Saturday Night: Amazing food at Oceana, and Denzel Washington in Fences in New York. What a combination!

An amazing Saturday night!

We started out with an early supper at Oceana, a restaurant at the bottom of the Rockefeller Plaza. The food and service was outstanding. Our waiter was absolutely hillarious, friendly, and because it was a more expensive place, he was also very low key.

At dinner, there were complimentary amuse bouche served first. An idiomatic expression in French. Literally translated amusing the mouth. Perhaps a better translation tantalizing the tastebuds. The soup was served in a little glass, like a shot glass that sat on a thinly sliced cucumber so it wouldn't slide and a thin wafer of a cracker sat on top of the glass. Inside, was a cool pureed asparagus soup with a drop of lobster oil. It was very good. Our main courses were served with our choice of sauces. One of my sisters had a blood orange hollindaise sauce, for instance. I had wild shrimp with a side of asparagus. I had a sauce of tomatillo, but didn't really need it.

At one point in the restaurant I needed to use the washroom. When I asked a busboy for directions he walked me there, since it was at the far end of the restaurant. He said it was a mile in "that" direction and pointed. Then we walked through a maze of tables, the wine bar, etc. Waiters were walking all over the place and every time I stopped to let them by, they said "Oh no, after you." no matter how quickly they were going.

On the way back from the restroom I was a bit lost for a second and there was our waiter. I laughed and said, just looking for our table. He walked me back and then made a big show of having found me wandering around. Got the girls in my family laughing. (The restaurant is more than 1,200 square feet...and we were probably as far from the washroom as we could possibly have been) Our bill was served with little homemade lemon basil and chocolate candies.

THEN, if that wasn't enough the excitement officially began.

We went to  Fences. This play has a 13 week run and features Denzel Washington. We sat in the first row of the top balcony, and could see the set and actors just fine. As we waited in line to enter the theatre, Eddie Murphy entered the theater. We never did locate him in the building. (that shouldn't have been an impossibility, as the theatre is very small)

The play is listed as a comedy, but it also has some serious overtones. It is quite the story. There was a lot of audience reaction to this story, from laughter to clapping when Denzel's character, Troy was given a talking to by his wife, played by Viola Davis.

When we left the theatre we turned toward 7th Ave. for our hotel and walked right into the crowd of people waiting for the actors to leave the theatre. We didn't have our cameras, but we did see almost of all of the actors leave, most especially....Denzel Washington. It was an amazing night of theatre.

A New York State of Mind; The Cloisters

Saturdays in New York are like any other day, but BUSIER! if you can believe it. On Saturday we rode the subway as far as it could take us, past Harlem, Queens and the Bronx to the end of the island (Northern Manhattan) into Tyron Park and a part of the Metropolitan museum, the Cloisters.

Tyron Park is a beautiful park in its own right. It had lots of flowers in bloom, and the bedrock of the city remains more intact than in the centre where it has been used to build and create the foundation for many of the skyscrapers.

The Cloisters are only open in the spring and summer months. The Cloisters were assembled from domestic and religious materials brought primarily from France that date back from the ninth to fifteenth centuries. It houses primarily religious artifacts, but also some famous unicorn tapestries, as well as a unique and interesting medieval garden. The garden had a number of unique twig cages, and fences for the plants to grow along.

Another interesting feature was a number of fruit trees that had been pruned to fit into spaces alongside certain buildings. For instance, this pear tree, that has four main branches coming up from the trunk. It is then pruned all the way through, with ties to hold it in place as it grows to their desired pattern.

The doorways in the Cloisters are tiny. Maybe 6 feet high. However that makes sense as in the fourteenth century the average height of a man was less than 5 feet. In perspective to the stone work surrounding the doors, and in relation to the height of the ceilings, the small size of the doorways is really emphasized.

Apple Store outside.

The Cloisters is not large building, in comparison to many, but very interesting and we spent a few hours there.

Interior of the Apple Store

Later in the afternoon, I walked along Central Park on my own, as I needed some fresh air. I visited the Apple store right by the Waldorf hotel. It is an interesting store, essentially below ground. The entrance is encased in glass, with an elevator or stairwell for you to take down to the store. It was packed. I took a quick look and then kept on walking!

I wandered down 5th and 6th Avenues on my way to 7th Ave. and 53rd. St. where we are staying. I walked along Rockefeller plaza and said no to about a million (exageration) street vendors. Came back to the hotel room hot and sweaty!

