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By Cari, on August 16th, 2012 I’m moving. No, I don’t know where. Hopefully still within Manhattan. Possibly Riverdale or NJ. I need some space and, ideally, cheaper rent. In the name of not doing this all the week I’m moving, I’ve committed to packing or purging a little each day. To make this saner, I’ve established some rules and I’m writing this out in the name of accountability.
Clothes:
- Stained: gone. No questions or wiggle room here. I own enough PJs and don’t wear stained clothes in public
- Too big: gone, with possible exception of potential gym clothes. I’ve lost too much weight to want or need fat clothes.
- Unworn this season – depends on why. If in one of the two categories above, gone. If not, maybe a reason to hang onto. Note: this only applies to work/dress clothes. Unworn play clothes are going as I have more than enough.
Books:
- Cheap paperbacks – gone. Can easily get form library or for Kindle. [Yes, just got a new toy. I'm already in love]
- Favorites – other than the three I can name by heart (Judy Blume’s Summer Sisters
 , Bill Bryson’s Neither Here nor There and Brad Newsham’s Take Me With You ) they can go. They can be replaced by Kindle/library copies in odd event I *need* a reread
- Sentimental favorites or ones I have yet to read that aren’t easily available via Kindle – I’ll keep
- Unread non-recent magazines – gone, unless collectable i.e. Giants’ SB winning, Yankees’ WS winning SIs
Furniture and Housewares:
- Held together by duct tape – gone. Held together by gorilla glue – maybe, if I need a coffee table temporarily
- Plasticware and paper goods – will keep enough to get me through initial move and toss rest. I have most of this from my housewarming. It needs a new home.
- Chipped/broken – hopefully gone.
Not comprehensive, but it’s a start. Any suggestions?
By Cari, on July 21st, 2012 that was never meant to be as long, but felt much longer on my feet.
I headed downtown to go to the New Museum’s Block Party with the plan of spending some time there and then walking home along the river. But do my wanders ever turn out as planned? I went from the Block Party (fun – good music, lots of stuff for kids) to the Museum to see new Ghosts in the Machine exhibit that I didn’t really get to see during my flyby visit on Tuesday.
I really don’t know the Lower East Side well at all despite recent forays and decided to have a wander on a gorgeous, sunny day. Didn’t have my camera, but had my phone and @travellingcari has a few thousand photos or so. This one, to me, sums it up though. The Lower East Side (and neighboring Chinatown and Little Italy) is a mix of old and new. From Bowery Mission to the New Museum, from the old St. Patrick’s Cathedral to the Whole Foods on Houston/Chrystie … it’s a fun land of contrasts.
Highlights today included**:
- original St. Patrick’s: very cool but hard to get a good shot since there’s so much traffic and congestion aroun dther
- Bowery Savings Bank: ditto the above and even more so as it’s in the thick of Chinatown on Grand St.
- 240 Centre Street aka the Police Building. Catches my eye every time – especially as you look down toward Centre. Definitely fits in better with City Hall and its neighboring buildings than its current surrounds, however it’s also a nice homage to European origins of Little Italy
- Germania Bank Building aka 190 Bowery. It looks abandoned but its roots are amazing and it’s now a single family home!!
- Bialystoker Synagogue aka Bialystoker the Beautiful aka I got cursed at in yiddish for my tats. Still an amazing building.
By the time I finished traipsing on the LES and across to the river, I didn’t check off much mileage on my Manhattan loop. Only from Corlear’s Hook Park to E. 10th, but it was a gorgeous day
**and now I blame Tim for putting Hart Island on my NYC bucket list.
By Cari, on June 3rd, 2012 Sometime during yesterday’s walk when I was uploading photos to Instagram, #greatmanhattanloop hit me. It’s perfect for this little endeavor of mine, which reached 2012: Stage 3 yesterday. I know I’m still due to write on Part 2, but the week got away from me. Oops
and the rest of the photos.
