Adios SF!

I'm out for a week, if you need me I will be here:

source

Where I will be enjoying some much needed girl time.

Finding cute dresses.

Trying to figure out why I ever left.

And very little else.

I'll try to bumpdate tomorrow but other than that posting will be light.

Everyone enjoy your week!

That's What Friends Are For

Sometimes while I'm here in San Francisco I forget what it's like to have a bunch of friends all around me.

People I can call to meet up for a quick drink after work.

People I can swing by their place on a whim because I'm in the area.

People who can come hang out and watch chick flicks with me while my husband is traveling.

I forget what's it's like to have those people.

But last Saturday I remembered.

My miscarriage started almost as soon as we landed in NYC.

I had a bit of spotting. Light brown. Minimal.

My midwife said she wasn't worried, spotting is very normal in the first trimester and as long as it wasn't red and I wasn't having any pain it was nothing to worry about.

Friday the spotting continued and began to pick up in quantity, but it was still brown.

Friday night it turned red and I got worried. But I really REALLY did not want to go to the ER in NYC at 11pm on a Friday night. And honestly I knew that if I was miscarrying there was nothing they could do for me.

Saturday morning I passed a small clot and that was it. Time for a visit to the ER.

The ER visit was BRUTAL. We were there for 4 hours, I had several really painful pelvic exams, 3 ultrasounds where they just stared and stared at the screen but wouldn't tell me anything and when I finally got off the table my blood was all over the floor and they didn't even clean it up, just threw a towel over it AFTER I had stood up and seen it.

Brutal.

After 4 hours they finally said it, your baby has no heartbeat.

We both broke down in tears that we had been holding in just waiting for the words even though we already knew hours ago.

And I really really wanted to go home. I could not imagine a worse time and place for this to happen. This was supposed to be my birthday trip to my favorite place in the world and here we were experiencing one of the worst things imaginable.

We were staying with friends, but I just couldn't face going anywhere where people would be.

So we booked a hotel, got into bed and cried our eyes out. And I told Dom I just wanted to go home.

He told me I would regret that. Not saying goodbye to everyone.

And as shitty as I felt and how desperately I wanted my own bed and my own bathtub and my cats to snuggle with, I knew he was right.

So, as we texted our sad news and the calls slowly came in one by one. I said yes to everyone. Yes you can come by.

And within a few hours our teeny tiny New York hotel room was packed full of people. People who cared, people who had stopped whatever they were doing to come comfort us in our time of need.

They brought wine.

They brought food.

They brought presents.

They brought themselves.

And I felt loved.

And then I realized that yes, worst timing possible, but also best timing possible. If the miscarriage had happened here in San Francisco I would have had no one (except my husband of course, but he's hurting too, he needs comfort just as much as I do). No one to hug me, no one to comfort me, no one to whisper in my ear that it get's better with time because they know, they've been there too. I would of had none of that.

And for that I was grateful for the timing.

Because that, that is what friends are for.

NYC Bound

Today I am off for a much delayed, much anticipated birthday trip to NYC.

It may be a month late but I FINALLY get to enjoy a birthday party for yours truly with all of my friends.

It's been 10 months since I've seen my beloved city.

New York, I love you, mama's comin home!

I just wish it was longer than 4 days!

Organic Lollipops and a Wax

My title sums up San Francisco nicely. Let me explain.

I went in for a wax, the really terrible kind, the painful kind, the Brazilian kind. When I walked in I was presented with a lollipop to "help me through the experience" and then she told me it was organic. If that's not San Francisco I don't know what is.

Super nice. Almost overly so. And uber worried about saving the environment.

Sidenote - In Oregon (and possibly the rest of the Northwest) we call lollipops SUCKERS. When I got to New York and said sucker, people were confused and totally thought I was some hick from the midwest. TRUE STORY.

Back to San Francisco, I have nothing BAD to say about San Francisco, other than it's not New York.

I mean more by that statement than simply the geography.

People say that New Yorkers are rude and unhelpful, the city is considered "hard", abrasive and rough. But that's why I LOVE IT.

And by the way, the only people that think New Yorkers are rude are tourists, other New Yorkers KNOW that fellow New Yorkers just know how to get where they're going or get what they want and sometimes it takes a little...brashness to achieve whatever results they're looking for. Also they're not sight seeing! They're...living and need to get where they're going quickly!

It takes a little getting used to, but as soon as I found my groove in the Big Apple I knew I was "home". The hardness suits me. I don't like extra niceties, I'd rather get to the point.

San Francisco is the EXACT OPPOSITE and I'm having a hard time adjusting.

For instance, I have a tendency to rush the elevator/train/crosswalk, etc etc. I learned long ago that people will push you out of the way if you're not moving fast enough, and that it's better to be ahead of the crowd, THAT WAY YOU'RE IN FRONT OF THE TOURISTS =)

Unfortunately, no one else does that here, SO I LOOK VERY RUDE AND PUSHY!

