Hotpads' Rent vs Buy Heat Maps

Gotta love Thrillist New York for its colorful, politically-incorrect, slightly offensive yet always hilarious summaries of all things New York. In a simultaneous renter's and buyer's marketed created by Fannie and Freddie - if they didn't take you under with them, Thrillist New York has reviewed a handy tool:

New York's high-priced housing presents a conundrum: start mailing hefty mortgage payments to a bank, or resign yourself to abetting your Ukrainian landlord's enviable lifestyle of hookers and kasha. Pick your poison with Hotpads' Rent vs. Buy Heat Maps.

A new, financially dispiriting tool from an established rental site, HP's maps counsel whether you should rent or buy via color-coded hoods: from light blue for steal-worthy purchasing opps (Jersey City, Forest Hills), to green for market average (Murray Hill, UES), to red for rent-worthy digs, e.g., SoHo and West Village (Manhattan's gated clubdivision). The site's calcs are automatically done via esoteric math wizardry, i.e., avg cost of ownership / estimated annual rent -- a formula that's confounded many a couch-surfer's TI81. To further assist your hopeless quest for shelter, HP plots icons for thousands of current listings, each clickable for photos and details, which even include moving solutions and storage units (there's an affordable option for you).

HP also provides additional real estate heat maps, like Household Income, Foreclosures per Household, and Median Age, thus illuminating another conundrum: how to get into the low-priced hood beset by a cabal of rent-control beneficiaries who just. Won't. Die.

See your options unfurled at HotPads.com

All in My Head

There are two dates that strike a nerve with me every year: June 7 is the day Rickey was born; August 3 is the day he died.

I was reading the tweets of loved ones & strangers who recently lost a friend of theirs. In times of tragedy and loss, I'm always struck by how life goes on. I perused their tweets about missing their friend and their seemingly cheerful and unrelated daily goings-on within spans of less than 24 hours ... I suppose it all goes on for all of us at one time or another. And it will again.

But when will I stop trying to make connections out of coincidences?

I needed today to be a good day. And it was ... outside of my head.

City of Perspectives

When I think of evolution, I think of birds and dinosaurs, prehistoric man and opposable thumbs. I don’t often apply the theories of evolution to everyday life or my progression through age. But I was struck yesterday by the notion of a constantly transforming New York City as I dipped out of my apartment building in Hell’s Kitchen and trotted down the front steps.

New York City is a very different city to a variety of people. I blogged about my relocation from Harlem to Hell’s Kitchen last year and was amazed by how the landscape of the city transformed within a mere six miles. Of course, there are the obvious and beautiful surface-level ethnic differences. Anyone can witness them by venturing from Chinatown to Little Italy to Harlem. There is the New York City for the native, the transplant and the tourist. But there are deeper levels of constant transformation that took me three years to consider or even notice.

There is the New York City of the train commuters, the ones who can often tell which stop is next – not by the conductor’s announcements – but by the bends and curves of the subway tracks, by the segments under seemingly constant construction or by the barely visible graffiti along the tunnels. They know where to wait on the platform so that they can exit the train near a stairway to the street or a connection.

There is the New York City of the pedestrians, which I became when I moved to a walk-up in Hell’s Kitchen with a 10-block commute to a Midtown office building. We are the ones who would rather walk 30 blocks than wait for a train or bus. We know where the shortcuts are between streets – for example, one could cut through buildings from W 50th Street down to W 46th Street between Sixth and Seventh Avenues and grab a coffee in the tunnel between W 47th and 48th, across from the old studio for The Morning Show with Mike and Juliet.

There is the New York City of drivers, the ones who know the parking rules and which avenues and streets to avoid during rush hour. I became cogitatively aware of this difference yesterday when I trotted down the front steps of my apartment building and was stopped by a man who was trying to figure out the parking rules on my street. I realized that though I have lived on this street for over a year, I had no idea how long he could park outside of my building nor did I have any insider information on the best parking in the area. I couldn’t imagine how different my street might look from behind the wheel of a car. And the backseat of a taxicab does not count.

There is the New York City of the financially elite, who live and work in the upper altitudes of the Manhattan skyline. Their perspective dwells at a birds' eye view and through the back seat of a sleek black sedan or limousine.

