On Sunday we attended our last big neighborhood event as residents. I'm sure most of the people who check here also read Patrick's blog, but just in case, here's his review. |

Riding the subway from Bryant Park to Brooklyn, our train picked up an entire YMCA summer day camp. After living in the midwest, I was immediately impressed that these 20-30 kids' parents were comfortable with them being taken on the subway from point a to b with just the supervision of about 5 counselors, who were probably about 18 years old themselves.

Aside from the city kids who ride their bikes through my neighborhood, most of what I see is typical of the family I witnessed last week at the West Side Market. A toddler is wandering around as her parents and their friends chat, just like toddlers do. Mom reaches out to grab the kid, who is maybe 5 feet away, exclaiming "You have to stay close to us so no one steals you!"

At some point network news must have decided that kidnappings make good tv, and so even though the numbers have actually gone down, there is this immense fear out there that everyone is out to steal children. I think back 20 years, and Mary and I were trusted to walk or ride big wheels around the blocks in her neighborhood without anything more than the standard 'don't talk to strangers' knowledge. I think it comes down to community. So many people have retreated to a world of suburban culdesacs with their doors closed and locked and they don't know their neighbors and don't trust anyone outside their own safe world.

Adding to the differences of these New York kids was the diversity of the group and the fact that only one of these kids was overweight, presumably because you actually have to walk a lot to get around. And even though the noise and chaos was a little annoying, I sat there thinking "This is the kind of environment where I would want to raise my kids." |

Yesterday (Friday) I didn't have any interviews planned. I had thought I'd go to the major creative based employment agencies, but they want me to live in the city first. So, I decided to start the apartment hunt.

I had been looking at several neighborhoods I had never actually seen, so on Thursday I checked out Park Slope and on Friday I checked out Hoboken, NJ as well as Brooklyn Heights, Cobble Hill, Boerum Hill, and Carroll Gardens.

All of these areas are great, and I'd be happy to live in any of them. As opposed to Manhattan, where there are lots of high-rises, Brooklyn and Hoboken are very neiighborhood-y with small townhouse type buildings on residential streets in between comercial streets.

It seems to be a bit early to find a September apartment, so Patrick and I are going to have to go back, likely the first weekend in August. I did meet a couple of brokers I liked (and one I didn't) and I think, as long as I plan ahead and call people to make appointments in advance, we should have no problem getting an apartment we will like. |

Thursday was my big interview day. I had a 10:30 appointment to meet with a vice president at a major media company, and to go around to a couple of interviews he had set up in various departments.

After doing a check in similar to the airport (showing my id and x-raying my bags) I went upstairs where I was met with great hospitality as the vp's assistant was waiting for me at the door and led me to the office of another vp, the first one's 'deputy' in the department, and waited for another meeting to end so I could meet him.

From first to last, everyone was as nice as can be, and I ended up meeting with a total of 8 people plus 2 assistants, which I would take as a good sign. Some of the people I met weren't in the design area at all, but it was good networking and they gave me a good idea of the workings of the company.

In the interactive area, I was only supposed to meet with one senior art director, and not even sure I would be showing my portfolio. Well, he ended up asking to see my book, and was so enthusiastic about my work, he told me he would love to have me on their team (because this is a big company, they may not have a full-time opening immediately, but they do have open projects coming up). He then took me to meet his boss in between meetings, and then she took me to see another senior art director.

After a short lunch break, I also got taken to the designer who handles all internal design requests from the company's internal website to posters and other promotional items. She was equally enthusiastic as the first art director I saw in interactive and, although she has no hiring power within the company, took my resume and said she'd be sure to refer freelance work my way.

Finally I got to meet the man who had set up the day for me. He's a friend of the family, and was really really nice. We chatted for a bit and he said he would gather feedback from the people I met and get back to me.

Even if I don't end up working there, it proved one really important thing for me. I knew I had a strong portfolio for the Cleveland market, but now I know that even in New York my work can hold its own. |

Just got back from a great if exhausting trip to New York. Before I get to that, tho, I finally goot my share of bad flying experiences.

Wednesday night, I guess we got the remnants of Hurricane Dennis here in Cleveland, and there was a ground stop for hours at the Cleveland airport, which meant that even tho I got transferred from the 7:10 flight to the 4:50 flight, we actually didn't leave the ground until about 10pm. Which meant I go to Newark at about 11:30, half an hour from my destination in Chatham, and I had to get up in the morning for the 8:35 train.

