Lone Guitarist...

Summer In Brooklyn...

I saw my first burst fire hydrant this morning!

You can't get much more New Yorky Summer than that!

Sir Paul McCartney!

Last night Ed and I went to see Sir Paul McCartney play at the Yankee Stadium - I don't think I'll ever be able to say that ever again! What a night!

We bundled off the crowded 4 train outside the impressive stadium and made our way through the gates...

Well, we went through the gates after finding out the big cameras weren't allowed in the venue, so I had to take my fancy camera and put it in a locker down the road, paying $10 for the privilege!!!

Anyway, once we got through the gates, we made our way to our seats - waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay up in the heavens, on row from the very very back infact, but it didn't matter - the view was still amazing...

We overheard people saying that the stadium could hold 40,000 people for a music event, put it looked like waaaaay more. It was funny to see that the pitch was so protected, with security guards making sure no-body could run onto it and disturb the sand.

There was no support act, just a DJ playing some fantastic mixes of Beatles songs and then there was a 15-20 minute musical introduction with a great video before the big man took to the stage!

The crowd went absolutely bonkers when he came out, the cheering made the hairs on my neck stand up, and then the band started playing, beginning with The Magical Mystery Tour.

The setlist was really really varied, I think he played a lot less Beatles songs this time, compared to when Pops and I saw him (1o years ago!!!) in Sheffield. He played some more albumy tracks like I've Got A Feeling and The Night Before he also did a Fireman song which was fantastic.

He did some great Wings stuff, like Maybe I'm Amazed, Jet, Juniors Farm and Live and Let Die, which was absolutely incredible with all the fireworks...



He even brought out his mandolin to play Dance Tonight, this video's for you Pops...



I had to keep telling myself 'He's 69!' as he was jumping up and down and getting the crowd going, rocking out on his guitar and singing and screaming. He was amazing.

His interaction with the crowd was great too, he was telling quite a few stories, he played a little tribute to Jimi Hendrix (he played Foxy Lady) and told a story about watching Jimi Hendrix play in a club 2 days after Sgt. Peppers came out and hearing the Jimi Hendrix had learned to play it, and then had to ask Eric Clapton to re-tune his guitar for him... Imagine being at that club that night!

He did his ukulele version of Something for George and sung a very lovely song for John, saying that he regretted not telling John in person that he loved him before he died (it was quite sad), he also sung Give Peace A Chance at the end of A Day In The Life.

Of course, he played a veeeeeeeeery long version of Hey Jude...



In the end, he played for about 2hrs 45 minutes (!!!) with two encores, the first of which he had a special guest join him... BILLY JOEL! Being from New York, the crowd went bonkers for Billy Joel too, he looked a bit shocked by the reception (but that might have been because he was probably drunk and didn't really know where he was!). They sounded great together!

It was an absolutely FANTASTIC night and such an amazing experience to see Paul McCartney at Yankee Stadium. The atmosphere was incredible and the audience we singing and dancing along to every song. I have a feeling the he'll be playing gigs for quite a while yet, he had so much energy and sounded absolutely brilliant!

Friday Night...

After work we went for a little walk to the Meat Packing District to de-work and get the weekend started. There's always something new to see whenever you go for a walk in New York...

The Standard Hotel

A Crying Clown Sculpture by Kaws

Some live mural painting.

A cat, a baby and a dolphin...?

It was just a little stroll, but it was enough to see some interesting sights.

Skyscapers at Sunset...

I went up on the roof this evening to watch the sunset. I don't think I could ever get bored of looking at the sunset behind Manhattan, with the skyscrapers, the bridges, the water towers, the chimneys, the Empire State Building... it's amazing.

Big Mack...

There was this BEAUTIFUL, big, old orange truck on Bergen Street on Sunday...

It was an absolute beast!

I want one of these too.

French Hipsters...

Bastille Day in Brooklyn...

