So Sandra came back from getting the mail in the office yesterday, and she had a thick, heavy enveloppe for me. From Starbucks. Could it be…?

It felt heavy, and I couldn’t  wait to open it. The contents were a letter, welcoming me to the Starbucks Goldcard program as one of the first people in The United States. It talked about what a valued customer I am. Of course. It also had a sort of manual with it, which contained the card and a couple of vouchers, so I can give friends the luxury of ordering a drink with 10% discount.

As you can see in the middle there, the goldcard is not really gold, it is more a classy black. Like the exclusive American Express Centurion Card. Although it was a little easier getting this card (and free!).

So I went to try it out, of course. And it works. People treat me differently now. And they were already friendly. But it seems they are friendlier now. And their service is faster. And somehow, people on the street get out of my way quicker and the traffic lights on my way to the Starbucks seem to make my journey there faster. Awesome!

Good news is that we have an Indian Summer in New York. Temperatures between 20-25 C.

Bad news is that the faul smell in Broome Street (around the corner) is back. I wish I could enclose the smell so we could do a survey about what you think it is. My guess (or fear); long dead chicken soaked in uncleaned fishtank water….

Blechhh.

Sorry. Again. We’re running way behind with the full updates, although we did have some time to write some shorter blog posts. But I’ve figured out why we didn’t write a big update. We’re running out of time. In three weeks, we’re back in Amsterdam. And before then, we want to do as many of the things we haven’t done yet. So somehow, writing the blog gets pushed back.

But, here I am, doing an update. I have a feeling we need at least three updates, but let’s start with this one.

On Thursday afternoon, two weeks ago, Marco and Margreet arrived in New York. I met them at their apartment (The Eldridge apartment that we used for Yvonne and Saskia’s mother too), and then went for coffee. Saskia was working until 6:30, so we walked around Chinatown Little Italy for a bit. We met Saskia and found our way to a nice wine bar where we did some catching up. It was not going to be a late night, so after some tapas, we called it a night. Too bad it had started raining a little.

The rest of the weekend would have more rain, a real pity, especially for our visitors. Lots of indoor activities were called for. Which basically meant quite a bit of shopping (both Marco and I bought awesome shirts), cofees, food and music. The music requires and deserves its own blog entry. On Sunday night, we actually made it out to a small club after dinner. It was called The Sapphire Lounge, and we had a drink there, and did our first bit of dancing in New York!

Anyway, it was a lot of fun to show Marco and Margreet where we’ve been spending our time here in New York, especially since this whole idea of going to New York started with the trip two years ago, together with them to the Big Apple. And I think they’d like to try this for themselves as well!

We only had a couple of days to recuperate, because on Friday, my mum and dad would arrive. They’d already spent almost two weeks in the States, a little further north. They rented a car there and drove around Massachusetts, Maine and New England. Their plane flew in to Newark airport, and Saskia was there to pick them up. 

They were staying at the same apartment in Eldridge street, and after they’d brought their luggage there, Saskia took them to the office where I saw them. I needed to finish some stuff at work, so Saskia took them out to lunch and after work, I joined them for coffees at my Starbucks. We walked back to our place, so they could see where we’ve been living for the past 4 months. After a little rest, we had dinner at Mole. We’d been there once before with Ap, and the food tonitgh was really very very good. It’s a Mexican restaurant, but they have some really interesting dishes on their menu. I especially liked the fresh guacamole (not very original, but they make it fresh at your table, to your specifications, and it really was one of the best I’ve had), and the ceviche. This is a dish made with raw fish that is ‘cooked’ in lime juice. This version had squid, shrimp and some sort of white fish, with tomatoes and a real chili kick. Very good indeed! The Margaritas were also very tasty and potent.

After dinner, we decided to go to Banjo Jim’s. We could all use a bit of fresh air so we walked there and had a fun evening with live country music (see next blog entry for more info).

Mom and dad hadn’t been in New York before. Well, dad had, but that was over thirty years ago. And they were only here for three days. So we needed to be efficient in showing them some of the highlights of the city. So, after breakfast, we traveled to TImes Square. Looked around a bit (Korean Day Parade), and then bought tickets for one of the bus tours. We hadn’t done this yet, and it actually was quite interesting. 