This morning, I go to the airport at the normal amount of time ahead (a little over an hour early - not the 2-3 hours early mom feels is necessary). Well, instead of the normal thing, where the agents at the check in counter take your checked bags and scan or don't scan them in the x-ray, we all had to line up for the 1 open machine at whatever designated station.

First they sent me to the international line, which didn't move for 15 minutes. Then they put me in another line, which did move, but I was all the way in the back. Finally I waved someone down and got to piss off a bunch of people by cutting in line because at that point I'd been in line long enough that my flight was boarding in 7 minutes.

Luckily the security line wasn't long, so I got through that and proceeded to what I thought was my gate (listed on my boarding pass) right next to the security checkpoint. I get there and find out my plane was moved to a gate all the way at the end of the airport, so I ran in sock feet over the people movers and got to the gate just as they said "We are now pre-boarding first class passengers...". |

Well - it's definitely reality now. This morning I told the office about our impending move to NY so that Patrick can go to the Institute of Culinary Education. Of course everyone is sad to see me go, but I think it went over better because it's a life change and not just an "I hate my job, I'm leaving" thing.

Everyone seems to think we're really gutsy to pick up everything and move from our comfortable life. Maybe it is, it just seems normal to me, but who knows. |

All day I have been following the news and trying to reconcile with myself why I am so much more upset about this bombing than I was with Madrid or Bali or even in some ways than the tsunami (although that one probably has to do more with natural disaster versus people killing other people). Is it because I know people from Britain? Is it because we speak the same language? Is it because of the geographical proximity? Is it because of some horrible unspeakable subconscious racial thing about westerners and all that? I like to think of myself as enlightened and compassionate and not hung up on any us and them kind of mentality - we're all people in the world and all that. But then why do some tragedies upset me more than others?

I also have been filled all day with this utter frustration with government and the useless beaurocratic means taken to make us feel safer. They talk and talk about the global war on terror and reforming the intelligence structure and then soemthing happens and it's all like "Oh - didn't see that coming". Well - why not? It's like the whole airport security thing where we are given the idea that all this hassle means we must be safer, but really it doesn't mean anything. It's like the focus is so narrow and short sighted that it assumes there's going to be another attack on New York with planes when obviously the target and method keeps evolving. |

The most exciting thing that happened yesterday was that we arrived home to find Byron gnawing on a mouse in the dining room. The scenario I imagine is that the mouse came through the crawlspace in the bassement and mistakenly thought the way out was through the hole where the ants get in in the corner of the kitchen. Audrey stalked and killed it. Byron tried to help, but it was all over before he knew what was going on. Audrey lost interest once it was dead, and Byron started chewing on it, excited to have some 'prey'. And the whole time Oliver watched, and wanted to join in, but was too pitiful to do so. In any case, they all got pounce treats. |

We went out on a classic date to Shaker Square on Saturday, dinner (at Fire) and a movie (Batman Begins).

I hate to say it, since I am a Tim Burton fan, but that was by far the best Batman movie of all of them. Very dark, not so much supernatural as much as it touched on the vigilante nature of the character (and super heroes in general) and the magic of technology (I loved the backstory of the belt and the batmobile particularly). I went into the movie wary, becaue I love Christopher Nolan's other movies, particularly Memento, and I was worried this would be just a sell-out money-making Hollywood film. But the director's mark was definitely there in the core theme of the tormented, grief driven protagonist. Really really good - I recommend it even to people who sually hate super hero movies.

After the movie, we had dinner at Fire, a place I'd been wanting to go for a while, in large part because they are not an Indian restaurant and they have a tandoori oven. Excellent food in a comfortable, relaxed neighborhood-y environment. I had wheat claybread with roasted eggplant, tomato and mozzarella and tandoor roasted vegetables, artichoke puree and white beans. Patrick had fire-roasted banana peppers, sausage and tomato and halibut with sweet corn risotto and jicama salad.

I worried about the eggplant in both, since I am picky when it comes to eggplant. It had the most perfect melty texture and smoky flavor. The roasted vegetables also had a generous amount of fennel, proving to me that I can like anything if it is prepared well enough.

For dessert we shared brownie sundae with hazelnuts and hot fudge. Kind of a dressed up highbrow version of the brownie monster at Tommy's, it was super-rich with delicious hot fudge sauce topped with a combination of vanilla bean ice cream and homemade whipped cream. I think about 1/3 of it was all I could manage, but I wished I could eat more! |