I also totally stole a cab from some girls the other night, BUT BITCHES WERE TOO SLOW ;-) I know the San Francisco thing to do would have been to let them have it, but seriously, I was closer and I got in the cab first, THAT'S THE WAY IT'S DONE. Even the cab driver complimented me on my smooth skills, SERIOUSLY.

Another sidenote - whenever I think of stealing cabs I think of my friend Jessica from No No You Say and her getting pissed off at some girls fishing downstream from us a a few years ago in NYC, so when she saw an open cab slowing to stop for the evil downstream fishers she booked it across the street with 5 inch heels and A BABY STRAPPED TO HER CHEST...and got herself a cab! Those are mad skills...and yet they would be totally unappreciated here.

San Franciscans also like to compliment anything and everything...randomly...on the street.

I've been complimented on my shoes, dress, hat, hair, you name it, someone has randomly told me they like it. I find this endearing, but honestly, I DON'T CARE IF RANDOM GUY ON THE STREET LIKES MY HAT. Yes it's nice to be complimented, but really, if you're driving an El Camino and you tell me you like my boots while you drive by me in your ugly El Camino I'm going to think seriously about throwing away my boots BECAUSE YOU OBVIOUSLY DO NOT HAVE GOOD TASTE.

And boy do they like to chat. Chat about the weather, chat about my hat, chat about my car, chat about the Giants, WHATEVER, doesn't matter. I mean on the bus, on the train, in the cab, EVERYONE wants to talk. PLEASE JUST LET ME READ ME BOOK IN PEACE CRAZY STRIPPER LADY, I DON'T WANT TO TALK ABOUT HOW YOU LIKE MY SUNGLASSES AND WHERE I BOUGHT THEM AND HOW YOU USED TO BE A STRIPPER IN NEW YORK!

People don't talk to you in New York! They leave you alone!

Is this terrible of me? Shouldn't I think the niceness is GOOD?

And btw, they become rude New Yorkers when behind the wheel of a car. The niceties extend only to face to face conversations, when it comes to driving it's EAT or BE EATEN, they don't take no crap when it comes to driving!

What else do I have to say about San Francisco?

They LOVE to recycle. And I love them for that.

It's pretty amazing the amount of things you can recycle or compost here. Plastic bags are banned from grocery stores, they only use paper bags and using your own bag is HIGHLY encouraged. You also receive a GIANT recycling container and a TINY garbage container and a compost container for garbage pick up.

Remember my compost post? Well, holy hell, these people take care of all of that for you! You just throw everything into a big bin and they haul it away every week and compost the crap out of it somewhere else. It's pretty awesome.

They also have zero emission buses that run on electricity and EVERYTHING is organic ;-)

I like it. They've cut out something like 70% of their waste with the systems they have in place.

Go San Francisco.

What else?

Oh yes...the hippies.

Listen, I'm from Eugene, Oregon. LAND OF THE POT SMOKING HIPPIES. But these people put Eugene to shame. Both with their sheer hippiness and with their pot smoking ways. More often than not I smell weed on someone getting on the train and more often than not I'm deterred from walking AROUND OR NEAR the crazy homeless hippy bums. I don't know what it is but they TOTALLY FREAK ME OUT, something that I've never encountered in New York. I think it might be the likelihood of them trying to talk to you, ie. ever the friendly San Franciscan, even the bums want to chat...or get high with you if you're interested ;-) Cause you know pot is LEGAL here.

All in all, I LIKE San Francisco, but I don't LOVE San Francisco. I've been told by many that it takes 1 year (or maybe a bit more) to fall in love with this city. I find this discouraging because I fell in love with NYC when my plane touched down in the dead of winter 6 years ago. But, I'm still giving it a shot, hopefully in the next 10 months my like will turn to love.

Anyone else ever moved somewhere and taken awhile to fall in love with their new city?

Nothing Says Valentine's Day Like Magnolia

Believe it or not I did this by accident.

I made cupcakes for our neighbors because Dom insisted it was the "neighborly" thing to do and just because they're my favorite I made Magnolia Red Velvet Cupcakes.

Coincidentally the lovely little red and white beauties were also perfect for Valentine's Day.

Magnolia Red Velvet Cupcakes w/Cream Cheese Frosting

The only thing I change is that I only put in 4 cups of powdered sugar in the frosting because 5 cups is just a bit too sweet for me.

Sorry this is a crap photo, but these are obviously beautiful little red treats of deliciousness.

If you've never been to Magnolia in NYC (specifically the one in the village) I highly recommend it. Make sure to get a Red Velvet Cupcake and Banana Pudding, YUM!!!

I miss NYC =(

Are You From New York?

