My First Encounter with the FDNY

While Natasha and I were watching this week's NetFlix pick, a "reminder of why we should just continue ordering in" set off our First Alert Carbon Monoxide Detector, which - up until this evening - we had thought was a smoke alarm. And which - up until this evening - we had not realized we did not have.

In any case, after 20 minutes of silencing the alarm - only to have it continue to go off every few minutes, sliding different parts of it in and out, calling my dad for advice, opening all the windows, and running the air conditioner full blast, we decided to call the FDNY to our rescue.

Unfortunately, our Manhattan Yellowpages phonebook referred us from "Fire Department" to "Emergency" to "Medical Services" with no listing for the fire department that we pass everyday walking down 8th Avenue. And none of the numbers we found on Google.com seemed to be getting us through to anyone of authority. So after much debate over whether I should dial 911 without a raging fire, a severed leg or a carving knife embedded in my neck, I pressed 9-1-1 into my cell phone, gulped and hit Send.

911 Operator: 9-1-1. What's your location?
Me: [Address eradicated]
911 Operator: You're between Eighth and Ninth Avenues?
Me: Yes.
911 Operator: Thank you. What's your emergency?
Me: [in my head: oye, it's not really an emergency per se] I'm actually trying to call a fire department in our neighborhood to ask someone to check our carbon monoxide alarm.
911 Operator: Ok. You have to connect to the fire department through 9-1-1. I'll patch you through.
Me: Thank you.

Fire Department Dispatch: New York Fire Department
Me: Hi, I'm calling because our carbon monoxide detector has been going off for awhile even though we have ventilated our apartment.
Fire Department Dispatch: No problem. We can definitely help you with that. What's your location?
Me: [Address eradicated]
Fire Department Dispatch: And you're between which avenues?
Me: Eighth and Ninth.
Fire Department Dispatch: We'll send someone right over.
Me: Thank you.

I walked back out to the living room, where Natasha was still poking and proding our molested carbon monoxide detector, which was continuing to warn us to "Move to Fresh Air". Then we waited, assuming that a small fire fighter pick-up truck with a few axes and a step ladder on the back was going to show up at some point. Instead, within minutes, we heard wailing sirens and saw flashing red lights dancing on our bedroom walls.

"Oh my God," Natasha said. "That's for us."

"No, it's not!" I exclaimed as we raced to my bedroom window and saw this (two fire trucks and about a dozen first responders):


Seconds later, four fire fighters in full gear, complete with hard hats, fire-retardant coats, oxygen tanks and axes had hiked to our fifth floor apartment and sauntered into our living room, where Natasha was peering at them from the couch, and I was leaning against the kitchen counter eating a bowl of rice. As I lamented over the fact that they had just climbed four flights of stairs in heavy gear, I couldn't help but wonder if we should feign carbon monoxide disorientation and dizziness to at least make the whole embarrassing scene look like a real emergency.

In a prompt and professional manner, they took carbon monoxide readings in our rooms, reset our carbon monoxide detector and taught us how to use it. And with a tip of their hats, they were off into the night to save the Manhattanites with real emergencies.

As I watched the taillights of the fire trucks disappear, I heard Natasha call from the living room, "Well ... and now back to our regularly scheduled programming."

Thank you, FDNY!

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

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

First Heat Wave of '08

Natasha and I bought a new air conditioner from P.C. Richards yesterday as the heat wave was settling into New York. With the help of our new neighbor David, a graphics designer, we installed it in the window of our living room, since it's central to the entire apartment and the only view is directly into the bedroom of a highly sexually active couple, who don't shut their blinds.

Natasha and I have joked about inviting our girlfriends over and ordering take-out for our neighbors' peep show, like Carrie and company did in an episode of "Sex and the City". And now our neighbors will have a view of Natasha and me standing in sweaty bras in front of the A/C, not that they need further inspiration.

