saturdays

Pardon the lack of posting lately. I was trying to be a good student and study for my latest architecture exam.  I took my fourth this Saturday and need to keep on a good study schedule to get all seven in before the end of the year!

After my Saturday morning exam, I met up with Jenn and Pilar for a celebratory/relief-it's-over lunch at Flipster's complete with boozy shakes.

Sadly, Erin and Paul are leaving NYC soon and hosted their final barbecue in their killer Fort Greene backyard. (I was impressed by the array of bicycles in their parking area.) Kurt and I couldn't stay long because we were entertaining his parents who came in town for the weekend. Erin and Paul splurged on a keg, so it pained us to leave early! 

Instead, I got to spend the evening in Staten Island with the Martig clan :) Here are 3/4 of them on the ferry over.

We arrived just in time to see the Staten Island Yankees take on the Brooklyn Cyclones. Can you believe all the seats were sold out?! Minor league baseball, people!! Luckily, we grabbed some standing room tickets and squatted in peoples' seats. No one ever asked us to move!

We briefly watched the game but were more interested in the sunset. We stuck around a couple hours until our dinner reservations at Enoteca Maria. Kurt took me there a couple years ago for my birthday and we ended up ordering half a sheep's head! We were pretty tame with our ordering this time but have plans to go back with adventurous friends :) The food is always delicious and very Italian. 

{thanks to Kurt for several of these images. i've taken to raiding his camera lately! he's quite the photographer!}

chicago: day one

Slowly but surely I am sorting through all the photos taken during our trip to Chicago. Our first day of exploring was Friday where Kurt, our host Justin (who luckily had the day off), and I set out for an all day bike ride.

We rode through the theater district in Uptown with several huge, old theaters that unfortunately don't see much use these days. However, President Obama had just held his birthday party/fundraiser at the Aragon Ballroom only a few days earlier!

'L' train

Lurie Garden

Cloud Gate in Millennium Park

It took many tries to finally get a good shot. It's harder than it looks!

Crown Fountain in Millennium Park by artist Jaume Plensa. There is currently another sculpture piece by the same artist in NYC's Madison Square Park.

Kurt was hot and sweaty after our several hours of bike riding and decided a run through the fountain was in order. (Don't worry, he didn't push that little girl out of the way.)

Riding within the 'Loop'.

Once again, I will harp on the fact that riding bikes around a new city is a great way to explore. We easily (and quickly) made our way to the IIT campus and saw the campus center designed by architect Rem Koolhaas.

Crown Hall by Mies van der Rohe.

Phew! We rode everywhere! I needed a good stretch.

Riverside cafe

After suggestions from a few friends, we decided to get tickets for an architecture boat cruise along the Chicago River that runs through the middle of the city. Luckily, the boat was stocked with a full bar. We came up with a drinking game where you took a drink when the docent mentioned famous Chicago architects (ie Mies, SOM, Frank Lloyd Wright). Very enjoyable. Coincidentally, we ran into a friend from NYC in line for tickets and we got on the same tour together! What a small world!

Prepare yourself for an inundation of photos from the tour. Keep in mind this a seriously edited selection of what was taken. There are just too many cool things to see!

Trump Tower

 One of many Trunnion Bascule bridges on the tour. Very interesting.

Sears Tower (they are trying to rename it the Willis Tower but it's not catching on).

Humongous old Montgomery Ward building which now houses the Merchandise Mart. The design center contains over 4.2 million square feet and in 2007 was the world's largest LEED-EB building.

Marina City, 330 N Wabash by Mies van der Rohe, Trump Tower--an ineresting trio.

The lower levels of Marina City contain boat parking, car parking, and commercial space. It's really fascinating to see how the city addresses the river.

Kurt loves this building. It's called Aqua and was designed by Studio Gang.

After the boat tour, we continued on our bikes. The creator of one of Kurt's favorite football blogs, Eleven Warriors, lives in Chicago and we had worked out a plan to meet him for after work drinks. After some light football debate for Kurt and a little bit of Auburn heckling for me, we met up with Justin's wife Brett for some dinner.

We ended up at Taco Joint for cheap gourmet tacos and $5 Tecate and tequila :) 

Not sure what was going on here, but Kurt and Justin were definitely satisfied customers. 