The tour guide told us a lot of things we didn’t know, so we really enjoyed it, and so did my parents. In Greenwich Village we got out of the bus (it’s a hop-on, hop-off system) and walked around the area for a bit. We visited our first apartment in the West Village and enjoyed the beautiful weather with a coffee on the Hudson. We then did the second part of the tour, which took us further down to the southern tip of Manhattan, and then up again, through Chinatown and past the United Nations headquarters all teh way to Central Park. By this time all of us were having serious bladder overload issues, so we got out just before the end of the tour at a Starbucks and stood in line to use the bathroom. It had also become quite cold up in that doubledecker buss, so we had some hot chocolate. Yummie!

From there, we went home, has some rest and then went out for dinner at Macelleria, the restaurant we celebrated Saskia’s birthday at. Another fine dinner, with great wines. I belive we called it a night after dinner.

On Sunday, we had breakfast at Prince, and then got in a cab to South Street Seaport, where we took the boat tour around Lower Manhattan and past the Statue of Liberty. Boat trips are always fun, and it is another great way of seeing the city. After that trip, we walked around the Financial District for a bit, seeing Wall Street and Ground Zero, and an exhibition in St Pauls Church on the rescue workers that used it as a base during the rescue operation after 9/11. 

It was time for (a late) lunch, and we ended up in a Malaysian place, for a very nice and affordable lunch. We went home again for some rest (we actually really enjoyed these little rests!). One last major touristy thing to do was of course to get on the top of some tall building to see the city. So we went to our favourite: The Top of the Rock. No lines whatsoever, so we were up there in no time, and got a great nighttime view of the city. Spent some time up there, took in the views and then went down and nearly got lost in the underground mall that they have there.

A taxi took us back to downtown, but the restaurant we had thought of turned out to be almost empty (it was Sunday night, 9:45pm). We dedcided to look for a place with a few more people and ended up at a really nice Italian place where we basically ordered a couple of starters and some pasta. But we did go through two pottles of wine again, and really enjoyed the food and the wine. And the whole restaurant was a very nice place.

We walked back to our neighborhood and I said goodbye to my parents, as I would be back to the office the next morning. Well, we’ll be back in Amsterdam next month, so I’m sure I’ll see them before too long.

Saskia had breakfast with them, and then they had to go back to the apartment, pack and catch a cab to take them back to the airport and to the Netherlands!

Two visits in two weeks. It was a lot of fun, and somewhat exhausting at the same time. And we now really feel that our six-month adventure is slowly coming to an end. So we’re counting down. Please excuse us if we don’t update the blog regularly (have we ever?), but now we’ve got one extra, very good reason for it. We’re making the best of every last hour and minute that we’re here. I know that we’ll miss this place when we’re back…

Tuesday we celebrated Janneke’s birthday in a hotel bar on one of the corners of Washington Square. This bar is one of the many hidden ‘treasures’ of NY. You wouldn’t know that there was a bar unless someone tells you. But at least this one is open to everyone, there are bars where you first have to call an unlisted telephone number…very exclusive. But that’s a completely different story.

So, we sat in the bar with Janneke and Matthias and ordered cocktails (the thing to do we thought in a bar like this). When we were just talking about how nice and quiet this lounge was the bartender told us that any minute now he would turn the TV on for the live debate between Mc Cain and Obama. Oh oh, the one thing worse than shouting to each other during a baseball game (except for in a sport bar) is to try to do the same during a heated talk show. While we were just complaining to each other about this we also wondered where this TV would come from. Suddenly the bartender walked straight to a wall, opened one of the panels and out came a TV. A secret window, cool! Later Jacco found out there was another secret door in that wall, leading to the restroom.

After half an hour or so we were accompanied by Katherina, the owner of the house Janneke and Matthias live in, and Webster her boyfriend. They were friendly, typically hip, successful New Yorkers with a lot of tips and gossip about this city and its people. They told us that the bar housed is home to many professors of The New York University and that he loved this place because of its (usually) quiet ambiance. Two cocktails later Webster (he cal himself Web) talked about yoga and how he can not compete with Katherina on these exercises except for his head stand. Katherina is about 1m 85 (still not uses to the feet and inches) so that makes it more difficult. But of course we challenged Web to show us right there in the bar. Understandably  he didn’t want to embarrass himself or Katherina in this classy west village bar but one cocktail more made a big difference and there he went…on his head, in a yoga stand in the middle of the bar! ‘Very impressive’,…commented a professor who just entered the bar and who turned out to be one of Katherina’s most admired teachers. As Matthias commented, this could have been a perfect film scene…maybe one of Woody Allen.

