Final Day, now it rains

Wednesday - Lily was going to work from home again, so we hd another day sans dog. She made me matcha latte then sent us out. Without Charlie, we could go to the Tenement Museum. This museum is right across the street (Orchard) from Alec’s apartment (tenement) when he lived in the lower east side. It had been on my list for awhile. It’s not a typical museum where you pay a fee and wander from exhibit to exhibit. The founders bought an old tenement building that was largely untouched and restored it. They restored the different individual units into apartments of the some of the people who actually (and not) lived there,-into the era’s they were there. They have since also bough another building for more exhibition apartments. SO, when you go, you watch a short film about the place, and choose a tour. There are 3 walking tours of the neighborhood and a number of apartment tours depending on the day/time you are interested in going. If you are a member, I think you get a discounted rate. It kinds of rubbed me the wrong way, that I would need to pay $30 and only see one part of the building. We signed up for “Family Owned” and got see a restored saloon that was owned by a German couple in the 1860s and their adjoining apartment.

The tour was run by a very engaging 30 something gal and the interaction with her and the others on the tour was very insightful! We got to see about as much about their personal life as was possible to know. In the adjacent basement space, we saw the restored 1930 auction space of a jewish man, Max Marcus. I will be going on tours in the future. This experience made me want to further research my NYC ancestors. I know a lot about them, but where did they live? are the buildings still there? Their churches?

Tuesday was so warm, that Todd headed out Wednesday in just shirtsleeves. As we came out of the museum, the weather was definitely a bit chillier. We were hungry, so headed up to see what the line looked like at Katz’s (too long), so we went around the corner to place called Sweet Chick, where I had the best piece of carrot cake ever.

Brooklyn General Store is another place that had been on my list for a bit. So we took the F train and headed into Brooklyn. We walked down Union chatting with a gal and her standard Poodle who had Charlie’s coloring, of course she was also headed to BG. Inside I got a new DropCloth sampler, and fat quarter set and a 2 yard remnant of lovely Liberty of London. I can’t wait to make myself a shirt.

We walked up Henry toward Brooklyn Heights so that we could brownstone shop lol. If only I had a few more millions.

This place had super nice water garden just inside the railing.

As we walked, Todd got more and more chilly. I was actually OK, since I had worn my brand new Andrew Mowry Tesselated Vest :) I remembered that Alec told us to check out a clothing place in SOHO that had reasonable prices. We got the train on Montague and headed back. The store was reasonable and we stocked up a bit. The self checkout machine could read what we had ?!? I never saw that before. Unfortunately no bathroom, and I was just about dying.

I then walked a mile to a scone place that Alec and Lily suggested in Ukranian Village without noticing the helpful google comment that it wouldn’t be open until the following day. It was now steadily sprinkling.

The rain created multiple small issues,—if it had been clear, Lily and I were going to go to a Yoga class in Bryant Park. More importantly if it had been clear, we could have gone down to the tudor bridge and watched ManhattanHenge. I was SO looking forward to this. Twice a year the sun sets perfectly down 42nd st, and we were going to be there that week!. But it was rainy and super cloudy :(

https://weather.com/news/trending/video/clouds-may-block-new-yorks-manhattanhenge-sunset

There was a backup Yoga class in the building, so Lily and I suited up. The teacher didn’t show :(

Alec did find us a nice place for dinner and a 50% off coupon, so that’s nice. Final nights are so bittersweet. I could have stayed longer, Todd was ready to come home.

The following morning we packed up. Generally we get to Penn Station and take the train to our cheap commuter lot in Morristown. What with Charlie and all the bags, we took the most expensive Lyft ever, and got to the car about 9:30 and we got the kennel at 5:30.

All is well :) It was a good trip.