Hello dear readers. I’ve been gone from the blogging business as stated earlier to work on my book which is progressing nicely, I might add.
Today, it has become clear to me that my blogging must begin anew because of my dear friend, Patricia. Patricia is a friend that would probably give me the shirt off her back if I needed it. We have a rich a varied history which included a stint with a gourmet dinner group and a trip to London many years ago. She spent lots of time on East Coast, attending the Univ. of Maine as well as living in New Jersey for a time. And that is why I bring her up today.
We are getting ready to embark on our trip to Turkey and this will take us to New York. In an effort to say money, we decided to break up our trip to Turkey on the way over by flying a redeye and staying all night in New York City (NYC) one night and then boarded our Turkish Air flight to Istanbul the next day thereby avoiding a long torturous flight in the back of the plane. And then on our way home we decided to fly back to NYC from Istanbul and visit the place for a few days before taking the final leg of the trip home by flying out of Newark to San Francisco.
And then we looked for places to stay and I don’t recall how we did it, but we ended up booking an hotel in Brooklyn. The price was right. Now I have to state here and now that neither the Rayman nor myself are that familiar with NYC….and that’s why we’re going there…to get familiar.
Anyway, it occurred to me that I should call my friend, Patricia, and ask her where we should go, what we should see. Which is precisely what I did a few weeks ago. She said she would get a list together and call me back. And she did only I wasn’t home and she left me a message and I forgot to return her call until a couple of days ago. And then she called me back and this went on for a few days and we finally connected a few minutes ago. And I must say I haven’t been laughed at with such zeal in a long time. When we found out we were staying in Brooklyn, she said, “WHY?”. I said, “Price.”. Then she proceeded to ask where in Brooklyn and so I told her and she laughed, perhaps uncontrollably. She then told me that Brooklyn is on Long Island, a good ways from Manhattan. We will need to take a subway there and it will be at least 30-40 minutes each way. And we won’t be able to go back to our room during the day. She said Park Slope, the neighborhood, had been a slum but in recent years it has improved. OMG. More laughter. Uhm, uhm.
She then hung up to talk to her good friend, Nancy, who lives in NYC to see about Brooklyn. She called back and said, “I’m not going to tell you what Nancy said about Brooklyn.” Oh, dear. However, there was some mention spuddering on the NYC end of the line. And Nancy, may have asked, “Are they poor?” Patricia likened our staying in Brooklyn to visiting San Francisco and staying in Woodside. Or Palo Alto. Oh, no. That wouldn’t make too much sense. But in our defense, oh, heck. We have no defense.
All of this occurred at the same time that Patricia wishes we would have called her back because she was set to buy a ticket and take us around. OMG. I was embarrassed and annoyed with myself. Having Patricia as a guide would have been fabulous. But I digress.
She then told me to contact the hotel and find out how far away the subway was and that her friend, Nancy, had a friend that rented an apartment out for 5 days at a time in Manhattan and really, really, we should email him about and that she would call her friend, Nancy, and have Nancy email the info. A aside. Patricia can’t email me because her computer is down, hasn’t been working for months, perhaps years…and her telephone is listed under someone else’s name completely…I know this because of caller I.D.
And this is the same Patricia that met me in London, she having arrived several days ahead of me and my mom (my mom stayed with a friend of hers and I stayed in an hotel with Patricia) and then getting me at the crack of dawn the next day (what jet lag?) and dragging me all around the city walking here, walking there never returning until after the theatre let out (midnight) and then doing the stay routine for several days in a row before then boarding a bus to Wales with my mom and her friend, Peggy, and debarking at an hotel that sported red furry wallpaper in the lobby and where the elevators stopped at mid-floor landings thereby giving you the opportunity to schlep your bags up or down a half flight to a green fuzzy wallpapered room where I woke up the next morning with Patricia pounding on my door at 10:00 a.m. and wondering why I had missed breakfast. My god, she just wore me out.
And this is the very same Patricia that decided to make a nectarine mousse cake for dessert for one of our gourmet dinner parties and she “underestimated” the time required and showed up for dinner a respectable 2 1/2 hours past the start time. The mousse cake was fabulous though. My prime rib was overcooked, a disaster. Yes, we held dinner for her and while waiting, we all got tipsy on too much wine on an empty stomach.
And this is the very same Patricia that had a party for the 4th of July and made papadzules (a Mexican egg dish, Sand pronounced papa dew ees) and didn’t serve dinner until 11:30 at night…about the same time that guests just asked for doggy bags as they were leaving. It was late, for heaven’s sake. Also, the ice cream never got hard in the hand cranked machine that Glenda, another friend, brought and so Glenda refused to be further involved because the whole vanilla bean disappeared into the slosh of cream and egg yolks…a bad mistake by someone, apparently. In Glenda’s defense, it was late.
I could go on and on but you, dear reader, must surely have other things to do today.
As it turns out, our reservation is unchangeable and of the non cancel variety so we’re stuck in Brooklyn, Patricia declines to be involved in the debacle but she was kind enough to say that there were things to be done in Brooklyn that are quite interesting including theatre. So…not all is lost.
The day we left home, we received from Patricia a AAA Guide Book along with many handwritten pages of what we should see with the sights at the bottom of Manhattan listed at the bottom of the first page and as you work up the page, you also work yourself up Manhattan. Fabulous friend, that Patricia.
What a hoot. You can’t make it up and I’m sure this is just the beginning of a fascinating trip that begins in a week or so from today. Stay tuned.
Leave Comment