Chi-town

Um, did I mention that I'm going to Chicago? Yes sirree...tomorrow morning, bright and early. Irene is participating in a sprint triathlon there and I'm going to watch her. For those of you who are fans of her, I'll post some Irene-approved pics from the grand even after I get back.

I was in Chicago in June, but only for about 12 hours. I'm looking forward to going to Millenium Park, which is supposedly really cool, and being in a different city for a couple days. I think this will be the last away from NYC time that I have until Thanksgiving rolls around, so I'm taking advantage of it.

My parents are going to jump in the Clampet-mobile and drive out here over Labor Day weekend to bring me all my must-haves. Aren't they lovely? This is actually the THIRD time they've agreed to drive to NYC to either get me/my crap or drop me/my crap off. Three cheers for parents!

A sudden lull

This day is just absolutely d-r-a-g-g-i-n-g on and on! And it's only 12:15 PM!

After weeks of being very busy, overwhelmed and stressed, I suddenly whipped my database records into shape and now have nothing to do. I don't even think there is anything I could do but that I just don't want to do. I took care of the last item on that list yesterday.

Actually, I am about to go to my first lunch with a recruiter. This woman is supposedly a complete airhead whose bubbly personality can't be contained or dampend and whose job opportunities our students don't wish to even entertain. She recruits Financial Advisors for the Private Client Services, but apparently her clients have personal wealth of less than $10 million, which is too piddly for The Illustrious and Prestigious Columbia MBA to invest.

So I think I'll take the next twenty minutes and see what I can find out about her company and about Private Client Services. I don't know why she wanted to take me to lunch, but whatever. Hopefully she'll be the entertaining type of bubbly and not the annoying type. *cringe*

Wonderful weekends

No matter what goes on during the long and onerous work week, my weekends in New York have been and continue to be splendid. Life seems so easy on those two glorious days, which have been ridiculously beautiful in terms of weather.

Take last weekend, which started out with a swim in the Marcus Garvey pool two blocks from my house. New York City pools are free for all and I've been taking advantage of the lap swim from 7-8:30 PM, mainly because Irene keeps asking me to accompany her on her triathlon training workouts. If it weren't for her, I wouldn't be doing any physical activity, so thanks to Irene! The weekend continued with a lie-in til noon, after which I filled holes in the wall left by the previous tenant because I wanted to. I also spent an enormous number of the reamining 36 weekend hours in Central Park. Saturday I laid out on a towel and talked to my friend Lauren on the phone, while Sunday afternoon was spent riding a rented bicycle around and around the park with Irene on during triathlon training session. Past weekends were spent at the beach and today I chatted up Carolyn while slurping ice cream and shopping on the Lower East Side, who I hadn't seen since she came through Iowa last year for Arlington Days.

Carolyn and Irene at Lenox Avenue's Sette Pani bakery, where the food's great and the service is...not so great.

My weekend nights have also been filled with a smattering of dinners with friends and late night discussions or board game playing. Last weekend included the discovery of the latest greatest dessert place--Black Hound. Irene and I were heading to a dessert bar called Chikalicious (terrible name, but we'll overlook that because they serve multi-course desserts--no real food to be had at this establishment) and we walked past Black Hound, a bakery. I was drawn to the rows and rows of cakes-for-one in the window and we spent a good 20-30 minutes in there before we decided to skip Chikalicious and buy ourselves cakes to eat at home instead. Who could resist something as cute as these cakes? Mine was reminiscient of the delectable cakes in Austria...light, sweet and hazelnutty, but not too overpowering. Irene's (with the bees) tasted exactly like a Mozart Kugel, for those of you who have had one--marzipan galore!

Tonight I am sitting in one of the front windows to catch the wireless signal on my laptop, breaking out in goose bumps every time the cool wind blows in. The view is good from where I am. How's yours?

Late night Scrabble

Irene and I sat down to a rousing game of Scrabble last night, and this is what we came up with. I was most proud of galavant (I used ALL my letters!) and vermin, which fit between two other words and connected some weird letters.

I have successfully completed week two of my employment. Everyone is still alive and I am becoming less frantic and clueless with every passing hour, many of which are spent in meetings. Take yesterday, when I spent four hours in meetings. Four hours! The time was well spent on training though, so I'm glad I had them.

It actually feels like I started this job lightyears ago. Was it really just last week that I went to my first investment banking event? It was, and yet it seems like ages and ages ago! I didn't realize that until just now...that's strange.

In other news, I had a really great birthday. I started the day out with a trip to Far Rockaway, where I hadn't been for over a year! I love going to the beach and that day there were incredible waves to jump around and practically drown in. An excellent start. Then I went out bowling with some friends and, even though a lot of people couldn't make it, I had a great time with those that did. We went to the new Harlem Lanes, which is right around the corner on 126th and Adam Clayton Powell (7th Ave). They have fancy lanes and decent prices, and I would recommend them to anyone looking for a change of pace from the lounge/drinks/screaming over the loud music scene that is so prevalent here. I won the game with a little help from Jacqueline, who bowled my third ball in the 10th frame because I thought I didn't get to have the third ball because I just got a spare. I think I would have won anyway, but I'm not 100% certain that Jacqueline wouldn't have beaten me. Whatever, it was my birthday; that's how things were supposed to work out, right? To top it all off, Irene had picked up some delicious cupcakes slathered with buttercream frosting for my special occassion.

So now I'm 26. I feel the same. Why do people make such big deals out of their birthdays? I met a girl the other night who was afraid of turning 26 in the fall...what's the beef? I mean, we're still mid-20s, we're still young and vivacious. No ifs, ands, or buts about it!