I haven't lived in an apartment with air conditioning in two years (here's why). A $100 discount on a 10,000 BTU unit, a $10 cab ride home and half a batch of cookies for David's assistance later, I am reveling in a truly a historic achievement. And it was just in time. Grade schools across the city were closed today because of the heat.

My First Yankees Game

The Former SNL Actor got Natasha four tickets to the Yankees game versus the Los Angeles Angels on Friday night and told her to invite two girlfriends. So she brought me and Iris.

The Yankees didn't win, but I had my first MBL hot dog. I couldn't help but wonder if the secret was in the sauce or in the stadium. And beer had never tasted so refreshing.

"Katie," the former SNL actor said, leaning across Natasha after the fifth inning, "You're going to love this."

The Yankees grounds crew came out to rake the infield mid-game and performed their traditional YMCA routine as they worked. I had to take a second and appreciate the moment. We were sitting in seats that the three of us would never have even dared to search for on Ticketmaster. The crowd was singing along, my friends were laughing, my beer was ice cold.

I added the moment to the montage of memories that I plan to play in my mind the moment before I die, right after me and Ra struggling to shop in Toys "R" Us for Mayra's baby shower, and right before Tasha screaming at Natasha and me to "work those thighs" as we ran up the stairs to catch a Manhattan-bound A train on the elevated platform at 111th Street in Queens.

Below: Waiting for the game to start ... and glad that the three of us stopped waiting for our lives to start (in Idaho, North Carolina and Arizona respectfully) and found each other.









The highlight of the game: Iris throwing the ball back to A. Rod.

A Year Ago Today: Uppity Executives
Two Years Ago Today: No post

My Main Cast

It took me almost a year to find the close circle of friends that I now have in the city. Last July-September, I began hanging out regularly with a few woman in Manhattan. Because of our diverse ethnic backgrounds, we once jokingly called ourselves "The United Colors of Benetton" and personalized a Disney fairies image that now hangs in some of our offices. The name for our clique never really stuck - not that we've ever tried to label ourselves as if we were some sort of girl band - but the group has gradually updated itself since the initial Cast of Characters post to encompass a beautiful group of women that I am proud to call friends.

Hallmark should make a card that reads, There are 8 million people in New York City, and we found each other. I'd buy one for all of them.

In alphabetical order:
Debasha - the fashion corporate merchandise planner
Iris - the fashion designer / personal shopper extraordinare
Jackie - the cocktail waitress who receives $100 tips from Jay-Z for counting his cash
Mayra, the international manufacturing, research and multimedia supervisor
Natasha M. (Tasha or T) - the film and TV voiceover/actress and the best "Sex and the City" Tour Guide ever
Natasha S. (Natasha) - the finance executive and fabulous roommate dubbed by the Former SNL Actor: "A White Girl Who Swallowed a Black Girl" (check her out from behind and you'll see what he meant)
Ra - the shoe designer and footwear guru

Other main characters (around and about NYC):
Bobbi (Tokii) - the best friend from college, whose acting career takes her in and out of the city
Annisha - the publishing marketer
Candice - the flight attendant
Cassie - the Connecticut-based nanny, soon-to-be-fulltime-New Yorker
Gina - the fashion merchandiser who just moved to LA

A Year Ago Today: September Sunrise
No Title for Last Night
August's Sunset
Two Years Ago Today: VMAs, Mass Celebrity Sighting and Almost TGIF

Two Years Down; A Lifetime to Go

Today marks my first two years living in New York City. But that anniversary is secondary. Five years ago today. And the 3rd has fallen on a Sunday again. At this exact moment five years ago, that darkness did not yet exist for me. In another 12-13 more hours, his father would be calling to tell me that he was dead.

I'm still creating coincidences and searching for that connection, which logic tells me does not exist. But as August 3, 2008, drew closer, I was helping plan a baby shower for Mayra, and Natasha invited me to attend a Yankees game - a first for both of us - made even more special by the location of our seats.

