Category Archives: Extras
Photoblog 017: Mooooooooooo York.
Photoblog 016: Grand Central Eats! Nomnom.
If people didn’t know any better, you’d think all I do in New York is eat (well.. that’s kind of true.)
Grand Central Terminal (AKA Grand Central Station) is one of the most beautiful buildings in the city. It’s a mix of classic architecture and design with modern-day functionality. Which makes it awesome.
I’ve always been a fan of the zodiac and astrology, and the ceiling of Grand Central is a giant painting of the constellations.
On each level, you have tracks (metronorth and the LIRR) leaving for Connecticut and Long Island. I decided to grab lunch today down in the dining concourse, which is in the “basement” so to speak. It’s home to a huge variety of food; pretty much any classic ethnic meal you’d want, you can find (I went with falafel today!) And a few popular chains like Juniors and Hale & Hearty Soups.
The station itself is pretty huge. Several levels and lots of wings, I always end up finding someplace completely new every time I go just to wander. I’ll have to go back and take pictures of the shops you can find (the fresh market is EPIC).
Stuff I have coming up: Port Authority Bust Terminal (ugliest building in NY) and Bryant Park!
Sketchbook Scans 001: Runic Annoyances
So I’ve been having trouble getting inspired to do artsy thing, be it drawing, sketching, or just free-form writing. It’s easy to try to look elsewhere for inspiration; friends, idols, culture.
But wanting to inspire myself is a little harder. While looking for classes to take over the summer one instructor described his course as tapping in to the inner artist; we all have two, the outer artists who observes and records and the inner artist who creates. I need to find the latter and shake her back into existence.
Anyway, point of this “series” so to speak is to inspire myself by drawing, sketching, doodling, and scribbling in my sketchbooks / notebooks and scanning all my old crap (we’re talking 10+ years of madness) to remind myself of those days when I was freer. You know, back in college and high-school when I wasn’t quite corrupted / jaded by adulthood and responsibility and actually had the time and energy to let my mind drift into the very scary abstract unknowns of my being. And shit.
Today’s scan dates back to sophmore year of college (age 19-20) where I apparently was taking notes in ancient runic & making a list of things that aggravate me.
I will eventually get around to translating the runes, since I have forgotten it enough that I can’t read it off the top of my head anymore. Yes, I used to be able to, but I also used to know the entire Pokérap by heart. Many things fade with time, it would seem.
But yes. My top 3 annoyances at the time were women w/ strollers, know-it-alls, and George Bush.
Go figure.
New York Photoblog 015: Urban Jungle Lunch
During warm weather, New Yorkers like to eat outside (even though it’s particularly hot today…). People will sit pretty much wherever they can plant themselves. Popular eating spots for lunch include buildings with lots of stairs, like museums and in this case the New York Public Library. This facade faces east from 5th Ave and spans 2 blocks (40 – 42 st) so it serves a HUGE chunk of lunchers, including workers and tourists.
Taste of Times Square 2011 Review
The great thing about summer in NY is that there’s room to be whimsical with the never-ending array of things to do. Working in midtown has its perks; sure the place is bogged down by tourists at any given point in time, but, the offset is that there’s always something interesting and/or free around.
Today I ended up passing Times Square as I’m apt to do on my way to the port authority when I came across the Taste of Time Square music & food festival thing. Now, I love food. I certainly look the part, too. I was more than excited to give it a go and it was the perfect warm/cool start of the evening to do so.
The jist is simple; buy tickets each worth a dollar and trade tickets in for food. You can buy traditionally 5-10 although certain booths offer buying one for one. All the vendors set a ticket price for their wares; on average a decent sampling will cost 3 tickets. Some are more, some less.
I ended up trying four delicious dishes; Eggplant parm from Carmine’s, oyster w/ beer-based sauce, conch chowder from Angus McIndoe, and “Hush Puppies” which is some deep fried smörgåsbord of marine delicious from Bubba Shrimp.
There was a total of 34 vendors this year from around Times Square spanning five blocks. Unfortunately, getting there late (after work) basically meant I couldn’t spend enough time as I would have liked. The ticket deal also meant I couldn’t try more than a handful out of them all; I had to really pick and choose wisely and didn’t even get to hit up the last block of restaurants. The atmosphere was pretty good; overcrowded but years of working at anime cons and dealing with rush hour kind of cure you of claustrophobia.
All in all: good times were had. I’ll probably make an effort to go again next year!
So check out the gallery of delicious and be jealous. <3
~Isa
Picture 014: The City At Night
Picture 013: View from the Train
@Janus Kane : subways are way worse, as much as NJT blows. We at least have AC and a chance at sitting, haha. Subways, you’re gonna stand 95% of the time.
@Izmeer: Yeah, I’ve had to stand once or twice before I learned the trick of just going all the way to the back of the train. The last few cars usually have space.
From Rain Rain Go Away
Rain is nice, but in NY it’s really shitty cause cars splash you and it mixes with the usual city much making for some grossness at times.
The worst is when it snows, it’s pretty and white for all of 10 minutes and then it’s just brown and yellow slush for the rest of winter, haha.
You guys will get a few of those pictures, I’m sure.
Picture 012: Misery Loves Trains Full of Company
This was one of those unfortunate days.