After Habana Outpost we went over to Bergen Street where the annual Bastille Day celebrations were in full swing. I think the official Bastille Day is on Thursday, but both Manhattan and Brooklyn had their street parties on Sunday afternoon instead.

As usual the whole street was closed to traffic and filled with sand for a big petanque competition...

There were also lots of food stands and drinks stalls serving champagne and sausage baguettes - I wish we hadn't just had some delicious lunch otherwise I would have been posting photos of a big french hot dog. The queues were pretty massive though, so it was probably for the best.

There was so much going on, and a really great atmosphere...

Some of the side streets near Bergen were absolutely beautiful, there were some lovely brownstone houses with amazing stoops. We went down one of these side streets to get a refreshing iced coffee and whoopie pie from a very lovely little cake shop.

Opposite the cake shop were two lurvely little wooden houses...

This one with the red door is my favourite - give me 25 years and I might have saved up enough to buy it, you'll all be welcome to come and stay, obviously!

There was, as usual for Bastille Day on Bergen, a fantastic band playing outside Bar Tabac. A couple of years ago it was a big band, with pianos and horns and trombones and a singer/conductor - this year it was a smaller band, but equally as brilliant!

The drummer was by far the highlight for me, his 'kit' was literally made out of pots and pans and colanders and he played with metal things on his fingers - it sounded fantastic, the whole band did...

I took some videos - so I hope they work...





I love the Bastille Day celebrations that happen in Brooklyn - I still don't really understand why they happen, but I'm glad they do. It was all great fun.

Back To Habana...

Sunday was incredibly hot and sunny - the perfect weather to go to Habana Outpost for some delicious food!

We went for some brunch, and sat outside in the blazing sunshine and enjoyed the colourful surroundings and the relaxing music.

It was just as fun as before, just as tasty and just as atmospheric - despite being a bit quieter.

As we were finishing my old housemate Jae came up to say Hello - he had been cycling passed with his new housemate (it's funny thinking there's someone else in my old little room!), and spotted us, so came in to see how we were. It was lovely to see him again, he always seems very geniune. It sounds like he's been travelling around and working, he said he'd just come back from designing a restaurant in Brazil!!! Maybe he needs a hand on his next project?

It was a great way to start our lazy Sunday. We finished our yummy food and heading on over to Bergen Street for some French festivities...

Saturday Night Bright Lights...

On Saturday Abi and Alice went off on the Sex & The City Tour (surprisingly, I wasn't invited?!), so once they'd finished with all that business we all met up in the village at Lombardi's for one of their 'world famous' and incredibly tasty pizzas.

We had a huge meatball, pepperoni, pancetta, red pepper and garlic spinach one, that didn't last very long at all once it was put on the table.

To work off the delicious meal, we walked from Mott Street all the way up to the Empire State Building (that's a couple of miles!) to go up to the top and enjoy the view.


As we were walking up Broadway we saw a helicopter flying quite low through the buildings, approaching the Empire State Building. It got really close to the building, so close people who were at the top must have been able to see right into the cockpit. It must have been pretty scary to be up there and see the helicopter coming for the building. It wasn't very clear why the helicopter got so close, or hovered alongside the Empire State Building, but it went away and didn't come back again.

When we finally got to the entrance of the building, there was a big queue, a queue to join a queue! We were just about to go in the doors when a man offered us his tickets to go up to the 102nd floor, when we said thank you he said 'You won't be thanking me when you see the queue!' He and his family had gone up to the 86th floor but couldn't be bothered to wait in the queue for the 102nd floor.

We took this warning and decided to walk a little further, head to Times Square, go and see a film and then within the next couple of hours the queues might have died down a bit.

It was perfect really, as Alice hadn't seen Times Square at night yet, and we were a little achy after walking all that way on a full tummy - so sitting in a lovely cool cinema was ideal. We went to see Horrible Bosses which has just come out over here. It was VERY funny and good fun - if it's out back at home I'd recommend going to see it, I think you'd enjoy it.

