A Day in the LIfe...

My apartment is in a prewar building which means its infrastructure is constantly being repaired in one way or another. In the fall the water line behind the wall in my walk-in closet needed repair so everything had to come out of the closet and clutter up the living room three or four days. But it was an occasion for sorting and neatening and that closet's been looking great. BUT just before the holidays the manager told me they had more work to do, after the first, meaning today. I emptied the closet again [when neatly arranged one can get A LOT in a walk in closet!] And the men arrived and set about making a big hole in the new plasterboard wall.

Normally I disappear as early as possible and let the workers do their thing. But my job is a feast or famine situation, usually times around holidays are slow. And yep, it's a famine time -- which normally means I can do a lot of stuff at home. But working with drills and power saws roaring is not easy. Plus I don't like to work with people coming in and out especially when one of them is both lardy looking and smelling. I must say in their favor that they do a job of isolating the work area that would do a surgeon proud. They tape plastic sheeting all around the incision area and cover the floor with taped down brown paper.

By 10:30 I checked that no work was on the horizon, realized that with the water shut off I couldn't use my own bathroom and decided to go out into the streets. Well, really I had a couple of errands to do, and then I dropped in at a Barnes & Noble to use their bathroom and check after Christmas mark downs -- no, I decided I don't really need a half price 2008 calendar. Seriously contemplated other books but, in fact had stopped in at a favorite thrift shop as I passed it and bought two used books so I didn't feel I was denying myself by not getting books or magazines.

I was getting hungry so I went for lunch and dinner to my favorite Chinese restaurant - no that's not a typo. They have a lunch special that is so generous I eat half and bring the other half home to zap in the microwave for dinner. That's two meals for $6.99 -- who says you can't eat cheap -- and good -- in NYC? It was a blue sky, unbutton the coat day. A few days ago it was 16 degrees with a wind chill of -1. Today it's about 50. So, I went down to Riverside Park, stopping to have a woof-woof conversation with a hairy little dog. I found a nice sunny bench and read for about half a hour, which was a chapter and time enough for shadow to creep up making me just a little chilly. So I came home, the guys are gone, the water is on, I had to tear some masking tape away from the wall to get into the living room although I had told them I needed access ... ah, well, if that's the only inconvenience that they could have avoided, I can't complain. So the day goes...