Walking Across (Fill In Your State Name Here)

I am suppose to be walking across Kansas over the next eight weeks. 423 miles. And there is still snow covering most of the state. Thank heavens I am Walking Across Kansas in New York. Oh, and in South Carolina.

Confused? So was I when the captain of my Walk Kansas team told me I was eligible to participate in the Walk Kansas program even though I now reside in New York. Walk Kansas is a program to get people up and out the door walking and exercising first thing in the spring. You form teams of six, come up with a snappy name (what's not snappy about Garden Stompers?), tally your walking time each day and hope everyone's totals get you across Kansas in eight weeks. You should also track your fruit and vegetable servings AND you can earn an extra bonus if you get up and walk around at least one to two minutes every hour. (That last part SOUNDS easy but in reality it's hard considering I've been sitting at my desk for the last three hours catching up on correspondence, paying bills, searching the web, and writing this blog without raising my batukus out of the chair.)

The day the tracking started I was attending a wedding in Charleston, SC. A walk in downtown Charleston got me thirty minutes down the Kansas road. Having a guest here in NYC for Spring Break who wanted to do the walking tour put me further into Kansas than I wanted to be at that point. With a tour of the Natural History Museum, a walk past Strawberry Fields and through Central Park, down Fifth Avenue to Rockefeller Center, further down Fifth Avenue to the New York Public Library, and finally over to Times Square I must have surely walked all the way to Salina (middle of Kansas for those of you who don't want to map it) in just that day.

It's fortunate that I enjoy walking as a form of exercise, it also makes it nice to be in a pedestrian city that makes it impossible NOT to walk. I may not walk past any wheat fields this year but there probably aren't many Kansans that will walk past the Empire State Building either.

Gotta get up and do my 2 minutes of exercise............

More Than Words

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It has become a nightly ritual. Wash my face. Brush my teeth. Tuck into bed. Play my Word.

Words With Friends grabbed my attention a couple of years ago and I quickly developed a habit. Let everyone else do their online farming, soldiering, be-jeweling, or Angry Birding. I was never a hugh fan of Scrabble growing up but I am content to electronically draw consonants and vowels (just exactly what am I suppose to do with 3 O's, 2 E's, 1 A, and a U?) to AMAZE (with a Triple Letter space that word could rack up some points!) my friends with some real ZINGERS (a nice Triple Word space entry).

When I first started playing I would sit for a few minutes (or more) playing with a random opponent inputting Word after Word, completing an entire game within an hour or so.  Finally, I convinced my mom and a couple of friends that this game was what smartphones were invented for. A daily ritual started. They know I play my Word late at night. I know they all play their Words first thing in the morning.  I concede at least two of them are heavily caffeinated and sharp thinkers that early in the day whereas I am fighting to keep my eyes open before going to sleep. That just makes an (occasional) victory over them that much sweeter.

A couple of months ago we lost connectivity for a night. Unable to play my Words I woke up to find one of my friends thought I was sick, the other suggesting my attendance at an inaugural ball had kept me up much too late. That's what makes Words with Friends so much more than just Words. It's nice to see those friend's monikers pop up and know for just a moment that I am envisioning Friend L. sitting in her living room easy chair and Friend M. at her kitchen counter while they are "seeing" me here in NY when they play their words. My mother, on the other hand, will only place a phone call to me after consecutive days of non-play. Which is to say my mother VERY seldom calls. But along those same lines I find it comforting to see her Word pop in every morning. She's letting me know she is up and has her wits about her.

At least enough to confound me with a QI on a Triple Word space.

Is It Spring Yet?

My calendar says it is Spring. The view out the window says different.

People are scurrying around under black umbrellas to ward off the freezing moisture. The skyline is hazy with low lying clouds. Puffs of steam blow out of rooftop exhausts. The city looks gritty, glum, and grey. The winter scarves, coats, gloves, and hats are yet to be stuck to the back of the closet. Had I not already attended a garden show in Philadelphia earlier this month heralding the best and brightest plants for the coming season I would swear everyone was getting ready to hunker down for a long winters nap.

Thank goodness for the "flower corners" all over NYC. You can hardly walk two blocks without encountering flower venders attached to the bodegas and deli's . Hydrangeas, tulips, fragrant hyacinths (I have yet to pass a stand without inhaling deeply into one of these potted beauties), and daffodils. On days like this it helps so much to be able to bring a little spring into the apartment.  As long as I can see evidence of the current season I retain hope it will actually arrive. Soon.

Introduction to Broadway

My husband wanted to see a Broadway play. I wanted to see a Broadway play too. I had already seen  a few and always enjoyed a comedy, a musical, or a combination of both. When it was announced that "Glengarry Glen Ross", David Mamet's 1984 Pulitzer Prize winning play about salesmen competing for their piece of the American Dream, was to be re-staged for a short engagement I knew I would not be seeing any singing and dancing.

Mr. Y. loves the 1992 movie version of "Glengarry Glenn Ross"d. He has been a salesperson for much of his career and some aspects of the Type A personalities quirks and attitudes resonated with him. Plus, how could you NOT love a movie starring Jack Lemmon, Al Pacino, Alec Baldwin, Ed Harris, and Alan Arkin? In my cases I could NOT love the movie when the setting is a Chicago sales office full of cutthroat, egotistical sales people competing for sales leads. Their mantra is "ABC, A-lways B-e C-losing". Or the break room conversation that ends with "Put that coffee down. Coffee is for closers only".  Watching people work in that type of environment, having to scramble for compensation based on their ability to sell a product to people that don't need that product and enduring the profanity (LOTS of profanity), put-downs, and derogatory comments had me squirming before I even found my seat in the theatre.

