To internet or not to internet…

A few weeks ago I was talking to Maya about the possibility of getting the ability to check my email and get internet on my phone.  Just considering something like that made me feel like a traitor and heading down the slippery slope toward the land of Blackberries and iPhones.  I work at a non-profit and no one needs to contact me at the drop of a time and I check email enough as it is.  Plus, I always liked the idea of being internet and email free for at least a few hours of the day when I was away from my desk at work or not at home.  
 

So why am I changing my mind?  First, I’m trying to get my voiceover career moving and it seems like in the VO industry, if I wait too long to return an email, the job could be gone and offered to someone else.  An agent she said a guy took three hours to respond to her inquiry about a job and that was too long.  Three hours was too long?? Damn. If she had called the guy she probably would have had a more immediate answer, but I digress.

Second, recent events have led me to see the light about the benefits of having internet access and email on my phone.  This past weekend I chilled with JYC in Queens.  I wasn’t checking my email a lot or anything, but I knew I could if I wanted.  I went back to Mt. V on Saturday evening and tried to get on the internet to do my usual (email, FB, Gchat) and the internet wasn’t working…gasp!  It was late, so I shut down the comp and decided to try again on Sunday.  Sunday morning rolled around, and I tried once more to get on the internet and again, NO LUCK!  ARGH!!!  Clearly something was going wrong.  I texted JYC and Maya to let them know I didn’t have any internet and that I was feeling out of sorts.  There was no Pandora, no Hulu....no Blogger.  I actually had an idea for a blog post (these ideas don’t come that frequently) that I had to put on hold because I didn’t have the internet.

I contacted Verizon and began the process of getting our internet going again.  I cut off the power on the router, hit reset using a paperclip, waited to see if the light would change from yellow, pardon me, “amber” as the Verizon folk say, to green, and in the end they determined that it was “problem with my router.”  I questioned this because coincidentally, my mother had upgraded our internet only days before.  She hadn’t gone on the computer for three days and didn’t know that the internet wasn’t working.  Can you believe it?...she went a few days without even bothering to turn on her comp.  But I was completely reassured by Verizon that it was purely a coincidence that my internet wasn’t working…yeah, riiiiight.  I was told that I was going to get a new router by Tuesday and everything would be working fine once I set it up.

Well, it’s Tuesday night, the new router came in, I hooked it up and surprise, surprise…it didn’t fix a damn thing.  I’m writing this post in Word, then uploading it, so really it's Wednesday now.  I can only assume that Verizon is working tirelessly to fix this problem.

I can’t tell you how incapacitated I feel when at home without internet.  I wanted to check the hours of a store, thought about printing a coupon, actually wanted to do some work from home and of course, check my email and I couldn’t…I can’t!  And I don’t like it one bit.  So it’s settled, at age 29 I will creep into modern times and get internet access on my phone…I think it’ll cost me an extra 10 bucks a month.  Notice, I’m not getting a BB or an iPhone.  I don’t like the look of BB’s and I don’t want Blackberry thumb. As for the iPhone, I just don’t really do Apple stuff.  I’ve never had a Mac or an iPod, so the iPhone means little to me, but maybe I'll be singing another tune in a few years.  In the meantime, I’ll settle for a regular phone that lets me check email and do some websurfing.  I’m trying to decide which one to get, so feel free to let me know which one seems more my style. :)

 Samsung Rouge, LGenV Touch and LG enV3

Harlem Days

As many of you know, I now work uptown at the Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture.  Since moving back to NY in 2005, This is the first time I've worked outside of the midtown/40s blocks.  There were some adjustments made to my commute and I had to get an unlimited metro card again (not happy about that added expense) but overall, I'm happy to be working up there.

I came across my grandparents' birth certificates and saw that my great-grandparents, lived in the same area, and at one point, down the block, from the Schomburg.  My grandparents were Harlemites up until my father and uncle were toddlers, before they moved on up to Mt. V, so it seems appropriate that I'm getting to know the area that my dad's side of the family called home for a good portion of their lives.

The first way that I am trying to get to know Harlem is through my stomach. So I'm just going to talk food ...

Harlem is a VERY dangerous place for food, especially, if you like Soul or West Indian food.  I feel like you can't walk two blocks without encountering a Soul, Fried Chicken or West Indian place...cuisines that I happen to really enjoy.  When I'm feeling hungry and I haven't brought my lunch to work, I have to resist the urge to get macaroni and cheese or a beef pattie, and I'm frequently left craving a Cosi Sandwich or soup from Hale and Hearty.  But then again, I manage to get a sandwich for $5 bucks or a whole meal from one of the soul food buffet places (not Mannas...I'm through with them...see below) and spend at a maximum $6, so it's balances out, sort of.

These lunch time challenges made me eager to find good lunch places in the Harlem area, and if I'm trying out lunch, I should find good dinner places too!  (I'll talk about dinner in a later posts) This quest to explore Harlem began when I started working up there in November and continues today, so I'm going to bring you up to speed.

Oui, Oui Crepes and Pizza - They had just opened when I stopped by in November, and I wanted a crepe, but the guy who makes the crepes wasn't there.  So I got a slice of pizza.  It was mediocre, but now that they've been open for awhile I'm going to check them out again soon.  Hopefully the crepe maker will be there.

