"Buddy the Elf. What's your favorite color?"

I never thought I would say this, but snow is passe. Okay, maybe that's not the right word to describe it, but it snows so much here that it's just another thing, like rain in Florida used to be.

I saw my first celebrity! You probably wouldn't know his name, but you would know his characters. We were walking in the Subway to Green Drinks(an event for work) and I saw him, made eye contact, and didn't recognize him. Then Morgan said "Did you see Peter Dinklage?" He plays the publisher in Elf (the really mean one that wants the limo heated to a certain temperature that Buddy gets into a fight with). He was also the nanny from Nip/Tuck last season. I was so excited to see my first celeb!

I'm sooooo excited for Christmas Break! Jack gave us Christmas Eve, Christmas Day, New Year's Eve, and New Year's Day off so I get to see my family from the 21st-31st! It'll be a nice breather before the craziness of January and NATPE returns.

23 days until Christmas!

The Christmas season is in full bloom here! It's snowing today, the Rockefeller tree is lit, and the streets are decorated.

I went Wednesday night to see the tree lighting. Erin and I tried to fight the crowds, gave up, and met her friends. They insisted that we see the tree get lit and thank goodness for their persistence. The tree was already lit when we finally got there and people began to leave. The area was barricaded and you could only exit the barricades, not enter. Erin and I were over it, but her friends were going to see that tree and we snuck through some barricades and there it was, in its now eco-friendly glory.

Last night I went out for Moody's birthday party which was so much fun! There were nine Phi Sig people there, but never more than eight at a time. As I was walking to the club listening to my iPod out of nowhere someone grabs me and goes "Hey! It's Eric." I joked with everyone that I was about to surrender my purse with the grab and the hey. I was so startled that wen I registered that it was Eric Kankowski I yelled "Oh my gosh...HEY!" very loudly. It was so nice to see him! When I got to the club it was (for those of you in Phi Sig) Moody, Janet, Lisa, Sarah H., Stefano, Aaron O., Travis, and me. The club was fun as were the people, but the bar situation was one of the worst I have seen. It took ten minutes to get your order taken by the one (sometimes it was two so that averages to maybe 1.5) bartender while the three or four barbacks stood there cleaning glasses. And, once you got your order taken you would only get to say half of it before the bartender went and either finished their beer (I heard they were also taking shots) or helped someone else. Then they came back to finish your order. They also would forget your order most of the time from what I was told. Other than that it was a great night!

My Thanksgiving went by much too fast and I was very sad to say bye to my family. There was no crying, but once I got home I was counting down the days to Christmas. However, I realized that I should enjoy these fun weeks leading up to it because my Christmas vacation will also fly by. Jack ended up giving us Christmas Eve and New Year's Eve off so I get to leave on the 21st and I come back on the 31st. Yay! 10 days!

I joined a gym yesterday. It was time. I feel so inactive, despite taking dance classes, just sitting at a desk all day. I walk a lot, but it's not enough, at least for me. So, there is a quick update for everyone. Hope all is well with you!

Let it snow, let it snow, let it snow

Sooooo it was snowing this morning...

But not the good kind of snow. The sludgy kind that is basically rain once it reaches you. The only reason we could see it was snowing is because we're on the 30th floor.

This Post Is For You...

After I was lambasted (okay, so it wasn't that bad, I just wanted to use that word) by a one Matt Scafidi to post in my blog, I finally felt up to it. So, Matt, this post is allllll yours.

(Addition to this post, after I posted it...at work Friday I left the office and saw all the marathon runners out and about it Times Square. It made me think, exactly one year ago I was in New York because my dad was running the NYC Marathon and I came with him and my mom. As I flew into LaGuardia, I remember thinking "I want to live here. Will I ever live here?" I was a senior in college and of course that whole "real world" cloud was lingering over my head. Crazy how much stuff changes in a year. Also, because of daylight savings, it's almost dark here and it's 5 PM. Soon it will be getting dark at 4:30!)

