Mario Batali's Babbo

Lobster pasta !

Gnocchi with Oxtail

Happy campers

lupe fiasco + b.o.b. concert

Lupe Fiasco

B.o.b

more pictures of my favorite buildings and parks...

Flatiron Building from Madison Square Park

MetLife Clock tower from MSP

Shake Shack in MSP

View from Union Square, looking north

Washington Square Park

The Sandman and his art

Spring in WSP

the guggenheim

the outside, from across the street.  designed by frank lloyd wright.  

inside the center of the rotunda, looking up towards the skylight

inside the rotunda, looking across the atrium, art and museum goers on the other side.

while the art in the museum wasn't my favorite type of stuff, the guggenheim itself is easily the coolest museum i've ever been to.  when I arrived there, I watched a 27 minute film about the history of the museum and its constantly changing exhibits.  after that, I took the elevator to the top of the museum and proceeded to look at the current work on display while walking down the 7 story spiral ramp.  while the frank lloyd wright design was initially controversial, it has proven itself as a lasting icon of modern architecture.  

northern central park shots

Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis reservoir, looking east from around 88th street.  

my new friend

so, last night i saw the movie kick ass at the union square movie theatre.  on the way home, we walked back to hayden by going down university place.  as we we're walking, i was singing the wu tang clan song C.R.E.A.M., which stands for cash rules everything around me. at a certain point, we passed by this bar that had a huge black bouncer outside of it.  he overheard me singing and decided to join in.  we sang the part that goes "get the money, dolla dolla bill y'all" together.  it was really cool to have someone on the street recognize and appreciate my taste in music.  hanging out with a bouncer in new york.  nbd.

my conversation with spike lee

today, i was walking around new york when all of a sudden something magical happened.  i'm standing on the island with the cube on it around astor place waiting for the street light to change when i see this man decked out in yankee attire.  he had the jacket with all the years they'd won the championship an a classic yankees cap.  he also had a customized pair of beats by dre headphones around his neck.  this pair was special because they were made of white and blue plastic and had the classic "ny" yankees logo on each side.  when i got closer to him, i realized it was spike lee, the famous film director.  feeling courageous, i went up to him and said, "those are sick headphones" to which he responded, "thanks man, they sound great".  at this point, the intersection was clear and the light changed so he began to walk away.  even though it was brief, i got to speak with spike lee.
nbd.

atoms for peace

tonight chris and i went to see thom yorke's new band, atoms for peace, play in new york.  a few years ago, thom yorke wrote a solo album called the eraser which consists of 10 songs with low-key beats, minimalist techno influences, and of course his hauntingly beautiful voice.  as radiohead is inbetween albums right now, thom decided to go on a small tour and play theses songs live for the first time.  he recruited flea from the red hot chili peppers (my favorite band) to be his bassist and nigel godrich (radiohead's producer) to play keyboards and guitar.  he played the entire album and then followed it up with a few random songs, including everything in its right place by radiohead.  it was a great show (although it only lasted an hour and a half) and awesome to see such a unique lineup perform an album that many thought they would never hear live.

thom yorke + flea (with blue hair)

dinner with NYU President John Sexton

back in october, I entered a lottery to attend a special group dinner with the president of my university.  a few days ago, while in class, I received an email letting me know that i had been chosen to attend.  I didn't even remember that I had signed up for the lottery since it was so long ago but I was really excited.

The event took place in the university penthouse, located on the 18th and 19th floors of 37 washington square west.  john sexton doesn't even live there so they just use the space for special events.  the views from up there were unlike any other I've seen in new york so far.  since greenwich village is in a relatively "short" part of manhattan, you could see all of midtown (empire state building included) in one direction and all of downtown in the other.  

john sexton spoke to the group of 20 undergraduates for nearly 4 hours.  the dinner was scheduled to be from 6:30-8:30 but didn't end until 10:30.  john began by telling us pretty much his entire life story all the way from his childhood in brooklyn to being the current president and everything in between.  throughout his storytelling, he would pause and use the events of his life to illustrate an important lesson he wanted us to remember.  by the end of the night, i was incredibly proud of what he had accomplished not only for himself but also for nyu.  and yes, he gave me one of his famous hugs.

no big deal.

the view of midtown

downtown 

a few pictures from the metropolitan museum of art

one of monet's water lilies

wheat field with cypresses by van gogh 

self portrait + flowers

i don't remember 

international pillow fight day 2010

today in union square, thousands of people gathered for a massive pillow fight.  it started at 3pm and lasted until almost 6pm.  there were even people providing pillows to those who wanted to fight but didn't have pillows.  the part of the park the fight was in was so littered with feathers by the end, it was pretty disgusting.

Chrysler building

yes, I took this picture.  nbd.

this is easily my favorite building in new york.  i love catching glimpses of it from places you wouldn't normally expect to (the top of kimmel for example).  an interesting fact about the chrysler building is that nobody died while building it during the late 1920s.  when it was completed, it was the tallest building in the world for 11 months, until it was eventually surpassed by the empire state building.    

looking forward to the return of the green

Central Park, New York

Photo courtesy of Flickr user kw~ny

walking the brooklyn bridge

spending my spring break in new york has allowed me the time to do the things in the city i've been wanting to do but haven't had the time to.  for months i've wanted to walk across the brooklyn bridge but i've always been too busy or too scared of the cold to do so.  since it was 70 degrees out today, it was the  perfect opportunity to do so.  we planned to eat at grimaldi's pizza, located at the base of the bridge on the brooklyn side, but the line stretched all the way down the block and was too long.  in walking the bridge, it's best to take the subway to brooklyn then walk from there towards manhattan so you can admire the skyline while you walk.  below are a few pictures i took.  

the entourage 

from the ground

skyscraper national park, view of midtown

john lennon memorial

today I visited the john lennon memorial in central park.  it is located near the 72nd street entrance on the west side of the park.  the part of the park the memorial is located in was named strawberry fields and is right across the street from where john lennon and yoko lived. when we were there, there were a few musicians playing old Beatles songs on acoustic guitars in memory.  it was a pretty powerful experience to see so many people still stopping by and paying their respects even after john lennon died 30 years ago.  

the part of central park where the memorial is, near the west 72nd entrance

the dakota, the building john lennon lived in and was shot outside of.

american museum of natural history

what a cool museum !

i finally made it to the natural history museum after wanting to go for quite some time.  they had everything you could ever want out of such a museum.  of course, they had a a huge exhibit of dioramas depicting scenes of ancient life and panoramic landscapes filled with model animals and humans.  that kind of thing didn't really interest me though.  when I go to museums i like to see things you know you can't really see anywhere else.  giant dinosaur skeletons and 

huge tyrannosaurus rex skeleton!

star of india, largest sapphire in the world (golfball-sized)

a huge meteorite, weighing in at 5.5 tons.

life-sized model of a blue whale

a shot of the new planetarium and space center from outside the museum.

central park!

view of midtown from the great lawn