By the way, we saw many after discussions about the debate and according to CNN’s poll Obama ‘won’ this one with 54% over 30 %.

As you may have gathered from earlier posts, I go to my Starbucks (on Broadway, close to Grand Street) quite often. About three times a day, roughly. And my order is always the same, a Doppio Macchiato. By now, five months in, most of the employees there (and there are many of them!) recognize me and know my order. Up to the point where I walk in the shop, I hear an order of Doppio Macchiato being called, but the person behind the machines then says that they already got it. So without ordering, I get my drink, often before I paid for it. It’s nice, and it sort of feels like a small coffee shop this way. In a small coffee shop, you expect this to happen after a couple of weeks. But a Starbucks, on such a touristy spot, I wasn’t expecting this.

Last week, things got a little crazier. First, I had a couple of discounts (charging a single macchiato) and even free coffees. Twice in a day, they refused to accept my Starbucks card. Hey, I’m not one to complain about free coffee! Then, one of the guys that seems to be a little higher op in the chain of command in the shop, actually introduced himself to me, and wanted to know my first name. We’re now gettign very friendly indeed. It sort of looked like they were introducing a new way of handling their regular customers.

And then, on Thursday, I received this email:

Dear Jacco,

I’d like to personally invite you to join Starbucks Gold. It’s a new program we’re launching for people like you who love coming into Starbucks. With the new Gold Card, you’ll receive a 10% member discount on most of your Starbucks purchases, plus lots of other exclusive benefits and top shelf treatment.

So, I just signed up, and we’ll see what happens next. But I’m becoming a Starbucks Goldcard holder. I think it’s a sign, saying that I drink way to much coffee…

Monday, 15th of September.  Someone’s NY birthday! I picked her up at the apartment and we went for breakfast at Orchard. I got us tickets to see The Seagull of Chekhov on Wednesday. After a healthy yogurt, granola and berries we took the subway to 42nd street and saw Bryant Park, The National Library and the fancy shops of 5th Avenue. We had lunch back at LES and in the afternoon we took the subway to Brooklyn Heights to enjoy the view on Manhattan. Unfortunately the sun had already set but the sky was beautiful! We met Jacco at restaurant Frankies in another part of Brooklyn, Carrol Park. We had dinner here once before with Wayne and Dana and because it was so good we needed an occasion to come here again…voila. This restaurant is in the middle of a living area with shops and quite a bit of traffic but as soon as you sit in their large their garden you are in a different world. The only thing you see pass by in the distance is the subway that runs above ground at that point but even that has a surreal feeling. We had a drink outside and went in for dinner. I’ll leave it Jacco to write a review about that, he has the right vocabulary to describe food,…but it was really good.

This could have been a nice ending to a good and full day but it was Monday night which meant we had to show mum the Kuntryoke! Jacco and I even rehearsed the song ‘Jackson’ of Johnny Cash but as soon as we arrived at the bar we heard the same song bursting enthousiastically out of the cafe. OK. Slight set back but we WILL do it another time (they don’t play the same song twice). We stayed and heard some good performances, highlight being a truck driver from Canada who happened to be in the area and who sung….. Brave people! My mother had a very good time, also because she knew most of the songs! The reliable yellow car took us back to our beds.

The next day I took my mother on a very long tour,…in short we visited St. Paul’s Chapel, Wall Street, Battery Park, the Hudson Riverside Park (all by foot) and then we took a cab to the Meat Packing District and walked past our first home into Bleeker Street. At night we ordered Mexican food and ate in with our feet on the table watching Frasier. Unfortunately Jacco had to work late and came in past midnight.

The next day I had to work so my mother went on her own to Central Park and to the MOMA. In the evening we met in midtown to go to the Walter Kerr Theater to see The Seagull but first we had dinner at a nice Italian place where the waiter spoke South African and where a pretty well known actor was our table neighbour (still don’t know his name). So, the play…the theater was beautiful, hardly seen anything like it! Imagine a theater from early 1900 with ornaments on the ceiling, painted walls, new fluffy chairs and a thick velvet stage curtain…as if it was hung and done yesterday! Later we read that it had been recently renovated. The play was wonderful! It was really special to see actors like Mackensie Crook (the nerd in The Office, pirate in Pirates of the Carribean) and Kristin Scott Thomas (The Piano) play on stage.