Part of the reason I haven't posted is that there really hasn't been a ton to write about. Kalen and Seth came to visit last weekend which was SO much fun! Even though it rained Friday night through most of Saturday, we still had a great time. After I took them to Lombardi's (the oldest pizzeria in the US!) we were walking past Rice to Riches and I informed them that I believed it is a rice pudding place, so we had to try it out. It was delicious! Kalen said if she lived here she would gain so much wait, but I told her that I don't come down here very often and I don't eat in the city that much. We did a few things on Sunday I had never seen such as Grand Central Terminal, Rockefeller Center, and we went into Central Park (kind of). We didn't ice skate though, and I really want to do that. There is one place by my work in Bryant Park and while Bryant Park is very pretty and the skating is free, it's just not as iconic as Rockefeller Center. Once the tree goes up it's going to be beautiful! Now that Halloween is over, the focus is all about Christmas (as I'm sure it is everywhere). Halloween candy has been replaced with Christmas ornaments and the temperature suddenly dropped to represent what it's actually supposed to feel like in November in New York.

It took me a couple weeks, but I finally found a couple dance classes that I liked. Some of the others I tried were just not my style. The ballet class was great because despite any messing up I might have done (or anyone else), our teacher never said anything. I know that sounds like a bad teaching style, but I have also been in classes where the teacher will something to this person, then this person, and that's just not me. I like to have fun with it. My jazz class was also a fun time! The teacher informed us that it's for people with 3-5 years dance experience, but that was after the warm-up and I thought "I might as well stay. I'm warmed up. But, what is she about to throw at us?!" In the end, it was just like my other classes. My technique is nowhere near perfect and my extension is half as high as most (I also have never danced like some of those people), but I knew the steps and I could execute them, even if it didn't look as good as the other people. I asked her later about it and she said I needed to work on my technique but that's what she is there for but other than that I was fine. I was going to go to a class today, but I slept instead.

Pushing Daisies...thank goodness they advertised EVERYWHERE or I might not have given it a second thought. I really like it! It's something new and different so I'm hoping it doesn't get cancelled.

I FINALLY ordered a dresser and my mom is sending me this garment rack she saw from Bed, Bath, and Beyond. Yay for no more living out of a suitcase! Downside, I have to put the dresser together (IKEA) and since I went for the biggest dresser so I could have plenty of storage, it's going to be a pain. I'm pretty sure it's going to take two people (maybe, we'll see when it gets here in its two heavy boxes) so I don't know what to do.

Work is going well. The tradeshows and conventions are slowly approaching so that's my main focus.

There, Matt. I hope you're satisfied!!

It's Beginning to Look a Lot Like Christmas...

Well, feel like it anyway. I called Kinko's last week and they were already referring to themselves as "your holiday shipping center" or something like that. When I was put on hold they even played Christmas music! The weather is slowly dropping, but then it gets hot again...so, I guess eventually it will get cold.

Since Seth accidentally ruined the surprise...YAY Kalen and Seth are coming two weeks from today! They'll be my first visitors! I'm really excited and I hope they have a blast.

Work is going very well. In addition to my normal duties, I am now coordinating all the conventions, trade shows, etc. that we attend, which is an extremely large task (the woman in charge of it before quit to be closer to home). Our big launch is in January and I don't want something to go wrong and have it traced back to me so I'm trying to stay on top of this stuff as much as possible.

I went and observed the Ballet and Jazz classes at the Broadway Dance Center last week and decided I wanted to take class there for sure. I was going to start last night but decided (because of the weather) I better prep myself by going shopping instead of being left in the cold ((rimshot))! I think I might take classes on the weekend instead since sometimes I want to unwind after work and I generally feel useless and unproductive on the weekends.

I've been extremely impressed with the shows I picked out for this fall's line-up. They've turned out to be good! Well, with the exception of Cavemen, which I only watched to see how bad it could be/out of curiosity. Even though I have a DVR, sometimes it decides not to work and I use the network sites to watch the shows on demand and I must say, everyone should take ABC's lead. Their on demand portion of the site is amazing and rivals every other network. In fact, I'm surprised the other networks haven't copied it by now.

