Don't Mess With a Texan

Now there are a few things I have learned living in NYC about well.....the people who live here. I am entertained daily and well sometimes not so entertained.

Now growing up in a small town and I mean small town, you know everyone's business. When there are only 5000 people in your entire town, it's hard not to, because if you don't know the person you know someone who does that is willing to dish the story. My favorite is watching this play out on the subway.

I would say you have the old gossiping lady on the subway, but here in New York it doesn't really matter the age, someone is telling someone else's life story and they know it ain't their room to be telling it. And they are telling it where everyone can hear it. I have learned more about who is having sex with who and who is carrying what's his names baby...and a few things I won't even mention on here.

Hearing the above story isn't that bad and you can handle it. It's, when you have that person that doesn't care if everyone knows their business and is shouting it out, when you wish you hadn't left your ear phones at home. Everyone thinks New Yorkers are just listening to music to kill the time from point A to point B, but really it is so 1) we don't have to talk to one another 2) so tourist won't ask for directions and 3) so we don't have to hear the problems the above mentioned is having. I learned this when I was on my way to work one morning and a lady thought it was appropriate to tell her friend all about the problems she was having, um, we will say downstairs. First of all I don't want to know about women problems, especially rashy, itchy women problems and second I don't want to know about them from a 60+ year old woman. I vomited a bit in my mouth, moved away and purelled myself from head to toe.

Then you have the I am broke; I have no job; I am trying; can you give me some money person. I have at times thought about giving some of them money until I read a report they are making more money than me. I mean RUDE! I work hard for my money. The speeches themselves can vary you will get the short and sweet ones where they know it's a crap game and they just want to get it finished. Then you will have the ones that don't realize that their "I need money" speech shouldn't last longer than one stop.  Two nights ago I had one guy ramble on for a good 10 train stops. He was giving every problem he and I honestly think he pulled out his medical record and was just going down the list. I have nerve damage in my leg, I have a bullet in my ass cheek, I was bit here by a rat (legit could happen) and my mom dropped me as a child I have a dent in my head to prove it.

I like the guys who use the time when the train is crossing the bridge or heading through the tunnel to put on a little show. I mean if you are going to ask for money you might as well work a little for it. If you are wondering what I am talking about just check here. These guys are fun to watch. Some people don't like it but I find it a bit entertaining on a rather boring ride.

I will give you there are tons of hot guys in NYC and this tumblr has decided to document it. I am not upset with them at all.

I have met a lot of people in New York and run into some interesting people and it they are what make NYC an interesting place to be either to live or to visit. But here is where the story brings you to the title of this post. We have an absolutely crazy neighbor. She lives below us on the second floor of a 3 story walk up and well to put it nicely, needs to live some where that she either is the only resident or lives on the top floor. New York is not a place this crazy loon should be living, because she has to deal with people here. I personally have never dealt with her until the other night, but I will give you a bit of her CRAZY so you understand what we are dealing with here.

1. "The Invitation" - I kid you not this woman made a hand drawn invitation for us to join her for wine in her apartment. "Please come and join me for a glass or two of wine in my apartment" it read. Granted that is how you can tell she doesn't really know us because there is not one person in this apartment that could have just one or two glasses of wine. Bitch we are drinking the whole bottle, um did you buy one for yourself?? No? Oh shit. Anyway back to the story. So after the sweet invite it continues on to say "after you have had some wine please allow me to go up to your apartment while you stay in mine and I will show you just how loud things sound down here." Pardon me? Did you just call me fat and say we walk heavy? Because that is what a gay man just heard. RUDE.

2. "The Phantom Walker" - One night while we were all asleep, our roommate John is woken by the door bell and someone banging on the front door. He kinda freaked out thinking there mush have been something wrong, because who tries to breakdown your door at the ass crack of night? So he answers the door to find crazy neighbor there to complain that if we are going to come home late we need not to stomp up the stairs as if we were herding cattle. Well first of all ma'am I am from Texas and we for sure do not herd cattle up stairs, stupid! But as John tried to explain, we were all home and asleep, there was no way we were herding cattle up the steps and she must have been mistaken, to which she did not like being called a liar.

3. "The Alarm" - Next we received a note addressed to my roommate Chase. Dear Chase, could you please not set your alarm to vibrate when it goes off? You don't get up when it goes off and it continually vibrates. I don't have to be up early on certain days and your alarm vibrating is waking me up and causing me to lose sleep. There are a few things wrong with this statement. How does she know which room is Chase's room? She needs something to help her sleep if she is that light of a sleeper. AND SHE IS CRAZY.

