On Thursday, we headed out for a trip to New York City. Lately I like taking photos right into the sun.
Lizz waiting for the megabus.
Lizz, Karen and I all went together. I love traveling with friends. It’s such a different way to experience a friendship that you’re used to just existing in one place.
Right after we got off the bus, we stumbled across the Macy’s in Manhattan with big animated Christmas window displays. There are parts of Christmas I actually like and seeing the Macy’s windows in Chicago was always something I liked accidentally crossing paths with.
Our first stop was New York bagels of course, which we got from Murrays in Manhattan. We met up with Lizz’s cousin David who was in town auditioning to be a Blue Man as part of the Blue Man Group! He was really nice.
Navigating the subway is always a little intimidating to me, since I still don’t really have any concept of the layout of NYC still.
After Murray’s, we headed to Prospect Heights where our hosts Sergio and Paul live. This is Sergio with one of his cats! Sergio and Paul were really outwardly friendly and warm hosts.
Stopping for coffee
We headed out to Champs Diner to meet up with my old roommate Ryan and our friend Ian from Braddock.
Karen and Ryan at Champs
We had a little more time to kill before heading to the Bowery Ballroom to see the Weakerthans so we decided to go to Foodswings for vegan milkshakes.
Part of the reason we were in New York was to see the Weakerthans play their whole album, Left and Leaving, which was a crucial album to all of us at one point or another. To me that album has stuck with me since I was 18 and has all sorts of weight and memories associated with it. It was a really good show, exactly what I was hoping for. I called and texted a few people during certain songs to leave them songs on a voicemail. I share a lot of memories with people over that album. Here’s a video of Left and Leaving, one of my favorite “long distance” songs ever. As someone who’s part of the great punk network with regular friends/crushes from all over the world, I do have a category of favorite “long distance” songs. The Weakerthans sounded perfect live.
Untitled from ramsey beyer on Vimeo.
After the show ended, Lizz’s friend Mae needed to stop by a party that a friend was putting on. He’s a nightlife events coordinator in NY and she said stopping by one of his parties is liking stopping by your friends art show or seeing their band play. It’s a way of supporting him. She warned us that it would probably be crazy and weird. We had to go in a fancy hotel and give his name at the front desk, and then we were shown up to the correct floor by an elevator guy. VIP.
It was in this dark fancy lounge that was all glassed in with pretty views of the city. It was a really weird mix of people and music and drinks and dancing.
Outside on one of the patios
These guys kept dancing with glowsticks and one particularly drunk one kept trying to get us to dance. I was sort of egging him on because I get like that in situations where I’m slightly out of my element. But that’s what makes it fun.
Mae and Lizz. We ended up staying pretty late even though we were mostly just talking to each other. I was sick when I left for New York but I was reeeally sick by the end of this night. I almost couldn’t talk because my voice/throat had gotten so scratchy.
The next morning Karen and I went on a quest for a shiny dress. The show we were going to that night was the last show for PS Eliot, a band I’m friends with, and it was supposed to be a Black Tie Formal. So I wanted something sparkly and silly. Karen and I stopped for coffee and did a search for a Rainbow, which is a cheap and cheesy store similar to Forever 21 that you can find in most big cities.
After I found a dress and sparkly gold shoes, we headed back to Sergio and Paul’s to watch some cartoons and chill out for a while with Mae and Lizz. We were all pretty tired by this point. Sergio had a giant tin of popcorn. This is relevant to my interests.
We took a burrito break
and then watched more cartoons while waiting for Rachel and Shira to arrive from DC.
Lizz Catbelly, that’s the punk name I just gave my roommate
Everyone arrived and we got ready for the show that night at Death By Audio.
r-har
To add some chaos to the already hurried mix (the show had the potential to sell out and we were running laaate), we locked ourselves out of the bedroom that had all our stuff in it. Paul worked his muscle magic to pick the door lock. He said they’d accidentally locked themselves out a few times as well.
At the show, where I could hardly talk because my throat was so sore. I always get really sick when I go to New York to see the Crutchfields play music. I think it’s a curse. I went on tour with their band, Bad Banana, this spring and got very sick the night of their New York show and was sick the rest of tour!
I was sort of out of my element since I was so sick. I didn’t even take any photos of the band. Sorry ladies. It would’ve been nice to snap some ‘last show’ pics.
The best part about the show for me was seeing friends from all over who traveled to be there, including our pal Claudia (who you might remember from my philly zine fest picture post) who came down from Toronto!
Our crew for the show
We found our way back to Sergio’s and had a relatively early night (1am? not early at all by sick standards…). We all fell asleep watching the Chipmunk Adventure, which is one of my all-time favorite movies.
so many cat photos
Saturday morning, Sergio took us to Tom’s Diner, which apparently is the Diner that Suzanne Vega wrote that song about.
You know, this song.
Apparently it’s a very popular joint. There was a long line, but they gave out cookies, oranges and coffee for free to people waiting in line. Very smart.
It was nice to get to know Sergio, who I had never met before, but he lived in DC and is a mutual friend of many. I love discovering people within a wider social circle that I still haven’t met. People with whom I have, say, 40 mutual friends with on facebook. It always feels like ‘why on earth haven’t I met this person until now?’
On the subway to our bus back to Philly, tis the season I guess.
I had a few hours of downtime to decompress and unpack, and then Woody and Ian came over to hangout and play bananagrams. Ian was in New York for the Weakerthans show, and then came to Philly to hang out before returning to Braddock. Woody is another of the crew from the DC network, which seem to be the only people I hang around these days…. I don’t know how that happened.
Ian crashed at our place. We watched Glee before I fell asleep, which I always do when I try to watch late night tv or movies.
On Sunday, Ian and I went to the punk rock flea market, which was waaaaaay bigger than I could have possibly imagined.
Buddies Steph and Melissa, with their vegan baked goods, Flax Your Head.
We met up with Karen and Peter
and then we all headed over to Blackbird for some vegan pizza.
Ian and Peter
Everyone is lookin all cute and wintery these days. This weekend was really the first cold weekend we’ve had in Philly.
Karen’s cat, Ender, is easily one of my favorite cats. He’s a good buddy. Dog-like cats are my favorite cats.
Their puppy, Valentine, is getting much bigger! She still has a lot of puppy energy though. She’s a little babe. Look at the fire in her eyes!
Karen and Peter and their cuted up house. Clearly they’re both designers. They have the only ‘adult house’ of anyone I know in Philly, but most couples I know who just live together do I guess. It’s easier to decorate cohesively when there’s fewer people in a household. They have a roommate, but the house is definitely done up in their aesthetic. Even when Valentine is being calm, she still looks like she’s ready to pounce!
Back at my house, we played more bananagrams while waiting to go to a pizza cookoff at the Bathhouse.
We arrived to the Bathhouse and found sooo much pizza! There was a vegan category, a non-vegan category, and a dessert category. It was all very delicious.
A lot more pizza came even after this photo. My favorite was the poutine pizza made by Claudia, the Canadian, of course.
In Jesse’s room. I really like the look of places with a lot of “stuff” but in reality, it’s my worst nightmare to have a lot of stuff! Maybe because I’ve moved houses so many times the idea of carting non-functional items around with me feels really impractical. I guess that’s what’s caused my ‘minimal’ aesthetic. But this loooooks really awesome.
We entertained ourselves with one of the prizes for best pizza, a book of “Geeky Heartthrobs”
I snuck this photo of me and Karen in the giant mirror before we headed home.
Just before leaving we caught the announcement of best pizzas, which Jesse theatrically announced.
and I’ll leave you with cat pizzas