It was about 12.30am by the time we got out of the cinema, the perfect time to go the top of the Empire State Building, so we walked back down to 34th to find all the queues had died down and we were able to go straight to the very top...

The view was just as beautiful as always.

Although we've been up the Empire State Building a few times, it never gets boring - how could it? Looking over Manhattan and Brooklyn, seeing the Chrysler Building all lit up, seeing the glowing lights of Times Square rising to the skies, and seeing the Statue of Liberty's torch all lit up in the distance... it's beautiful.

Soggy Friday...

Friday afternoon was wet, very very wet and I got absolutely soaked as I made my way to Crif Dogs to meet Abi and Alice for a drink and by the time I made it there I had rather soggy feet...

I love going to Crif Dogs though, the surrounding area - St. Mark's Place is always full of interesting people and funny sightsts, and despite the grey and damp, it still looked as vibrant as ever...


We made it Crif Dogs just in time for the opening of PDT, the secret bar through the telephone booth in the restaurant. We were on of the first people in, and enjoyed the quiet and cozy bar, sipping some fancy cocktails (well, mine was whiskey and coke, but the ice cube was fancy, it was a very long thick ice cube that took up most of the glass - not leaving much room for the coke after he poured the whisky!). We also had some of their fancy hot dogs.

If you have hot dogs in Crif Dogs, they're amazingly delicious, but they're made with the more regular recipes, like wrapped in bacon, deep-fried and served with a fried egg and some lettuce, or a chili dog. However, if you get into PDT, they have the more gourmet recipes, so there's Mumafuku sauce and molasses.

I had a delicious Wiley Dog - a deep fried dog, with deep fried mayo! Yyyup, they managed to batter and deep fry mayonnaise!!!!! It must be SO bad for you, but as with most things that are fattening, it tasted DELICIOUS!

I know I've already blogged about PDT a couple of times, but it's such a brilliant place, and the whole experience of walking into a telephone booth, picking up the phone and the back wall opening up will never get old.

We had a great time, and managed to leave before it go too busy, or the regulars got too grouchy...

Grrrrr!

Macy's July 4th Fireworks...

It's become a tradition now - my 3rd Annual Macy's 4th July Firework display, Abi's 2nd and Alice's 1st!

We managed to get from Fette Sau to Manhattan in record time, and we made our way up to 5oth Street and 8th Avenue before walking as fast as our legs could carry out BBQ filled bodies towards the river.

I think this year we may have got the best view we've ever had. Managing to pick the perfect spot in between two low buildings, being able to see one of the 5 displays (all the displays are the same, they just repeat it up the river so everyone can see).

There was such a great atmosphere amongst the big crowd of people taking over the whole of the road and pavement for every crossroad from 27th Street to 57th Street along the river.

The fireworks started a wee bit later than scheduled, as they were waiting for the sun to set completely, but the show was well well worth the wait. It went on for 20 minutes, I couldn't hold my arms still enough to film the whole thing, but here are the last 2-3 minutes of the display...





It was a fantastic way to end a really lovely long weekend.

Fette Sau...

After wandering round Central Park we went back to Brooklyn to meet up with Laura and some of her friends for some BBQ at a place called Fette Sau.

Fette Sau (not sure what 'fette' means - but 'sau' is the pig bit) feels like a bit of a secret place, it's out of the way of all the other restaurants near the Lorimer Street stop, and you could easily walk past is without noticing the little sign at the end of the alley way.

Luckily we had Laura to show us the way, and once we found it, it was like a little scecret BBQ heaven. We instantly joined a veeery long queue for the meat - luckily we were able to go to the bar and get a beer while we waited.

Inside Fette Sau was amazing, the decor was fantastic, with a big open front (with those retractable panels, like a garage door) and lots of picnic tables to sit and eat your meat at...

The walls are covered with great illustrations of all the different cuts of meat you can get of various animals and the light shades above the bar were made from old gramaphone funnels...

The seats at the bar were old tractor seats and the beer pump handles were like nothing I'd ever seen before...

