september 17

as my time in brooklyn is winding down, i've ended up spending more time in manhattan. i went this morning to see i'm still here, the kind-of documentary about joaquin phoenix being a rapper. in addition to supplying me with a new (and i think first) fashion icon, i'd recommend the movie to most everyone, as long as you don't mind a little debauchery. the theater was in chelsea (the lower west side of manhattan), which seemed like a pretty cool area from the little i got to see of it. i also happened to walk by a hotel while some young, heroined out dudes in leather pants were walking out, followed by a camera crew, so i may or may not make a walk-through on some reality show. keep an eye out for me (this means you, michelle). this marks the second show i might appear on, since there's been a production crew on suffolk st, which i take to get back to the bridge to brooklyn, most everyday i ride down it. i tried to figure out what was filming there, and according to some google search result, law and order filmed at that spot a few years ago, so i'm guessing it's them.


after the movie, i headed uptown to the metropolitan museum of art (or the met if you're into abbreviations). i'm fairly certain i've been there before, but i obviously didn't remember how immense it was. the place spans multiple blocks. i was literally lost inside for a couple hours, and i'm still sure i didn't see everything. but, it really wasn't my kind of art. all of the exhibits i saw were old artifacts--tables, pottery, recreated rooms, etc. while i can respect the craftsmanship involved and i do enjoy seeing how people lived in the past, i really don't want to look at that kind of stuff for that long. it lacks the significance to interest me historically, and it lacks the purpose that interests me as art. but, a little advertised fact about the met is that there isn't a set admission price. right under the $20 price listed at the welcome desk is the word "recommended." despite how rude it may be to not pay the twenty bucks, i paid three. it seemed like a reasonable number considering my income, and i'm considering it payback for them listing "free admission" as one of the benefits of membership.


after the met and another knish (so good) i wandered around central park for a bit before heading to the museum of modern art for whatever cleverly named event they call the fact that friday nights are free there. i thought, oh so naively, that i could just walk in. but no. because obviously free admission means you still have to wait in line--a line which stretched around the block--to get a ticket. and since moma requires you to check bookbags, i had to wait in that insane line too. but, i eventually made it in, and was much more in my art-world home. the exhibits were great, with the featured one being a career retrospective of matisse. there was also an interesting room dedicated to showing new york's plan for dealing with rising water levels. but, the downside to free admission was the ridiculous crowd there. i've always thought of myself as a calm, patient person, but i came rather close to shoving some of the people that would stop in a line blocking my only path past them to take pictures of the art. but maybe that was just because i still don't understand why so many people take pictures of the art--that shit is pretty well documented already, you know? oh well.


i headed home, where i sit now, after the museum, having been too late for the free hours at the nearby international center of photography. but, i had some vague recollection of a google maps route which told me the fastest way from my house to moma was through queens and across the (mysteriously named) queensboro bridge. and since i happened to see a sign directing me to the bike path towards the queensboro bridge, i decided to try it. how hard could it be to blindly make your way through queens? a little bit hard, it turns out. you see, queens may be the worst place on earth. brooklyn and manhattan both have gaping potholes, which i didn't see in queens, and yet the roads through queens were still somehow more unridable. there was not one bit on smooth pavement that i saw, and most of the roads had strange ridges in them. but, to queens's credit, most of the sidewalks are around twelve feet wide so it wasn't too hard to avoid the roads. all of the areas i passed through also made me glad there was a little bit of light left--they weren't exactly shady, but they certainly weren't welcoming. it looked like one giant, run-down shopping center without any shopping.


nonetheless, i made it. now i'm eating all of the strawberries i can find before i go out in search of some sort of adventure for tonight.