Friday in New York; Ground Zero, Da Marino's, and a Little Night Music in New York

On Friday we explored Manhattan, saw Ground Zero, visited Century 21, (a discount store), strolled through Battery Park and walked through the outskirts of the financial district. These are tiles on a fence in Greenwich village. They were painted by children who lost loved ones in 9/11.

There are many neighbourhoods of New York that have changed over the years, as immigrants have migrated into different parts of the city. For instance, there is a former Jewish synagogue that is now a Buddhist Temple.

There are also lots of "districts." Shopping districts, bargain districts, garment district, fashion district, meat district, fish district, to name a few. One thing we found in the garment district was a shop with sewing machines floor to ceiling in the windows. We were on our bus tour, so didn't go inside. The picture doesn't do it justice, but sure was interesting.

Before we went to the theatre on Friday, we ate supper at a tiny Italian restaurant called Da Marino's. The restaurant was in the basement of a building. It had a unique bathroom. We got a couple of pictures, but not on my camera. I hope to post one of them at some point.

After supper we went to a Stephen Sondheim Broadway musical A Little Night Music with Cathering Zeta Jones and Angela Lansbury. It was a lot of fun. We had great seats. Angela Lansbury still has a dominant presence on the stage and a powerful voice. Catherine Zeta Jones is making her Broadway debut. She is quite good. The story is fairly comical, and we had a great night!

A Big Apple Evening; Times Square and Rosie O'Grady's in New York

On Thursday night, sisters P and R arrived. Anyway, there were a flurry of text messages back and forth as they hit the airport an hour apart, then taxied in from the airport, to the hotel together. We went out for supper and took in a bit of Times Square at night before packing it in.

Times Square is quite the sight, whether at night or during the day, but especially at night. There are so many lights, it's hard to tell the time! It's something you can look at nightly and still see something new!

Our supper was at Rosie O'Grady's, a seafood restaurant. I don't know what the best meal was, Lobster Ravioli? Fisherman's Platter? or Shrimp Linguine? The verdict is out. It was ALL yummy!

Tomatoes

We ate a light supper at a tiny Italian restaurant last night. It was in the basement of a building along W. 49th St. just off of Times Square in New York. Our supper was light, because we were off to see Catherine Zeta Jones and Angela Lansbury in "A Little Night Music." (Which I will write about on the Life is a Highway page)

What I want to talk about is the food, as this is a post about tomatoes. I had a tomato salad. It was so yummy. The tomatoes were fresh and perfectly ripe, none were over ripe. I think they used nice round tomatoes about the size of a baseball, or smaller, they didn't have much pulp. In fact, I believe these tomatoes had been skinned, and then the seeds had been removed, as well as any white parts. They were then cut into big chunks (1") and tossed in a bit of olive oil, raw garlic slices, some salt and pepper, and maybe a tiny bit of oregano. They were served in a big dish, with a sprig of mint on top. Normally, I would think you would share such a dish amongst two to four people. However, I ate the whole thing. It was so good. It wasn't too acidic, instead it was just right. I couldn't get over how yummy it was. The garlic was raw, so I didn't end up eating it, but otherwise, it was terrific. It would be a good dish to make at home, and I think you could add cucumer, or diced onion, (cooked or raw) and the onion could be green, red or yellow...lots of ways to do this dish. Simple but yummy. Very light for a meal before going to the theater, and I think it probably had a low caloric content, too!

Wish I had a picture of the actual salad! 

Mom

My mom is a very interesting person. We're currently on a trip in New York city. She's the kind of person who can talk about bible study on the subway, and then switch to a story about a movie she's seen in the next breath. She is widely read, super intelligent, and always learning and growing.

When I was a kid, we often disagreed, about a number of things. We are both quite opinionated, and sometimes about different things. Disagreeing, when I was a teen was difficult. Was I doing it out of disrespect? Who knows? In any case, now we listen to each other, better. In fact, I think I could still learn a lot about listening better from my mom!

I guess the one unique and truly wonderful gift I've received from my mom is to recognize and appreciate that we are all works in progress. We all have the capacity to continue to learn and to grow, to become who we are by learning from our experiences. And, to accept who we are, rather than step into that negative self-talk zone that sucks us in and spits out, worse than we were... Instead she requires me to be positive about who I am, and to rethink how I see myself. When I do reframe, I am always better for it.

One thing, though. She still cuts our heads off when she takes our pictures.... 

Optimism

"When we choose not to focus on what is missing from our lives but are grateful for the abundance that's present...we experience heaven on earth." ~ Sarah Breathnack