SYP Says

Music Rising

In light of the buzz about the re-opening of the New Orleans Superdome tonight and the special pre-game Music Rising performance from U2 and Green Day, I figured I'd just post a reminder that the company I work for, Musician's Friend, is partnering with Gibson and Music Rising to restore the Gulf Coast.

Music Rising Supporters can now purchase a very limited edition Music Rising Epiphone Les Paul Standard guitar exclusively at Musician’s Friend with artwork designed by U2’s The Edge specifically for the campaign. The guitar is available for purchase for $599.00 with all proceeds going to Music Rising and its program of providing musical instruments to Gulf Coast schools and churches to replace instruments lost in the huricane.

If you missed U2 and Green Day's performance, you can watch online and then download the U2/Green Day charity track "The Saints Are Coming" via Rhapsody also with all net proceeds going to Music Rising.

Donate by Phone: 1-866-370-3403
Mon 9-25 7:30am - 3:00am EST
Tues 9-26 9:00am - 6:00pm EST
Weds 9-28 9:00am - 1:00pm EST

Please make checks payable to:
Gibson Foundation / Music Rising

Guitar Center Music Foundation
5795 Lindero Canyon Road
Westlake Village, CA 91362

I Heart Tacos Michel

My favorite restaurant in the Ashland area is a roadside trailer called Tacos Michel on Rte 99 (on the way from Ashland to Phoenix) . This place has helped make my transition from NYC to Ashland bearable. (What will I do when it's closed in the winter??) The owners are a couple from Jalisco, and they say all of the Mexican workers in town go here to eat because it's the only place that serves authentic Mexican food. Having been to several other Mexican eateries in the vicinity, I have to agree with that. I've only been to Mexico 6 times in my life--Playa Del Carmen a few times, Baja, Puerto Vallarta and Zihuatanejo-- so I certainly wouldn't claim to be an expert. I AM a self-proclaimed expert in good food though and Tacos Michel has it. If you're in town, check it out. Try the chicken tacos which come with caramelized onions. Mmmm. (Closed Mondays.)

A Stupid Joke for You

Hey! What did the shark say to the clown?...

You taste funny.

Ha!

Mon 8/21: Back to NYC DAY 6

My last day...so sad! Went with Mike to drop off my bags downtown and had breakfast at Veselka, a hip 24-hour Eastern European diner. They have the best chicken salad sandwich. Then I walked up to the NYC Guitar Center on 14th Street to do a half hour of work. This wasn't a business trip, but I figured since I was here, I should visit. The store manager, a guy named Judd, wasn't there, so I checked it out on my own. It was so clean--looked new and had a lot of square footage for a Manhattan retail store. I had just read the Guitar Center sales manual, so I was looking to see that in action.

After strumming a couple Gibsons, I got a manicure and pedicure down the street at Acqua Beauty Bar and then got THE BEST body scrub in Manhattan at Sol Spa in Koreatown. This isn't for wimps; this is a body scrub Korean-style which means some actual pain but lots of gain. Unlike a Korean bathhouse, you're in the room alone, but otherwise, I suspect it's much the same experience. Not exactly the best atmosphere, but this place is all business. After 15 minutes in a steam sauna, you lie down on a metal table and get hosed down. Then a Korean grandma in her bra and undies sets to work with loofahs. After an hour and a half of vigorous scrubbing in which absolutely no spot is missed (and you are undoubtedly shocked at the amount of grey...stuff that has come off your body), you get a milk bath and cucumber mask and then off to the dry sauna. I am never as truly squeaky clean, smooth and soft as after I get this done, plus it lasts for weeks. Great deal too--only $120 for 3 hours which includes the scrub and the sauna plus an hour and a half shiatsu.

In one of the most difficult decisions of my trip, I had chosen to get the scrub instead of having one last meal, so now it was a mad rush to the airport to go back to my pastoral life in Oregon. I'll be back soon though--I know I'm still a New Yorker at heart which means it's impossible to stay away.

Click here to see all of my NYC trip pix.

Sun 8/20: Back to NYC DAY 5

I was excited about today because I was seeing two close friends I'd been missing a lot since I left. First up was Michelle who I have known for about 10 years. I met her when we were both working in the publishing industry and we've been friends ever since.

We met at one of the places I'd recently discovered before I left town--Zucco, Le French Diner, an 18-seat bistro on the Lower East Side. The owner was a boxer in France (hence, the boxer in his front window and the various pics on the walls) and the place has tons of NYC/Paris character.

It took at least an hour to just get off Orchard Street because after brunch we immediately went across the street to a vintage store that caught our eye. I bought 2 bags there that I just couldn't resist. After an afternoon of shopping in Noho and Nolita, she drove me up to the Upper East Side to a good friend of mine's apartment for cocktails.

