TGIF-ing

My coworkers and I have been waiting for the yearly holiday increase in sales for a while now and the people finally came out this weekend. The last few nights I have worked have been quite lucrative AND fun.  ‘Bout time!

Friday Jen and I had the whole day off together! As previously mentioned, our plan was to get to the NBC building in Rockefeller Center early in the morning to get stand-by tickets to Late Night with Jimmy Fallon.  We had to come back around three to check in (which seemed pointless) and then again at exactly 4:15 (we were a few minutes early and told to keep moving because we were a fire hazard. Seriously?) to line up in our numbered order. We were the 29^th and 30^th people in line out of about 100 so we thought we had a pretty good chance.  Long story short, they only had about ten spare tickets and we didn’t get to see him, this time.  Jen was super disappointed because we'd put in so much time and effort and because Maya Rudolph was one of the guests that night.  We’ll just have to get up earlier next time.



Friend/ coworker Blair measuring one of her models



The day wasn’t wasted though. We did some Christmas shopping and for dinner went to the Chelsea Brewing Company at Chelsea Piers. Although the brewery is kind of in the middle of nowhere, it’s got a great spot right on the Hudson River. Plus, their Pumpkin Pie Ale is delicious. The highlight of the day was definitely ice-skating at Bryant Park. Doing anything with Jen that requires a moderate amount of eye-hand coordination is always entertaining (pic).  I was a little disappointed because she didn’t fall once.  A lot of other people fell, though, which kind of made up for it but the ice was still missing blood. We had to endure about 100 elementary and middle school kids who were on a field trip.  That was fun.  There was also a man who had to be in his eighties skating around in old-fashioned skates and was clearly wearing a diaper.  My favorite was the man in a wife-beater (It was forty degrees out) who was doing triple axles, among other stunts, and appeared to be on acid.

It’s been tough, but I’ve been doing ok watching my carbs and sugar lately in preparation for the Fusion Fashion Show. Tonight I went to my first fitting for the show at Parsons. Only two of the four designers who chose me, Jackson and Simon, had templates ready for me to try on tonight.  There were about ten or so designers working with their models while the director of the program did some DJ-ing up front.  There was great energy in the room and it was fun.  I was surprisingly comfortable with stripping down to my skivvies in public.  Enjoy the few pics I was able to sneak in.



Designer Simon  photographing model



MoMa

A few months ago I blogged that I was going to visit more museums and galleries on my days off. I visited The American Museum of Natural History, really enjoyed it, and then forgot about my goal until Jen mentioned it recently. Well, this week I followed up on my previous statement by visiting The Museum of Modern Art (MoMa). In Midtown, not far from our apartment, it offers amazing collections of contemporary architecture, design, drawings, paintings, sculpture, photography, books, and film. I entered into its vast lobby, headed to the information desk, and found out I get in for free because I’m a student at a city college. I like this place already! Some of the highlights for me were the collections of wild midcentury-modern furniture, evolving NYC urban design, and the outdoor garden that the museum surrounds (pic). After feeling like I got my money’s worth in the museum, ha, I headed to the design store which had really cool modern gifts. You can visit the store anytime without paying admission and I’ll probably be going back to show Jen. I could have easily spent a lot of money in there. I’ve always liked modern art but enjoyed the museum even more than I thought I would. This is usually the case with me and museums and the reason I want to continue exploring the ones NYC has to offer.

Around the time I was leaving Jen was getting off work so we decided to meet at Herald Square to do some (more) Christmas shopping. With the combination of holiday shoppers, heavy security due to the President being on the move somewhere close to MoMa, and people heading to the Rockefeller Center Tree Lighting, the sidewalks were packed! Once I finally made it we started at Macy’s which was just slightly less crazy. As frustrating as it all can be, the stores, and really the city in whole looks best this time of year. Entire buildings in the major shopping districts are dripping with lights or wrapped in ribbon like big packages.

I’m working tonight but Jen and I have all day tomorrow (Friday) off and might go to a taping of Late Night with Jimmy Fallon tomorrow evening if we can get standby tickets. Hope so!