New Yawk…whadda town, eh?

I've been managing to keep myself occupied with my visit back to New York pretty well so far, despite being limited to dialup access. Spent a day hanging out with Dan and Daniel on Long Island. Burned another day building cat toys for mom's kitten. I went into the city yesterday around noon, to see a few other folks and, well, just because the city is a hell of a lot more interesting than Long Island. Some highlights included:

• Had an excellent turkey schwarma sandwich at Alibaba, a Yemeni-Israeli place on the Upper West Side. I felt painfully goyische stepping into the place: "Yes, it's obvious that I'm not among the chosen... can I still order food here? Please?". Ate lunch sitting in Central Park, because it is ridiculously warm right now (i.e., the temperature I keep my Canadian apartment at in the winter).
  
  Hmm... MS Word spellcheck doesn't recognize 'goyische.' Oy.
  
  
• The local hardware store has the 'Plumber's Menorah' in the shop window. How cool is that?
  
  
  
• On the subway, I had another case of somebody coming up to me and thinking that I spoke Spanish (a mother-daughter pair; the daughter spoke enough English for me to convince her I had crap for directions to 145th Street). I should really pick up the 'Teach Yourself Spanish' audiobooks sometime.
  
  
• Wandered around Williamsburg for the afternoon: my understanding is that it's the hipster part of town that is getting gentrified (and property values are going up). The part that I wandered through (Grand Street) definitely felt non-yuppified—-heavy Hispanic population; a bit run down—comparable to East Boston or East Cambridge streetscapes. A strong sign that gentrification is slow: saw only one Thai restaurant, two espresso bars, and no Starbucks.
  
  Anyway, here's a photo I kinda liked, from beneath an overpass for the Williamsburg Bridge. For some reason, there's a chair sitting on the bridge abutment. Sorry... couldn't tell you why.
  
  
  
• In Williamsburg, hung out at Gimme Coffee, the awesome Ithaca-based coffee roasters that Jofish introduced me to. I confirmed yet again that I am not man enough for espresso. It's one of those things I try once in a while to test myself, but ugh... I can't manage that concentrated thick bitterness and acidity, even if you get to show off your coffee manliness with tiny cups. Wuss-ass Americanos for me, sorry.
  
  
• Met up with Probe and Becca and some of their friends for a very nice dinner in Park Slope (near Prospect Park). I think it was the first time I tried osso bucco (braised veal shanks), over a bed of saffron risotto. It was all really good; the marrow was like butter: "yummy but you know it's really bad for you."
  
  The Park Slope area feels like a pretty quiet and possibly more family-friendly part of the city; it's also much cheaper than, say, the West Side. But it didn't feel completely devoid of life… the street feel was similar to the quieter neighborhoods in Manhattan, I think.

And that's just day one. That's one reason I love this town: you can pack that much cool stuff into half a day.