Karen and I have been good friends since about 1998. We worked together at A&E for a few years before she moved on to a new job. Now we're both in the music industry--she just got promoted to VP of Worldwide Distribution and Content at Warner Music. I am so proud of her! Anyway, she's off in Japan now and blogging away.

We hadn't seen each other in 5 months, so there was a lot to catch up on that IM just isn't good for. We hung out at her apartment with her husband, Andrew, an artist and then went to the Bar at Etats-Unis for dinner. Etats-Unis is one of the best restaurants in the city, but expensive, so their Bar across the street which is more hip and casual is a great place to go. They have delicious food with an interesting mix of French, Spanish and Mexican influences. Great guacamole too.

We were so busy gabbing that I forgot to take a pic of us, so I've stolen a photo from Karen's blog to post. It's got her looking suitably inebriated in Japan, so things seem good there so far.

It was my last night before heading home to Oregon the next night, so I met Mike downtown in the Village for live Latin jazz at Zinc Bar and then live R&B at Groove. I think I went to more live music on this 6-day trip than in an entire month when I lived in Manhattan!

What a bummer that I have to leave tomorrow...

Check out all of my NYC pix.

Sat 8/19: Back to NYC DAY 4

I needed a bit of restful alone time after all of the festivities of the last few days, so I slept in late and didn't rush anywhere particular. I took the subway down to 34th Street and made my way over to Lush for handmade soap and bubble bath. I first found out about Lush in London a few years ago and remember how psyched I was when they opened their first NYC store. I walked around my old neighborhood--the last apartment I had in the city was at 30th Street and 5th Ave. Surprisingly little had changed in 5 months. Same delis, same Turkish rug stores.

There is basically no Korean food in Ashland, Oregon or the surrounding area, so I figured I should have lunch in Koreatown. I went to one of my favorite 24-hour Korean restaurants in the city, Won Jo. It's not fancy, but they always have good food. I had tofu and seafood soup and mandoo. Yum!

After a bit more sightseeing, I walked up to Grand Central Terminal and hopped on a train to Goldens Bridge in Westchester for Phil's 40th birthday party. In attendance were Phil and Lisa's families, their friends, Creative Good employees and various business associates. One of the people who showed up was my old boss at A&E, Steve Ronson. What a surprise that was! It was lovely to catch up with him though.

Here's a pic of Steve (in the middle) and his wife with Mary Baumgartner's husband, Philip.

Some more party pics:

Marty Keane, SVP of e-commerce at Bluefly.com and Armen Chakmakian's brother.

The Birthday Boy with his honey.

Mary Baumgartner, VP of New Media at HBO with her son, Jack.

Got a ride back to the city from Mary and her family. They invited me over for drinks at their apartment in Tribeca. Then it was off to a quiet dinner alone, so I went to one of the places I love most in the city, a basement dive in Chinatown called Samar (formerly New Indonesian) on Doyers Street off Pell. They have the best Roti Canai--a little dish of chicken and potato curry with a flaky bread kind of like an Indian paratha. There are prettier, hipper places to eat in the city, but not many authentic Malaysian restaurants. This is one of the few. If you're looking more for fusion or at least something less... grungy, try Cafe Asean or Bali Nusa Indah.)

I was so busy eating, that I mis-timed my next to-do. I rushed over to the Film Forum to see a movie called 13 Tzameti, a French thriller that won prizes at the Venice and Sundance Film Festivals, but I got there too late, so I decided to go to Times Square, an area I used to avoid like the plague when I lived in NYC and see what's what.

It was worse than I remembered--a total zoo of tourists and teens. I must be getting old. I could barely stand it, so I got out of there quickly and walked up 9th Avenue through Hell's Kitchen. Mostly a quiet day today, but I needed it.

Fri 8/18: Back to NYC DAY 3

Waking up this morning was really tough. I guess st aying up until 5AM will do that to ya. I'm able to peel myself out of bed in time to meet my account reps at Hitwise, a competitive research firm that we've been using.

I met Loren & Keith at our place of choice, The Spotted Pig, a gastropub in the West Village. The last time I was there (also with Keith because The Spotted Pig has basically become his living room), I saw P. Diddy. This time, I was sitting in what was known as Bill Clinton's booth...need I say more. Anyway, the real reason I love this place is the gnudi. It's totally heart-stopping and if you ate it more than like once a year, you'd probably keel over dead from eating that alone. The last time I saw Loren was at the Internet Retailer show in Chicago a few months ago where she met me carrying a giant bag and smelling strangely of garlic. Why, you ask? Because she had brought a dozen everything bagels from NYC to help me out of my I miss Manhattan doldrums. What a sweetie!

