Ewa and Sports

Ewcia is here! yay! she is here for her 2nd round job interview which i know she is going to totally get and then she will be moving here!

i have joined the softball team at the new job. And also have joined the Volleyball team at my old job. it should be a fun summer!

pope

I saw the pope cruising down 5th ave. this saturday! not as many people as i thought there would be. it was a beautiful day and i busted out the rollerblades and rode from my apartment to central park, watched a concert, rode around, watched some more concert (Matt Pond PA was playing) and then i rode back home. it felt so good to finally be able to wear shorts and a tank top again!

Urinals

I'm working toward getting my LEED AP (LEED AP = Leadership in energy and Environmental Design Accredited Professional). While doing some research on a preject i discovered that one of the buildings we are constructing is using waterless urinals its pretty amazing! at first i was grossed out thinking about pee just sitting there and smelling but looks like they have it all figured out.

Next on my agenda: invent a waterless toilet that isn't an outhouse!

out of hibernation... hopefully

so when i last wrote that i was hibernating for the weekend i didn't realize it would be this long. but alas! spring has come and it is time to start writing again! 

The city is full of daffodils and tulips and pink trees! it is an amazing time to be in New York!! i haven't seen seasons change like this since i was 7! 

started working for a new company same boss mid march. lots and lots of work so i am keeping busy! VERY busy! no more googling through work all day! facebook and myspace are blocked as well so even if i had time i still can't explore other peoples happenings. 

More bad news... the love of my life Mr. Misiu my puppy has a perianal gland tumor  on his pupcia and had to get his juevos removed today! poor baby! i miss the little pooper and now he's never going to be the same dog!

hibernation

Taking it very mellow this weekend. Just hanging out around the apt and running a few errands here and there. Ewcia's return back home was sad! i love when people come visit but hate when it is time for them to go! I still have yet to get my parents their 25th anniversary present. i'm planning on getting them a his and hers massage in whistler when they go there for their celebration. I;m planning on buying a laundry hamper since i've been using my trader joe bags to store my laundry in. and i need a gym bag that i can take to work so i can go to the gym after without having to go home and change. 

Work is going fast and crazy i've been put on this challenging project that requires me to work directly with the office manager so lots of pressure there! but its exciting to be actually working and not googling all day!

The New Year

January so far has been a good month. I finally signed up for the gym and have been going regularly. Also since New Years Eve I haven’t gone out too much. I think of January as my recovery month from the craziness of the holidays. Right now I am eagerly awaiting Ewa’s arrival in New York, which is next weekend! I cant wait to see her and go off exploring BEAUTIFUL New York with her!

I am looking for a new hobby or activity that I can get involved in this year; haven’t really thought of anything great yet but am working on it.

This is a quote from “The Secret” it’s going to be my rule to live by for this year:

“Think of a car driving through the night. The headlights only go a hundred to two hundred feet forward, and you can make it all the way from California to New York driving through in the dark, because all you have to see is the next two hundred feet. And that's how life tends to unfold before us. If we just trust that the next two hundred feet will unfold after that, your life will keep unfolding. And it will eventually get you to the destination of whatever it is you truly want, because you want it.”

boys -> new years

The boys (Mariusz, Arek, Dawid, and Dominik) came and visited me a week before Christmas. What a weekend! Thursday night and Friday night were a blast. Then Friday at around 4am Arek got put into Jail and Mariusz had a bottle broken over his head! Crazy long story but in the end everyone is ok and Mariusz and Arek have to come back in March for their Court dates to resolve the whole thing!

Going back home for Christmas was amazing! Warm California sun and all the people I’ve missed! I couldn’t ask for a better holiday! It made me realize how much I miss it and all the people in it. It was really hard to leave. I got to go to Q’s, have a girls night out (Ewcia, Basia and Ania), went to Bodega, The Room, and the Beach. Saw two movies. Hung out with family for two days. And got to hang out with my mama all day on Wednesday after Xmas. It was so nice to relax and to see people I love!

New Years brought Ida and Hani to come visit me in NY. We did all the touristy stuff and we did lots of drinking to accompany all the touristy stuff. We had a really good time! We went to Azuki for free Saki and did a mimosa brunch at Benny’s burritos. And we ate pizza from Pizza Booth twice in one weekend! New Years Eve we went to Suzie Wong’s in Chelsea for their grand opening and took advantage of the open bar! Filip got sent home at 11:30 and at the stroke of midnight was walking home on the streets of NY. I on the other hand was standing at the bar and made out with some random guy (not too random, it was filip’s friend). Ended up being an early night due to all the drinking done the days before and the fact that my feet were killing me!

