Snowed in!

Made it back to ny just in time. Ordered a crap load of Indian
delivery. Am set for days!

Don't tell the vegetarians!

Coworkers Holiday Happenings

Here are some pics of me and my coworkers.

First one is me and my immediate team mates who went ice skating after work: our manager Rohit, another Senior Associate Jeff and me. For some reason, it looks like the guys are holding hands! When we got on the ice, it started to snow- such a Hallmark moment for us!




















Below is me and Madina, a coworker I have become good friends with already. We are at our company holiday party which was 80's themed!


















As part of the 80's theme, there was 80's candy available so we took some bubble gum cigs and pretended to smoke on the dance floor for some 80's NYC clubbing nostalgia!

Weezer concerts!

I just finished seeing both weezer concerts in ny on Friday and
saturday nights. It was an unreal experience!

OOOoooMMmmmmmm....

Well I got back from the Ashram Sunday night and I am feeling more peaceful than ever, but more importantly I am have come back so grateful to be back in NY! After four days of not eating any meat, I met up with some friends to have burgers in the West Village! What a great welcome back!

Also, there was no caffeine allowed in the ashram, so a lot of the time during silent meditation, I would sit there just thinking about a hot, creamy latte.... Mmmmmm. I will never take my Startbucks for granted again and treat every latte like a gift from above.

As for the yoga part, it was very relaxing and I can feel stronger already. I was creaking all over the place in the beginning, but towards the end of the trip I was feeling more fluid and flexible in my movements. I want to continue practicing at home too!

Below are some quick pics of the sign for the retreat at the boat dock, me being peaceful by the beach, and the coconut grove that I would lie under and read.

More pics and stories to come!

50K words!

So after writing a few thousand words a day I managed to reach the 50K word mark to win the NaNoWriMo challenge, but my novel is far from over. So what I have now is a really really rough draft, but I will continue to write, and maybe even keep updating my word count as I go along.

But I find that my novel will soon become more akin to Eat, Pray, Love because next week, I am going on vacation to a Yoga Retreat in the Bahamas!

But this is no ordinary tropical vacation. It begins with 6AM mornings heading straight into silent meditation, followed by yoga at 8AM and then 10AM breakfast. Then yoga again at 4PM and some communal get together at 8Pm and then lights out at 10PM. Vow of silence from 10PM - 8AM. No meat, caffeine, nicotine, or alcohol.

I should really take at least one beginner yoga class before I leave next Thursday!

Writing my novel

So as you can see in the column on the right that I have signed up for National Novel Writing Month, in which you commit to writing a novel over the course of a month with a word count of 50K words by the end. Today being the 15th, we are at the half way point and I am furiously trying to get in my last 2K words in order to reach my goal.

So nearly every day, I have been in the most awesome tea shop in the world and it doesn't hurt that it is only 1.5 blocks from my apartment. My friend Usman who is also writing a novel took this picture of me with my head in my netbook and I thought I would share it on my blog. Must get back to writing!

Secret present

Someone mysteriously taped thus zipper pull to my door today. On it
reads the word "dove." whatever the heck is goining on, it's like an
old fashioned mystery and I like it!

Cartoon of my neighborhood

Here is a cartoon that appeared in the Village Voice. It is actually a good representation of my street!

Cupcake class

This week I took a cupcake baking class. It was fun and here is the
finished product. The reason they look so poor is that once they came out of the over all of us wanted to ice them right away so the icing melted on them. Other than that, they were delish!

Halloween in NYC

This is the scene right outside of my door. Totally gross amount of
ppl acting stupidly.

Knicks vs Celtics

I was back in the company box to see a pre season bb game. Celtics won!

Christie and me

Here we are en route to the Jefferson memorial. After this I treated
to the Old Abbott Grill next to the white house in return for letting
me crash with them!

Soup line

I'm trying to flip my pockets inside out here while in the soup
kitchen line, but you can't really tell what is going on.

Weekend in DC

So I am visiting my classmates in DC over the long weekend and here
are some pics from the FDR museum. It was nice and peaceful.

Fireplace pictures

So a while ago I bought a fireplace candelabra for my non-functional fireplace. I then played around with my new camera and wanted to share some shots. Sorry about the strange formatting, but the website is a little off today.

WWE @ MSG

I am in box seats at Madison sq garden for wwe wrestling. It's like
wearing a top hat at the trailer park... You're still at a trailer
park. But it's fun so far!

MoMa

So before I start work, I'm running around the city accomplishing
things I don't think I'll get to after I start work next week.

I liked this picture. It was among others describing African Americans
coming to the north from the south. The title of this is "But living
conditions in the North were better." you can see my reflection in the
glass.

My neighbor in #8

No lie, my neighbor looks like the old guy from Disney's UP. Apparently, he's been in this building since 1967. I used to think he was crotchety until he received my UPS package today and helped me bring my new rug upstairs. And now he is my favorite person in the building! He is British and has a ton of books in his apartment. Maybe we can be like the duo in UP.

Couch

So my couch came today and it fits perfectly in my apartment. I also
ordered a rug to go underneath it. Now I am on the hunt for the
perfect pillows!

New Sofa!