Let’s see, what did we do the next day…AH, we went to Ellis Island, the island where between 1890 en 1952 millions of immigrants arrived. The ferry took us first to Liberty Island with the statue and before stopping at Ellis Island. We took a audio tour to hear all the stories which was really very interesting.  It’s amazing that nearly half of the population of the United States can trace their roots to Ellis Island. Also many Dutch people. Should you want to find out which of your ancestors made the trip you can find out at this website www.ellisisland.org. I already found many ‘de Ruiters’ an ‘Nieuwlanders’. We spent a good afternoon at the island and took one of the last ferries back to Battery Park. The weather was beautiful, one of the last nice summer days. In the evening the three iof us went out for dinner in the East Village, to a Spanish restaurant. The next day I first went to Brooklyn for the English-Arabic class and met up with my mother later at the subway to go to the Rockefeller Center. We went up to enjoy the view from the 68th floor. Again a sunny day so the view was amazing and my mother loved it. Down at the Rockefeller Center we drank a last wine before picking up her suitcases and travelling to JFK. <!– /* Style Definitions */ p.MsoNormal, li.MsoNormal, div.MsoNormal {mso-style-parent:”"; margin:0in; margin-bottom:.0001pt; mso-pagination:widow-orphan; font-size:12.0pt; font-family:”Times New Roman”; mso-fareast-font-family:”Times New Roman”;} @page Section1 {size:8.5in 11.0in; margin:1.0in 1.25in 1.0in 1.25in; mso-header-margin:.5in; mso-footer-margin:.5in; mso-paper-source:0;} div.Section1 {page:Section1;} –> We looked back on a great week and now my mother knows why we love this city so much!

Last week my mother visited us and I’m going to try to remember what we did.

She arrived on Friday night (12th) at JFK and after a few good hugs we took a taxi to the city. It is so nice to see people’s faces when they see NY’s skyline for the first time! Although it is still breathtaking I will never forget the first time I saw it.  We arrived at her home for a week and after she left her bags in the room we met Jacco downstairs and went for dinner at a French restaurant in The Lower East Side. Again we had to make our way through film crew shooting one of their many series but it immediately gave her a sense of New York.

The next day we had breakfast at Orchard (one of our two breakfast places) and afterwards we walked towards Mulberry Street where there was a street festival honoring St. Gennaro. Those Italians have a lot of Saints celebrations and it involves mainly one thing: FOOD. And lots of it. We tried our luck at a shooting game and walked some more in this neighborhood. Because we had an evening program planned we went home in the afternoon for an hour rest and met again for dinner at the noodle bar, a nice little restaurant in LES where you can have good noodles and other Asian dishes. After dinner we took the train to Brooklyn to find the location of the Rooftop Film Festival. The first time we went there was with Yvon and that time it wasn’t on a roof but in a large garden. This time it was on a roof, the roof of a can factory. The setting was beautiful but also a bit too ‘clean’. It didn’t have the cosy feeling of the garden but it was nevertheless a special place. Like the first time the evening starts with a music performance. This time the singer was not drunk which was an improvement but all her songs had a dreamy, slow sound that worked as a lullaby for the three of us. Fortunately the crowd shared our opinion and didn’t mind our snoring.Then the films started, the theme was  ‘dark comics’. So no nice sweet films about…well,…for example rabbits but scary, dark and cynical films who where often very funny. The amount of bugs however was not so funny, we were eaten alive. And for the first night in many it got really chilly, but that was a discomfort we embraced because that meant better sleep! After the film there was complimentary wine in the inner court of the building which is not a can factory anymore but houses many little ‘ateliers’. The evening ended with a taxi ride with skyline view.

Then next day we had breakfast at the diner owned by our Greek friend and mum had her first ‘eggs well done’. Then we decided we wanted to go to Governor Island, a little island close to Battery Park which is uninhabited. After the last occupants, the coast guard, left nobody is allowed to live there. New York City doesn’t have money to maintain the facilities on the island and so the whole place is up for sale. In the summer they make an exception and you can take a ferry during the weekend to visit the island. So on the day it would become 90 degrees we escaped the city and took the boat which took only 10 minutes to cross but you had a good view on the Statue of Liberty. Every weekend they have a theme party on the island and this time it was Charleston. On the big lawn was stage with a large band playing music from the twenties and a lot of people had dressed up for the occasion. It really was as if cute Doctor Who had offered as a tour with the Tardis. All around empty houses which tried to look pretty but if you looked close you could see the signs of abandonment. A weird island… But it was a beautiful afternoon and from the west side you again had amazing views of the Statue and Manhattan. Back on Manhattan shore we walked to a cafe, had a drink and took a cab home. Trying really hard to remember where we had dinner. It will come to me…later.

