Housing Works

I went to this really awesome comedy show at Housing Works Cafe on Tuesday night. My old roommate, Emily, has been a Housing Works volunteer for the past year and I never really knew what it was until this week. Housing Works is an organization that donates all of its funds to provide housing and social services for New Yorkers living with HIV and AIDS. They have a bunch of thrift stores around the city, as well as this bookstore/cafe and it's almost all volunteer run.

Anyways, they do free comedy shows all the time and the one I saw was the last installment in a special series of summer comedy shows, called "Staycation." It was really great and I can't honestly remember the names of the comedians that performed, but they were much more impressive than I was expecting for a free show - one of them was just hired to be a new SNL writer, another is on the Comedy Central show "Michael and Michael Have Issues," another just filmed his Comedy Central special, the list goes on... It was a super enjoyable night and my cheeks hurt at the end from laughing so hard. And I got to see Emily, Dianne, and Pat for the first time all summer, which was great! I definitely plan on attending more shows and exploring the bookstore and thrift stores some more.

2 WEEKS UNTIL THE STUDENT COUNCIL WELCOME WEEK BLOCK PARTY!!

AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!

In the Loop

I saw "In the Loop" last night (I've been seeing a lot of movies this summer for some reason), which is a British comedy that is based on a show called "The Thick of It." Basically it's about whether or not the UK and America should declare war on the Middle East and it's a comedy. The movie was okay, funny at times though not "a gut-achingly hilarious farce" as the previews promised, and the ending was a total let down. Maybe it's because we're used to super happy endings where the good guy wins and the bad guy gets what he deserves, but the end of this movie was kind of a downer, just warning you. There were some pretty great insults in the movie though, including calling someone "the Nazi Julie Andrews," so if anything, you can enjoy that. Oh, and remember the girl from "My Girl"? Well she's in this and all grown up!

Pier I Cafe

Went to this cafe on 70th street with some friends the other night and it was really cool. So basically, if you're walking on the street, at 68th street you will come upon this giant staircase and ramp that will take you down to the water where there are lots of bikers, runners, a pier, a great view of Jersey, and this cafe. It's self serve and the food is pretty good, but the real appeal is that there are a ton of tables where you can just hang out and look at the water. It was really nice and even though NYC is an island, this is the first real waterfront restaurant that I've been too. Anyways, this is what it looked like:

Paris to the Moon

I just finished reading Adam Gopnik's book "Paris to the Moon." I originally found this book at Dad's house during Winter Break and started reading it, but didn't finish before I had to go back to school. Then when I was home over the summer, I found it again, this time on Mom's bookshelf and decided to take it. It's a collection of essays that Adam Gopnik, a writer for The New Yorker, wrote when he and his wife decided to move to Paris for 5 years with their baby son because they knew if they didn't do it then, they never would. I really enjoyed the book, mostly because of the anecdotes about his son, who is thoroughly entertaining. Also, I loved just being able to relate to the places he went to and the experiences he had as an American in Paris, although he was there from 1995-2000, so some of the stuff is outdated. So even though this one took me a long time to read (over half a year) it was still really good. And I finished it yesterday and had a dream last night about going back to my homestay in Paris for another semester abroad, weird...

Paper Heart

I saw this new movie with Charlyne Yi and Michael Cera the other day. I think it started as a documentary but turned into a fictional documentary (I hesitate to use the word "mockumentary" because that always sounds like they're mocking the documentary, which they weren't really). Anyways, Charlyne claims she doesn't believe in love and sets out across America to interview people about their views on love. She visits high school sweethearts, scientists, bikers, romance novelists, little kids on playgrounds, but somewhere along the way, she finds herself in a relationship with Michael Cera (they are perfectly awkward together), but is she in love? Of course there was only one way to find out: go to Paris. The movie was cute, but kind of left me wanting more or at least wanting it to be true since Michael Cera is an actual movie star and he played himself in the movie. Oh, and I really wish that Charlyne had brushed her hair. Just once.

Moving!

So I moved into my new dorm for the school year last Saturday. I'm now living in Lafayette, which is a dorm (surprise!) on Lafayette Street, and is at the bottom of Chinatown. I had a horrible moving experience that involved the street being closed (thanks for notifying me, NYU!), a cop literally screaming in me that he had no time to talk to me and that I needed to keep moving, a surly security guard, a sassy student checking me into my new room, a street fair that caused a traffic backup, and the world's hottest day ever. I'm living in a 6-person suite, in a 2-person bedroom with my friend Kelsey who doesn't get here for another 2 weeks and while we have the best room because it comes with a closet and our own bathroom, the room itself is the smallest that I've lived in since being in NYU housing, not to mention I'm incredibly confused as to how 6 girls are going to share 1 fridge, about 7 cabinets and absolutely zero counter space in the kitchen. So that will be...interesting. While I've been moved in for almost a week now, I'm still not even close to unpacked, mostly because I'm trying to figure out where I can fit all my stuff, but good news: I bought closet organizing material at Kmart yesterday, since this closet is about 1/4 of the closet space I've had before. On the plus side, I'm actually enjoying the neighborhood more than I thought I would (well, I mean I haven't actually done much in Chinatown yet, but it's not as annoying as expected and I'm looking forward to some cheap meals of dumplings or something) and the walk from school is actually only about 20 minutes through SoHo and surprisingly nice. I get to see lots of very nicely dressed people, which I always enjoy. So that's about it, pictures to come once I've actually set up my room.

:(

Tomorrow's the last day of my internship. It went by so fast and I'm going to miss it and the other interns a ton. We close out our time there by giving presentations in front of like 55 important people in the company plus other people that work there too. Scary...