Five Miles of Manhattan

I love 80s music. It is arguably my favorite genre. Aside from growing up in the 80s and already listening to the albums my parents had, from Paula Abdul's Straight Up, Madonna's Immaculate, Michael Jackson's Bad and Thriller, to Heart, Oingo Boingo, Echo and the Bunnymen, Genesis, and The Cure, I re-embraced the 80s as a freshman in high school, starting with the Pretty in Pink soundtrack, and still going strong with the double-disc Best of The Smiths I got last Christmas, and Simple Minds' "Alive and Kicking" that I'm listening to now. So how is it possible that I never made it to an 80s bar before?

On Friday night, I left work at 5:30 on the dot (maybe even 5:29), raced home as fast at the subway could take me, and put myself to bed for a power nap, before I dolled myself up and went over to Betsy's on the Upper East Side, where I met up with Casey, Ronnie, Caroline and Nikhail. Vodka-sodas and Jordan almonds started our night before we went out to the karaoke bar Duet for the room we had reserved at 10 o'clock. It was our usual mix of power ballads and guilty pleasures for two hours before we made our way to the pre-determined 80s bar Joshua Tree. (I'm going to go out on a limb here and say it was named after the U2 album of the same name??) And IT. WAS. FABULOUS!



I'm going to say that I've never been happier in my life!!! What on earth is better to listen to with a beer in your hand than The Cutting Crew, Modern English, Prince, and Michael Jackson? And not these awful mutilated club version interspersed with Britney Spears and trance... I mean like the original, full music with the video up on the screen. I could've stayed there ALL NIGHT! (And I think I did!)

On Saturday after sleeping in all morning, I headed downtown to get my eyebrows done at my usual salon Thread. I had plans to meet up with Ronnie at Battery Park, but not for about two hours, so I wandered down Nassau Street and passed by a suspicious limo with a sign in the front reading "MUSIC TRANSPORT: BURTON" and I figured it was for Tim Burton, but why? As I came to the next corner I found myself at Wall St, where a huge movie production was going on. I stopped and watched for awhile. It was pretty boring, but I was LOLLING OUT LOUD watching these "extras" who would simply walk back and forth within the frame of the camera while they were filming. Such hard work that must have been! It's amazing how staged EVERYTHING is in the movie. They even had fake steam for the subway. I moved on shortly after, found myself in a Starbucks and settled in with a caramel macchiato and Shantaram to read the hours away. When it was about time, I walked the seven minutes to Battery Park, and while waiting for Ronnie, took this picture with the Instagram on my phone of the beautiful scenery just outside the park (my phone died right after this so sadly it remains the only remnant of Ronnie and my's time together, and he wasn't even with me at this time, lulz)



Ronnie showed just as the sun was setting, and we walked to the water and watched the light fade over the Statue of Liberty, as the torch lit and started to blaze and the pink hues fell on the sky and the water turned from an uncertain grey to a deep and fearsome black. We then walked. For four hours. Covering roughly five miles of Manhattan. From Battery Park... to Times Square. And it. was. awesome!

Ronnie and I walked the whole west shore of Manhattan from Battery Park up to Pier 40. With absolutely no agenda or time restraint, we lulled and ran, walked up every staircase, tried out the views from every bench, admired every apartment on the way, and watched the slowly-moving Jersey skyline across the Hudson. At Pier 40 we found a football league playing on an artificial field and we went in to watch. It reminded me of college, of the sports fields in the middle of bustle, and all the boys practicing in the evening under the stadium lights. Following that we headed into the city, right smack in the middle of the Village. We paced around hungrily, trying to find a reasonably priced and no-wait restaurant (which at this point was impossible since it was 9 or 9:30 and the Saturday night crowds were coming out) yet somehow I spotted Oyishi Sushi (shouldn't it be Oiishi?) and we got a window-front table and had mixed-green salads, shrimp and vegetable tempura, eel-avocado and spicy yellowtail rolls, and Sapporo beer. It was perfect. We continued the walk up, going into some fun Village shops, getting dessert at a diner-esque donut and coffee shop, snaking up through Chelsea and coming into Times Square around midnight, where we explored some of the shops while navigating the crowds, as thick and active as though it were noontime, and finally separated at 50th Street where I hopped on my uptown train and got home wearied and sore, but so accomplished!

So impressed with ourselves we were, that in the summertime Ronnie and I are going to start earlier and walk the length of the whole island of Manhattan in a day. Hey, it could happen!