You might have noticed a lack of mentions of work here on the blog lately. Part of that has to do with the fact that I have worked on a number of pitches, so some of that work is classified. But mainly it was just that there wasn’t that much work.

However, it seems as though all the work has come in at the same time, so now it’s suddenly über-busy. Three projects at the same time, all with tight deadlines. You know, fun stuff! I actually really enjoyed working hard for a change. A pity that this always seems to happen when we have visitors though. Anyway, I’ve been keeping busy with several projects for a large bank (one of the ones that still exist after this week!).

Also, this weeks seems like fall has arrived. The weather’s been holding up fine, but it has definitely cooled down a lot. Right now (Saturday, 1:45pm) it is only 66°F (19°C). Saskia is actually wearing a jacket again, basically for the first time since we’ve arrived. Although I’m going to miss the summer, I’m also looking forward to seeing a different season.

Saskia took her mother to the airport yesterday, after her week-long visit. It was great having her over, and I’m sure Saskia will tell you a lot more about that.

Wow, that must have been my shortest blog-post ever. But I have nothing more to tell you. Check out the pictures on Flickr (September or all), and you can always keep up with my twitter feed.

Of course, there is a lot of media coverage of the elections. Especially during the previous two weeks, where we had both the Democratic convention and the Republican convention. I don’t want to get into details of the parties, or their programs (programs? Do they have those? You really do not hear too much about that at all…).

But recently I discovered this cool little gadget called Wordle. It allows you to create a ‘cloud of words’ based on a text or a URL. It will make words that appear often larger than those that appear less often, sort of like the tag clouds you see at nerdy websites a lot. I was wondering what the homepages of the  websites of both parties would look like through Wordle. Here are the results:

The Republican Party (www.gop.com)

I have to say this website is a mess, and the results depicted above are sort of skewed, as it doesn’t take into account the rotating Flash banner promoting alternatively the “BarackBook” website, “Meet Obama” and “Not your Average Joe” (Biden). The website also slows my browser to a grinding halt. But let’s not get technical.

I’ve used color coding (blue = Democrat-specific term, red = Republican-specific). As you can see, GOP (the Grand Old Party, another term for the Republican party) features prominently, just a little more than the words Obama and Barack. Notice how McCain does not show up at all. 

The Democratic Party (www.democrats.org)

I was really disappointed to find that the Democratic Party’s website is even worse than the Republican one. the name “McCain” is way ahead of anything else here. Good thing that both Barack Obama and Joe Biden are mentioned here, but their prominence on the homepage is way below that of their opponent. I find it interesting that there is no mention of Sarah Palin on their homepage, which seems like an easy target right now. They seem to be ignoring her completely.

Of course, this is just a snapshot, taken from just the homepage of the repective sites. I’ll see if I can do a more in-depth analysis of the content on the websites themselves. Or on the speeches! Did I mention work had really started again for me? Hmmm…

Wow! That was my first reaction when we arrived at Angela’s house in Southampton. I had left New York on Tuesday morning, together with my colleague Ruby. We had arranged bus tickets for the Hamptons Luxury Liner (!), and around noon we arrived in Southampton. Angela came to pick us up, together with Anouk, her dog. The idea was that we would be working in her house, and enjoy the pool, the tennis court and the beach for a couple of days. Since Saskia had her songwriting class on Tuesday night, she decided to come to Southampton a day later.

We got to the house and as I said, ‘Wow’ is really all that I could utter. What a house. The bedroom I was assigned with Saskia, was bigger than the apartment we have in New York. Ruby and I got settled in and started to do some work, while Angela went off to do some shopping for lunch and dinner. 

We had some lovely sandwiches and did some more work, and around 17:00 we got  in her little Mini Cooper convertible and drove to the Beach with Anouk. We got a little tour around Southampton, and saw houses that were quite a lot bigger than the one we were staying at!

