Nasty Weather, Perfect Reading

The weather outside was frightful, but inside it was quite delightful today.

Strange and unusual weather seems to be not so strange and unusual these days. Earlier in the day it was 96 degrees, hot, and humid. Now it is 74 degrees, wet, and no humidity as major rain storms worked their way through the city.  This is the kind of weather I was not expecting to encounter in the East. Spectacular bolts of lightening, bangs of thunder, and lots and lots of rain. This was the king of weather people from the Midwest said they missed in the East. Red and purple weather on the slide rule of the rain weather maps. Big, noisy, flashy thunderstorms.

But red and purple weather make for a great reading day. Deep into a mystery book, it was a good day to curl up in the swivel chair, take glances at the spectacular lightening, and try to figure out how the hypnotist is going to find his kidnapped son, reclaim his marriage, and help the police track down a young man accused of killing his family. 

Nasty weather, perfect reading.

Shopping By Weight

Is it a bad thing that I now eat all light foods? Not lite, as in nutritional value, but light as in actual weight. Should I get the strawberries or the half watermelon? Should I pick up two cans of beans or four. What else am I picking up on this trip? Anything especially bulky or heavy? What can I actually carry home? Will my frozen food be dripping out of the bag by the time I hit my door?  Do I need to stop anywhere else on my way home from the grocery store and load myself up further?

These are all questions I ask myself as I prepare to go shopping, am in the process of shopping, and as I prepare to go back to the apartment. What CAN I carry? Where am I in relation to home? Does this trip involve the bus, the subway, a taxi, or walking? It's no longer a matter of plopping myself in my vehicle, loading up my back seat, trunk, and front seat from a variety of stops all over town, and then backtracking when I realized I failed to pick up some vanilla. There is not much backtracking on these shopping trips. Planning is everything.

I'm not complaining here. I'm really not. I have a friend who lived in the Brrrrrr! parts of Alaska and actually had to board a plane to get her groceries, so living three blocks from my C-Town grocery store I can handle. If nothing else I can make multiple trips or I could even have my grocery store deliver. I shop, they schlep. Or I can avoid the store all together, shop online AND have it delivered. I think maybe as we get closer to winter and wanting those comfort foods that require canned goods like kidney beans, stewed tomatoes, and cream corn I'll have a look at those services.

For now I'll just keep watching my weight.

A Room and a Closet

 A couple of upsizing, downsizing observations since moving to the city.

I am used to weekly trash pick-up days when I would roll my big carts (one for "regular" trash and one for recycled items) down the driveway, then wait for the big smelly, loud garbage trucks to come by and whisk it way. Not any more. I don't have trash anymore. I have rubbish. How very Uptown.

That's not saying that NYC does not have trash trucks. They do. I just don't do the curbside thing anymore.  I use the Trash Room. That's right. I don't have a trash can, I have a trash room. That's where my rubbish goes.

The Trash Room is my next door neighbor. To some that might sound awful as you imagine a room where everyone tosses in a bag of trash, the smells permeating out as you wait for a semi-weekly pickup. No, these people have this all figured out.

In the small (very small) Trash Room there are receptacles for paper recycling, plastic recycling, and rubbish. The recycle receptacles are cleaned out not once, but twice daily.  I read The Times and it goes to the paper recycling. I finish up a bottle of detergent, into the plastic recycling it goes. My house was never this clean of daily debris. But what I really like is the rubbish chute.

The rubbish chute reminds me of the laundry chute we had in my childhood home. From my second floor bedroom I could open up a lid built into a wooden shelf and expose a chute that went all the way to the basement. Into that I could toss all my soiled clothes where they would end up in a heap on the basement floor next to the washing machine. There was also a small door in the kitchen that accessed the same chute and I can't tell you how many times we used it to yell upstairs or downstairs for someone to come to a meal or stick our heads in the kitchen chute and play chicken while someone upstairs threw something other than clothes down to the basement. But, back to my rubbish chute. I can collect any amount of rubbish I want during the day and take five steps to the rubbish chute and it is gone. Way gone. Down 25 stories to the building's basement.  No muss, no fuss. Which is great considering our apartment, like most others in the city, does not have a garbage disposal.


So my trash can has been upsized to a room and my laundry room has been downsized to a laundry closet.

Turns out that works out just fine.  I always wanted my laundry to be close to my bedroom. Now it's right outside the bedroom AND the bathroom. Well, if you want to get technical it's also right next to the kitchen and living room too. 

I'm growing to like this downsized living. And that's not rubbish!

Day and Night

I am looking out my office/bedroom window and enjoying the view. During the day I see people far below scurrying around on their way to appointments, walking to the grocery store with lists, and picking up prescriptions at the drug store. The traffic flows smoothly up 1st Avenue with an occasional emergency vehicle racing through with sirens.

The apartment buildings I see nearby look empty of it's occupants during the day. I'm sure they are not,  just as my building is not. There are young mothers and their children carrying on daily routines, work at home employees going about their business, people who work at night are sleeping soundly in their beds. 

I sometimes see a window open up or a shade being drawn but rarely do I see any occupants. But then night falls......

 

and I have not been able to capture a perfect picture of my magical view of the NYC skyline at night. I can see the Chrysler building lit up like a beautiful tiered wedding cake. The apartment buildings and high rises take on a whole new life. They sparkle and glisten as people turn on their lights and settle in for the evening, or workers stay late to file a list minute report. More than a few times I have been reminded of the movie "Rear Window" and contemplated the purchase of some really good binoculars. But I'm not sure I really want to know that much about what goes on in those other buildings.

