Category: New York

Is It Better To Have Loved and Lost?

I’m not so sure.

Oh! Yeah, I’m not talking about romance or relationships. I’m talking about vacation.

I had a glorious, fabulous, amazing week in the city of New York. I loved, I laughed, I ate until I saw blue spots in front of my eyes. We walked and walked, saw multiple Broadway shows, had a few cocktails and generally had one hell of a good time.

It was a MUCH needed vacation. I’m pretty bad about taking more than a couple days of vacation here and there. This was the first full week with plans and events and turning off work email that I’ve had in a long time. In fact I can’t remember the last time…

Today, now, is Tuesday. My second day back at work.

Brutal. There really is no mercy in the flow of work. I mean, I can dip out of the ever forward charging machine, and then upon returning I have to run to catch up and hop back on.

In the weeks leading up to the week off, I had widely publicized my upcoming vacation to all who would listen. This was a strategy to make sure everyone knew, to head off any surprises, and to assert that no one should bother me while I was out.

It worked pretty well. I had no calls or even a text message while I was on holiday. Awesome!

However, what that also meant was everyone I work with delayed all meetings for the week I was out. Great! Right?

Every missed meeting was then plopped all over my Monday and Tuesday.

Back to back to back to back to back meetings for two days straight.

In fact, I’m writing this while on a conference call. It’s a dull call and my attention isn’t needed at the moment.

So I decided to take this moment to whine. Or whinge as the Brits might say.

Is it better to have vacated, then come back and drown? Struggling with work life knowing how great it was last week (and missing it terribly)?

Or is it better to just slog on without vacation and never know truly how good it can be. Ignorance is bliss?

Meanwhile, I have a wicked craving for a piping hot knish and a real pastrami sandwich.

Oh, and an egg cream made with Fox’s U-Bet syrup. (the good stuff).

None of these things I can get with any quality here in the Bay Area.

*sigh*







Image from JamesCampbellTaylor.com.




And So It Begins

Well, with Thanksgiving done and dusted, I suppose that officially begins the Holiday Season.

No stopping the relentless advertisements and ho ho ho’ing at every corner.

Each holiday season, it’s always a bit of a toss up for me if I am in the spirit or feeling grinchy.

Honestly? More often than not it’s the grinch that emerges in December.

But this year is a bit different. I have to admit, standing there in Rockefeller Center watching the ice skaters and gazing at the tree, I did sort of feel a warm, happy Holiday spirit wash over me.

Now I’m ready to head home and put up our own tree and make spiced cider and hum a few carols and enjoy the holidays this year.

No worry, I’m sure it will wear off in about a week.

But until then…it’s beginning to look a lot like Christmas!



Copyright 2012, Karen Fayeth, and subject to the Creative Commons license in the right column of this page. Taken with an iPhone5 and the onboard camera app using the panorama feature.



Getting The Hang of this Panorama Thing

When Apple introduced the new iOS6 for iPhones, it came along with a new camera feature called Panorama.

It’s a way to take really wide angled photos. The OS has a pretty clever little interface to help make it easy.

As I’ve been traversing this big ol’ city of New York, there are a lot of great views that are hard to capture in just one frame.

I posted a fun panorama view of the New York City Public Library a couple days ago.

And herewith, are a few more of my favorite panorama shots from the week:


This is the beautiful Lincoln Center where we saw War Horse. I took this as the show let out and New York was bathed in that magic hour light. This is by far my favorite shot using the new technique.



Copyright 2012, Karen Fayeth, and subject to the Creative Commons license in the right column of this page. Taken with an iPhone5 and the onboard camera app using the panorama feature.



Here is a shot from the American Museum of Natural History. I’d tried doing the panorama technique on the TRex skeleton, but the buggar was just too darn big. This was an awesome display of various skeletons ranging from a dino-era horse to a small dimetrodon. It was pretty nifty:



Copyright 2012, Karen Fayeth, and subject to the Creative Commons license in the right column of this page. Taken with an iPhone5 and the onboard camera app using the panorama feature.