They had lots of local beers and a great selection of Whiskey behind the bar. They even had a local Six Point beer that's brewed especially for Fette Sau!

The meat ordering worked in a very similar way to the Country Hill BBQ place we went to last week, you queue up and order various meats by the quarter/half/pound and then choose some delicious sides to go with it.

We had some of the sweet pork sausage, some of the pork belly, some of the beef brisket and some of the most incredibly deliciously tender and juicy boneless beef ribs I have EVER tasted in my life... with cripsy rub no the outside and the most amazing meat on the inside, that you could probably cut with a spoon... it was sooooo goooooood!

It felt very fitting, and a very American thing to be doing on July 4th...

They even had patriotic hand wipes!

It was, by far, the best BBQ restaurant I have ever been too and I'm already considering going again this week! If not, I think a trip will be in order in the next couple of weeks for sure. I have a feeling they might even deliver!

BBQ's good for you, isn't it?!

Boats, Beer and Boogying...

On Monday, after a very American breakfast of over-easy eggs and french toast, Abi, Alice and I went to Central Park to enjoy the July 4th sunshine.

We had initially planned to go to the zoo, but after seeing the massive queue for tickets, we decided to just carry on walking through the park and head for the boathouse for a drink.

We had a very restful time, sitting on the sunny deck by the lake sipping beers, watching the terrapins popping up to say hello and all the people in the rowing boats trying not to bash into each other.

Then we carried on with out walk, heading towards the famous and fabulous Central Park Roller Disco, which never fails to be incredibly entertaining.

It was, as ever, full of very interesting characters!

We just couldn't help but stand at the sides for aaaages watching all the characters dancing their way round...



It was a great relaxing, sunning afternoon and a very New Yorky way to spend Independence Day afternoon before heading to Brooklyn for some BBQ.

Phillay...

Yesterday I went to Philadelphia for the day to meet up with Swazi Ed!

We worked out that it'd been about 4 years since we last saw each other - but once we met up it didn't feel like it at all, it was really lovely to see him again.

He's over in Philadelphia doing a placement as part of his PhD research, so he'll be around for another few weeks - we've planned a couple more visits, Ed's going to be visiting us in New York in a couple of weeks and I expect we'll meet up again before he leaves.

We didn't really see much of Philly yesterday - so we walked around chatting for a wee while until we found a bar that was open, and then set up there for the next 5 hours... the time flew by and then it was time to get back on the bus to New York.

I did spot this famous landmark on the way to the bus though...

Just for some proof that I was actually there!

It was a really lovely day, and great to realise just how easy it is to go to Philadelphia for the day . it took less than 2 hours to get there in the morning and about 2.5 on the way back. It was great to be able to catch up with Ed and rememeber all the fun we had in Swaziland...

Who knows, one day we might get to go back?!

Can of Coke?

How this got signed off and allowed to go on shelf is a mystery.
For sale in the Staten Island Ferry Port shop... unbelievable!

Co-ordination...

I think Abi and I might start co-ordinating our outfits a bit more!

Staten Island Ferry...

After sorting out my bike stuff I went to go and meet Abi and Alice at South Street Seaport for lunch. They'd walked over the Brooklyn Bridge in the glorious sunshine while I was at Target - so we all met up for some lovely fish on Pier 17 before heading to the Staten Island Ferry.

It was just a quick little trip - just to see the Statue of Liberty really, so we got on in Manhattan, went across to Staten Island, got off the ferry bought a drink, and then hopped back on the the next ferry to go back to Manhattan...

It was a quick, but lovely little trip and you get some pretty good views from that free ferry!

Obey in Bedstuy...

I also spotted this new Shepard Fairey pasting on Myrtle Avenue, not too far away from our laundrette - I'm not entirely sure if it's the real deal, or if it's a copy cat, but it's got the Obey logo on there and it's definitely a Shepard Fairey design...?

MIke's Mobile Knife Sharpening...

Whilst cycling home, I spotted this funny little van...

It's a mobile knife sharpening van - that also does scissors!