Many New Yorkers can transition between any of the above at any given time, but just as many are partial to one particular form of transportation - which ultimately designates the New York City they know. It seems to be a trivial point to debate, but the mode of transportation one uses to get around the city probably forms their versions of New York City more than anything else. Everything influences the mode - residence, career, money, lifestyle. All determine how we interact with the city and thus determine our perspectives.

New York City is a landscape of evolution from its skyline to its culture, but the most personal evolution of all is the New York City of perspective.

ShopNYC - Episode 1

I am so excited about Natasha's first episode of ShopNYC!

Read more on Natasha's ShopNYCTours blog.

A Year Ago Today: Sex and the City: The Movie ... Life and the City: The Reality
Two Years Ago Today: Phone Photo Ops - Date Night

Photo Ops - Long Beach, NY

The view over my shoulder.


And the view to my right.


A Year Ago Today: No post
Two Years Ago Today: Once in a Blue Moon

"Things I Love" Thursdays - Side Walk Flower Stands

I love walking by sidewalk flower shops in Manhattan. It's like aromatherapy in the streets.

"Things I Love" Thursdays are inspired by "I Love New York" (BNY, February 14, 2007).

A Year Ago Today: No post
Two Years Ago Today:
Memorial Weekend Highlights
Sunday Mornings in Manhattan

The Return of Fleet Week

From the web pages of East Village Idiot - So funny that I've had to repost it or link to it every year during Fleet Week. I have to say that I continue to be disappointed each year that sailors aren't swarming the streets in the abundance portrayed on an episode of "Sex and the City," but men in firefighter gear continue to have a similar effect.

Without further ado is the warning issued on May 24, 2007, by the East Village Idiot:

Men of New York City,

For the next seven days, you will have a mortal enemy. He is desperate to get laid. In a head-to-head battle, he will always get the girl. You will spend months trying to get into a woman’s pants, and he will get into them in one night. You will wear your very best designer clothing to impress a woman, and your enemy, in his standard-issue polyester uniform, will take that woman home. You will meekly suggest going back to her place, and she will laugh. He’ll suggest the same thing, and she will graciously accept, and perhaps even offer to pay cab fare. You will wonder what consequences come with taking a woman home, like how long you have to wait to call her back after that night. Your enemy won’t even be in New York in a week, or a month, or perhaps a year. He’ll be out at sea, somewhere far, far away.

Gentlemen, this is your enemy:


Beware Fleet Week. He may be a mere Seaman on the open waters, but for the next seven days, he is the Captain of the Civilian Cockblock.

And SUBWAYblogger also made an announcement that same day in 2007: Hide your daughters: It's Fleet Week

A Year Ago Today:
Myths & the City
Real Estate LOL - Toilet & Shower Rooms
Two Years Ago Today:
Naval Warfare (as blogged by Chris, a.k.a. the East Village Idiot)
Phone Photo Ops - Beerpong, BBQs and Booths

Memorial Day Weekend in ATL

I went, I ate, I shot moonshine.

Back in New York City.
Summer trip #1 of 4 completed (Atlanta, GA).
Next up: Turks and Caicos over the 4th of July weekend.

A Year Ago Today: Unforgettable Day Weekend
Two Years Ago Today: No post

Phone Photo Op - In Production

You're more likely in New York City to use your lunch break to get your chipped pedicure fixed at NY Nature Spa on West 41st Street (yesterday) and notice this signage outside of Arena ... unless MTV happens to be filming a True Life episode of "I'm an Objectum-Sexual" in your hometown.


Side note: If men knew the extent of our maintenance - waxing, shaving, trimming, dyeing, filing, polishing - they'd always have dinner ready and waiting for us.

A Year Ago Today: "Things I Love" Thursdays - Dog Parks
Two Years Ago Today: No post

"Things I Love" Thursdays - City Lights

I love the view of the Time Warner Center from my bedroom window less than ten blocks away. I lay in bed at night and stare at the high rise lights until I fall asleep. It makes me feel like such a New Yorker within my exposed brick walls, looking through the bars of my fire escape.

Often, as I lay there, I notice random lights turn on and off in various buildings. Sometimes I spy a shadow passing by windows and I'm curious about the hundreds - and thousands - of separate lives living around me in the skyscrapers of Midtown. It's one way to humble yourself and make your own problems seem a little less significant. That - or look at images of outer space from the Hubble Telescope.