Fortified by gnudi and the best chocolate torte in the world, it was off to The Met to meet my fellow book club members for a day of Greek art and literature. The Reading Odyssey was started by my good friend Phil Terry, CEO of the customer experience firm Creative Good and his best friend Pat Wictor, a blues slide guitarist. Last year, they decided to celebrate 20 years of knowing each other with a commitment to read the classics together and in typical Phil-style, they opened it up for others to join.

We were meeting at The Met to do a literary tour of the Ancient Near East and bring to life the first three books we'd read over the last year--Herodotus's The Histories, Homer's Odyssey, and Thucydides' History of the Peloponnesian War. The first part of our day we went through galleries and a packet that Phil had put together as an informal guide. We touched on Assyria, the Trojan War, Babylon, the Persian Empire, the Scythians and King Croesus of Lydia.

 

At this point, our dogs were pretty tired, so we went to the members-only area upstairs for cocktails and met up with Horton A. Johnson, MD, our private tour guide for the next part of our Greek adventure. I have met few people as passionate as he was about Ancient Greece, so it was a treat to have him show us everything from Cycladic art to Roman copies of Greek statues. Horton is so into Ancient Greece that a few years ago he published an article in the Journal of the Royal Society of Medicine about the foot ailment suffered by the hero Philoctetes during the Trojan War (depicted in a lekythos or small oil vase from the 5th century BCE at The Met).

Horton kept trying to show us just one more thing, and who were we to argue? But finally our tour was at an end and we went up to the Trustee Dining area to have dinner. We had a private room for the 7 of us--6 book club members plus  Robert Strassler, the editor of the Landmark Edition of Thucydides we were reading. It was so awesome to have him with us at dinner. It is so rare to be able to spend hours with an expert like him. We were able to ask whatever we wanted--from the differences between Herodotus and Thucydides to what lessons we can learn today from Ancient Literature.

We actually closed down The Met. Closing down bars is nothing new for me (don't mind me, mum), but closing down The Metropolitan Museum of Art? We left at 10 after 11pm and the guard had to escort me and Phil out. It was an amazing experience to walk through the museum after-hours, completely by ourselves. The only noise was our shoes clicking on the marble floor. I kept trying to walk extra slow so I could look at the priceless art in the near-dark (all of the overhead lights had already been turned off) but unfortunately Phil walks faster than I do and he apparently didn't get my hint. :)

8 hours at The Met--a record for me! It felt good to exercise my mind--I probably needed it after having killed several hundred thousand brain cells from the partying I'd done the night before. lol

Check out all of my NYC trip pix.

Thurs 8/17: Back to NYC DAY 2

I'm not a huge shopper, but living in a town of 20,000--even one as cute as Ashland--really builds up my usually manageable shoe & purse urges. So after a night on the town, I got up to go shopping on 5th Avenue. I found cute items at H&M & Zara and then moved on to meet a friend for lunch at the MOMA cafe.

The friend I was meeting was someone I had worked with at A&E for several years. About a month after I left, she moved on also to a VP job in the legal dept of Lehman Brothers. It was so good to catch up and she looked relaxed and infinitely happier than the last time I'd seen her. There were at least 10 employees I know of who left A&E about the same time I did. It's a shame, really--they were all very smart people...most of whom took with them quite a bit of history. That's the kind of knowledge that can't be replaced, but hey, change is good, right?

This is Dina:

After lunch, I really really really had to get my hair done, so I went to my usual place, Miwa Alex on E. 22nd St. I really shouldn't have waited 5 months. Was I scared of getting my hair done in Oregon? Yes, I am a wimp.

I ended up working a little after all--the company that manages our paid keyword campaigns, 24/7 Media, is based in NYC, so I met the two key people on my account for a drink at the ever-stylish, art deco Flatiron Lounge. Chris and Konny admitted to me that the next day would be spent at a company bonding event in which they would have to perform in groups. Chris was performing FAME and Konny would be singing the Roy Orbison hit, "Crying." Whoever at their company came up with this is obviously sadistic and cruel. Since the show was going on though, I figured at least I should be able to partake in a picture of the momentous event. The person doing the lift below is Chris. He smartly chose an image that doesn't show his face, however, I have asked him to send me a replacement photo...

I don't want to live forever, but I did want to live long enough to get to dinner. I was meeting Agnes, a friend of mine who is in charge of HR at Court TV which was recently bought by Turner. She is honestly one of the nicest people I know. We gabbed for hours at dinner (the lovely Spanish restaurant El Cid in Chelsea) and closed down Bar K on W. 10th and Hudson St in the Village.

