the hired help–wanted to leave but waited to open the gate until Kamran and I were well across the street. We talked about how we spend so much of our lives feeling better-off than everyone everywhere else in the U.S. that it’s annoying to see someone wagging their rooftop solarium in our faces.


New Yorkers play tennis inside giant balloon-domes


Magnolia Bakery cupcakes from Bloomingdale’s


a store devoted entirely to buttons


Hans Christian Anderson in Central Park


apartment buildings on 5th Avenue behind the Central Park conservatory


the Alice in Wonderland statue, which is totally freaky and not at all for children


squirrel/rat


an elaborate temple on 5th Avenue


sunset over the Central Park conservatory

Adventure Time with Kat and Kam: the East Village, Lower East Side, and Chinatown

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Kamran and I had no plan in mind for this walk but to drink some bubble tea and to eat some noodles at Xi’an Famous Foods, which is beloved by Anthony Bourdain and Andrew Zimmern and which we’ve talked about visiting approximately every five seconds of our five-year relationship. It was closed that day for no apparent reason, but at least we still got our bubble tea.

I know I’ve shown you versions of this next picture ten times already, but walking out of his building and seeing this against the sky just never fails to make me think, “This is New York City! I LIVE IN NEW YORK CITY!” The architecture in Tudor City is unmatched for me, as much as I love the glass-and-steel highrises in newer parts of the city. I think it’s because it makes me think of 55 Central Park West, the Ghostbusters building:

East Side, NYC

East Side, NYC

East Side, NYC

Kamran in Tudor City, being gorgeous:

East Side, NYC

The Chrysler Building, also being gorgeous:

East Side, NYC

Kamran outside of Thirstea in the East Village, where we stopped for bubble teas. He got honeydew, because he always gets honeydew, and I got Pixy Stix, because like there was any way I could resist that:

East Side, NYC

I always think this sign is going to say “Burger King”. It does not:

East Side, NYC

We went to Economy Candy and bought chocolate-covered s’mores and ate them in a park with a camel statue in it:

East Side, NYC

This thing actually tastes better than it looks. And it looks like The Best Thing Ever, soooooo . . .

East Side, NYC

Kinda want this sign painted on the gate over a store’s window to be recreated on my bedroom wall:

East Side, NYC

East Side, NYC

Kamran and I took pictures in front of this graffitied building just because it looks badass, and when I Googled 90 Bowery just to see what it used to be, I thought the place had been turned into condos. Then I realized that the sign actually says 190 Bowery and tried that instead. It turns out that HOLY SHIT, THIS IS SOMEONE’S HOUSE.

It’s a 72-room, six-story, 35,000-square-foot former bank that a photographer bought in the 60s for $100k and turned into a studio/gallery/home. That was back when the Bowery was known for drugs, prostitution, and rent-by-the-week apartments with a shared bathroom in the hallway where you were likely to get stabbed. And now it’s worth $35 million. But it’s priceless to those of us who need graffiti to look cool.

East Side, NYC

We stopped at Banh Mi Saigon so Kamran could have his first of the famous Vietnamese sandwiches:

East Side, NYC

You know it’s more authentic than Paris Sandwich down the street both because it has Saigon in the name and because it’s hidden in the back of a store behind a jewelry counter.

East Side, NYC

Notice the daze in Kamran’s eyes and the crumbs on his lips:

East Side, NYC

Just a bucket of frogs in Chinatown:

East Side, NYC

My second bubble tea of the day, an Oreo one from Bubbly Tea. Wait, I’m sorry. Did you see that I said it was an OREO BUBBLE TEA? One person should not live a life this decadent:

East Side, NYC

We stopped at Malaysia Beef Jerky next to buy pounds and pounds of what is totally not beef jerky at all but bakkwa, which is grilled so that it’s not so hard and chewy. It’s a little saucy, too, so we refer to it as “that wet beef jerky”, usually in a redneck accent:

East Side, NYC

This is a shrimpy pork jerky, because Kamran likes gross things.

East Side, NYC

Kamran looking a little bit lonely and lost with his bubble tea and bag of jerky:

East Side, NYC

Billy’s Antiques & Props closed a year or so ago, and we found it so fitting that the only thing that remains is a coffin in the midst of debris:

East Side, NYC

And some more pretty buildings to bring us back full circle:

East Side, NYC

East Side, NYC

Wouldn’t you just die to live on the upper floor of a building like that? I’m sure those apartments are just as awful as any other New York apartment, but they sure seem special.

ADVENTURE TIME!

Adventure Time with Kat and Kam: Southern Roosevelt Island

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Between the East coast of Manhattan and the West coast of Queens is Roosevelt Island, a strip of land two miles long and 800 feet wide. You can walk from one side of it to the other in literally five minutes. It’s considered part of Manhattan, so the rents are high despite there being exactly one subway stop on the island and no actual way to get there from Manhattan by car. But the way you do get there is glorious. Before you actually get there, though–at least if you’re Kamran and me–you have to make a couple of stops.

