Starf*cking

Today is my last day here at the law firm.

On an unrelated humpday note, I'm going to celebrate by telling you my favorite New York moments. We all have them, and they're all good. I'm even going to rank them 1-10 for you, ending with my favorite.

10) Stop and Smell the Cancer

About five years ago I was walking across West 40-something-th st and noticed a lady stopped in the middle of the sidewalk. She was middle-aged, average looking, carrying a bouqet of flowers and appeared to have stopped to smell them. I remember thinking, "Holy Shit! Someone actually stopping to smell the flowers!" And then I walked past her and realized that she was stopping to light a cigarette and using the flowers to block the wind from her lighter.

9) Milk and Sugar? Clean Underwear?

So "someone I know" was working as an assistant on a feature film and sparked up a "romance" with(read: went out drinking with) one of the actors. The night that this "romance" (hotel sex) occurred was my "friend's" second to last (penultimate, if you will) day on the film. Stumbling out of the hotel at 8 am she realized that going in to your last day of work wearing what you wore on your second to last day of work was probably frowned upon and thought on her wobbly feet. The hotel and work were within walking distance of each other, so she started the trek, got a cup of coffee, and on the way saw a glimmer of light on the horizon-the amber arches of H&M. She sat on the dirty, piss-covered ground on 7th Avenue and waited until H&M opened. She and a large group of Italian tourists.

8) Tiger Beat or Are you a Carrie?

In the fall of 2008 a friend of mine got a gig on a pilot with an ex-teen star-turned C-List celeb. It should come to no one's surprise that after a few days on set canoodling and kissing my friend and this unnamed actor who formerly graced the covers of Tiger Beat and Teen Bop (and probably my bedroom wall) began their "romance". I accompanied her to a poker night with former Mr. Tiger Beat and even continued my Wingman-ship all the way to the West Village loft that he was staying in. I even slept on the couch in the living room while they "romanced" upstairs. In the morning we bid our host adieu (after I bit my tongue and refrained from asking him if I could see the difference between his "swimsuit" and "underwear" modelling poses) and went on the quest for a good breakfast. Crossing Perry street in our haze of moderate celebrity, we bumped, and I mean almost literally, into Sarah Jessica Parker looking like she was on a walk of shame of her own.

7) Let me show you around, maybe play you a sound...

4/11/10. Brooklyn-bound D train at 59th st. Two gay men and a tranny singing Gnarls Barkley's "Crazy" a cappella. It was so good that I cried. They were NOT asking for money, they were just trying to get their harmony right. Those who know me know that my biggest pet peeve is group singing in public places, but this was an exception

6) Hold'em like they do in Texas please

Times Square circa 2001-2002. Friends and I had won one too many tickets in the Rent lottery and went out to try and sell our extra ticket. After walking up and down Broadway several times tapping people on the shoulders asking if they wanted a ticket, a tall, blonde Texan man stopped and turned around to us-I can only imagine what we looked like, as two tweenish girls trying to scalp Broadway show tickets-but the man said he was sick of us yapping in his ear and he'd just buy the ticket if it was less than $25. We sold it to him for $20, I think, and proceeded to explain to him why Rent would change his life. In the middle of the show we spotted him in the audience with a HUGE smile on his face. Our teeny-bopper, rock musical hearts soared. (vomit)

5) Tell me that part about Kenny G again...

It was late, the lady whose son I babysit for didn't give me cab fare, I was on the Upper West Side, and it was January. I walked down Central Park West and across Central Park South and started down 6th Avenue. The streets were mostly deserted, and all of a sudden I heard a saxophone player playing "Moon River" in Rockerfeller Center, ten blocks away. The noise carried all the way down the avenue until I was almost at 34th street. A super cheesy moment, but definitely memorable.

4) Home is where...ever you want it to be

Two of my frattiest, most non-urban college friends came to the city to visit two summers ago and got rip-roaringly drunk to the point of antagonizing their hostess into locking the apartment doors. What did they do? Found a large piece of cardboard and slept on the street. Lucky for them their hostess lived on 66th and Madison.

3) Kicking 'em when they're down

I mean it was my 21st birthday. But I still probably shouldn't have kicked over the homeless man's change cup just because we couldn't find a pizza place.

2) A+ Train

10 am, Saturday morning, August 2008. I am wearing a low-cut "going out shirt" and a pair of men's flipflops. The cute pair of wedges I wore out the night before are acting as a pillow against the window of the A train as the conductor announces that it is going to be running express. I open my eyes and say "oh for fuck's sake" and the middle-aged Dad sitting across from me on the train (the only other passenger) says "Yeah, sucks. Nice walk of shame outfit."

1) The Patriot Act(ress)
July 2008. Christopher Street Pier. It's a perfect day. The sun is setting. I'm sitting with a friend enjoying the moment when a ghetto-fabulous lady starts to sing The Star Spangled Banner. She's pretty good actually. I take in the very New York-ness of the whole thing as a homeless guy yells, at the top of his lungs, from twenty feet away, "Shut the fuck up, woman! You can't sing for shit!"

I've said it once and I'll say it again: I love this city stupid.

A

PS: HAPPY BIRTHDAY ROOMMATE!!