#16 SUMMER LOVIN, HAPPENED SO FAST
Summer is officially over, which means the count down to my birthday begins. In just 18 days, I'll be 24 - exciting and scary, isn't it? But before that countdown, is the one for Austin, TX! I can't wait to be traveling there with my boyfriend for a week. It'll be my first time in Austin... first time in Texas. He bought tickets a while back for this music festival going on that weekend, and I guess I happen to be his lucky plus one!
Coincidentally that week will also be the week of my birthday so I think I got a pretty awesome deal! A birth-week getaway and a music festival weekend?
Anyway, I was scrolling through my camera roll just before and looked back at all the photos I took this summer. I'm so sad that I haven't been blogging throughout the season, but I am guilty of being lazy. I have an issue with organizing my ideas into one place at a time when I have so many things going on. My new-now current job has taken up a majority of my time and brain space to put in the TLC that I used to into this blog. I know that sounded like a rant, but my job has also brought some good things into my life.
VIVA LAS VEGAS
I traveled to Vegas this past June to attend a conference that I helped market for my first 6 months. The event was MASSIVE and incredibly inspiring, compared to the previous events that I worked on at my old job. I think I am pretty lucky to have been recruited into the team that I am in, specifically. It's a lot of hard work, but in my opinion, it is work that will take you somewhere.
I met a Rod Stewart impersonator at the event cocktail reception. This was day 3 of the event and my second day in Vegas. I flew there on Tuesday morning with 3 other colleagues. I think my last 3 flights before that one were 6 hour flights as well, so long plane rides had sort of became a norm for me, which isn't a very comfortable feeling. This event was so tiring by the end of the week that I passed out for the ENTIRE 6 hour flight going back to New York. Unfortunately, I didn't get a chance to step foot outside of the hotel that the conference took place in, except for a team photo. My week's agenda consisted of the following: Eat, Sleep, Conference, Repeat.
A TRIP TO THE FRENCH... 'ENCAS
Another cool thing that I did this summer, besides going on a cruise to Puerto Rico, was sign up for a Macaron making class with my boyfriend. We were originally supposed to have this class in the beginning of July, but then the chef traveled to France that week and we had to reschedule for a month later.
I highly recommend this class, especially if you're in a romantic era of your life right now. I found this class from Groupon and I paid a little under $200 for two. Here's the link (https://www.groupon.com/deals/french-encas). I believe it's actually cheaper now because the deal has been out for a while. The 3-hour class takes place in a small kitchen all the way up in East Harlem. Chef Simon is very down-to-earth and you can tell that he genuinely enjoys doing what he does!
SPIDERMAN POP-UP
Another cool thing I did was go to the Spiderman pop-up exhibit at the SonySquare place in Flatiron. My boyfriend and I tried out some 4D thing where we sat down and watched a small 3D clip of Spiderman while having the chair move and feeling the sound and effects from the chair. It was pretty awesome - not many people knew about it I guess since it wasn't crowded. We each also took a picture on this set that made us look like we were hanging off a wall. 8)
We also walked around the store to take a look at the other neat things Sony was showcasing. I tried on their wireless headphones, which was probably THE game changer of music entertainment. The headphones drowned out all surrounding sounds the second I turned it on. If I wanted to raise or lower the volume, all I had to do was swipe my index finger up and down the side of my ear where the headphone was. They are definitely so much cooler than Beats.
BAD AND BOUJEE
I went to the boujee-est team dinner last month at Buddakan. Some people may call it "over priced chinese food." Other people may call it a "finer thing in life." I'd like to consider this experience as the latter of the two. Each of us got a purple haze to complement our meal, which was the Lychee martini drink that flushed the heck out of my face.