4. "The Take Off Your Shoes" - Now this brings us to my encounter. I may or may not have been out with some friends the other night and I may or may not have come in at 445 in the morning. ( don't you judge me, it was Saturday I went for lunch and next thing you know it is 4am SHUT IT ) Anywho, I get home and walk to my room, I counted it, my room is only 5 steps from the front door. I literally had enough time to walk to my room pull off my shoes and walk out of my room when there was a knock at the door and she rang the doorbell. This bitch was ringing the doorbell at 445 in ever loving morning. So I answered it. You never know she may have needed a cup of sugar. I open the door and said "can I help you?" To which I am face to face with a woman who looks like shit, she looks like she has been ridden hard and put up wet. Not kidding y'all. Anyway she looks at me and says "when you come home at 4am can you please take off your shoes?" To which I roll my eyes and shut the door.  The CRAZY maniac pushes my door back open and says "Hey did you hear me?" Well being the southern gentleman I am, I responded rather quickly with, "If you weren't such a crazed lunatic you would notice that I don't have shoes on, as I took them off the minute I walked in the door because they are cute and hurt my feet, Second if you  don't get your ass out of my apartment I will call the cops and if you trek your crazy ass back up here again I will call the cops, now take your ass back to your cave." I think the only thing she heard was the crazy part because well most people call her that. She gasped and tried to come back with something but before she could respond I politely said "And just for annoying me this early in the morning, I will be purchasing tap shoes tomorrow and if you thought it was noisy tonight just wait til I show you my new dance moves GOOD DAY!" and shut the door.

Now y'all you know I would rather walk on my lips than talk bad about someone BUT this cracked glass of crazy needs a hobby. I can tell you, we aren't the lightest footed people, but we aren't jaba the hut either. If we can't walk from our front door to our room with our shoes on there is an issue. This woman is lucky our door are on the inside of them building or I would have left a burning bag of dog shit on her front door step.

But just wanted to let you all know that from now on Monday thru Friday we are having tap dancing lessons in our living room. Everyone is invited and please bring every heavy footed bitch you know!

Bye Y'all!

New York for as big as it is, is so small too. I mean I was having drinks with a friend the other day and in a span of 2 hours 3 people I knew from different stages of my life walked by and chatted. It was crazy.

The job hunt is over for now. I spoke with a recruiter when I first got here who, did really work on anything for me. And then 2 weeks ago, I found another one based on a connection through my friend Logan Hart, (we will get back to him in a bit) and after a week of her working for me, I found a job. I met with the company on Tuesday and they hired me that day, I started on Wednesday and they are already talking about where in the company I will fit better. It's amazing!!! The company is called JKR Global and they are a packaging and branding firm. I am really excited!!

So I have to say the things that have happened to me since I moved here have been craziness. One of my roommates is friends with some well known folks and we have hung out with them. One of which came up for NYC Pride and we had a blast. Some of you may know her from RuPaul's Drag Race. Phoenix from Atlanta, GA. After a cancelled flight on Friday, she arrived with a terror on Saturday! We couldn't go anywhere without every woman on every corner saying something along the lines of "Daaamn girl" or a car passing by saying something the same. It was cracking me up. Then Sunday we headed out again. We did a few bars early and then head to a bar I can't remember the name of, but I will say, Gilbert Hernandez's dream came true. We ended up at some bar having bottle service with so many of the girls from Drag Race, Gilbert couldn't write down the make up tips quick enough. It was ridiculous. All in all, Phoenix is welcome back here anytime she wants to come.

Back to my friend Logan, who is currently living out a dream. About a month after I got here Logan got the call that he was booked for the tour Book of Mormon. he left literally 5 days later and will be in Austin in October and well I am looking to be there too. Can't wait to see a friend doing what he loves!!!

I know this post isn't as fun as the last but give me sometime it will pick back up!!

Just getting started....

Well, I was hoping to do this a little everyday but these first three days have been interesting. So let me catch you up.....