Wrigley Field on our bike race home. See you tomorrow!

Spontaneous Friday...back in action!

It's been a while since Kurt had a Spontaneous Friday (or any other spontaneous days for that matter). Somehow the holidays can get the best of you with plans and obligations and traveling, but we're back at it in 2011! Kurt had his yearly review this week at work, and since he is such a beneficial addition to the Terrain "team" (i.e. Kurt and his boss), he got a pretty sweet raise. Congratulations, Kurt! 

To celebrate his success, we decided to do something Friday after work. It had been snowing pretty steadily all day, and Kurt thought it would be fun to see the High Line in the snow. The last time I had seen it was back in the summer when it was packed with people. I was excited to see how it is used differently when the weather isn't so pleasant. Unfortunately the snow passed before 6 and hadn't really stuck, so it wasn't quite the winter wonderland we had hoped. It was still interesting to see the different parts of the park still blanketed by last week's snow and encounter a few die hard patrons walking around. 

It seems like we met some really nice and interesting people this night. The first was Jasper and his lady friend on the High Line. Jasper was trained in real estate but is going back to school to study architecture (funny, don't people usually go the other way?). He is a big fan of James Corner (landscape architect of the High Line) and was actually at the same lecture Kurt and I had attended at Cooper Union last year. 

The Standard Hotel

Gansevoort entrance

14th Street

Empire State Building

After we walked the length of the High Line, it was pretty chilly and we were ready for a drink and some food. We debated a long time over where to go, and finally ended up on the 1 train to head back to Brooklyn. We would eventually have to transfer because the 1 train stops in Downtown Manhattan at the South Ferry Terminal. Then Kurt had the great idea why don't we just ride this to the end and go to Staten Island?!

Just over a year ago we had gone to this awesome Italian restaurant on Staten Island for my 24th birthday. We forgot to make a reservation and had to wait a while for a table. The host at the restaurant instructed us to head a few doors down to a local bar, and they would call down there when our table was ready. The bartender was great. The bar was deserted and we fit in a drink before dinner. So, last night, Kurt and I decided to revisit Steiny's Pub, grab a bite to eat, and (of course) watch some of the LSU v. Texas A&M bowl game.

I think I've said it before, I really enjoy taking the ferry. It's much better when the weather is nice, but it is always great to just sit and stare out the window at all the city lights. Plus, the ride is the perfect amount of time to buy a beer at the snack bar and drink it. Some people may enjoy sipping champagne on yachts, but we prefer ice cold Heinekens on the Staten Island Ferry :)

We made the short walk to Steiny's and found a much different scene than our last excursion. The place was pretty full with some rowdy Islanders and the music was super loud. We found a table and Kurt was able to get the bartender, Tommy, to put the LSU game on. Unfortunately, the kitchen closed at 7 but Tommy was more than happy to offer us some take out menus from local places that would deliver. We perused the choices and eventually went with a taco place. We were quite puzzled when our food came by way of an Asian delivery guy. Our new friend Will (born and bred Staten Islander) later informed us that a Chinese family owns a restaurant in the neighborhood that does Chinese food and Mexican. Go figure! They could have fooled me. It was pretty tasty.

The crowd at Steiny's was pretty interesting. They were raucous and loud and laughing and dancing and having a great time. You can definitely tell once you get off that boat that your aren't in Manhattan (or even Brooklyn) any more. There were even a couple guido-esque guys and their fake nail wearing girlfriends. Everyone seemed like a regular at this place. We obviously stood out as outsiders but people were surprisingly nice! This old guy, Nick, came over and talked with us for a while. He and Kurt bonded over their common Ohio roots and he told us a little about how he landed in NYC over 45 years ago to be an artist. I guess he hits the Steiny's happy hour everyday. In a city where you don't often have conversations with strangers, it was nice to exchange stories with some new people.

We left the game a little early (I am fighting a little cold and was getting tired) and headed back to catch the ferry. We just missed one and had some time to kill. Luckily, that left us time to make friends with Willy, the guard dog at the ferry terminal. He was an adorable English Yellow Lab and gave both Kurt and I a very thorough licking in search of food. I'd say it was a pretty successful Spontaneous Friday :)