this week's simple moments

1.  finally stepped foot in washington square park by nyu
2.  asked mooch to buy me shoes from payless on her worker bee discount because full price payless shoes aren't currently in my budget
3.  found out a close friend is moving out of the city - sad
4.  downloaded all episodes of downton abbey from iTunes...have i mentioned that i'm obsessed?
5.  saw tulips starting to poke through the dirt of the park avenue mall in february!
6.  construction worker called me 'hot mama'
7.  brilliantly brought my lunch to work on a rainy day to avoid the massive crowds at lunch time in the rockefeller center concourse
8.  climbed a ladder at work to put an HVAC diffuser in the ceiling - boo yah!
9.  booked a flight to utah to see the family and munchkins in april
10.  took a nap on the couch from 6:30 - 7:15pm on 2 out of 5 week nights this week

personal realization #9 - the dark day remedy

generally this blog is for posting about my life in new york and to make my friends jealous of all the cool things i get to do.  (can no longer hide from that simple truth)  it is relatively rare that i will post something deeply personal or a weakness i have or an event that has made me emotional.  it's just not my style and would detract from the "make my friends jealous" mantra.  

then came the dark day...

i decided to post about that truly horrible, gut wrenching, emotional black hole of a saturday because it fit perfectly in my personal realization post series.  the thing i didn't count on was the outpouring of support and love i received after the post was published.  amazing friends, many who i haven't seen in YEARS, sent me a text message, called me or posted in the comments section to check to make sure i was doing better and remind me how much they love me.  to each of you that reached out to me, i send you my sincerest thank you.  you were the remedy to my dark day and will continue to be my medicine for any dark days to come...

and my joani sent me flowers.  that really helped too. 

british ancestry = i'm british

most of my adult life i have wanted to be british.  i love almost everything about britain; only things on the not keen on list is their food, bad teeth and conversion rate of pound sterling to US dollar.  other than that, i'm in rapture with all things british.  

based on the above information it should make absolute sense that i soaked up all the british goodness of downton abbey on masterpiece classic.  it was doc who first implored me to watch the series that had been stuck on my DVR for a couple of weeks.  once i hit that first "play" i was on the downton abbey express train.  the acting is fantastic, the history is enlightening, the romance is sweet and the clothes and jewelry are too die for!  

i thought having high tea at the kensington palace orangery solidified my desire to claim britain as my own.  i didn't realize as i was drinking my ginger lemon tea that another british export would steal the love thunder from the orangery in such a short amount of time.  downton abbey gave me a home to rest my weary head and forget the cares of the world as i dived into the lives, trials and triumphants of the crawley family and their faithful friends belowstairs.  i implore you to watch downton abbey and realize your own strong desire to be british if even for a moment.

highclere castle was just added to list of places to see on my next british isles vacation...it's right up there with chatsworth house and the lake district.

a small snippet of scenes from my fave couples - mary & matthew and sybil & branson (plus it's made with a snow patrol song...bonus!)

fell off the wagon (not literally)

i truly was trying to curb my addiction over the last year or so.  i didn't buy that $1000 plane ticket to london in june to watch jimmy eat world perform the entirety of my FAVORITE album "bleed american".  still haven't plopped down the cash to see the lion king on broadway.  i saw less concerts and musicals last year than probably any year since 2002-2003 when i was a starving newbie new yorker. 

that hard work to battle my concert addiction is sayonara within the first couple of months of 2012.  thus far i have seen kelly clarkson at radio city music hall (awesome show!), bought tickets for snow patrol in april, heading to turn-of-the-century new york to see newsies the musical in april and for the peace de resistance...have tickets to see the cranberries in may!  anyone who knew me in high school couldn't be unaware of my love for the cranberries.  i remember exactly where i bought their "no need to argue" album.  i was in santa barbara, california at a music store at their outdoor shopping complex and i was 15 years old.  i am super, duper excited to finally see them live.  plus they are releasing a new album next week.  be still my beating heart!

i thought i had my addiction under control but alas i can't stop the goodness and joy i feel when i see tickets tacked up on my ticket board.  one day i will get this addiction under control...it's just not going to be today when i check the prices to fly to utah for snow patrol's show @ the depot.

personal realization #8 - the dark day

last saturday was, in the words of luke daines from gilmore girls, a dark day.  i have put my life on hold for about 5 weeks while working towards a goal.  last saturday i checked on the status of obtaining that goal.  the result i received was absolutely demoralizing and discouraging to the point that i spent most of the day crying and i never cry.  i mean i NEVER cry...unless i'm watching a pedigree dog commercial or preview for a disney film about an orphan chimpanzee.  if in the unlikely event that a tear does spill from my eye, i am extremely quick to shut down the tear ducts immediately before there is more splash down.

after many hours of an absolutely dejected and discouraged mood i opted to call my joani.  she said all the right things but there was something about the fact that she was saying these things through a telephone instead of directly to my face that made my mood even worse.  she then recommended that i call big lug to talk about what my next options for this goal could be.  i waited a few hours to get the crying under control to call him.  around 8pm i dialed his phone number and thankfully for me, but unlucky for him, he answered the phone with a "hey" and i immediately started crying.  i love my brother very much.  even more so because he was so patient with me during this phone call where my voice kept breaking and the silence on my end was, at times, deafening.

