Tonight a bunch of my family went out for dinner and dancing to bring in the new year. At midnight, my mom, my aunt Menry, and Vanessa whispered, ‘This is your year’ when they hugged me, and my heart skipped a beat every time. And I couldn’t say anything back because I didn’t want to ruin my mascara.
I missed Devin a whole lot, especially during the dancing. But then Menry said, ‘Colecciono momentos mágicos. Creo que este es uno’, which reminded me so much of something my grandmother used to say. And then the band played the first song Devin learned in Spanish, and my aunt Martha exclaimed, ‘La canción de Devin!’
I remembered what it was like to kiss my Abbita on the cheek to wish her a happy new year, and I imagined what it will be like to kiss Devin at the stroke of midnight. And I thought about how the people you love stay a part of your life forever.
This year I finally ate all twelve of my grapes and made a wish for each one. At 12:30, my aunt Menry said, ‘We have to go because we’re getting up early tomorrow’.
But the whole family stayed until the party was over. Like we always do.
Last year I decided Devin and I would be City Mouse, Country Mouse on account of the perfect suitability of that description. Sadly. I wish I could claim country-mouse status, but the truth is that I learned to feed chickens from Beauty and the Beast, and once I packed a bag of long summer dresses for a visit to Devin’s family farm. I thought it would be so romantic, wearing flowing dresses that undulated in the wind just like all those stalks of corn… Devin’s mom took one look at me and declared, ‘You’ll have to be extra careful about the ticks.’
So yes, Devin obliged and we dressed like characters from a fable by Aesop. We didn’t win any costumes, but I’m pretty proud of those ears I made.
I haven’t written much about planning a wedding, mostly because I don’t know the first thing about it. But this week I am in Portland with my mom to see Devin and start putting some real thought and effort into figuring out the beginning of our plans! This trip was planned on the shortest of notices. And I mean that. Here’s the timeline:
On Wednesday, Devin & I decided to have our wedding ceremony & reception in Portland.
On Thursday, I realized I have this week off from work.
On Friday, my mom and I decided we should come to Portland. We bought plane tickets in the wee hours of Friday night/Saturday morning and flew in on Sunday! I had never bought a plane ticket/packed my bags on such short notice.
Phew. I am also working on a very big translation project, which is fun but time-consuming work. I can’t really remember the last time I slept a full eight hours, but I am very happy about the reasons I haven’t been sleeping. My brain keeps having these pop-up notes like: Translating? Hanging out with my mom? Seeing Devin? Portland? Biking seven miles with Devin…and my MOM? Wedding-planning? IS THIS REALLY HAPPENING?!?
It is actually happening, and I am posting this before I go to bed because I try my hardest to update this thing once a week, and I doubt I’ll have much time tomorrow. Sorry if it isn’t a very interesting post.
Let’s close with some engagement pictures!
Here we are sitting on the grass looking like your average engaged couple.Here we are showing off our watches like the feminist engagement super(s)heroes we are!
Funny story about these pictures. I made this grand plan for Jo to take our engagement pictures. Only I forgot to tell Devin…and I also forgot to tell Jo. Until the day I thought the photo session would be. Luckily, they were both free and such good sports about the whole thing. I guess after you know me a while you realize that while I might be good at planning, I am not always so good about communicating plans (some would say that’s the most important part, but what do they know).
Like every movie ever would suggest, New York is full of diners. One time Devin went to one and reviewed its chocolate milkshake.
Due to this pesky-but-wonderful thing called employment, I was unavailable to photograph the event. Sadly, Devin is not the type to take pictures of himself, or the world around him for that matter. In February he went to Singapore for a week and didn’t snap a single picture. Granted he was there for a conference and didn’t have much free time, but still! (Somewhat related: I sometimes try to imagine what Devin’s Instagram feed would look like, and I am stumped.) I am the type to photograph any and everything (Instagram: smoothliminal), so I managed to take this picture of EJ’s Luncheonette another time. And now…without further ado, I present unto you, the third installment of Devin’s search for New York’s Best Shake! (Note: Devin uses a 1-5 scale with 1 being the worst and 5 being the best.)
EJ’s Luncheonette
Exactly what you would expect from a diner shake.
FLAVOR: 3.5 – Hand-scooped but not gourmet ice cream.
CONSISTENCY: 3 – The man behind the bar could have used a little less milk. The shake was pourable.
PRESENTATION: 4 – As I said last time, everyone loves a bonus, and this shake came with a healthy extra 8 oz in the steel mixing cup. However, the plastic (though reusable) pintglass lost a few points. Also, there was no cherry as one would expect at such an establishment, but I didn’t mind.
AMBIANCE: 3.5 – EJ’s is a surprisingly classic diner for the Upper East Side.
ETHICS: 2 – The employees seemed happy but no guarantees about the cows or cocoa pickers. Kemps ice cream and generic chocolate sauce are classic diner, but one would hope Upper East Siders would demand better.
OVERALL VALUE: 3.5 – $5 is exactly what I would expect to pay for this classic diner shake; I only wish they used glass pints and local dairy.