Anyway, I need to get back to work. I just realized I hadn't posted in a while and thought I would quickly fill you in!

It's that time again...

...Fall Primetime line-ups began!

I watched Cane on Tuesday. Pretty good, but we'll see what happens with it. Private Practice and Dirty Sexy Money were on Wednesday. Dirty Sexy Money was good...I think. I wasn't sure how I felt about it at the end of the episode. A little confused but maybe that will clear up as the season continues. I'll give it a couple more weeks. I was actually very surprised with Private Practice considering when they started building the show up last season in a couple episodes I wasn't completely interested in it. Could be decent! I think part of the reason that it's good is that it's back to focusing on the patients and their ailments and not the love/personal lives of the doctors (there is a little bit of that entwined, but not as much as Grey's).

Speaking of Grey's, I'm not sure I like all this change (ironically, that's what the whole show focused on). Last season wasn't my favorite season (focus shifted to personal lives), but now that Kate Walsh and Isaiah Washington are gone and there is a new batch of interns, it's too much. I heard that it's supposed to return focus to the patients, and I hope so. I think Grey's to me is like ER was to my parents. It was amazing at first and then it got too personal and they stopped watching it as much. Ugly Betty returned for Season 2 (the season 1 finale was really good) and it was funny and I liked it. I think I'm really just having a hard time getting back into my shows because of the break. Last year I started watching the shows on DVD so right after I finished a season the new one would start and I was overly excited because I could remember all the stuff that happened in the finale. Now, The Office...I DVR-ed it and only watched the first 10 minutes (roughly), but I was soooo disappointed that Jim and Pam went on a couple dates and are just "good friends again". I'm really hoping that later in the episode they date again...or at least the season. I was looking forward to seeing them together so much!

OK, that's my update on how I watch too much TV. Have a great Friday!

My Top Ten(s)

I was thinking about all these, figured I would share.

Top Ten:

Things I miss about Florida:
1. Family
2. Friends
3. UF
4. Being able to drive places
5. Publix
6. The weather (I would assume, once it gets to freezing temperatures here)
7. Central A/C (or any at all!)
8. Places like Moes, McAlister's, Chick-Fil-A, to name a few, don't exist up here
9. Apartment hunting is a breeze
10. Tampa


Things I Don't Miss About Florida:
1. The weather (when it gets to be that 100% humidity and extremely hot temperature)
2. Rain everyday in the summer at 2 or 3 PM (at least you can prepare!).
3. Not always a lot to do there (or it seemed that way)
4. Impending sprawl that is slowly but surely creeping into Lutz
5. I guess that's it...
6.
7.
8.
9.
10.

Things I Would Miss About New York:
1. The diversity and availability of everything (and diversity of people to meet)
2. Paying only $76 per month for my transportation
3. The view (Central Park, Bryant Park, Westside Park, Battery Park, Times Square)
4. Having to walk so much (good exercise!)
5. Broadway is steps away from my office
6. Things get released here earlier (magazines, movies)
7. The shopping (that I haven't had a chance to partake in)
8. Everyone can go out and no one needs to worry about driving and/or how we're getting home later
9. My job
10. Being able to do my own thing walking down the street and no one cares because they're doing their own thing

Things I Wouldn't Miss About New York:
1. Times Square
2. Having to commute so far to work (actually not so bad anymore since I've moved)
3. The traffic (both foot and automobile)
4. Having to walk so much (trying to go from one store to another can be a daunting task)
5. It's expensive
6. It's crowded (read: on the train)
7. The trash that seems to be everywhere
8. Not being able to call people on my commute to and/or from work
9. The train not always having a direct route somewhere
10. Being far from Florida/family/friends

Reasons I Know I'm An Adult Now:
1. I have a job
2. I have benefits
3. I have a 401K
4. I am awake by 7 AM during the week
5. Around 10 PM I get tired and consider going to bed
6. I look forward to every other Friday
7. On the weekends, "sleeping in" means 9 or 10 AM
8. I have to file my taxes as head of household
9. I have to worry about my taxes
10. I have to worry about rush hour traffic

Actually, doesn't that just make me sound like an attractive candidate for dating?