Natasha and I spent the three days before Friday's game, bouncing around our apartment, giddy about the idea of sitting in the first row behind home plate for our first-ever Yankees game - and one of the last to ever be played in The House that Ruth Built. We giggled continuously and said corny things sporadically, like "Home plate, baby!" while passing each other in the kitchen. One evening, I walked in the apartment and called out, "Is there a home plate ticket holder in the house?"

And as Mayra's baby shower approached, I became increasingly busier with last minute preparations and shopping for gifts on her registry. Ra and I met at the Toys "R" Us in Times Square after work one evening and wandered aimlessly in the babies section. Sifting through the endless options of bottles, diapers, teethers and care kits was overwhelming, to say the least. I highly recommend it as an effective form of birth control. As we were exiting the store with our purchases (including a large, boxed high chair), Ra - slightly frustrated by the complicated shopping spree - mentioned that we should probably catch a taxi to my apartment. I replied that we probably wouldn't be able to catch a cab in Midtown at that hour, to which she exclaimed in horror, "Oh no! What are we going to do?"

I looked back at the genuine expression of repulsion on her face, her body hunched by the weight of Toys "R" Us shopping bags, and we both died laughing. Unable to catch an available taxi from 44th and Broadway, we ended up taking our first pedicab ride.

Mayra and Melvin's baby shower was a traditional Dominican shower, which included a lot of friends, food, music, dancing and alcohol. I ran around Midtown on Saturday morning, trying to find some of the last things I had forgotten to purchase for her shower games. And then there was the commute from Midtown to 111th Street in Queens, the set-up for the party, and Melvin's reassurance that we had plenty of time because Dominicans are never punctual. But what about all of the invited Americans, Ecuadorians, Puerto Ricans, and those who bubble in "other", I wondered? So many things to keep my mind occupied. And of course, I found more moments to add to my memory montage when Mayra was in the middle of opening her gifts and suddenly began to cry. We all knew it was partially her eighth-month hormones, but we also knew how overpowering it can be to feel so incredibly loved. As Melvin laughed and began to console her, his own eyes welled up and a few tears spilled over.

And this evening, Natasha and I are painting our living room and kitchen. Spiced Butternut and Autumn Orange while we order Thai take-out and sip Pinot Noir. It's the combination of the big and little things, after all, that make life go on.

A Year Ago Today: One Year At A Time
Two Years Ago Today: Temperaturely Speaking ...

You Want to Go Where Everybody Knows Your Name

Yesterday Natasha and I were sprawled on our couch immediately after work - already in pajamas - when the infamous promoter text messages began to beep in. One after the other. Like clockwork. We ignored one after the other, absent-mindedly deleting them as they came. But one prompted me to read it out loud: "Hey katie! Tonight jermaine dupri bday party @ tenjune + dinner at [restaurant eradicated to preserve the promoter's identity since I'm about to bash the mass text messaging strategy that he and other promoters enlist]."

I do not mind mass text messages from promoters. Sometimes they lead us to fabulous evenings. Sometimes they are fruitless promises of open bars and celebrity-infested affairs. But I absolutely despise when promoters send out mass text messages - which most of my friends receive at the same time because we all know most of the same promoters - and then resend it with "Hey katie!" at the beginning to make it seem like a personal, private invitation.

Promoters, I know you sent the same bait out to reel in dozens of beautiful women. I do not need to feel like I have an exclusive invitation to a nightclub to motivate me to respond. Honestly, I don't want to go to something to which only I - with my personalized text message invitation - was invited. I can drink alone at home and usually in my underwear with a bag of chips, a pint of ice cream, a spoon and a greasy napkin; I don't want to go somewhere that no one else was invited because it was so exclusive that you only invited me.

I find "exclusiveness" to be the most incredible, contradictory cliché. Many want to go to the most "exclusive" places, but we're only happy when the most "exclusive" places are packed to the brim. Perhaps "exclusivity" implies a night of multiple celebrity sightings. I am certainly guilty of the star struck-ism. I won't deny that I have seen Sarah Jessica Parker walk into the GRACE building on 42nd Street with TMZ cameras in tow (at 2:11pm on September 23, 2008) and stopped dead in my tracks to gawk, text my girlfriends and send an update to Twitter (which I recently joined despite my personal affirmation to avoid signing up for yet another online social networking site).