The plan for yesterday’s walk was to go from the 79th St. Boat Basin to Grant’s Tomb but then the best laid plans went haywire…
Continue reading #GreatManhattanLoop: Upper West Side
By Cari, on June 1st, 2012 May was a so so Month #GoTheDist, wise. With all of my workouts input, I ended up with 36.7 miles on the bike and 39.03 miles walking. The latter is definitely helped by the miles walked last weekend and in DC two weeks ago (~14 in both cases). At the same time, the bike mileage was hurt because I wasn’t in the gym as much.
2/3 of the way through #GoTheDist Q2 my stats are as follows:
Q2 mileage:
April:
31.42 bike / 35.8 walking
May:
36.7 miles bike / 39.03 walking
Q2 total to date:
68.12 bike / 74.83 walking
Add that to Q1:
Q1 mileage:
January:
114.23 bike / 4.01 walking
February:
62.18 bike / 8.61 walking
March:
62.57 bike / 31.24 walking
Q1 Total:
238.98 bike / 43.86 walking
and it gets the following:
2012 #GoTheDist YTD:
307.1 bike / 118.69 walking
So I’m definitely helped by my strong Q1.
If bike and walking counted, I’d be good for Q2, but only the bike counts.
So with 307.1 miles down and a goal through Q2 of 350 miles I’m <43 miles away. Doable? Yes. Likely? Not really. This is made more troubling since my Q3 goal is 225 miles and I don't necessarily want to borrow against Q1 already. So if I only went by Q2 mileage I'm more than 100 miles off the pace. Phooey! But still, not bad, with the knee/achilles issues I've been having.
The thing is? Walking is way up. I've nearly doubled my Q1 total through two months of Q2 and that's only likely to keep at that pace/increase if we have a nice summer. I love walking home from work even if it means I don't make it to the gym. I'd much rather spend my weekends on my quest to walk around Manhattan than in the gym…
And walking is exercise.
That last point made my decision for me. No exercise is bad and any is better than none especially as my legs are healing. So I’m not going to worry about being off the pace so long as I’m still moving.
By Cari, on May 29th, 2012 it all started with the sun finally coming out after a long week of rain, rain, rain and more rain. Combine that with a half day, Fleet Week and my love of the waterfront and New York history….
Continue reading Hello, Sailors… and lots of miles 1/2
By Cari, on May 21st, 2012  US Capitol from the Newseum terrace More photos here
Back. Had an absolutely AMAZING time. Couldn’t have asked for better weather. Of course the map ended up wildly ambitious, which we expected. It still served as a good set of choices for things to do. Especially if you’re a history nut like I am. Part travel guide, part blog…
Continue reading 14.8 miles through DC
By Cari, on April 19th, 2012 in which we briefly return to this blog’s origins as a travel blog inspired by Yom HaShoah
I reread some of the posts from my Holocaust summer that included Auschwitz, BirkenauA, and Terezin, among others. I learned so much that summer, but I was also saturated. After doing Poland, I couldn’t do the Berlin memorial. One day, I’ll do the DC one. Almost feel due, in an odd sense.
The camps were really the final determinant in the Israel trip. Somehow I don’t have a single photo of Yad VaShem. Not sure how that happened. Holocaust has always been moving to me, and I look at the news and I realize not a damn thing has changed. It may not be European Jews, but it’s in Rwanda, Cambodia, Sudan, etc.
One day we’ll learn. I hope it’s not too late.
Yom HaShoah also inspired these two collages:
By Cari, on March 31st, 2012 with today’s workout complete, Q1 of the #GoTheDist challenge is as well
Q1 mileage:
January:
114.23 bike / 4.01 walking
February:
62.18 bike / 8.61 walking
March:
62.57 bike / 31.24 walking
Total:
238.98 bike . / 43.86 walking
Although only the ~239 miles counts for #GoTheDist, I’m very impressed with those totals. While it looks like I wasn’t any more active in March than I was in a (sick & traveling) February, it’s more that I walked home a lot more. Not as strenuous as the gym, but good activity and good for the head.