New Years Resolutions:
- Get Gym Pass and USE it
- Plan out meals for the week and spend less money on eating out
- SAVE SAVE SAVE (aka stop spending $$ on booze)

80's in SoHo

Since Filip's and Mike's Birthday is within a week of each other the boys decided to throw an 80's party! It was a blast! well at least from what I heard! I went to bed like two hours into it!! so sad but learned the next day that we had no lock on the bathroom door, all black floors, and i slept through 2 almost fights! Ela came and stayed until Monday we went out on Sunday and I felt like vomiting all over my keyboard the next day at work! granted the weekend was a blast!!

Paco!

We got a Christmas Tree!! All four of the roommates went out and picked out our very own christmas tree! It took a lot of time and lots of negotiating but we finally got 'Paco!' We then took it home and turned on the christmas carols and made hot chocolate and decorated the tree together. it was really fun and good for roommate bonding! We also decorated the crazy tree thats in the corner of the living room with lights.

Its Snowing!

So I woke up on Saturday morning looked out the window and it was snowing!! So exciting! Filip and I went out to birthday brunch and then hit up central park to see how beautiful it looks covered in white!

Tree Lighting

Filip, Kasia and I met up at my house after work and spiked our chai lattes with some Irish Whiskey and headed over to Rockeffeler Center. It was so crowded! we had to push our way forward just to get a glimpse of a part of the tree. Filip got into a confrontation with a lady that apparently had no christmas spirit and was just grumpy! We saw Celine Dion, Carrie Underwood and Josh Groben perform christmas songs! It was really cool! We ended up leaving like 40 minutes before they lit the tree because we didnt feel like standing around with 1000's of people for that much longer. Planning on going back to check it out all lit up pretty soon!

Thanksgiving Weekend

Filip invited my to spend Thanksgiving with him and his brother Adam's family in Lebanon, PA. It was so nice and relaxing! Their home was beautiful as well as their family. They have a 5 month old baby Tyler who is so precious! We just hung out on Wednesday night and on Thursday ate dinner around 3pm and after that watched football and kept going back for rounds with the food. We took a really nice stroll with the baby around the neighborhood. On Friday we ate more left overs and I went jogging around the area and then borrowed one of their bikes and rode around. It felt so good to be able to ride a bike, its been so long! 

Friday night I went back to the city and hung out with Konrad S. was in town for the weekend. We went to a couple speakeasies, which are prohibition bars that usually are very hidden and have secret entrances. The first one you enter through a phone booth and the second one was disguised as a toy company and served drinks in tea cups! 

Saturday I hung around the house and then went out to sushi and then to the Buddha Bar with Sylwia P. who was in town for the weekend as well with her friends from NC. It was really fun we had sushi

 and free Saki and then did some booty shaking at Buddha Bar. 

Sunday I went to the Farmers Market in Union Square and then walked around town and did some window shopping. It was really nice I just sipped on a peppermint Mocha and enjoyed the Christmas decor all around the city. I went to kosciol at St. Patricks and then checked out the Chri

stmas tree at Rockefeller Center which was still bare. All in all a nice relaxing day.

Philly

So I love Philly! I had such a blast there this weekend! My friend Ela (whom last I saw/met was in 2000 for about 2 weeks at a harceski Zlot) goes toUPenn and she invited me to come out for a weekend so we could catch up and hang out. I got there early Saturday afternoon and her and her friend (also polish) Sebastian picked me up from the train station and we had lunch and went tailgating at Villanova University (she went there for her undergrad its also in Philly) we just walked around and yelled at people from the opposing team mostly. She is in some dental fraternity thing and they had this whole dinner thing at this really fancy club house, she took me and Sebastian as her dates. There were rooms with all these presidential paintings and stuff. There was a wedding going on across the hall from the dinner so we snooped around and made our way to the open bar and then the dance floor. The professional photog even took pictures of us dancing and stuff. It was great! And afterwards the fraternity hosted an open grey goose cocktail and dessert party at some bar/lounge in the downtown area of Philly. It was great there was dancing and lots of boozing.
Sunday we walked around the historic parts I saw the liberty bell, the rocky stairs, and some other cool buildings. The weather was pretty shitty so we just ended up walking around the UPenn area grabbed tea, went to kosciol, and then headed to a bar. I barely made my train back to New York.
This weekend was so fun! And it was great re-sparking an old friendship! Ela kind of reminds me of Aggie so you can only imaging what kind of ridiculousness went on those two days. Way fun!