But bobbing my head in a nightclub full of celebrities, like Natasha and I did last night at Tenjune, is not always everything that it is cracked up to be. While we had an above-average good time drinking and dancing with each other, nights like that can sometimes leave me feeling pretty dull when I wake up the next morning. Even when reviewing the photo I took with Coco and Ice-T on my digital camera - which I finally had the courage to do after a few standard Vodka Sodas at our promoter's table - and others I shamelessly took of Irv Gotti and Busta Rhymes, who were all at tables immediately adjacent ours, I ultimately realize that I always have the most fun when I'm out with my girlfriends in a sea of no-name faces. The photos felt lame. I studied them for a moment and wondered why so many of us ask to take photos with people who have no idea who we are.

It was not as if we were unwillingly being fed to sharks.

But there is a conventional emptiness that often follows parties like those when you reflect on the type of night you had - yet duly realize your role: that no one in attendance cared whether you were there or not. You gained entrance through a promoter who was hired to market you as a glorified seat filler to take up the empty space between celebrities.

Sometimes you really just want to go where people know, people are all the same. You want to go where everybody knows your name.

A Year Ago Today: To Aspiring Transplants
Two Years Ago Today: Six Degrees of NYC

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

The Reality of Likelihoods

You are more likely in New York to have a friend go to L.A. for a few weeks and then return to tell you that she was filming a reality TV show.

Catch our girlfriend Natasha on VH1's "Tough Love", Sundays beginning on March 15.

A Year Ago Today: M-I-C-K-E-Y ... M-O-NYC
Two Years Ago Today: Size Does Matter

Other Natasha-related links:
VH1 Profile
NatashaMalinsky.com
ShopNYCTours.com (Use code TUFLUV for 10% off any shopping tour!)

Unforgettable Day Weekend

Terrence left on Saturday morning to spend a few days with his family in Atlanta before joining friends in Ohio to play on Kevin's Gus Macker team in Zanesville. But there was no time for me to be sad following the end of his two-week visit because I had Saturday afternoon coffee and shopping in Soho, Saturday night dinner plans at Wild Ginger in the West Village, Sunday afternoon brunch at Roberto Passon in Hell's Kitchen, and a Memorial Day Weekend harbor cruise Sunday evening with various combinations of my best girlfriends.

Dinner on Saturday with all the usuals was relatively tame, but attributable to all-you-can-drink mimosas, bellinis, bloody marys and screwdrivers at Sunday brunch, there now exists photo documentation of me holding my dress over my head amongst some young Naval sailors in Times Square. I would love to depict myself as truly outrageous and free-spirited, but for the benefit of accurate memorial recordkeeping, I have to add that we began our Sunday morning sunbathing in Central Park and I was wearing a string bikini under my dress. So it wasn't as bold as it may seem, but with or without the panties, either version is a shameless salute to Fleet Week.

To celebrate Iris' birthday, we rounded out Memorial Day Weekend with a harbor cruise around Manhattan, a hook-up courtesy of a good friend who was DJ'ing on a yacht. Later, we were joined by Ra, Debasha and two of Iris' old roommates at a comped table at Club Home with one of our favorite promoters.

On a Hudson River party cruise, featured below from left to right:
Natasha (Natasha S., a newbie to NYC), Jackie (a new friend of Cassie's), Iris, me

My Best February Birthday Ever

My friends are so fabulous. Since I was in England during the week of my birthday, my friends planned a belated birthday celebration. Busy schedules pushed the date back over a month, but I was so touched by their persistence. Tasha and Gina B. sent out the following evite on January 28:

"Hey ladies..... So it's time to celebrate Katie's birthday! The day will start with brunch at the amazing Spring Natural. Following, we will work off our calories by heading to Bryant Park for ice skating!!! (Make sure you bring your insurance cards in case of emergency!) To warm up after the cold ice, we will head for hot chocolate in Rockefeller Center at La Maison du Chocolat. Please RSVP and let us know if you're "in" for this fabulous day!!!!!"