Thought about adjusting up my #GoTheDist goals but as the weather gets better, I’m morel likely to spend more time outside, so might not be as easy to hit my goals so I’ll keep it at 175, and re-evaluate in April or early May. Where on earth did this year go? In the interim, I’ve added goals. Beginning March 1 I recommitted to tracking (22/31 days. Infinitely better than the 0s the previous months) and this month I’ve committed to strength training. So we’ll see.
I also finished Tales from the Scale. Mixed feelings on it, but glad I read it
By Cari, on March 25th, 2012 Since I got my iPhone in December, I’ve fallen back into shutterbug mode. I’ve discovered Instagram and generally enjoyed exploring Manhattan with my camera. Most of these had been on my way to or from somewhere, or walking home from work through the park on a gorgeous, early spring day. What I hadn’t done was dedicate a day to taking pictures like I used to do while in Spain. That changed yesterday
As any of you who know me know, I have no sense of direction. Up and down? I’m OK with those. Right, left, east, west? Not so much. I usually do OK within the park and after having accidentally re-found Cherry Hill on Friday night when it too late/dark to get a good picture, I had a general course planned for Saturday morning. I just didn’t realize how long it was.
I entered the park at E. 86th and headed north along the reservoir. The east side of the reservoir had the sakura in peak whereas they are totally gone on the west side. Odd. From the south end of the reservoir I dropped down toward the Delacorte and new-to-me deck over the Turtle Pond via the great lawn and some amazing cherry, plum and magnolia trees. It’s amazing how many more turles you can see when the brush is cut back. I wanted to go up to the top of Belvedere Castle but the crowds were too big so I headed east around the Turtle Pond to the Poland/King Jagiello statue where I just s at and people watched for a bit. It was a gorgeous, warm-for-March spring day but a little too cool in the shade so I kept walking again after too long.
At the top of the hill to the south of King Jagiello I found another wonderful tree where I probably stopped and took photos for 20 minutes. Photos, yes. These were 20 or so of my best from yesterday but I took 248 in a matter of four plus hours. Yep, Shutterbug Cari is alive and well. From there, cut down through the crowds by the Boathouse and Bethesda Terrace to cherry hill. Surprisingly after the blossoms by King Jagiello and the ones I’d seen earlier in the week near the Pilgrim statue, where I returned on my way out of the park, the blossoms on cherry hill weren’t as magical. I still enjoyed the view of the Lake and the people watching.
By this point, my achilles were starting to hurt (fit flops and hills in the park don’t mix) so I decided to head out and make my way to the gym … but then I found the pilgrim blossoms even closer to peak than earlier in the week and an hour was gone to taking pics. Those trees are where the majority of the pics above are from – and they’re what spurred me to figure out how to edit photos on my computer and upgrade flickr so I could post them. WOW. These are by far the best sakura I’ve ever seen outside of Himeji or Hiroshima. The perfect climax to a great day.
I was floored when I tracked my route in MapMyFitness and realized it was more than five miles. Followed that with seven miles at the gym. A productive day in many ways.
By Cari, on March 5th, 2012 I like “wench” better than “wh0re” but when it comes to the scale, both are true for me.
I can weigh myself daily and it doesn’t make me (too) crazy. I’ll even weigh myself multiple times. I just need to know where I am. Non-scale cues don’t work for me especially since I have yet to learn to properly use a measuring tape. Yes, I’m special at times.
Weighed myself this morning knowing it would be up because a) couldn’t bend my fingers and b) overnight cankles. Hi. Crazy salt in Knorr Rice Sides buffalo chicken, anyone? Saw the number, shook my head, started drinking. At day’s end? I’d peed about 12 times and my night weight was 2 lbs less than my morning weight. Good sign but further proof our bodies are nuts.
Proud of myself today. I tracked everythng (except 4 m&ms as I couldn’t figure that out) and stayed OP.
I WILL DO THIS
Currently reading: Tales from the Scale. I see so much of myself in there, it’s eerie.
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