And finally, we have Katz’s Deli on the Lower East Side. You know, where Harry met Sally?

It’s also about the most amazing deli in New York. Oh the corn beef! All piled high on a reuben with swiss and sauerkraut. Yum! The perfect egg cream. The knish to die for!

This photo just makes me drool. I may lick my computer screen…

This photo is also a bit of an amazing feat considering how many people are in the photo and everyone is moving around. That would usually cause weird pixel jumps and odd stuff, but other than one woman with a distorted head, it turned out pretty good.



Copyright 2012, Karen Fayeth, and subject to the Creative Commons license in the right column of this page. Taken with an iPhone5 and the onboard camera app using the panorama feature.



Digging this new feature! More NYC photos to come.



The Right Answer and the Best Answer

Today was pretty much a banner day in my little life. Here I am in New York enjoying the city life, eating good food and loving every minute of it.

Today just took it up an extra notch.

What precipitated this trip to the big city, as described here, was the chance to see the Tony Award winning stage show “War Horse.”

After seeing this amazing show in San Francisco on its closing weekend, I suddenly knew I needed to see it again, and I wanted to see it in New York.

The Good Man and I had been batting around the idea of a trip to New York for a few years, but this idea of seeing War Horse on Broadway really put a charge into the idea.

And so today, all of those plans came together.

The show is staged at Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts at the Vivian Beaumont Theatre.

I had never been to Lincoln Center and in fact in my one visit to New York prior to this week, I hadn’t really spent much time above 50th and Broadway.

Lincoln Center really is an amazing place.

I have much more to say about the show and about this magical day, but I just wanted to stop a minute and share one of those slice of life moments. This is a very telling story, indeed.

You see, we arrived a bit early for our 2:00pm matinee, and so The Good Man and I decided to stroll around a bit so I could see the layout of the Lincoln Center.

It’s quite lovely.

And as I looked around, all amped up and excited to see the show and to be in New York and to be seeing all these things I’ve not seen before, my eyes fell upon this building:






Now when I saw this building, in all of my geekery and excitement and still-got-a-little-New-Mexico-hayseed-in-my-hair, I turned to The Good Man and I asked “Is that THE Julliard?”

Now, pause here.

True confessions: That’s a pretty dumb question. I’m not even sure why I asked it.

And yet….

My darling husband, a man of Brooklyn from his childhood and in many ways still a New Yorker probably should have turned to me and replied in deep New York accent (with much sarcasm), “No, it’s the other one,” and rolled his eyes.

But he did not.

My darling man replied, “Yes, honey. That is THE Julliard. Pretty cool, huh?”

Then I kind of laughed and shook my head and said “well, that was a silly question.” Then I thanked him, because the right answer was probably the sarcastic one, but he is used to my propensity to geek out, so he gave me the best answer instead.

And when he’s being that much of a Good Man, I just gotta let him know how much I appreciate it.

Then I told him I was going to blog about it.

Hi honey!





Photo Copyright 2012, Karen Fayeth. Taken with an iPhone5 and the Camera+ app.



I Got A Date

Ever since I was a young girl in New Mexico, I always knew there was a big old world out there full of cities much bigger and much grander than my beloved Albuquerque.

Even as I was a small town girl and in many ways feared big cities, I was inexorably drawn to them as well. Always fascinated.

Once, The Good Man and I were talking about growing up. He in Brooklyn, me in the ‘Burque. I summed it all up this way, he grew up in New York knowing he was in the center of the world. I grew up in Albuquerque knowing I was pretty gosh darn far from it.

I’ve gotten around this big blue marble a little this year and I’ve seen some truly world class cities, but to me, New York (and to be precise, Manhattan) really is the center of the world.

And now, after a very long year with a lot of hard work, I have a little vacation coming due.

So The Good Man and I are getting on an aeroplane.

I have a date with that little ol’ island and I can hardly wait.

(Please forgive if the blogging is a little sparse this week. Just know I’m out there having fun!)









Image from Barewalls.com.