And often, as I lay there, I notice lights continually going on and off in the Hearst Magazine Building. It's home to the offices of popular monthly periodicals, such as Cosmopolitan, Good Housekeeping, O Magazine, Seventeen and Redbook ... and I think it's haunted. I'm sure there is a logical - perhaps environmentally friendly - reason why entire floors of lights turn off and then turn back on seconds - or minutes - later. Sometimes it's a single room of lights. Other times it's the row of a whole floor. And even more dramatically, several floors will go dark before relighting. Perhaps it's a nighttime electrical glitch, but it makes my evening wind-down more exciting to believe that it's haunted.

I imagine myself going to the doorman one day - a tall, intimidating and bald man perhaps similar to the hero in "The Shining" - and asking probing questions regarding the nighttime electrical activity of the building. And then the stereotypical response of a person of color warning the curious White (or half White, in my case) person to stop investigating paranormal activities that ultimately lead them to horrific ends: "If I were you, I'd stopping asking about those blinking lights."

If you work for Con Edison and know the reason, please don't email me. I like my (il)logic better.

A Year Ago Today: Real Estate LOL - No Bathtub in the Bathroom
Two Years Ago Today:
1300-Mile Walk of Shame
Phone Photo Ops - M.I.A. in the MIA

Phone Photo Op - Wienermobile

I walked by this on my way to the office ...

... and had this song in my head for the rest of the day:
Oh, I wish I were an Oscar Meyer wiener
because that's what I really want to be.
For if I were an Oscar Meyer wiener
everybody'd be in love with me.

A Year Ago Today:R-E-N-T
Two Years Ago Today: No post

Neighborhood Gem - Sweet Emily's

Terrence (back from the BJ League on his first visit during the off-season) and I discovered an adorable, below-street-level restaurant in my neighborhood with a menu so enticing that you need one or two rounds of drinks to decide what you want to eat.

Sweet Emily's is run by Emily and her husband (and head chef) on West 51st Street between Eighth and Ninth Avenues. With its warm decor, flavorful plates and low prices, it is a new personal favorite among the Hell's Kitchen diamonds. Take advantage of reservation-less dining now before a feature in Time Out New York or a Zagat review change it from a local secret to a tourist headliner ... like Roberto Passon's once quiet brunches. But the city couldn't keep Roberto's $8 all-you-can-drink bellinis, bloody marys, mimosas and screwdrivers a secret for long.

POST UPDATE:
Oops. Too late: What to Eat at Sweet Emily's, Bringing Comfort to Midtown on Saturday

A Year Ago Today:Real Estate LOL - "Separate" Kitchens
Two Years Ago Today:Six Stiches of Separation

Phone Photo Op - Police Pony Ponderings

Yesterday while walking home from work along Sixth Avenue, I watched a police officer write a parking ticket on horseback.

And I momentarily stopped pondering quadratic equations and the global economic impact on farm subsidy programs - which accurately reflect the depth and breadth of my daily thoughts while walking in the streets of Manhattan - and wondered who cleans up the manure when a police horse shits on the street?

A Year Ago Today: "Things I Love" Thursdays - My Friends (Again)
Two Years Ago Today:
Cyber Relating
Phone Photo Ops - Lunch in the Park

"Things I Love" Thursday - The Foods of New York

The Foods of New York on NBC's Today Show

Visit msnbc.com for Breaking News, World News, and News about the Economy

"Things I Love" Thursdays are inspired by "I Love New York" (BNY, February 14, 2007).

A Year Ago Today: Nightlife Highlights of Late
Two Years Ago Today:
Phone Photo Ops - Subway Performers
BNY Updates

Phone Photo Op - Their Job is So Much Cooler

While walking to work the other day, I saw "Good Morning America" news anchors bouncing on trampolines in Times Square; two blocks away, I got to answer phones, schedule meetings, create spreadsheets and process data charts.