The beach was fun, and Anouk is a dog with more energy than I’ve seen before. It is funny, as in the office, she’s always sort of lazy, almost lethargic. Her dogwalker has problems getting her out of the office to do some wlaking. But on this beach, and actually back home as well, she is a completely different dog! Running after balls we threw away, after birds and diggings holes in the sand, she kept on going!

Back at the house, we got cleaned up and Angela started work on preparing dinner, while Ruby and I played some guitar. Oh yes, I haven;t reported this, but I’be bought a guitar here. Saskia did bring her guitar, but it’s a nylon-stringed Spanish guitar, and I was really missing my acoustic steel-string. Really, trust me, there is a big difference. So i went on a little shopping trip earlier last week, and found a pretty good guitar (Yamaha) for only 150 dollars. And it came with a little gigbag, a few picks, a strap and an electronic tuner! And since Ruby also brought her guitar, we could play a few songs together.

In the mean time, Angela had marinated some skirt steak (an interesting cut of beef, don’t think I’ve ever seen that back home), and had fired up the grill. We had a lovely dinner outside, with some wine, and later some whisky (I brought the Coal Ila we had brought to New York, but had hardly touched yet).

On Wednesday, we woke up and got back to work. I actually had a phone conference in the kitchen, and we could make our own espresso with the Nespresso coffee maker like we have in the UI office in Amsterdam. It felt almost like being back there, except for the fact that we enjoyed the espresso in the garden, with a view of the pool & tennis court, and Anouk, running around askign for attention. 

Around 14:00, Saskia had arrived at the station in Southampton. She had actually tried contacting me by phone, but reception over there is really bad, so by the time we reached her, she had already been waiting 15 minutes. We got into the Mini again, and Angela let me drive so I could learn how to drive this little beast. After all, she would leave the house on Thursday for a couple of meetings, and wanted to make sure we could get around in her car.

After we picked up Sas, we had some lunch and continued work, while Saskia settled in and did some work as well. For dinner, we went to Sag Harbour, to a restaurant that was apparently redesigned by Donna Karan’s daughter, Gabby Karan de Felice. It is called ‘Tutto Il Giorno‘, a small Italian restaurant with a little patio where we could sit outside for dinner. It was immediately obvious that something was wrong with our waiter. He was weirdly fidgety and absent, and according to some he was probably ‘coked up’. We decided to share a couple of starters and each order a main course.

The waiter suggested a wine that would go well with our starters, and we accepted his recommendation. It was a very nice wine. Then our main courses came out. That was a little strange, as we had not yet seen our starters. He was all annoyed, and said he couldn’t remember any starters being ordered. It was all rather uncomfortable, but our main dishes were taken away, and we explained to him what we had ordered as starters. 

When those finally came out, there was a third starter that we hadn’t ordered. But the ones that we did  (fritto misto, with calamari, shrimp and zucchini, and sea bass tartare) were wonderful, and so was the wine. Our main courses came out (again?, we weren’t sure), and they were pretty good as well. we had a lot of fun, the service notwithstanding. On our way to the restaurant, we had spotted quite a lot of deer. A little early, but they were out in numbers. Luckily, on our way back, in the dark, we didn’t see any of them.

When we woke up on Thursday, Angela had already left for the city. We had some breakfast and coffees, and I had another phone conference, in the garden this time. Very nice! We went on a little shopping trip with the three of us, and then had lunch back at the house. Around 17:00, Saskia and I took Anouk to the beach again. When we got to the beach, it looked like there was some big fire somewhere, with lots of smoke. It actually turned out to be a very dense fog coming in from the sea, and it gave the beach a very strange and eerie atmosphere. 

We let Anouk do her running and digging, and then went back to the house. We had bought some fresh fish (Arctic Char) and giant shrimp, and while I worked some more on a sudden rush project, the girls were cooking in the kitchen. I really didn’t get much more work done, and somehow the dinner lasted quite a long time, possible lengthened by more whisky and a game of dice. By the time we decided to call it a night, my colleagues in Amsterdam were already at the office, and wondering what I was doing online…

The next morning, some work really had to be finished before a phone conference at 10, and then some more work before 12:00. We got the work done, with a serious hangover. The rest of the day we relaxed a bit, with some time in the pool and on the tennis court. And then we got back on the bus, to go back to Manhattan.

We had an amazing couple of days! It was fun to hang out with Angela and Ruby, and it was very cool to see how people in the Hamptons live. I totally understand why you’d want a house out there, as well as an apartment in the city. This way, you can actually have the best of both worlds.