At that point, I felt like I was getting a second wind, so I called Mike and he came down to meet me. We went down the street to the jazz institution Smalls, a basement joint known for being an after-hours place for musicians after their regular gigs. It was in danger of closing a year or two ago, but thankfully, it's still around. In a true NYC moment, we were sitting at the bar listening to the band when I looked over and saw someone I thought I knew, so I whispered to Mike, "Hey, I think I know that guy." Then the band called the guy to the stage and shouted, "Look who's with us tonight?! Jazz legend Jon Hendricks! Come on up and sing a tune."

Now, Jon Hendricks looks amazing for his age and still has a great voice and style, but he is no spring chicken. So it was really inspiring to see him up there on stage, singing his heart out and having a wonderful time. And best of all, I felt like my life had come full circle.

When he was finished singing and the set was over, I went over to him and I said, "Jon, I'm sure you don't remember me, but I met you 12 years ago when I worked for Wynton at Jazz at Lincoln Center. It was my first real job. I was backstage at Blood on the Fields, typing up your last minute lyric changes!" Jon was so nice--he said. "Wow, that was 3 years of my life! It is so good to see you" (as if there was any way he could have remembered me). We chatted about his wife and living in Ohio (where we're both from) and then I got our picture taken. He gave me his card so I could email it to him. What are the odds of coming back to NYC for the first time and out of millions of people seeing someone I knew from my very first job?  It was a really nice moment.

For those of you interested in trivia, Blood on the Fields was the first  jazz composition to win a Pulitzer Prize and it won in the category usually reserved for classical music.

After all of that, I bet you can guess...I was hungry. So off we went to one of my favorite places in the city, Corner Bistro. I know it's dirty and dark and old, but I love it anyway and they have great fries at 3AM.

By this point, I can say I was pretty looped, so when we got back to the apartment, I of course deemed it time to take lots of pictures of ourselves just because we could. Herewith, some lovely drunken photos of me and Jeff's friend, Mike, who really was such a great sport to put up with me.

 

Check out all of my NYC trip pix.

Wed 8/16: Back to NYC DAY 1

I recently went back to NYC for the first time since I moved to Ashland, Oregon. I'll admit it, I couldn't wait to get back to see all of my friends and old haunts. I know it's only been 5 months, but it feels like longer. 

A friend of Jeff's was kind enough to let me stay in his apartment in the Bronx. Lucky for me, Mike had been on a cleaning kick and the place was pretty spotless for a NYC abode, especially one inhabited by a bunch of guys.

The first thing I noticed was the smell. After just a few months in the clear mountain air, my nose wasn't too happy about being back. The rest of me was though. I think I was beginning to get a bit soft in the head from not having enough people around. Ashland is lovely and I do like it, but no place has the energy of NYC and I had been thriving on that for the last 12 years. Is this what withdrawal feels like?

First stop: Meet Mike at Frank in the East Village (5th St & 2nd Ave). This is one of my favorite Italian restaurants in the city. It's tiny, cash-only, and feels like your hip grandmother's dining room. This place gets packed during dinnertime and the wait is usually long (no reservations), so I used to come here on Sundays for lunch. I had my usual: black ink linguine with spicy seafood. Mmm...as good as I remembered.

From there, it was off to have cappuccinos at the Italian cafe around the corner and then Scratcher, a low-key pub in the East Village with Guinness on draft. Hard for a girl to pass up.

I was determined to pack as much as possible into every day & night of my trip so even though it was fairly late already, I convinced Mike to accompany me to Tonic, a club/lounge on the Lower East Side known for experimental music (not to be confused with the Tonic in midtown). It was hard to miss the shiny, giant apartment buildings going up around the little building. Couldn't the architects at least try to give them some character and make them look like part of the neighborhood? This was a huge pet peeve of mine when I lived here. Anyway, we ended up skipping the live act upstairs and hung out in the basement with the DJ and the French movie projected on the wall. I was SO tempted to ask the guy where he'd bought his equipment.

By now I think it was around 2AM, so I was starving again; we walked up to La Esquina on Kenmare at Lafayette. This place is genius--they tore down an old burger stand and put up a restored diner that actually has 3 separate restaurants in one--a 24-hour taqueria, a hidden trendy club downstairs, and a mid-range cafe. The taco stand even delivers around the clock. Now that's part of what I love about NYC. After a shredded chicken & avocado taco with lime and a grilled corn with cajeta cheese, it was time to go home and get a few hours of much-needed rest. It was good to be back.

Check out all of my NYC trip pix.