Office Jokes

I had my first office joke played on me yesterday. A certain employee who shall remain nameless came out of a meeting and very stoically and hurriedly told me to get the phone number for Scores West and put it on another employee's desk. I had no idea what Scores West is so I rushed over to the computer and jotted down the name, address, and phone number. The other employee wasn't at their desk (thank goodness!) and it's actually called Scores West Side, so I confirmed if it was the same place and they began to laugh and tell me it was a joke. I still had no idea what I had looked up and assumed it was a sketchy bar, but it turns out it's a pretty popular strip club, haha!

The title of the entry is the hardest part to write...

So for once the eyes are not on New York, but rather Gainesville. Last night at UF Senator John Kerry came to speak and, well, this is what happened...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SaiWCS10C5s&mode=related&search=

I'm not going to get into what I think, but it was interesting to see UF make the news for something other than winning championships! I actually find it a bit sad that I don't read the news enough to have seen that. I found out about it on Facebook via the mini feed and then looked into myself.

Work is going well. This is my fifth week with the company already (today marks the complete 4 weeks)... I can't believe it. Where does time go?? Pretty soon I'll be on Social Security! Okay, I might be getting a little ahead of myself. I got a potted plant and a new fax machine. The fax machine alone made me much happier. It'll be such a time saver now. The plant is just nice decor.

When I started it was really nice outside and hot somedays. It's 69 degrees today and has been "cold" since Saturday! It really doesn't feel that bad, it's just mind blowing that if I were still in school I would be sweating to death in the 80+ degree weather. In a way I kind of like not sweating all the time and feeling like I need to take a shower after walking a quarter of a mile. My winter clothes (read: jackets) need to get here quickly, though. I should probably tell my mom to make those the next priority.

I watched K-Ville last night or at least half of it. However, thanks to my DVR I can finish the rest this evening (or watch the re-run they are showing). It seemed pretty good from what I saw, hopefully it won't get cancelled.

Gotta take care of some things!

"Why Does It Say Paper Jam When There Is No Paper Jam?!?!"

You know, Office Space has always been a classic movie that I've enjoyed thoroughly, but now that I have a job, some of that stuff is even more hilarious. I can't really relate to all of it except the IT problems they have, specifically with the printer. We have a new fax and printer on the way (woo hoo!), but I can feel their pain when they want to take the thing out back and beat it with a hammer/baseball bat/anything that will cause damage. Maybe that will show it!

Today was a nice busy day, which was a good contrast to yesterday. Most of today was really just figuring out small IT problems. Fix them now and they won't be bigger issues later. I seriously think there should be a show just about me trying to fax things. Sadly, the stuff that viewers would find funny are things that actually happen to me while faxing. 24,905,804,958 error messages, the cancel button ignoring me pressing it repeatedly like a sewing machine needle and continuing to redial despite the fact that it's obviously not going through. But, in all seriousness, it has actually been a great learning experience for me. In my opinion, one of the best ways to learn something is to be thrown into the fire. Before I came I was moderately computer savvy, or so I thought, but now if something technical goes down if I don't know how to do it I need to find someone who does or find some way to fix it. I feel like I have learned a lot of helpful things that I can use at home for troubleshooting or when the same problem happens here I can do it within minutes.

I love living so close to work now! If I am waiting for the train 25 minutes before work starts, I don't freak out because I know I'll make it. Astoria is like its own little New York City and it has so much stuff you almost don't need to come into the city.

I'm really excited for the new season of It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia to start Thursday (the first of my many shows). I happened upon that show fall of 2005. I'm not sure if another show I was watching was used as a lead-in, but it started and I watched and loved it! I'm extremely excited for the fall line-up so that I can start watching all my shows again. Has it already been 4 or 5 months? It honestly seems like a few weeks ago I was watching the season finales. I think we're getting a DVR which will be the first time I can record shows during the season (at school I used good ol VHS and could, obviously, only do one at a time) so I can watch The Office AND Grey's Anatomy. My parents have one and I became reliant on it when I moved back home after graduation so I think it's a great investment. Plus, I want to give some of the new shows a try. OK, I better finish things up here.