‘Home’ is the word I most strongly associate with Portland, Oregon. It is far from the only thing I associate ‘home’ with—shopping malls, telenovelas, Christmas, American commercials from the 90s, and Mexican junk food all rank high on the list. But Portland is a special part of that list because it is the only place where I have felt at home from the moment I arrived.
I remember landing in PDX airport in August of 2007 and running to the restroom. When I turned to flush, I saw my first dual-flush handle (it allows the user to control how much water is used to flush, which saves gallons of water.)
It was love at first flush.
Everything I encountered after that was just as perfect: farmers’ markets, efficient public transit, bike lanes, flowers the size of my face, trees the size of my dreams, public parks, and delicious vegan food everywhere…
Because I moved to Portland for college, it became my first home apart from my mother’s. And what a home it was! Fittingly, Portland also has some of the most beautiful houses I’ve ever seen. While I was visiting last month, I tried to capture some of them.
The number-one reason Portland houses are beautiful is, of course, the setting. The above picture is an unedited iPhone photo of a random house I saw on my way to the bus. Look how full of life Portland is! Look how tall that tree is! Look at that tangle of flowers on the mini-porch! There’s probably a more apt term than ‘mini-porch’, but I am not an architect!
Even if you subtracted the setting–as I tried to do for this shot–Portland is full of beautiful Victorian and Craftman-style houses painted in cheery colors. This house with individually-painted shingles in some of my favorite colors used to be my dream house. When I showed Abbita, my grandmother, a picture of it, she noted that it had too few windows for her taste. You can’t tell from this picture, but I agree with Abbita. My dream house should have no fewer than one million windows.
Portland residents also like to add fairytale touches to their already magical real-estate realities. This Craftsman has miniature toy dinosaurs on every rock in its front yard! I’ve also seen tiny toy horses tied to horse rings in sidewalks. (Horse rings are what people in the 1800s used to ‘park’ their horses. Read more about Portland’s toy horse project here.)
But what’s a home without an interior? This picture of my friend Alex’s house shows two things characteristic of Portland homes: (1) amazing old wood details and (2) color. Sadly, the photo doesn’t do justice to the deep orange of this dining room’s wall. Another thing I love about this picture is the cross. Alex was my roommate freshman year, and this cross is the first thing we bought to decorate our room. We bought it at a store selling fair-trade artisanal goods from Latin America. From what I remember, it’s either from Ecuador or Honduras, but uh, don’t quote me on that. Living with Alex is one of the best living arrangements I’ve ever had—and that’s even considering the size of our room. It was so small that the next year it was turned into a single-occupancy dorm. Alex, if you’re reading this, I love you! Thanks for letting me crash in your perfect house.
When I walked into Jo’s house (a house I’d been dying to see ever since I saw this house tour on her blog), the first thing I saw was this yellow tea kettle sitting on the most darling gas stove I ever did see. I was breathless over the color coordination among the kettle, wall décor, and dishtowel. If I had a Pinterest, I would pin this soooo hard. Let’s focus on what’s important here, though: tea kettles. Every Portland house has one! A lot of them have a stovetop one and an electric one. I didn’t even know what an electric kettle was until I moved there, and I’d only really had two kinds of tea in my life: chamomile and peppermint. Then, I started drinking tea to stay warm, and pretty soon I was drinking it just to drink it. Once, when I was feeling very romantic and Devin was writing his thesis, I bought him flowers and fancy tea. Only the tea tasted like perfume, so I ended up using the tea bags as potpurri for my drawers. All my socks and t-shirts smelled really good for a few months. After I took the above picture, I discussed kombucha with Jo and her housemate Aria. It boggles my mind that a lot of North Americans reading this probably don’t know what kombucha is. If you have never heard of it, here is all you need to know: it originated in China, it’s fizzy, some people think it cures every disease ever, everyone in Portland has an opinion about it, and once Lindsay Lohan claimed it made her drunk.
Jo, Aria, & Chris also have the neatest book & zine corner. This picture is a testament to their design genius, in case you weren’t convinced by the kitchen shot. I know not everyone knows what a zine is, so I found this webpage from Brooklyn College that explains the concept. Basically, it’s cool writing made and self-published by cool people. Most zines are made using paper, scissors, and photocopiers though that has changed a lot thanks to things like computers and Photoshop. When Devin asked me to be his girlfriend significant other—he asked me to be his girlfriend, but I prefer the term ‘s.o.’ ‘Girlfriend’ is just too antiquated/normatively gendered for me. So is ‘fiancée’, but I haven’t found any accurate equivalent for that so most of the time I say ‘partner’, which doesn’t really capture it…ack sorry, what was I saying? Oh yeah, Devin photocopied every feminist zine he could find at the Portland Independent Publishing Resource Center, put them in a binder, wrapped the binder in newspaper from the New York Times Style section, and asked me to be his ___________. The rest is history! (Can you tell I miss Devin? Me too.)
