Swingin Saturday in NYC!!!!!!!!!!!

Saturday I figured out how to get to Astoria, Queens.  Sara Olson, who was a UWEC student, lives there and we met at one of her favorite restaurants for lunch.  The iphone told me it would take me 2 hours to get there, and it actually only took one, so I had an hour to walk around near the subway.  Bustling main roads with lots of small bodegas, hair and nail salons, restaurants of all stripes, discount clothing stores, and cell phone/electronics stores.  Just one block off the main road are nice apartment buildings and brownstones and the area is pretty quiet.  Queens was less than 30 minutes from Midtown, as opposed to 40-60 from the Bronx to Midtown.  I think I'd like Queens.  It was great to meet up with Sarah- prix fix lunch that was yummy and came with two drinks.  It is so hot and I don't really know where I'm going, so I opted for no alcohol  :)  People are drinking at all times of the day here, though, which I'm not used to.

Queens in Queens!!!!!!!!!!!!!

 After hearing about what's up with Sara (she has been doing background TV work, on shows like CSI and Blue Bloods- she said Tom Selleck is tall, handsome, and humble) I hopped back on the subway and headed to Greenwich Village for the volunteer rally for Fringe Festival.  Fringe Central is an empty cement space with no airconditioning, but they have put together a fantastic menu of theatre, music, and dance in 19 venues around the city.

I bought a ticket for "Mahmoud" because I don't want to miss it (Canadian-Iranian female comedian dealing with anti-Arab racism, etc.) and signed up to help at 4 shows, which means I'll get 4 show vouchers!  The people seemed interesting, and if I were going to be around longer this would be a place I could make some interesting friends.

After the meeting, I walked around the NYU campus and then went to sit in Washington Square Park.  Fun people watching, including a street musician who rolls his grand piano into the park and plays Liszt, Chopin, etc.  He wasn't bad and he had a lot of people gathered around.

You can see NYU in the background

This dude tried to get me to hold a pigeon.  Uh UH!

Found my way to the subway, passing a true NYC wedding with a stretch Hummer limo and a huge wedding party blocking the sidewalk, and went up to Lincoln Center.

Watch out for express on weekends!

Got on an express train by accident and sailed past Lincoln Center.  Now I've pretty much got uptown/downtown right, but got tripped up on weekend/evening express trains.  Argggg.  I really am getting much better, though.

Got a ticket to Mostly Mozart at Avery Fischer Hall, and then walked to Magnolia Bakery for a HUGE piece of Devil's Food chocolate cake and a mocha which were DELICIOUS!!!!!!!!!!!!

YUM!!!!!

Then walked back to Lincoln Center where I watched about 45 minutes of an outdoor dance performance--the same one I saw rehearsing earlier in the week!  The company is called "Gimp" and half the dancers have physical disabilities and they do not shy away from exploring the challenges and beauty of all the dancers.  

It was packed, and I sat on the cement wall on the side so I could actually see.  A number of grand New York ladies sat around me and I served as their "hostess," trying to help them find a place they could see from.  Left at 7:45 for the concert at Avery Fischer.  I've never been in there before, and it is a stunning hall.  I had a ticket in the orchestra (thank you guy at the ticket booth for telling me that for just $5 more, I'd move out of the top balcony and into the orchestra!).  

My own dorky self-portrait from the balcony terrace of Avery Fischer

And a much better photo by a nice dude who was in the right place at the right time!

They played the Beethoven 2nd Symphony and the Haydn "Lord Nelson Mass" and the conductor was Yannick Nézet-Séguin, who was awesome and so full of charisma and energy (kind of reminded me of the actress that played Judy Garland actually.....).  The orchestra was wonderful, the chorus rich and full (prepared by James Bagwell, who I went to graduate school with), and the soloists good.  I want to be around art at that level!  

 Sometimes I almost forget that music at that level of mastery exists, and that makes me sad.  I have a lot of thinking to do.