Update from a new Astoria resident

Wooo! What a crazy weekend. I had to move my stuff out of my (now) old apartment to my current apartment. On Saturday I took my first load over, which consisted of a suitcase, a bag of dirty clothes, and my shoulder bag with lots of papers and books in it. Once I got there, we had to wait for the cable to come between 12 and 4 and we also had a handyman there fixing up all the holes in the wall from the previous tenants (nail holes, not big holes). The plan was to go to Gin Mill to watch the Gators game and we had to be there to get our reserved table by 5. Well, the cable guy didn't come until 3:30 and we needed to leave by 4:30, so we didn't make it. When we realized there was nowhere to watch the game, I just headed back to the other apartment to prepare everything for the final haul. It became obvious very quickly that I could not do it in one trip, try as I may. On Sunday I woke-up and didn't shower to save a little time then carried four large bags with me to the train. For those of you who don't know my living situation(s), I live about 7 minutes from the train at both places which really isn't bad except for when you are carrying a lot of stuff and that stuff is also really heavy. Even though I am only travelling from the south side of Queens to the North, there isn't anything that runs between the two so it can take anywhere from an hour to two hours to get from Ozone Park to Astoria (I go through Queens, Brooklyn, Manhattan, then back to Queens) and I tranfer two times. Once I am on the train I can sit and rest for a little bit until I transfer, which is nice. Upon arriving in Astoria, I ordered my bed, went to do laundry (my sheets and some clothes), and waited around for my bed which was supposed to come between 4 and 7 and came at 6:45. I was hoping it would come closer to 4 because I still had to go back for the last of my stuff and I needed to go into the city to get pillows and a fan for my room, among other items. Once it came, I went into the city, got 4 pillows, a matress pad, a big fan, some kitchen stuff and had to carry it all back on the train. I think the theme for the weekend was see how much stuff Allison can carry on the train at one time. I got to Astoria, literally dropped it all off, and left around 9:45 for Ozone Park. I got to Ozone Park around 11 and was out of there by 11:30 with the heavier bag which was a joy to tote around at that time of night up and down stairs. I got to Astoria around 12:45 and never felt the need to take a shower more than I did right then. I didn't care if it was almost 2 AM by the time I had to get in, I needed that shower. And, I actually took a cold shower and it felt amazing! I got into bed by 2:30 and was up for work today by 7. The train ride is so much shorter! I will admit, though, that Ozone Park was growing on me. I was used to everything by the end of three weeks (including an hour commute into work) so it was a little sad to say bye.

Today, I have very sore arms and a sore back, but I feel accomplished, or at the very least like I went to the gym which I haven't been to in a month. At least all I do up here is walk. I feel like I am getting some form of exercise.

We're supposed to do a shoot today, but the weather is calling for rain. It was raining this morning, just a little cloudy. However, within a five minute period it got dark and looked like the sky would rip open with rain any minute, then it rained for a little bit and got sunny again. I thought I left Florida?! Hopefully the shoot will still be going on since I will get to help out with it! Better get back to work!

Yay for free sandwiches!

I just went to Subway and was absolutely delighted to find out the Sub Club program is still going on up here! I remember when I saw it was being discontinued in Florida and I wanted to, well, not cry, but I was calculating how many free sandwiches I would be missing out on.

One of the great things about living in New York is the exposure to so much advertising (I'm specifically targeting TV here), almost to the point of oversaturation. Everyday I see at least one Pushing Daisies advertisement and I remember being in a train car twice with Justin Timberlake's HBO special plastering every board in the car. Even though I had absolutely no idea what Pushing Daisies was about, the fact that I saw it over and over made me want to know why I should watch this show. So, hat's off to you advertisers and your elusive billboards that make me want to research your shows.

In other news, the apartment is clean and ready to be moved into, except for the painting. At this point, Ali and I might as well move in and take the painting one weekend at a time or else we'll be paying rent on a vacant apartment for who knows how long. Her dad was up for the weekend and he really liked it. We went to Target and cleaned the place out; more than it already was!