New York Knick's

So I went out for drinks with this boy, lets call him Texas, (I met him at a bar on a random Sunday afternoon while watching the Patriots game) and a lady walks up to us gives us 2 bud lights and 4 tickets to the Friday night Knick's game and asks us to take a picture with the stuff she gave us. Pretty cool! So That Friday Filip, Texas, Kelley (Filip's co-worker), and I go to the game. It was a pretty good time we sat in the last possible row and Filip harassed the little 10 year old girls in front of us for sushi and nachos! Afterwards we went out to an Irish pub and then to a Hookah bar. I danced with the belly dancer trying really hard to imitate her but ended up looking like the drunken fool I was! It was fun though! And then on Saturday I went to this girl Viola's 21st b-day party in Williamsburg. Didn't know her but knew people she knew. It was so much fun I got to see a lot of people I haven't seen since ZLOT 2000, which is always trippy! All in all it was a good fun weekend of partying!

Holy Halloween Batman!

So Halloween ended up to be a blast! We just walked around the streets of the West Village harassing people and taking pictures with rndoms! So many cool costumes out there! Buddy the Elf made my night! "Santa's Coming?? I know him! I know him!" I have a lot more pictures on my face book account so go there and check them out! We had people over for a pre party and had some fun on the fire escape. Somehow just because i dressed up as a cat and the boys did a batman robin thing i was automatically assumed to be cat woman!

NYC Bike Tour

Really starting to miss going biking with Jen and Mariusz up and down PCH, I decided that I was going to rent a bike and go ride around the green path which goes around the whole island of Manhattan! Filip and I ended up getting up pretty early on Sunday and what better to cure a hang over then to strap on a helmet and go ride about 30 miles! It was such a beautiful day! It wasn't too hot and there wasn't a cloud in the sky! I love the west side. Its so much prettier and greener then the east side. We stopped a few times to rest and took a few pics. We witnessed a Costume Dog Show... the things people do to their animals is beyond crazy! poor puppies! Also we stopped to watch a lacrosse game, Filip stopped to see where he can sign up and play, I stopped to look at sweaty boys running around with big sticks! it was fun. by the time we got back we were completely dead. It took us about 4 hours with all our stops and breaks in between. I can't wait until spring time so I can do it again!

Polish Parade!

So the first weekend I'm in the city there happens to also be a polish parade down 5th ave! How awesome is that! I went to kosciol at st. Patrick's and after went to check out the parada! it was pretty cool never knew there were so many polish people on the east cost! it was quite exciting! I met up with Wesley, Plastus, Michal and Allie! It was a fun way to spend a Sunday afternoon.

Kasia

Kasia lives in Greenpoint which is a total polish community! The place is great because it has everything polish (laundry, markets, people) its as if you are in polska! Kasia is from Detroit I met her long ago during World Youth Day in 2002. Gotta love the way Harcerstwo brings people together. We have gone to U of Michigan bars to watch games and she works on the same street I live on so we see each other quite frequently.

My Roommate...

... is awesome! Filip and I get along so great together and we seem to have a blast doing stuff together. We don't do food well together, whether its going out for dinner or going grocery shopping, we seem to have bad luck when we go together. Other them that he is always fun and energetic and is a great companion to have in a city where I don't know too many people!

Grocery Shopping

One thing that will definitely take some getting used to will be grocery shopping. There are no decent supermarkets on this Island!!! Everything is crazy expensive and organic! There is a Whole Foods on almost every corner and only one Trader Joes. I miss Vons! So the other day Filip and I went to Trader Joes the place was so packed that it took us almost an hour to load up our shopping carts! And then we saw the line which was woven in and out of aisles (hence why it took so long to get around) we both were so tired and decided it wasn't worth it to wait so we opted to leave our carts and go to Whole Foods instead. We were very slick in leaving the carts full without anyone noticing and yelling at us. We got to whole foods and by this time we were both tired and so over it that we just ended up going to get smoothies next door and taking the subway back home. This is why I have been eating peanut Butter and Jelly out of the jar for the past two days! I am going to attempt to go again tonight, but this time I am going to go right before the place closes! Or I might just get lazy and do what appears is the New Yorkers way of shopping: Order Groceries online and have them delivered to my door. There are fantastic Farmer's Markets on Sunday so I will buy my fruits and veggies there.