Tag: #NYC

  • Day Trip Out of New York

    I decided that I was going to take the weekend off from writing anything, with the exception of journaling. That lead to an exceptionally lazy Saturday, where none of us did anything. As for Sunday, we planned a hike outside of New York City, at the Great Hollow Nature Preserve in Connecticut. We went looking for a place that had an “easy skill level” that was kid friendly, but still had enough of a hike to make us feel like we had accomplished something. Great Hollow checked all the boxes, and we had a wonderful afternoon of hiking, which ended with a picnic on the lawn.

    As we are now in the middle of August, the last month of Summer before school starts, the idea that we will be able to get away for a vacation is no longer even remotely a possibility. To make the best out of this situation, we are planning more day trips upstate, and seeing if we can find a few more easy trails to tackle. This has been the third time this Summer that we took a short excursion to get out to a park or preserve to do some very easy hiking, and it has been a welcome relaxation for us. 2020 has thrown us so many curveballs, car trips to break up to monotony of being stuck at home have helped.

  • Just a Little Tone Deaf

    Just a Little Tone Deaf

    I live in New York, and I read The New York Times. None of this should come as a shock to any of you, as I am sure you have noticed I refer to many stories from The Times. I support what they do as a newspaper still trying to inform the populace, and for holding people in power accountable.

    And now and then The Times fucks up.

    Case in point, “Turning a Second Home Into a Primary Home,” written by Julie Satow for the NY Times Real Estate section, which was published online on 7/24/20, and then in print on 7/26/20. If you can’t guess from the title, it’s about people making their vacation homes outside of NYC into their primary addresses, and with the exception of Newburgh, NY (which isn’t a bad place, just not super wealthy trendy) all of the people profiled are living in rather exclusive places.

    From where I sit, I’m watching people in my neighborhood of NYC move out, and also know a few people who are behind on rent. The $600 a week Covid unemployment payment ran out on 7/26, and evictions are about to start up again soon for most people, so it really struck me as odd that The Times thought it was a good idea to celebrate people who are doing fine. (I don’t fault the people profiled for being successful; they earned it.) Who is this story helping?

    I know I’m not alone in this thought. Just read the comments on the story, and you will see that most people agree that this is the wrong time to be talking about “discovering” the joys of a home you only saw 7 weeks out of the year.

  • Coronavirus: Moving Out of NYC

    Coronavirus: Moving Out of NYC

    I know that I am not the first person to talk about this, but it does need to be repeated; the amount of people moving out of New York City is enormous, and just might have a terrible effect on the City.

    Today, another neighbor moved out of our building. Yesterday, a neighbor also moved out. Last month, the first tenant in left on the top floor. There are only twelve apartments in our building, so we are 25% vacant. In better times, an empty apartment here would be taken in a matter of days. As soon as one person moved out, the place would be cleaned and painted, and another person would be moving in.

    Our building isn’t alone. In our neighborhood, I counted two moving trucks Sunday, three on Saturday, and another three on Friday. On July 3rd, the first weekend of the month, I counted six moving trucks. Now, I do this count when I walk the dog in the morning, so I have no idea how many other people are moving themselves over the course of the day. And that’s only in a five-block radius around our place.

    When it comes to this, what has been making the news around here is the amount of rich and middles class families that are leaving New York for the suburbs and upstate. What has not been making the news is all the young people, who moved here to start their careers and live their dreams ,are moving back home. I know its kids moving out because the moving vans aren’t big, and the furniture they are throwing out is crappy.

    If all of these young people leave, and most of them are in the theatre arts, it will have, I fear, a dreadful impact. Yes, most actors wait tables, but I was a temp when I started here. I did dull filing and office work. Where are the temps going to come from to do that when the City does open up? They are also the diehard audience members, and they also are the new ideas. This virus might cause a huge creativity hole for a generation of theatre.

  • Pretty Much Back

    So… It’s been close to three months that I have been off of the blog, which is a very sad shame on my part.

    I feel compelled to update:

    I had a job, then my wife got a job, and we discovered that it was psychologically damaging our daughter to have both of us working from home, and both of us half-ass trying to help keep up with the kid’s school work. Then I got laid off from my job (thank you, Coronavirus) and I have become the stay at home dad now. I got the kid through her classes, and she has been promoted to go to kindergarten, and I am trying very hard to keep her skills up by working on her reading, writing, and math over the summer. I also quit drinking over the month of June, and did not gain any helpful benefits from doing that, and in fact, I put on more weight. My unemployment claim was denied. People are moving out of New York City left and right, and the town feels like a husk of its former self, and pretty much every day, the world feels like it’s coming to an end, but we are protesting with the hope that up until the end, if we survive, we’ll have a better world to live in.

    Oh, and I don’t have health insurance, and I started a novel, but hey, I bet half of NYC can say the same thing right now.

    How are you?

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  • Coronavirus: Day 17, Laundry Run

    Balance still seems to be our issue. We are trying to make sure that we keep some sort of routine during the week including doing the online classes for the kid’s school, while I’m trying to work my job, and then there is the wife who is trying to hold the family structure together, and still looking for a job, though even she will admit that it feels like a fool’s errand at this point.

    To keep that normalcy feeling, I did laundry today, which meant that I had to go out to the local laundromat. I was not excited about doing this, but just like grocery shopping, even the most mundane tasks now are sprinkled with the possibility of infection and disaster.

    Our local laundry place did have signs up saying that only people doing laundry were allowed in, and to please not bring extra people. They even suggested washing/sanitizing your hands upon entering and leaving. And most importantly, don’t hang out while your clothes and washing/drying. I went first thing in the morning, right after they had cleaned the place, and by following their rules, it did feel like it was a clean and relative safe activity. Oh, I did wash the hell out of my hands when I got home each time. I’m still trying to be safe.

    But what I did notice, and have noticed for the past few days on the streets of NYC, is that there is an undercurrent of aggression. The people who ask me for money aren’t taking no for an answer. I even had a guy ask me for a lighter, which I didn’t have, then he accused me of lying which spurting out obscenities at me. Even in line for groceries, it’s like people are looking for a problem to have with you.

    I think I am beginning to see to toll that this is having on the psychology of the City.