Right now I will just enjoy the views during the day and night.

The Pea

I took my son to see "Once Upon a Mattress" when we were in NYC several years ago (it was a quick decision at the Tickets! Tickets! kiosk in the middle of Times Square, okay?). Based on the Anderson's fairy tale "The Princess and the Pea" it starred Sarah Jessica Parker pre "Sex in the City" days. I remember watching her toss and turn, and, yes, burst into song because she just COULD NOT get comfortable. That little pea at the bottom of her mattress was making her miserable. I am NOT bursting into song but I am miserable when it comes to choosing mattresses.

We slept in the bed we just abandoned in the Midwest for nine years. It felt great in the mattress store, perfect in fact. Not too firm, not too soft, roomy and king sized. Memory foam was just coming into vogue and it sounded like the best thing since, well, straw filled mattresses. Oh, this mattress had a memory all right. When it was delivered it came with a pre-memorized bump down the center. I would swear someone else had slept on it and the mattress conformed to their body types and wasn't going to forget them. We called the mattress company and explained our issue but were told it takes at least ninety days to get used to a new mattress. Nights ninety one and ninety two must have felt okay because we decided to keep it - too much trouble to exchange, money invested, blah blah. We were only too happy to leave that mattress behind, hoping the next person could learn to negotiate that hill in the middle better than we did.

When we arrived in NYC we slept on our blow-up queen size mattress for five very long, very uncomfortable nights. (It sprung a leak on our very first night but fortunately a bicycle tire patching kit saved us.) We decided a queen size would work for us and give us more floor space. We were thrilled to be mattress shopping again. Finally, FINALLY, we would find something perfect. Firm, but not too firm. Something we could say "ah" on while we stretched, curled, and rolled over. Maybe a mattress where I would feel like bursting into song.

Not so fast. We tried out several mattresses, then tried out several more. Making a mattress decision after spending the night on a half inflated blow up mattress and a sense of urgency is not the best idea. But buy a mattress we did. It was delivered two nights ago and we discovered we bought a VERY firm mattress. As in sleeping on a board loosely wrapped in foam. And I swear it tilts, as in water boarding only the opposite direction. I am NOT bursting into song.

This salesman told us it takes only thirty days to know whether this will be a good mattress for us. So, it's down to 28 days (or nights).

 I am hoping for a fairy tale ending but I have a feeling this mattress is imbedded with a pea.

A Big Week, A Big Day

We made it. We are the in the Midtown of Midwest to Midtown. We left the Midwest last Wednesday after the wheat was harvested and in the bins and before the temperatures started climbing into the triple digits.  Our U-Haul ride across half of America was uneventful (thank goodness). The sale of the house closed yesterday, so now we call a NYC apartment home.

This was a tough move. Lots of heavy sighs as I packed up boxes, made last minute decisions on what to bring, and said goodbyes to friends. "I'm not leaving forever you know and my e-mail and cell number stay the same," I would say at each parting. This is a move both my husband and I desired but I fooled myself into thinking it would be much easier than it was. I wasn't really sorry to leave the weeding in the garden behind, or the house maintenance and cleaning of a big house, or one of the gas guzzling vehicles. At this stage I am missing my routine, my connections, and being settled.

The flip side is that there is a little guy in an apartment four floors above with beautiful blue eyes and a killer giggle that turns three months old today.  It's been seven days since we arrived here and we will figure out a structure to our days, and appreciate a super who, within an hour of reporting it, caulked the bathtub faucet (something we MIGHT have gotten around to in a month of two), and get used to the walking, walking, walking, and more walking.  But for today we have "birthdays" to celebrate. And smiles to exchange. And giggles to enjoy.

A Flea Market Starter Kit

Someone is about to get really lucky. They are going to get a lot of my things at a bargain price. They can resell it, re-gift it, or move it into their house. I don't care as long as they cart it away. This could be the start of a new reality show. My version of Storage Wars. Go find as much stuff as you can and see who can re-sell it at the highest price. Flea Market Fanatics. Uh, Flea Market Floozies. Well, Mike Burnett's marketing group will have to pitch their own ideas. Anyway...........

I don't want to have a moving/garage/relocation sale. Call it what you will. I consider the whole process a pain. I don't want to haggle over prices. I don't want to watch people pick over my stuff ("What possessed her to pick THAT pattern/color/shape?") and then reject it. And I sure don't want to sit in a hot garage for hours hoping people understood the directions to my cul-de-sac. I just want to be rid of a bunch of stuff all at the same time and have it carted away. No muss, no fuss.

Surely there is someone out there that enjoys the above much more than I do. Someone who likes to dig through boxes, and laundry baskets, and shelves for hidden gems. Someone who likes to sell someone else on the idea that they cannot possibly live without that wok, garden pot, or vase. I have just the deal for them. A flea market starter kit. Pay me X dollars and you can have EVERYTHING. No picking and choosing. No LL Bean backpack without the Farmway Co-op mug. No pretty basket without the saucer sled. And certainly no box of silverware without the fifty frames.

Some enterprising person out there is cruising the internet tonight hoping they will come across an ad for a Flea Market Starter Kit. Keep looking. It's out there.