column nine

Here's column nine: The amazing adventures of the side show.

And some pictures:

Going to see Wicked:
Dancing on the Big keyboard at F.A.O. Schwartz:


Hanging out in Bryant Park before the summer classic movie starts:


At Coney Island:

a never-ending amount of free activities

Free activities could really keep someone busy all of the time. I get an email every day that contains a listing of all things free. It's intense. Over the last two weeks, I've attended a fair share of free activities, but considering the number that is on each daily list, I really haven't been to a lot.

Last Monday my roommate and I went to Bryant Park for an old movie. HBO shows old movies and everyone brings picnics and eats on the grass. We saw "The Man Who Came to Dinner." It was pretty funny and hanging out in the park was lots of fun. On Thursday afternoon I went back to this park for the Broadway in the Park series. For five Thursdays, four or five Broadway musicals head to the park for an hour-long performance. Each show gets two or three songs. I saw Chicago, [title of show] and an upcoming musical about Russia. This week is In the Heights among others. I'll be heading over during my lunch break. It's about a 13 minute walk from work if I cut through Grand Central Terminal and walk really fast. I did get there today for the show, and I saw the tail end of Avenue Q, all of Mamma Mia!, which was superb, Phantom of the Opera (and the Phantom asked us to sing along with him for Music of the Night), Pure Country, and In the Heights. The Heights cast was missing some of their leads, so the understudy sang one of the parts, and this mean that none of the songs that the creator and lead character sings could be sung. Poor Usnavi.

This past Tuesday I went to Central Park after work for the final Concert in the Park. The NY Philharmonic was fabulous. The people sitting around us were quite hilarious at times. Just picture a lady wearing a fanny pack swaying to Tchaikovsky, some super-possessive, Italian-speaking blanket hoarders (they wouldn't let anyone step on their blanket, yelled at them if they did, and tried to block all pathways surrounding their blanket), and a group of 20-something-year-old guys galloping to William Tell Overture.

This weekend will bring more free things, with a trip to Coney Island for some beach-going and some music and a trip to MoMA. It's going to be a marathon weekend, I'm assuming. We'll see how it goes.

columns seven and eight

I apologize for being so tardy with my postings. I'm going to get these up and then write a post about all of the free things I've done in the last two weeks.

So check out column seven titled Brooklyn offers new expectations.

And here's column eight: Coming to the final stretch.