Spoonbread - I've gone there multiple times.  The first time I got the chicken salad sandwich, fries, a slice of cake and punch.  Based on that order, I hope you understand why I say it's dangerous to have lunch in Harlem.  The sandwich was really delicious and tasted like my mom's chicken salad.  I don't remember the cake and the punch was just spruced up fruit punch.  But the two other times I've gone to Spoonbread they haven't even had the chicken salad.   How hard is it to have chicken salad everyday?  And if it's difficult, make it a special, not a regular menu item.

Manna's - Probably the most prevalent Soul Food buffet franchise in Harlem has a location down the street from the Schomburg.  On the whole their food is fine, but I got their macaroni and cheese twice and both times it was SWEET.  Mac and cheese  should NOT be sweet.  So I'm done with them.

Jacob's - I heard from one of our volunteers that Jacob's was opened by a guy who was a chef for Manna's.  It's another soul food buffet place.  I was nervous that their mac and cheese was going to be sweet, but it wasn't so they are my go-to buffet place.

Trattoria Amici - Misha and I made a lunch date and strolled down Lenox and paused by the door to consider this place.  At first we thought it was closed, but an eager young guy, who actually was the chef, greeted us with a smile and convinced us that the restaurant was indeed open.  I got the penne a la vodka and thought it was really tasty.  I wish it were a bit cheaper, but it was good.  I've gone back a few other times because the chef, Modu, is friendly and they have $5 drinks during happy hour.  I'm not eating cheese right now, so I need to stay away from Italian places, but I'll go back at another time for lunch and try something different. 

88 Chinese Restaurant - I hadn't had Chinese in a while and needed something without cheese. My colleague recommended this place and I was pleased with what they offered.  The lunch special is good.  For $5 I got my usual, Broccoli with Garlic Sauce and plain Fried Rice, and Chicken with Rice Soup.  I wasn't blown away, but I certainly wasn't disappointed.  It wasn't oily and had a nice sauce.  When I'm in the mood for Chinese I will turn to them.

Oh and there is a place across the street in Harlem Hospital.  I was a little nervous about eating there, because I didn't expect anything in the hospital to taste good.  But they make very very delicious grilled chicken wraps. I  round out my sandwich by adding some onion rings from a Halal truck that manages to park itself right in front of the Schomburg everyday.  A grilled chicken wrap with a side of onion rings...yum yum yum yum yum...my preferred lunch time meal.


Ok, those are all of the places I've visited for lunch.  For all of this week I'm going to be brown bagging it to work, but there are many more eateries to try.  Slowly by surely I'll get to know the neighborhood, one meal at a time.  :)

I'm BAAAACK!

Yeah, it's been awhile since I've blogged. *hanging head in shame* Blogging has always been difficult for me. If any of you read my other blogs, you know this. And once Maya stopped hounding me, it was like I had a free pass to chill, hence the months long hiatus. But...I'M BAAAACK!


I started thinking about why I had not been blogging. And the answer is clear...I was busy! Here's a quick run-through of what's been going on since my last post...

I was promoted to a new position at the Libs, I was dating Mr. Meet Up (some of you might remember him from "What Would Matthew Say?"), and I was trying to really dig in and get my voice-over career going, in addition to other random activities...blogging just wasn't fitting in. Plus, you know me, I like to tell and share stories and frankly, I didn't think that I had any good ones, or at least not ones that I should be writing about in a blog. ;) Anyway, I realized this blog is all about me and my journey to 30, and I don't need any special stories.

So...I'm a little over four months into 29 and moving full steam ahead toward October 22nd! There have been some challenges and disappointments these last few months, but this happens and I know great things are on the horizon. In fact, I've already got great things to report...

On February 22nd, exactly eight months to the big day, I booked a cruise going to FL and Bahamas, and I'm trying to plan another trip before then because I don't need to wait until October to take a vacation. So I hope to go to Europe with a friend, and hopefully see my Granny in MS at some point too!

Oh and I've been cooking! *gasp* I made a New Year's resolution to cook at least one new dish per month. Yes, only once per month. I've had people roll their eyes or turn their noses up to say that wasn't a big deal. But I don't cook at all and would sooner make a sandwich than turn on the oven, so cooking a new dish per month is BIG. Thus far, I have not broken my resolution. In January I made a pasta dish with red peppers, broccoli and parmesan cheese. I just went in the kitchen and threw some stuff together...it wasn't too bad, but didn't knock my socks off. But February was a knock out month for me -- I made two - two - new dishes, and an old standby, my ground turkey breast roll. Of my new dishes, one was a tuna pasta salad, which required the use of the blender (!) to make a red pepper puree sauce. My second new dish was a smothered pepper steak courtesy of Emeril. I had never worked with beef before, but I had my gloves and got clearance from my mom that some of the beef will be that red raw-looking color and other portion brownish (I thought I had been sold bad meat). Anyway, the dish was sooo flavorful and the meat very very tender. If you eat beef, you need to add this recipe to your repertorire.

Well, I think that's enough from me. I've brought you up to speed and there's only more to come...more recipes, more travel plans and more NYC explortion...spring is coming so I've got to get to know my new neighborhood -- Harlem awaits me! Stay tuned..