Roosevelt Island Walk

We started at Kamran’s neighborhood CoCo for bubble teas and took them to Dag Hammarskjold Plaza, which is clearly the most rolls-off-the-tongue park in NYC. Birds cooed on the arches above us, the United Nations building beckoned from across the street, and a heavily Photoshopped sky loomed darkly over Jesus.

Roosevelt Island Walk

Roosevelt Island Walk

Roosevelt Island Walk

We walked along the river in the park below Beekman Place and stared across the East River to Roosevelt Island, which has this creepy old shell of a building on one end that’s always lit up at night, making it even creepier:

Roosevelt Island Walk

On the way, we’d stopped at Choux Factory for cream puffs that aren’t nearly as huge and gushing as the ones at Schmidt’s in Ohio but come in more interesting flavors. I barely care about blueberries at all and nearly passed out from the deliciousness of this:

Roosevelt Island Walk

Kamran looks pretty pleased with his boring vanilla, too:

Roosevelt Island Walk

But then we spotted this on our way out of the park and threw them both up:

Roosevelt Island Walk

We walked up to 59th Street and watched the tram to Roosevelt Island come in:

Roosevelt Island Walk

Roosevelt Island Walk

And then we boarded it ourselves and took it across the river. I’ll never get over how it feels to hang so far up in the air, to see taxis look like matchbox cars, and to peek into the windows of twentieth floor apartments like that pervert Superman.

Roosevelt Island Walk

Roosevelt Island Walk
hanging in mid-air over the East River

Roosevelt Island Walk
the many apartment buildings of Roosevelt Island

Roosevelt Island Walk
a sign evidently left over from the days when Roosevelt Island was known as Welfare Island

Roosevelt Island Walk
the Queensboro Bridge, which passes over the island on its way from Manhattan to Queens

Roosevelt Island Walk
Kamran under the bridge with a Queens power plant in the background

Roosevelt Island Walk
seagulls over the Goldwater Hospital

Roosevelt Island Walk
Manhattan through the gates surrounding Southpoint Park

Roosevelt Island Walk
this was a really terrible picture, but then I made it look retro, so now it’s art

Roosevelt Island Walk
the Pepsi sign, one of my favourite parts of Queens, through the grass on Roosevelt Island

Roosevelt Island Walk
the tippy-top of the old Smallpox Hospital

This thing was built in 1856, lasted 100 years, and then fell into disrepair after it was abandoned. (Here‘s a picture of it from the 1870s that’s so romantic it makes me kind of want smallpox.) In 1976, it was designated a New York City Landmark and then . . . left to rot some more. The city is currently working to stabilize the building so that it can be open to the public when the new park on the very Southern tip of the island is finished. It’s lit up at night with green lights that make it look suuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuper haunted-housey from Manhattan, so it was awesome to finally see the thing up close and realize that it’s just as creepy as we thought.

Roosevelt Island Walk
Kamran, looking pretty wary of the ghosts

Roosevelt Island Walk
and then looking happy

Roosevelt Island Walk
and then looking like he really wishes I’d stop so we could eat the Milky Way we brought with us

After walking all over the Southern tip, which is really just a couple thousand feet long, we got back on the tram and rode into 59th Street again:

Roosevelt Island Walk

Roosevelt Island Walk
looking North up 1st Avenue

Roosevelt Island Walk
a, um, rather specialized store on 60th Street

Roosevelt Island Walk
Kamran looking sad, because Sprinkles was closed

Roosevelt Island Walk
purdy archytecture

Aaaaaaaaaaaand then we went home.

The End.

Adventure Time with Kat and Kam: The New York Public Library’s Main Branch

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Adventure Time

The Main Library of the New York Public Library system is located approximately 3.5 steps from Kamran’s front door. A door that he has lived behind for approximately six years. And yet up until a couple of weeks ago, he’d never been there. Truth be told, I’d only been there once to pick something up, was confounded by the long empty marble hallways, ended up in the children’s section in the basement somewhere, ran away, and decided to go back to being illiterate.

But with Kamran in tow, I tried again, because I needed to renew my library card in order to be allowed to download ebooks from the library website so that I can not only continue being cheap and not buying books but also so I can continue being lazy and doing everything from my computer.

In short, Kamran was astounded at how beautiful and interesting the place was, and I was astounded that I don’t own a piece of artwork with a pooping donkey on it.

NYC Main Library
one of the long, empty, echoing, marble hallways

NYC Main Library
the map room, haunted by the reflection from my camera’s UV filter

NYC Main Library

NYC Main Library
eerily glowing LEGO lion

NYC Main Library
Kamran, the bronzed glamour boy

NYC Main Library

NYC Main Library

NYC Main Library
NERDS!

NYC Main Library
reminds me of something out of “Boardwalk Empire”

NYC Main Library
pooping donkey artwork!

NYC Main Library
Kamran, thinking he was really cheesing it up for the camera but basically looking like normal person

NYC Main Library
Kamran’s usual facial expression

Summers in NYC are so stifling (I know it’s bad wherever you are, but we don’t have air-conditioned cars, so can it) that we sometimes find ourselves just wanting to stay indoors for five solid months. Now that we know we love the library, we’re going to spend all of August with our cheeks pressed to the cold marble floor, copies of Don Juan and Dandelion Wine splayed out beside us.