In general no one here seems to notice that I'm American. As far as I can tell my accent distinguishes me as an American IMMEDIATELY, but apparently that is not the case... or maybe no one cares enough to comment. I don't know. Dom on the other hand, EVERYONE notices that he's English right away and comments on it. I find this funny because to Americans Dom and the Aussies have a very similar accent, sometimes people think he's an Australian when we're in America, but apparently to the Aussies they find his accent more distinguishable as English than mine is as American. I don't get it. And in fact sometimes I get lumped into being English as well, just because I'm with him i guess? Seriously, what? I do not sound English.

Anyway...

Last night was the first time since I've been here that someone actually said something about me being American, except they didn't ask me if I was American, they asked me, "hey, are you from New York?" Weird right? Dom and I were just coming back from our dinner cruise, not talking about New York, in fact I don't know what we were talking about, but it definitely wasn't NYC. Anyway, isn't that a strange question to ask someone? Was it our outfits? Honestly I have no idea, but I was like, um...yeah, I guess I am. And then they proceeded to tell us about how they went to New York once, except they stayed in JERSEY! And we had to go and be all New York snobs on them and tell them that Jersey is not New York, LOL. They probably thought we were rude...and you know what? We probably were.

We're still such New Yorkers sometimes.

West Side Story Bitches!

Doing everything one last time. That means one more Broadway show! This past Sunday we decided we'd hit up Broadway one final time...well final time whilst living here anyway, I can hardly say this will be our last Broadway show ever. Anyway, while watching the Today show last week I saw a commercial for West Side Story on Broadway and thought to myself, "Perfect! I've always wanted to see that!" Except I had no idea what it was about! Insert sheepish look here. But I convinced the hubs that I knew what it was about and had always wanted to see it, so he agreed to take me for the Sunday matinee.

I went into this knowing this much...two gangs and dancing in the streets of New York.

I did NOT know that this was a Romeo and Juliet type of story.

I did NOT know that half of it would be in Spanish, because one gang is Puerto Rican after all.

I did NOT know that this is where "I feel Pretty" originated from.

I did NOT realize how gay dance fighting really looks, in fact I don't think it HAS to look gay, but it looked really gay in this particular show. And really now that I'm thinking about it, it definitely does NOT have to look gay, think Michael Jackson's Beat It video.

Ok, it's a little gay, but not this gay, West Side Story.

I was excited going into it.

But decidedly disappointed coming out of it. And felt slightly guilty for dragging Dom to it. But just slightly.

I usually love musicals, so my disappointment was mystifying even to myself, what was I expecting?

Rent? Amazing!

Wicked? Amazing!

Beauty and the Beast? Amazing

Spamalot? Amazing!

Cabaret? Amazing!

Yes, I was expecting it to be like any one of these amazing Broadway shows, and it was not!

Anyone else ever seen West Side Story, anyone love it?

Picnic in the Park

Spring is possibly my favorite time in New York. This city gets a bad wrap for it's weather...and rightfully so, both the summer and the winter are dreadful.

Summer is so unbelievably hot and humid that when you walk outside you feel like you're in a sauna and want nothing more than to immediately turn around and go back to your air conditioned apartment.

Winter is so unbelievably frigid that if you leave your apartment without gloves, scarf, hat and winter coat you won't make if a block before you decide wherever you're going is not worth the frostbite.

But spring, spring is beautiful in New York City =)

With just over a week left before we're off to Sydney, the hubs and I organized a picn

ic in Central Park with our closest peeps, something that none of us do very often but are always glad when we do. Luckily the weather cooperated and we made the long trek uptown, nosebleed above 14th street be damned!

I'm so glad we managed to fit this in one last time before we leave.

I have no idea what Summer is pointing at, but this is a pretty pic.

T-minus 7 Days before we move to Sydney!

Picnic Prepping

This Saturday, all my NYC peeps, the hubs and I will be hitting up Central Park for a little picnic action. We have an awesome picnic basket that is dying to be used just one last time before it gets put in storage for 7 months plus I just got this awesome portable wine thingie...it looks like this:

Source: Emmohome

Not only does it make boxed wine oh so fashionable, but it also has room for ice, which means chilled white wine in the sun on Saturday here I come! Now if only the weather would cooperate...

Nostalgic New York

Though I'm excited to be embarking upon this new adventure, I am definitely going to miss New York. Knowing that we will be leaving this amazing city, probably never to call her home again, I find myself looking around with new eyes. Remembering how big and scary she was when I first got her and how familiar she is to me now. I will miss you New York.

The Angelika

Pearl Oyster Bar (Best Lobster Rolls in the City!)

Washington Square Park

Florence Meat Market (Best Butcher in the city!)

T-minus 15 Days to Australia!

Photo montage taken with my iphone using the Hipstamatic app.