Monday started off pretty early at 4am when Crystal and I ventured off to the airport. Let's just say she is a delight at that time of the morning. LOL. The flight to Chicago wasn't bad, but the 4 hour layover was horrible. I was tired from not being able to sleep and stuck in an airport. I found a spot to eat that had a bar in it. Who knew 9am was a good time for a drink?? One lady sat down beside me and had 3 vodka tonics (ew those are never good at any hour), and then a gentleman sat down and had 3 vodka sodas. I felt out of place with my coke but hey I guess normally I am the one making people feel out of place. But right about that moment I turned and saw a gentleman walking down the terminal like he was making his way down the runway. As he approached, I noticed that his t-shirt and jeans were accompanied by a great pair of stilettos. Once he was close enough I looked at him and said "Great shoes girl," to which I received the biggest wink. When I turned back to the bar where I was sitting the bartender replied "well that was a first for me, but you made that situation less awkward." We chatted for a bit, but I was totally hoping the heels would reappear.

Kitchen and living area with a view of Chase's room

Finding my place was easy. Well easy because I had a black car pick me up and take me. Thank God, because I am sure I would have been lost. Our apartment is super cute. I attached a picture. As soon as my stuff arrives I will update with better pictures.

Interior of Dear Bushwick

 My roommate Chase was great and got me to all the places I needed to go. Target, which by the way is no where close to our place but was a lot of fun. It was a two-story store and when you want to go upstairs, your cart has its own escalator. AMAZING! This was the cheapest trip to Target I have ever had. But with the worlds longest trip to NYC (12 hours) my eating schedule was off and it was time for some food. Chase attempted to get me to Roberta's Pizza but the wait was 1.5 hours and I would have eaten another guest if we waited that long. So off to Dear Bushwick, which ended up being the best choice. You walk into this little quaint restaurant that on normal days has a patio that can seat a number of people, but with the rain this day, it only had a few tables inside. We were 2 of about 10 people. After getting the run down of the menu and the changes, Chase and I both decided on the pork chop with brussel sprouts. We were told it would take 20 mins to cook and the timer started. Now, being from a not so wealthy family, I was thinking pork chop....you know like you get at HEB that is cut slightly thin. After about 30 minutes our chops were on the table and at first I thought we bit off more then we could chew. These chops were bigger than the Friday lunch special at Perry's Steakhouse. (for those that don't know, those are bigger than your head) At first bite we both fell in love with these perfectly made pork chops. When we were done all that was left was the bone. I don't know what they did to make these things so good, but I would pay good money to have another. (and I just might)

The next day started off normal. I got up, met the other roommate John and then headed out to see if I could figure out the subway system. I picked a location and started to make my way there. I chose Times Square because my adopted sister Denise Miller Green wanted some pictures of NYC and I figured that would be ones she would recognize. As I headed there I remembered one of my interns from Equality Texas lived here, so I shot him a text and found out he was heading in the same direction. Getting to Times Square was easy, but I got there quite a bit earlier than Brandon (my old intern) McDaniel. So I walked around and thought I would grab a coke at McDonald's. As I was walking away from the counter I almost got run over by a man on the phone who was explaining to a friend "it is the most glorious coke ever, it's beautiful, but it is $60 an ounce." I might have chuckled a little and he turned to me and said, "oh sorry dude" and I said "no worries." As I was walking away, he turned and said, "but we do have it and it's great!!" I just pointed and said..."I believe you," and got the hell away from him. I didn't want to be panhandled by him.

As I headed to find Brandon, I was approached by so many people, all of whom had something new to say. Hey Mr. Good hair, hey dude like that box necklace, hey guy with the swagger...I mean if they had one more I might have just bought something.

After a cute little lunch with Brandon, I headed home and hung out with the roommates. We decided to make a trip to the store and  got back home to cook dinner and watch a movie. Sounds safe right? Well after the trip to the store we were walking back to the apartment and saw a gentleman kicking his trash cans. Now in my head I knew what he was doing, but then my ER background kicked in and said no maybe he is a bit unstable and is mad at the trashcans. But about that time he kicked the last one and picked up the whole can and two rats, no two big rats, no no two rats that could have kicked a dogs ass ran out from under that last can. I don't think I thought about anything other than pushing everyone down on my way out of that burning movie theatre. When I turned around, Chase and John were hot on my heels. Hun, I can do a lot of things but being a rats next victim is not one of them.  Luckily, we all made it home safe. I washed the day down with a great bottle (yes I said bottle) of wine.