Since the ice skating rink in Bryant Park was replaced shortly thereafter with Fashion Week tents and coordinating the schedules of eight 20-something, fabulous women pushed back my celebration further still, we agreed on alternative arrangements: comp tickets on a Sex and the City Tour led by Natasha (her weekend gig) and dinner at a clique favorite, Wild Ginger. At a toast to me after the wine was poured, I said to them: "This is the best birthday in February I've ever had!"

But it may have been the best ever.

The Sex and the City tour covers over 40 hot spots of Carrie and crew, including:
· Carrie's apartment stoop
· The Pleasure Chest where Charlotte bought her 'Rabbit'
· Magnolia Bakery, where Miranda stuffed cupcakes into her mouth
· Steve and Aiden's bar
· The church where Samantha meets "The Friar"
· The gallery in SoHo where Charlotte worked
· The furniture store where Aidan designed his tables and chairs

If you ever take the tour on a Saturday or Sunday, request Tasha (Natasha) as your guide. Tell her Katie sent you!

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

Oh, What a Night

New York City has the Morning-After-Election glow. I woke up this morning in a nation with a violent history of slavery, oppression, and civil rights struggles and remembered that overnight, we had elected our first African American President. I know that not everyone in the United States is rejoicing this decision. But today matters because it is the first step toward a time when perhaps it will no longer matter. When a Black, female or even gay president will not be a phenomenon, but a norm. Sure, there are more politics behind Obama's win than just race alone - Bush's reputation, taxes, the economic crisis, McCain's choice of a vice presidential candidate, the war in Iraq, our relationship with Iran and the rest of the Middle East ... and this first step is not affirmation that racism is behind us, but it is a sign that our nation is - not entirely, but broadly - ready to heal.

A dozen or so of our friends gathered in our tiny Hell's Kitchen apartment to watch election coverage. We mixed drinks, ordered takeout and debated politics as we crowded around the television and surfed between the CNN Election Center and the Indecision '08 coverage on Comedy Central. Even a chef friend showed up after his shift with lobster fritters.

When CNN projected Obama to win at approximately 11pm Eastern Standard Time, our apartment erupted in cheers and our neighbors rushed in to tell us that they were heading over to Times Square. As we were throwing on our jackets and silly 2008 and beer mug sunglasses, someone yelled pensively, "Maybe we should double check FOX News to make sure everyone is projecting it."

"Quick," someone else yelled, "What channel is FOX?"

After a quick scroll through the Time Warner guide, we found the channel and again erupted in celebration when we saw that even FOX News was [reluctantly] declaring Obama the winner. Cognizant of the false Al Gore projection in 2000 yet feeling fairly certain that the victory was sealed, we charged through Hell's Kitchen and ran, leaping and screaming, in the streets of West Midtown.

A blind man could have followed the roar from Times Square that was echoing through the canyons of Manhattan. We raced down the blocks, dodging Obama supporters with campaign signs, wearing crazy hats, even some in full body paint, and packed ourselves into the masses of thousands reminiscent of New Year's Eve. Complete strangers met in an embrace and then remained nameless as they turned to scream Obama's name at passersby. Rather than the short, agitated beeps of impatient taxis that I've learned to ignore, I rejoiced in the long, victorious honks of the car horns. I hollered, I did little jigs on street corners, I took silly pictures. If human electricity were conductible, I think our bodies could have lit Times Square alone.

When the jumbotron monitors suddenly experienced technical difficulties as Obama commenced his speech, Natasha and I took off through the crowd to race the few blocks back to our apartment. It was in that moment when I realized that Times Square and Midtown Manhattan were like our very own backyard and for the hundredth time, Natasha and I linked arms and squealed about living in the best city in the world.