Here is a pic of the new couch (minus red pillows) that I bought today as I hit the streets of Soho for something for my living room. This is just one season old and I got it down from $1500 to $800! It is from some swedish designer and it opens up as a sleeper for one. Now i can walk tv on a couch instead of stretching my neck from the bedroom!

First night in my new place

So today is my first full day moved into my new place. Last night after the movers got in the last box and helped me rearrange some things, I went out with some friends to see a comedy show. Upon coming home, I remembered that I had no idea where anything was so I slept on my plain mattress. It wasn't such a bad night actually. No trash bags taped to the windows this time. And this time, it actually feels like a home rather than a infested place to sleep like my other apartment.

The glaring thing missing is storage space as I am unpacking my boxes and looking for a place for my things. I think I might do another round of goodwill giving; hopefully, I can find one that will pick up the goods.

Luckily there is an ACE hardware store right around the corner next to a small coffee shop. This was my only destination today and I may go back for more things b/c it is very good for small space solutions.

So far, I have met a couple of neighbors. The people here are very old and have been living here for 40+ years including the super. I bet they all have rent control and pay $125/ month or something like that. And it's suckers like me that have to make up for this inequality to make this darned building profitable! But they are all very nice and it is very safe on the 5th floor. My poor movers yesterday looked as if they would expire each time they reached the top with my huge boxes.

Anyway, I am here safely and happily. This truly feels like home. I just need this full week to clean and unpack.

Good bye Inman sq!

Today I am moving. Will update with ny pics!

Red sox game!

Awesome seats!

Got keys!

So I got my keys on Tuesday, hired a cleaner to clean the place top to bottom and now I move in on Sunday, father's day! Though I slightly feel bad that the movers have to work on a holiday, there is sure to be less traffic in Manhattan that day and maybe I can save on the move! Here are pics, pre-cleaners:


















Living room. I will put my TV on this side.


















Bathroom. Very small but I have seen smaller. Oddly enough, there is a skylight above the shower.


















Here is the kitchen with full sized appliances. woo!


















Here is the long shot of the place. Glass paned doors close to the entrance of the bedroom.


















Here is the inside of the bedroom where my deco fireplace is. Pretty sweet!

New Apartment in NY!

****UPDATE*****
I was approved and it's officially mine! Yay!
******************

Barring any unforeseen problems, I have put in an application for my own one bedroom apartment in Greenwich Village in Manhattan on MacDougal St between Bleeker and W3rd. The red steps are the front of my building! It's the best location in the world and I have exposed brick complete with fireplace (nonfunctional)!!!

More to come on the outcome and pics. But it is such a long walk up, I am all the way at the top!

http://tinyurl.com/34t3jll

Suzi's 1st bday

Suzi gets to dig into her very own cake!

BVI pics

This was taken on our first day at sea. As soon as we got our stuff on the boat, we headed out to meet our other classmates.














A few days we grilled off the side of the boat.














We snorkeled almost every day and here is a snorkel site we went to called the Baths.














Lunch this day was a group effort!















We docked for a few minutes here to refill our water tanks and get some ice!

Gradutation Webcast

Just got back from a week of yachting around the British Virgin Islands! It was truly a once in a lifetime experience and pics will be up soon.

Now I am in the home stretch towards graduation this Friday. I found a link for people to webcast the event live on Friday!

http://web.mit.edu/commencement/2010/webcast.html

Gala pics

Birthday ice cream cones!













Sit down dinner at Gala.



























Mansion on the waterfront in Newport!













The back lawn of Rosecliff.

Spring Gala

This weekend we can all kick back and celebrate our class Spring Gala event in Newport, RI. Our class rented out Rosecliff mansion for the night for dinner and dancing!

http://tickets.newportmansions.org/mansion.aspx?id=1001

Can't wait to post pics!

Celtics game!

I'm OK

So I guess I never realized how many things my twitter feed was attached to plus I never did a follow up tweet to thealarming message I tweeted yesterday. I spent about two hours in MIT med yesterday hooked up to an iv drip where they let me just soak in the nutrients and fall asleep which was nice. I went through two bags, and afterward I have to say I felt a whole lot better, maybe 60%. I then went home and slept a lot and today I am back at 85%. I even ate a PB&J sandwich! (though the thought of Korean still puts me off).
So in the end, the doctors have no idea what I had. Maybe it was a virus, maybe it was bacteria. But the bloodwork came back fine. Sorry to gross you all out with this picture, but I found it amusing. P.S. iv drips make you cold, but it is a rather refreshing feeling!

And thanks to all who called, tweeted, and texted making sure I was ok and had everything I needed. I'll try not to alarm you guys again!

rainbow

There's a rainbow coming out of my head!

Pics from Safari

Jet lag is setting in now, so this post will be quick. These are the highlights of the pics I took on safari in the Masai Mara last weekend with my new camera!


















Giraffe up close.














A pack of elephants.














We visited a Masai village and made this human MIT with our guide.


















Two cheetahs, a very rare sighting!














We found a fully grown male lion on the very first day. He was right outside of our vehicle's window which is how I got such a clear shot!














And just to prove I didn't pull these pics off of google, here is me with an elephant in the background!