A Year Ago Today:
Phone Photo Ops - End of East Village Servitude
Creating Coincidences
Reviving my Greek Life
Two Years Ago Today: No post

KFC Sit-In

I can always count on my fellow citizens of New York City to demand chicken consumption equality for all.
Oprah's Free Chicken Leads to Long Lines, Sit-In
KFC Stores Mobbed by Coupon Holders Looking for Free Meal, Anger at NYC Shop

A Year Ago Today: "Things I Love" Thursdays - May Flowers
Two Years Ago Today:
Alternatives to Previous Norms
Phone Photo Ops - Walking to Work

More Middle-Class New Yorkers Face Eviction

Once ‘Very Good Rent Payers’ Now Facing Eviction
By MANNY FERNANDEZ
Published: May 4, 2009
More of the city’s middle-class tenants, their jobs gone, are falling behind on rent, straining legal and financial services once used mostly by lower-income New Yorkers.
Read More

"It’s kind of dehumanizing. They see you as a certain kind of person. We’ve never been that certain kind of person."
KEVIN BREWSTER-STREEKS, who, with his partner, was forced to leave his Bronx apartment after owing $7,000 in back rent.

A Year Ago Today: No post
Two Years Ago Today:
City Walk #6 - Midtown East
Phone Photo Ops - City Walk #6
Phone Photo Ops - Street Trees

One Degree from Michelle Obama

Texts you're more likely to receive living in New York City (or Washington, DC): I'm at the time warner center wrking the first lady till 10pm (sent by my secret service buddy).

Thoughts you're more likely to have living in New York City: OMG. The First Lady is at the Time Warner Center - less than 10 blocks from my apartment!

A Year Ago Today: No post
Two Years Ago Today: Subway Talk

In the Wake of Tough Love

Partied with our girl Natasha and her friend Abiola at the "Tough Love" Season Finale Charity Soiree last night at The 40/40 Club. I'm sure there are photos online somewhere.

In the meantime, check out Natasha's new Shop NYC Tour blog, where she dishes about her company, ShopNYC Tours. Whether guiding tourists or locals, shopping vintage or high fashion or visiting the East Village or Meatpacking, you'll hear about the best shopping NYC has to offer.

For more information about New York City shopping tours, visit www.shop-nyctours.com.

Other irrelevant reports of the day: My boss sat next to James Worthy on a flight from JFK to LAX today. If you are not an avid basketball fan ... you may need Wikipedia or a basketball-savvy boyfriend to find out.

A Year Ago Today:
Brunching and Walking on a Sunday Afternoon
City Walk #19 - Upper West Side 4: Church and Gown
Phone Photo Ops - City Walk #19
Two Years Ago Today: No post

Who's That Girl?

It was a warm day in May. Jessica was nonchalantly flipping through a magazine in an Atlanta parking lot. Apparently Walter was taking his time in the local fresh market. A tiny bead of sweat formed above her furrowed brow. Impatiently, she turned another page, and there in the "What they were wearing" section ... a familiar face ...

That's not how it really happened. We had actually been tipped off that she was in it ... but that's how we like to tell it. I mean, it's not every day that your best friend is 8x10" in a national magazine.

A Year Ago Today: Phone Photo Op - Disappearing Acts
Real Estate LOL - Embracing the College-Dorm-Life for Life
Colleague Convo - Shoe-In Kitchens
Two Years Ago Today: Phone Photo Ops - Through Windows

TGIF

Welcome to the weekend!

That's damn right.

Taken outside of the House of Brews on West 51st Street and Eighth Avenue.

A Year Ago Today:

The Texts You Receive in New York

"Things I Love" Thursdays - Street Vendor Regulars

Two Years Ago Today: A Garden Grows in Harlem

Remembering Aprils

As with previous months, the responsibilities of my expanded job position and ups and downs in my personal life have prevented me from blogging as regularly throughout April as I would have liked. Thus, affecting my Year Three in Preview, where "posts of present accounts of being will end with 'a year ago- and two years ago- today' links to the past of becoming until the third year comes full circle and the 'Becoming a New Yorker' blogtale is complete."

So here is a year ago this month and two years ago this month for April:
April 2008
April 2007

Attack of the Swine Flu!!!

... Oh never mind. It's just a sore throat.

Facebook maps swine flu hysteria

A Year Ago Today:
My First Pair of Valentinos
Phone Photo Ops - Valentino
Two Years Ago Today: Indiscriminate Sunday: Societal Service, Cat-Sitting Cash & Tradition Choices (in Random Order)

Downtown, We Have [No] Problem

NYTimes.com Quotation of the Day:
"First thing is, I’m annoyed — furious is a better word — that I wasn’t told."
- MAYOR MICHAEL R. BLOOMBERG, after a plane normally used as Air Force One and two fighter jets flew over Lower Manhattan.