But this time, as we ran zigzagging along West 45th Street, stumbling on uneven pavement and giggling uncontrollably, we both knew that we were subconsciously capturing this moment and realizing that this is the story we will tell when our grandchildren ask where we were when Barack Obama was elected President.

... And what a very special time for me,
'Cause I remember what a night ...

A Year Ago Today: No post
Two Years Ago Today: New York City Marathon
Phone Photo Ops - Marathon Images

NYC has Small-World Syndrome

So, I walked into H&M to look for a cocktail dress to wear to tonight's party at Kevin's apartment. I didn't find one there (that's what I get for waiting until the last minute), but I did come across an old acquaintance from Cullowhee, North Carolina.

As I browsed the racks with Iris, Angie and Natasha, a guy approached me and said, "Is your name Katie?"

I didn't recognize his face immediately, but quickly realized that he is a current Western Carolina student that I had helped get into college during my post-graduation, 3-year admissions counselor stint. A native New Yorker, he is back in the city for the Winter Break. We chatted for a few minutes about mutual friends and the dramatically changing landscape of Western Carolina's campus (the university has been undergoing a multimillion dollar facelift for a few years now).

As we parted ways after musing over our chance encounter, I said to him, "Don't you love this about New York?"

Later, after finally finding a dress at BCBG with about five hours to spare, I was was walking along West 40th Street to Seventh Avenue to catch an uptown train to Harlem. I looked up Broadway at the barricades and crowds gathering in Times Square and couldn't believe a year had passed since Terrence and I had waited there for the ball to drop into 2007.

Just before descending into the subway at 34th Street, I texted Iris, who was already en route to her own apartment to get ready for the 2008 countdown, "Girl. There is no better feeling than walking in the streets of new york carrying a bag containing a gorgeous dress! :)"

44th Street Detour

Natasha and I walked to work together this morning for the first time. She recently scored an executive assistant job with a financial investment group a few blocks from my office and will be making as much as I do as an executive assistant in advertising. Not too bad for a girl three months fresh out of Idaho.

She and I have had amazing - and unconventional - luck ... from our jobs to our new Midtown apartment. Although she interviewed for two separate positions within the media company for which I work and was not called back, she has now begun a fairly remarkable road to success in New York City. Not to mention that separately she has had amazing luck racking up quite a few celebrity admirers.

We walked down Eighth Avenue with celebratory Starbucks in hand, and at 44th Street, I said, "Hey, let's cross town here so we can get a peek at Chris Cuomo's fine self." [my celebrity crush]

"Sure," she replied and then reminded me: "Except he's in Louisiana right now." [He's covering the aftermath of Hurricane Gustov ... which we would know since we're tuned into GMA when we return from the gym each morning]

"Damnit!" I exclaimed, "I hate it when he goes on assignment without calling me!"

A Year Ago Today:
My Boss's Life
Sky Writing
Two Years Ago Today: Real Estate Stress

Search-Term Saturday: "Some Pig" - Charlotte A. Cavatica

Someone in Arlington, Virginia, googled "twin blondes new york yankees behind home plate" on Wednesday and found my blog because the keywords probably found this post.

Those must have been some blondes.

Funny that no one googled "gorgeous, half-Filipina brunette behind home plate" the day after I attended the Yankee's game with Natasha, Iris and Former SNL Actor.

A Year Ago Today: Cocktail View
Two Years Ago Today: Not Exactly An Offer Yet, But An Opportunity on the Table

The 48 Hour Film Project, New York '08

Tonight I attended The 48 Hour Film Project at the Sunshine Cinema in Soho to see Natasha's big screen debut in her first 48 Hour Film Project project. We viewed eleven 7-minute films created from brainstorm to DVD in 48 hours.

From 48hourfilm.com:
The 48 Hour Film Project is a wild and sleepless weekend in which you and a team make a movie—write, shoot, edit and score it—in just 48 hours.