Mr Y. was beyond thrilled to be there. I was less so. But since Al Pacino was playing the lead (albeit in a different role than he played in the movie) and the cast was entirely made up of actors I recognized from TV, if I was going to endure a dark drama at least it would be entertaining. And entertaining it was. There were funny parts in the play that I didn't remember from the movie. I didn't leave the theatre with a pit in my stomach from watching confrontational characters chew and gnaw at each other to get ahead.

Now that Mr. Y had been introduced to Broadway I'll make sure next time he goes he leaves humming a catchy tune from from his first musical.

On This Bench........

 Walking in Central Park today I began to study the brass plaques affixed to the benches. There must be thousands of benches scattered throughout the park and even though I have rested on several different ones I had not bothered to read the inscriptions. I believed all of them to be memorial plaques and reading them would be akin to perusing tombstones in a country cemetery. They would detail the person's name, date of birth, date of death and perhaps a sentimental verse about their life. There are those types of plaques on some of the benches but when I came across a quote from an animated movie I knew I was going to have to start looking a little closer.

The first plaque I leaned over to read today was this:

Kung Fu Panda? I had no idea there were quotes from that particular movie that were brass plaque worthy but apparently someone did. Well, my goodness I have a LOT of benches to read if the messages are going to be this inspiring and profound.

It makes for a pretty stop-and-go stroll when you are trying to absorb all the messages from loved ones, parents of small children, friends, and even corporate sponsers but it's worth it. There are sweet ones like this that make me think Leonard is one lucky guy:

more philosophical ones like this:

And then there was this one:

and the bench next to it:

But did he? And more importantly did she?

At $7500 a bench (all tax deductible since you are contributing to the Central Park Conservancy for bench upkeep) that's a pretty big, public investment in a marriage proposal. Sitting on a park bench in Central Park has just become much more interesting and thought provoking.

Stuck. Sort Of.

My favorite calendar is stuck on the last day of 2012. A Christmas gift from a favorite sister-in-law in 2011, the Metropolitan Museum of Art Day by Day calendar gave me the opportunity to literally turn a new page every day last year. I enjoyed revealing a new image each morning, never peeking ahead to see what was in store. I loved having it in my home in the Midwest and enjoyed it even more when I moved to The City and knew the objects de art were only a few blocks away, ready for my immediate and leisurely viewing. Some of artwork I recognized immediately and some encouraged me to seek out more obscure collections at the museum (see "Porcelain Century Vase by Karl L.H. Muller (American, c. 1820-1887) Beautiful!) I loved it.

In September, during a vist to the MET with a dear cousin, I saw the 2013 Day by Day calendars in abundance. It was much too early to think of moving on to 2013. I, so typical of me, delayed and continued to enjoy the pages and days of 2012. I thought I would wait until the calendars went on sale. After all, calendars have a short shelf life at the beginning of a new year. None of my outings in December took me close to the museum and trips out of town during the holidays didn't have me facing an expired calendar until a few days into January.

A walk last week took me by the museum but of course, it being a Monday, it wasn't open. An uncomfortable feeling is starting to take hold. I should not have delayed, I should have bought it, stuck it in the back of the closet and been prepared for the new year to start. Yesterday another walk brought me back to the museum. Immediately upon entering the doors I see the the gift shop entrance holds the welcome "Clearance" signs I knew would be there. Holiday cards! Calendars! 50% off and more! I will be in luck. I just know it.

Hurriedly dismissing the wall calendars, mini-calendars, desk calendars, and purse calendars that still stock the shelves, I cannot find the Day by Day calendar. I seek out a clerk. Ah, yes he says with a negative shake of his head. Those are our most popular calendars. They have been sold out for some time. Disappointment sinks in. I really, really wanted to buy my calendar at the museum. It just won't do to recyle 2012. I've seen those pictures and lived those days.

Thankfully, online ordering came to the rescue. Of course they had the calendars. Of course they could have it to me tomorrow if I wanted to pay extra shipping. (I did not.) I don't have the calendar yet but I'm moving on to 2013. I'm going to work harder at not procrastinating. Really.

Umbrellas Are My Friend

Living in a pedestrian city requires that you become friends with an umbrella. Make that umbrellasssssss because just as you get used to a favored one the day turns sunny and and it is soon left behind to become the friend of someone else.
There is no loyalty in the umbrella world.

I had never before given umbrellas much thought. We always had them around the house, shoved under more frequently used weather items like gloves, hats, and scarves but it was rare to pull one out. Oh, maybe there would be a showery morning that required an umbrella covered dash to the driveway to pick up the newspaper that was five times its normal size from absorbing every puddle within three feet of it, but for the most part the umbrella stayed in the closet.

My lesson in learning to carry an umbrella at all times has been learned the hard way. Unexpected torrential downpours have left me shopping, museum strolling, and lunching with a look that should only be viewed in private. That "just stepped out of the shower but with all my clothes on" look. Not a pretty look and very hard to recover from once it's acquired without going home, taking a real shower, and throwing all your clothes in the washer.

It IS possible in NYC to dash under overhangs for blocks at a time but then comes the storefront where there is more people overhang than actual overhang. And you don't want to be that person just barely under the overhang because that is where the rain accumulated on the roof is definitely going to spill. I've seen it happen. Okay, I've HAD it happen. Carrying an umbrella is definitely the way to go.

So now I've made friends with my umbrella(s). I like them all. Big ones, small ones, pretty ones, black ones, travel size, golf size, and even adopted ones. As long as they keep me dry.