he took all the information i gave him and analyzed it to produce options for the next step towards my achievement of this goal.  he looked at the issues plaguing me and causing copious amounts of tears from a third party perspective and then compassionately helped me realize that all hope was not loss, nor would it ever be completely lost.  this ultimate goal just might take more effort and help from others.  i could no longer rely on only myself to gain success.  that was news to me but made perfect sense.

my life has been a road of hard work and receiving the fruits of that hard work.  i was taught at the knee of my joani to work hard for something that is worth achieving.  up until now i would estimate the veracity of that formula in almost 100% of the things i have worked hard for.  the fact that it wasn't working with this next goal was an entirely foreign concept to me which is why i didn't know how to handle the perceived failure of my dark day.  

i guess it was inevitable that this moment would happen.  i'm not sure i would have chosen this particular goal for this personal realization to take place.  it was a tough realization to swallow to know that hard work doesn't always equal getting what i want.  instead, i'm choosing to focus on allowing my family and friends to extend extra love & support and to ask for help because i can't do this on my own.  that is a personal realization that i can get behind and will hopefully cause less crying in the future.

a dedication to my mommy

yesterday was my mommy's birthday.  happy birthday joani g!  i wish i could have been at los hermanos with the familia to celebrate this most wonderful day of february when you were born!  hoping at least one family member ordered the monster burrito smothered in sauce and cheese.

my mommy is the best woman i know.  she is the epitome of kindness, honesty, strength, integrity, compassion, support, hard worker, goodness, intelligence (except when it comes to new technology), laughter, patience, selflessness, and so on and so on.  many people would claim that their mother is the best ever; but i would have sufficient examples about my mom to teach them who really IS the best mommy ever.  joani would win every time.

she is my best friend, most fervent supporter, amazing shoulder to lean and cry on, generous with her time and talents, wonderful us open viewing partner, an example of how i want to live my life through both difficulties and happiness and someone who all of her family and friends wants to spend as much time as possible with.  i love you oh so much my joani!  happy happy birthday!

vile lady neighbor update

i can report that since the night i called the cops on my horrid neighbor she has NOT screamed at her children!  hooray for her three boys!  i have seen her on the street a couple of times and gave her my most fervent annoyed with you stare. 

the thing that bothered me almost as much as her vileness is their front door is papered with drawings and colorings with the name Jesus.  there is even a palm cross from last year's Palm Sunday taped to their front door.  i had a VERY difficult time with a woman who behaved as she did but professed to place things on her front door stating "God is Love".  if this woman truly understood the nature of Jesus Christ and the profound love of God, she would NEVER treat anyone the way she was.  let alone her own children.

i love me a list

i've decided to add something meaningful and fun to my life.  good thing i define "fun" as a list which allows me to cross items from the list.  just another trait in the long list of others i possess that cement my type A personality.  i'm going to start a bucket list!  woo hoo!  everybody...can i get a woo hoo?!

it often hits me in the middle of a day - "that would be awesome to learn how to do" or "I've always wanted to go there or do that" or "i really want to buy that"...  today is the night all these thoughts are going to make it onto a list!  my bucket list will reside on the left side of this blog. 

my poor knees request that you organize an intervention if you ever see the words "run a marathon" on the bucket list. 

a bit of an explanation

i became rededicated to my blog in 2011.  finding numerous things to say about my long term relationship with new york city.  

you might have noticed that my posting has been decidedly scare for the month of january and early parts of february.  this lack of relationship analysis is due to something that has come into my life and completely sucked every last free moment i have to spare...and there aren't a lot of free spare moments to begin with.

i ask for your patience as i complete this time sucking task at the end of february.  i promise to resume my witty repartee on life as pinkymcg on march 1st.  

and just in case there was any question...the reason is not because i am dating someone.  if that was the case, i'd be shouting it from the rooftops!

the night i called the cops

for those of you that see or talk to me on a regular basis, you have at one time or another heard me complain about my next door neighbors.  my 2h neighbors are a husband, wife, a boy age 8/9, a boy age 5/6 and a baby boy about 4/5 months.  the wife/mother is one of the most vile people i have ever come in contact with.  here's why...

on a somewhat regular basis for the first two years i lived next door she would scream profanities at her children, slam cabinet doors, smack her boys, locked one outside of their apartment once, etc.  she is truly truly vile.  i had complained to my landlord before and called child protective services because i could clearly hear her hitting one of the boys one night.  so all these things happened maybe once every 6 or 8 weeks.  she once threatened to kill one of the boys.  when i ran into her husband in the laundry i told him i would call the cops the next time i heard that.  he didn't seem to think that was a big deal.  moron.

then she had a third child in september and since then she has been extremely abusive almost every night for the past 3 months.  last night i had enough.

i called 9-1-1.  cops came to check on the boys and arrived about 4 minutes before the moron husband got home from work.  the cops were in the apartment for about 30 minutes.  you would think that would frighten her (it would terrify me).  it didn't, she started screaming at everyone in her family about 20 minutes after the cops left.

so when it comes time to sign or not sign a lease renewal, i'm going to look long and hard for another place to live because i honestly can't deal with a home that is affected by her vileness.  my home has become uncomfortable because she isn't getting the mental help she needs.