New York State of Blog: day 2

I woke up Friday very refreshed. I got to sleep more than I normally do because my hotel was like a 15 minute walk to the office. As I was about to leave I noticed that not only did I get the New York Times, but I also got the Wall Street Journal delivered to my room. It's REALLY too bad the company won't pay for me to live in NYC, but I may have to see if I can make a few more trips down before I move....

Anyway went out to lunch with all the people that I will be working with when I move down there. I had the quiche. It was good. I would have preferred more quiche, and less greens, but oh well. It was probably the healthiest meal I have eaten all year. It was also nice to have the company pay for that too. Did I mention that I'm a whore? Anyway that lunch was entertaining, it seems like people are pretty close in this job, which is nice. I'm going to miss the fraternity that is the Bristol campus, but I really do want to move to the city. A few of them may have been concerned that I knew more about Urban Cougars than anyone else, but at least I waited for 2 or 3 other people to discuss it before I chimed in.

Since they don't' have a whole lot for me to do (yet) I decided to spend some of my time looking up apartments/roommates on Craigslist. I saw a listing on the East Side and decided to send the guy an e-mail. Someone acted as the voice of reason ('cause he's married and has a kid) and convinced me to go check it out before I left NY instead of going out to drink with everyone after work. I conceded to this logic because it would be good for me to see what an actual NY apartment looks like and it would give me at least some basis for comparison as I got further into my search. That and the guy seemed like a sports fan and there will be lease that starts March 1, which is exactly what I want.

Anyway on my way there I only took 2 wrong turns on the subway (wrong way once, me not paying attention to where I needed to get off the second time) so I could finally get on the train that takes me up to the East Side. It didn't help that I needed to change trains like 4 times to get form the West Side to the East Side. I'm sure there's an easier way to do it with buses, but I'm a long way from that point right now. Anyway, I got to the final stop and had like a 5 or 6 block walk to the apartment building. I finally get to the place and step inside to call up to the apartment. I reach inside my pocket to pull out the piece of paper that had my directions and the apartment info on it, and, um, it was gone.

Shit.

Ok, the guy had an Irish/Scottish last name, lets look at the listing on the wall. There's one Mc________. I give that a shot. No answer. Damn. A woman who lives there comes in and offers to let me in the building, to which I thank her, but unfortunately I have no idea where I'm going in this building, so wandering the halls really isn't going to help. I ask her if she has internet access, but she doesn't, so I have no way of accessing the information. Great. I now have 2 options, give and go home, or back track and see if in the 6 blocks I walked there is a 3-5 piece of paper sitting on the side walk (yeah right).

I decide to do a sort of diagonal towards a different subway stop to see if there is a kinko's or an internet cafe somewhere around,s o I can access my e-mail where I have all the relevant info. (I'd also like to point out that I've been carrying my overnight bag and my laptop this entire time, on my off (left) shoulder because my "strong" shoulder has a subpar collar bone.) Anyway, I tack through the East Side and come up empty. (For the record there are like 36 kinkos in Manhattan, and if I had walked back to my original subway stop, I probably would have seen one). I figured that with the East Side being largely residential, that there would be some demand for internet cafes, but apparently (in the 2% that I walked around) this is not the case. But I did pass like 10 Chinese restaurants. Anyway, I went home and wrote and apology e-mail to the guy to try to convince I'm that I didn't blow him off, so hopefully I'll be able to check the place out like next weekend or something.

At least I have started to get a better sense of the subways and the numbering system of the roads in Manhattan so I will have a better concept of where I'm gong the next time I'm there.