Apparently I am not very bright either. For the past week in Bryant Park (one block from my office) there have been big cables lying on the sidewalk and it looked like a shoot was going on there. Oh, no. It's New York Fashion Week and I never put two and two together. I knew it was Fashion Week yet I never thought, "Oh! All these cables are for the runway shows." Silly, Allison. There are probably 539,482,048,203,948 celebrities one block away from me and I have yet to see one (knowingly).

So this is what it feels like to be 22...

Happy birthday a moi! Well, it was yesterday. Ali and I were supposed to watch the Gators game at the Gin Mill at 6. Unfortunately, we were unaware that the game was moved up to 12:30 to be put on TV so we didn't quite make it. One of the downsides of no longer being a student or a season ticket holder I suppose. Oh well, there is always next week. Ali and I have some serious work to do (read: spackle and paint) before our apartment is ready, but once it's finished it's going to look like a million bucks! We found out the building is one hundred years old. It's beautiful! Hopefully we'll have put a pretty big dent in the work by this time next week!

Work is going very well! I love it! I got to help on a shoot last week by holding the cue cards. Needless to say my arm felt like it might fall off by the end. We went to Riverside Park which I had never been to before. The weather was gorgeous, as was the view. I still have so many places to explore here. I should probably just "get lost" one day and wonder around. Laura gave me a great piece of advice which is to ride the bus because underground you don't see the relationship of the stop to the surrounding roads but on the bus you see what connects and how close everything is. I'm really starting to dislike Times Square. Everyone walks so slow and they stop right in the middle of the sidewalk to take pictures!

This week I am really going to concentrate on putting the final touches on the office (furniture, etc.) so that I can help as much as possible with any production work they might have.

I'm going to go to the new apartment now and start cleaning!

Inaugural Post

Everyone is out of the office, so I figured this would be the perfect time to quickly write an entry. Today marks my second week since moving to New York, and I can't believe how fast it has gone! I moved up on August 16th with no job and much trepidation about the decision I was making, but was employed by August 20th. Yeah, a bit easier than I thought.

I work for TitanTV Media right in the heart of Mid-town New York City (my window overlooks Times Square). My first night on the job I already went to dinner with the CEO/President Jack Perry, which is a pretty rare event for any new employee of a company, so it was nice to see an intimate working relationship. We had some delicious pizza and, although forewarned, we all decided to get personal pizzas. Bad idea. They came out each on their own pizza holder and about four or five in we realized we had severely over-ordered...Oops! Delicious nonetheless.

My job here is to mainly get the office organized, especially for when we move to our new studios, but I also assist with shoots, both in the preparation stages as well as going out on them. It's been a great experience thus far.

I think Ali and I found our dream apartment. We meet with the landlord tomorrow night and if she likes us (which I can't imagine she wouldn't), we get to move in on Saturday! It's HUGE and the rent is reasonable; less than what we budgeted. We can actually have guests stay with us instead of saying "Come visit, but get a hotel because the apartment's too small." It's in Astoria right next to Astoria Park and the East River. I've also heard that there is a lot of selection for delicious food, which excites me. Anyone who knows me knows my affinity for food.

I'd have to say I'm adjusting really well to the city. I do miss everyone at home and I'm trying so hard to stay in touch (thank you Facebook for making this easier), but I love it up here. The one thing I truly miss is not being able to call people during my commute. I used to ride the bus in Gainesville and use that as my time to return calls or make important ones. Now, I have an hour where I'm free, but I can't talk to anyone--kind of nice sometimes, I suppose. I definitely have plenty of room to meet people. It's quite different than college where at any moment your plans could change and instead of staying in you're going to see a movie with a friend and constantly meeting people that you run into on campus, etc. I usually just go home after work and unwind (I go to bed and get up so early now!) and I can't do impromptu, partly because I live far from the city, but also because I haven't really developed my core group of friends yet. Although, I suppose I could start talking to whoever sits next to me on the Subway my next few trips...