On Friday night, you get a character, a prop, a line of dialogue and a genre, all to include in your movie. 48 hours later, the movie must be complete.

Then it will show at a local theater, usually in the next week.

In 2007, some 30,000 filmmakers made films in 55 cities around the world. This year, we're even bigger, with filmmakers in over 70 cities taking the challenge to make a film in just 48 hours.

In New York, each team draws a different genre, but each film must include the following elements.
Character: Thomas or Thelma Ellison, former attorney
Prop: a string instrument
Line of Dialogue: "I canceled my plans for this" (may be a statement or a question)

The movies we screened tonight will soon be available on http://www.48.tv/, and if they ever appear on YouTube, I'll add my favorites to my blog.

I voted for:
The Negligible Nabber (look for the blonde secretary)
The Dull Exorcist (my favorite of the night)
Love on Wheels (I think it was called)

United Colors of Benetton

Tonight is Girls' Night.
Meet the cast of characters from my nightlife in New York City.
We're like the United Nations or a gang of Disney Fairies.



Clockwise from top (with fairy correlation):
Natasha M., (Tasha) the film and TV voice over/actress (the adorable blonde)
Ra, the shoe designer (the token Black hottie*)
Iris, the handbag designer (the gorgeous White girl with an ass)
Mayra, the international manufacturing, research and multimedia supervisor (the Equedorian with the entire exotic package, including the sexy accent)
Me, executive assistant, blog author (the half Filipina/half White girl with long hair)

*Featured as the Token Black Fairy in our Disney remake and representing for:
Gina, the fashion merchandiser who just moved to LA
Debasha, the fashion corporate merchandise planner

Other main characters:
Tokii, the best friend, whose acting career takes her away from the city more and more and takes my heart with her wherever she goes (the next Tia & Tamara Mowry by appearance; next Angela Bassett by trade)
Annisha, the publishing marketer (the Caribbean beauty)
Candice, the sexy flight attendant (the Black Southern belle)
Cassie, the Connecticut-based, soon-to-be-fulltime-New Yorker, hot nanny that I would never hire to be eye candy for my husband in my home, and one of the top five prettiest people I've ever seen in real life (Puerto Rican with a Southern accent - does it get any hotter than that?)

The most interesting part of the above list is that all of us, with the exception of Annisha (from Trinidad & Tobago), are from or have lived in North Carolina.

There aren't too many Disney references that can be applied to our unmarried-gals-in-the-city lives, but this blog is full of cliché Sex and the City quotes. Many of my cliché moments are inspired by the most important women in my life within the five boroughs ... although that area is quickly expanding to encompass the world.

Signing a Midtown Apartment Lease = Kia Rio Paid-In-Full + $1500 in Gas Cards

While packing up my small Harlem studio, it occurred to me that - between the two of us - Natasha and I paid up front more than the entire value of a basic Kia Rio to move into our new apartment.

But as I begin unpacking in Midtown, it feels good to be home in Hell's Kitchen.

"Things I Love" Thursdays - My New Hell's Kitchen Address

I love that Natasha and I can see the sign for Radio City Music Hall from our front stoop ... that Times Square is just around the corner, but you don't know it's there unless you walk to Broadway ... that within a three-block radius of our front door there are Afghan, American, Caribbean, Chinese, Cuban, Greek, Irish, Italian, Japanese, Mexican, and Thai restaurants (and Restaurant Row is just a few blocks away) ... that we're within a short distance of a post office, grocery stores, drug stores, salons, barber shops and cleaners (although we discovered that we do have a washer and dryer in the basement) ... that I am a 15-minute walk from work, which takes me east through the Theater District, passed Rockefeller Center, south through the Diamond District and ends at Bryant Park.

There are already things I miss about Harlem, but the landscape and the dynamic of the city have transformed since I moved to Hell’s Kitchen. I no longer spend the majority of my personal and professional commutes below ground. It’s a new Manhattan that I will get to know all over again, and I love that just by moving a few miles to another neighborhood, you can meet an entirely different New York.

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