Today was a very easy day, hung my new curtains, met up with one of my favorite New Yorkers Logan Hart and ventured through my hood and found some dinner. New York is new to me, but is not going to get me down. Tomorrow, keep working on conquering the job hunt! Oh and all my belongings arrive!!!!

From Texas to the Big Apple!

Well everyone wants to know why I am moving. You know, I couldn't give you an exact answer, other than I want a change. I have only lived one other place than Texas and it was Traverse City, MI and though I met some great people up there, it wasn't for me. I am now in my 30s and I feel like I don't have anything holding me here in Austin, so I should move and see what happens. I mean I can come home anytime I want to. But if I don't go, I will regret it later in life.

Why NYC?? I have always wanted to live there. My friend Kristin and I were just chatting about this the other day. No I am not going to try and become and actor or whatever. I am just going to see what happens. If you can't find what you are all about in NYC, then you probably can't find it anywhere.

It's funny that when I decided to go, a lot of people thought I was moving because of someone I was dating. But, no, I am going for myself. I mean I love him, I love him with all my heart and I can't imagine my life without him, but he won't be there. And well if it happens that eventually we are in the same city, AMAZING. But I am sure that won't happen for a very long time. What I want for him is happiness. He is the first person I ever fell in love with, ever. I love many friends and ex's but I am completely in love with him. So, whatever he needs to be happy, that is what I want. he deserves it. But as for moving, I am going at this alone. This Texan is heading to the Big Apple!

What I figured I would do is write about all my adventures here. So that hopefully I make you laugh. But who knows. I could make you cry, hell I might even cry. But just know, you are kinda going through this with me. Big Smiles!

I am back.....

I want to apologize for the lack of writing I have been doing in the last year. I have been busy. Yeah, that's it, I have been really really busy!

So, that being said, I promise you to get back to my blogging like Lindsay Lohan gets back to drug habits. Now, if there is something that you think I need to write about, please feel free to message me and let me know. I am always game for new topics. Until then, I will write about things that happen to me.

And you know your comments are what make my day so comment a way. I mean, you can be my little white powder, Lindsay promises she isn't doing.

Dog days of Summer...

So I have a ten year old red heeler and for the most part he is a pretty laid back old man. I mean, come on, in dog years he is 70 years old. I really feel like I should have already gotten him one of those wheelchairs for dogs, you know the ones where their back legs dangle and there are wheels that act as their legs. Yeah I am cruel. But, I have never had a problem with him chewing on something or making a mess inside. But apparently this past Monday Radar (my dog) was pissed about something. I came home to find the blinds in my kitchen, well a bit of a mess.

Now, if I like sunshine on the floor but not the rest of the room, then these blinds will work out REAL well. But since I am someone who needs a full set of blinds, these aren't really going to cut it. But Radar was proud of himself. I mean I walked in the front door and he was ready to show me what he did. "Dad!!! Come here! You have got to see what I did!" was practically coming from his eyes. So when I saw the window, and he saw my face, I have to say he was less than happy with my reaction. I think, "What the Hell??" and "Adoption at the pound" came out of my mouth, and he may not speak english, but I think it translated really well into dog barks. But I cleaned the mess up and we went outside and played with the ball until he could not play any longer. I mean I am going to get any extra energy out of him so this does not happen again.

Well Tuesday rolls around and I was thinking, I did a great thing taking him out and wasting that energy. Funny thing is Radar was thinking something different. I think for him Tuesday stood for two blinds. When I got home that day, he had taken out the two sets of blinds in the living room of my place. So, yeah I now have an apartment that my neighbors think Freddy Krueger visited in a bad 1990's scary movie. There is nothing like your 70 year old dog year dog redecorating your apartment. So bright and filled with sun light

I am all about being green, but there is a limit.

So when it comes to being green, I am all about recycling and keeping my carbon foot print as low as possible. This being said, I was on the Eastside of Austin this past weekend and they took green to a whole new level.

As you can see, in the photo to the right instead of allowing you to flush the urinal they just filled it with ice. To, I am assuming to melt and wash away the nasty?? Not sure, but I can tell you how unsanitary this is. I steered away for this thing all night long, but others were coming out talking about back splash and things of that nature.

I love you hipsters on the Eastside, but I am going to just say that running water has been around for years and I really think we should start using it. I don't know if this works in the summer when it is warmer and the ice melts faster, but in the winter its cold in there and they ice is just chillin with pee in it. EW EW EW. Maybe up the price of the drinks by a quarter and pay to have that running water. ;)