When I say that this was the best Chinese food I had, I am not exaggerating. For the price that I paid ($130 per), I think that each dish (except for the lobster fried rice - don't get that bland and flaky plate) lived up to it's hype. And if not, they have definitely been under rated. My favorite dish was the Edamame Dumplings. If I wanted to write a review of this place on Yelp, I would be sitting my ass all day in front of that app because there is no proper way to tell people to just spend their money here. Honestly, I believe this meal inspired me to renew my gym membership at Lucille Roberts. Why do such good things always have to come with a darn price?! But seriously though, if you want to talk about bad and boujee, you have to chat about that over a meal at Buddakan.
MUSIC FESTIVAL SEASON
This was a spontaneous decision I made a couple of days prior to EZOO. I wasn't going to go because I had gone the last 2 years, and I would be going to a music festival in a month anyway. However, I was at work one Monday listening to Armin Van Burren's playlist on Spotify, and thought to myself that if I do not see him at EZOO, I would probably regret it. So that was why I ended up buying my ticket!
I had to throw out my TOMS at the end of the night because they got super muddy. They actually got drenched in mud the second I stepped foot on the grass because it rained the day before. I'm kind of sad because they were my only cute rave shoes! My girlfriends and I also went to the Billboard Hot 100 Festival for our girl Maggie's birthday. My favorite part of that night was Big Sean's performance. It definitely brought me back to high school :).
We spent Maggie's birthday weekend in Long Island. We went to Fire Island during the day we went to Billboard, and went to Lavendar by the Bay the next day. Unfortunately when we got there, all the lavender were picked out. We were told that they were getting ready to replant them for the next season (assuming for Fall). We decided to walk around anyway since we drove all the way there - and it was free admission since there were no flowers. It was a weekend still well spent with the girls, as how it is whenever we all go out together!
29 ROOMS
My boyfriend got tickets to see Refinery's 29 Rooms earlier this month. He's so good at doing these things with tickets. For me, by the time I find out about these kind of things, it's already a few days before the event and tickets are all sold out. So I guess I'm pretty lucky that my boyfriend is a geek at this stuff.
The event didn't start until 11AM, and we got in line just a little past 9AM. He brought a chair for one of us to sit on while we wait. I mean, how dedicated and intense is this whole early bird gets the worm thing? #loveit Since we were the first few people on line, I got to test out the Snapchat spectacles for the day. I thought they were pretty cool, but the only thing I didn't like about them was that you need GOOD internet/WiFi to have the snaps sync onto your phone.
We spent the whole 3 1/2 hours there - I was so tired. My favorite room? I don't have one. I feel like my time in each room was short-lived for me to really judge. This event was pretty much set up like a ginormous art gallery, but with the crazy amount of people and the time limit you have there, I feel like you don't have much of an opportunity to appreciate the art.
OF ALL THE FISHES IN THE SEA... YOU ARE THE ONE FOR ME
Just before the last day of summer, my boyfriend and I went to eat at Sushi on Jones with two of his other friends. I was really excited because it was going to be my first time having sushi from a sushi bar. The catch here is that you only get 30 minutes to eat 13 pieces. It was surprisingly filling and we took up the whole time! I think it was because I ate each piece so quick. The bar only sits up to 6 people at a time (a part of 4 and a party of 2). Watch out - I'm about to flood your face with tons of raw fish!
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My favorite piece was the shrimp. It was actually my first time having raw shrimp and I usually don't eat shrimp because I'm allergic to it. I would like to experience this again, but at a different sushi bar with more time. The tag-line here is "Less talk, more eat," and that's literally all you have enough time to do.
So that was most of my summer summed up in one long blog post. My aunt recently left back to Florida after staying here for a week. She left her dog with us for 2 weeks while she went away to Hong Kong. I fell in love with that little guy that I almost shed a tear on his last day here. I know I can't get a dog of my own because I don't have enough time to take care of one. My girlfriend warned me beforehand that I am going to fall in love with him after those 2 weeks - I did not believe her at first, but it happened.
It will be until the next time I visit Florida when I probably get to see that doggie again :'(