Saturday back in NY

Today I got to spend the day with some old college friends (and half of my fantasy football league), when we met up in NY to celebrate Mike's bday.  It was great to see Mike and Tom again and I hadn't seen Joanne in forever.

We started with an awesome brunch at Paprika:

Then hit Salt Bar (where I enjoyed a tasty Lower East Side Car--haha, get it?!), enjoyed an Indian dinner, and got some candy at this neat store called Ame Ame, where they focus solely on candy and rain gear.

We even checked out some of our old residences.  Our first apartment together was this weird setup where the two bedrooms were in the interior of the apartment and had no windows to the outside.  Instead, each bedroom had a window to the living room.  And the living room windows faced the courtyard.  The bedrooms were like caves and miserably stuffy in the summertime (we didn't get an air conditioner) even though we were on the 3rd floor.  Another interesting set up was that the bathroom was split into two rooms.  One had a tub/shower and sink and the other had the toilet and sink.  Pretty handy considering there was three of us.

When we passed by, it looked like the building had been seriously renovated (new door, nice buzzer system)--it looks so fancy and upscale now.  For current residents, I hope they upgraded the apartments as well.

The next place we lived (and where I lived for years after) was on East 9th Street.  I LOVED this place.  The big drawback was that we lived on the 6th floor and it's a walk-up.  Also at the time, the front door didn't lock, so some mornings, we'd have to step over a dude passed out in a puddle of his own urine in the vestibule.  The more unsettling one was the homeless guy who'd sneak in and sleep on the top landing of the stairs--he'd leave his very-specifically-themed p0rn magazines behind with some clothes.   But the location was (and still is) great (and eventually they got a lock on that front door).

Anyhoo, it was a great night of memories and catching up!