Jo’s living room is one of the prettiest I have ever seen (I got to sleep on that couch, you guys!), but it also reminds me of every Portland living room I’ve ever been in. The vintage couch by a window, the glass jars and bottles on a coffee table, the laptop… The whole scene gives me goosebumps, in a good way.
P.S. Every time I rave about Portland, I feel a strong moral conviction to acknowledge the huge problem of racial segregation in that city. Portland’s racial inequality is increasing. Seattle—the other metropolis in the Pacific Northwest—is decreasing racial inequality thanks to bold, innovative policies. This episode of Think Out Loud, a radio show from Portland, is a solid introduction to the problem.
P.P.S. If you enjoyed the pictures of Jo’s house, check out her blog. It is my favorite blog in the whole of the worldwide web. Her latest post, especially, inspired and moved me. I cried the best kind of tears.
I have a method for finding something specific to do in New York City. I search for whatever I want to do on Google or Yelp, look at the top five results and pick one without giving it too much thought. It’s a lot like plugging your nose and jumping into the pool. I’m a toe-dipper, myself; but you guys, New York is big. If you attempt to use the toe-dip method, you will get stuck. I repeat: you will get stuck.
And so it came to pass that on my birthday morning, Devin and I found ourselves at the top-rated restaurant in Yelp’s weekday breakfast & brunch category. And Devin found himself drinking a milkshake at nine o’clock in the morning. The things that man does for the sake of science, I tell you!
Here’s his review. (Note: Dev uses a 1-5 scale, with 1 being the least and 5 being the best.)
Clinton St. Baking Company & Restaurant
While the food at Clinton Street Baking Co. was great, the shake was a bust. I’m not sure if it was cheap ice cream or skim milk (I would not go so far as to accuse them of using ice), but this shake was bland.
Devin evaluates the presentation.
FLAVOR: 2 – It’s a bad sign when the whipped cream has as much flavor as the shake.
CONSISTENCY: 3 – The menu calls it a classic extra thick shake, but it’s more like extra thick chocolate milk. Not a soup, but nothing special.
PRESENTATION: 3 – While glass is good, if you are going to use the old fashioned diner-style, you should include the steel mixing cup with the extra shake. Everybody loves a bonus.
AMBIANCE: 4 – Bustling and lots of natural light, we had a nice brunch but did have to wait 30 minutes outside for a seat.
ETHICS: – Aah…I forgot to ask.
OVERALL VALUE: 2 – At more than $6, this is not much shake with not much flavor for your money.
If you’ve been reading the blog for a while or know me in real life, you’ve heard of my partner Devin. I haven’t yet written a super lovey romantic post about him because ewww. Maybe someday I’ll figure out how to write a public love letter without simultaneously blushing and vomiting, but for now, let me just tell you one thing.
Once upon a summer of 2009, Devin came to Mexico to meet my family. One night while having dinner in the Copper Canyon, my mom asked him what his favorite food was. Without hesitation, he said, ‘Milkshake.’ My mother was aghast (milkshakes are not food!). Dev quickly corrected himself and claimed the Mexican burrito* as his favorite, but this was a shameless lie! His foremost loyalty is––and will always be––to the milkshake.
That’s why when we passed this sign in November, I interpreted it as a challenge for my favorite milkshake connoisseur.
Oh yeah?
It was thus decided that every time we pass a restaurant that boasts having ‘the best shake in NYC,’ Devin must attempt to verify that claim through a rigorous taste test! Below find Devin’s first review. (Note: Dev uses a 1-5 scale, with 1 being the worst and 5 being the best.)
* Mexican burritos are not the size of a human baby and do not have rice or other weird toppings. Just beans on a reasonably-sized tortilla. Mmmm!
brgr
(A milkshake review by Devin)
After our Thanksgiving trip to Philadelphia, we stopped at brgr in Midtown near where the Megabus left us. We really had no choice; their window advertised that they were ‘Voted Best Shake.’ Granted their award was for some berry concoction, but no award in the world could affect my shake order. It’s chocolate every time. brgr calls it “the Black & White,” but don’t fear; this is a classic chocolate shake.
brgr’s Black & White shake
FLAVOR: 4 – Bonus points for leaving some marbled veins of chocolate sauce but mostly mixed. CONSISTENCY: 5 – Solid, solid, solid. 30 seconds upside down, and this shake doesn’t budge, yet it glides effortlessly up the straw; perfect. PRESENTATION: 2 – We dined in, but brgr only has plastic cups. Not glass, not compostable. Not styrofoam, but still, not classy. AMBIANCE: 4.5 – I like this place. Despite being new and a little fast food-y, the high ceiling has beautiful exposed beams and the single-person bathrooms are marked “vegetarian” and “carnivore.” ETHICS: 4 – local and grass-fed = fresh and tasty, but I’m not sure their chocolate is fair trade. OVERALL VALUE: 4 – At more than $5, brgr’s shakes are not cheap, but as I said, it’s a solid 16 oz, and I’d say that we got our money’s worth of chocolaty creamy goodness.
smoothliminal 