I heard about this the next day from someone in Georgia, but I'm sure I would have been concerned, too, if I had seen a low-flying Boeing 747 speeding in the shadows of skyscrapers and trailed by two fighter jets.
Read More
Not a quote of the day, week or month. Just of whenever. Until the next quote that moves me.

A Year Ago Today: What Do Guacamole, Brisé volé, and Hookah Have in Common?
Two Years Ago Today:
West Side's Tale of Whoa
Phone Photo Ops - Horseback Riding in the City

Happy Administrative Professionals' Day

... to me!

A gift card to Sephora and Starbucks from my bosses.
April 22, 2009 was definitely better than April 22, 2008.

Company name and logo blacked out to protect confidentiality agreements signed at the start of my employment.

A Year Ago Today: My First NYC Emergency Room Visit
Two Years Ago Today:
City Walk #5 - Lower East Side 1
Phone Photo Ops - City Walk #5

Another Day, Another Dollar, Another Headline

Just another day in New York City when three of your bosses are in The NY Post.

A Year Ago Today: No post
Two Years Ago Today: Phone Photo Ops - City in Bloom

Thoughts from Today's Meanderings Around the City

Leaving my apartment:
New neighbors moving in on the 2nd floor.

Somewhere on Madison:
Poodles and Bug-A-Boo strollers. Yep, we're on the Upper East Side.

Walking up Seventh Avenue:
Lived almost a year in Hell's Kitchen - yet it still feels weird that I'm walking through Times Square and I'm almost home.

Walking down Ninth Avenue:
And tonight, we're eating in Brazil ... on Ninth Avenue.

A Year Ago Today: No post
Two Years Ago Today:
Phone Photo Op - Skyline Sunset
Phone Photo Ops - Ready to Assemble

Out in Public

On our way to The Public Theatre to see "The Good Negro", we apparently passed someone from Desperate Housewives coming out of the subway at Broadway-Lafayette. I didn't see him, but Tokii did.

And I finally realized that we were next to Sterling Brown in the theatre.
Special thanks to Gina for walking up to him and starting a conversation because trying to match his face with his character in "Army Wives" was driving me crazy.

Side note: Rachel Nicks, a close friend and former Juilliard classmate of Tokii and Gina's, was incredibly moving in "The Good Negro." If you missed her on stage at The Public Theatre, you can see her onscreen in "Life Support" with Queen Latifah. She is a talented and promising young artist.

Public theatre, street fairs, outdoor cafes, gorgeous weather ... Days like today are why I moved to New York.




A Year Ago Today: Dear Younger Self
Two Years Ago Today:
Six Months to Almost Furnished
Six Months to Final Repairs
Phone Photo Op - Free Ben & Jerry's

Shameless Plug

I was at a TastingNYC event at Taj tonight with Natasha (M. - not to be confused with my roommate Natasha S.), chatting about her "real" life without the "Tough Love" cameras while our friend Stacey flirted with a handsome guy named Larry over $6-wine specials. Natasha is no longer working with the Sex and the City tour group since she began her own tour company ShopNYC Tours.

Natasha has created a series of comprehensive shopping tours catered to your retail needs and preferences with convenient door-to-door mobile transportation, eliminating the stresses associated with available parking, slaloming crowded sidewalks, or lugging bags through subway turnstiles. At an affordable price (especially relative to the costs of parking and taxicabs in New York), she really does create a memorable VIP shopping experience in some of Manhattan's best-kept retail secrets and hidden gems.

If you are ever in NYC, you should go shopping with her! Tell her I sent you.

ShopNYCTours.com (Use code TUFLUV for 10% off any shopping tour!)

A Year Ago Today: "Things I Love" Thursdays - Random Acts of New Yorker Kindness
Two Years Ago Today: Connecting in Chantilly & Beyond

Phone Photo Op - South of Madison Square Park

Looking north from below Madison Square Park at sunset.


A Year Ago Today: "Things I Love" Thursdays - Random Acts of New Yorker Kindness
Two Years Ago Today: Connecting in Chantilly & Beyond