Mai Tais & Cinema

Last Monday I had my one-week post LASIK follow-up, I was very happy to learn that everything was in order.  My eyes are also looking normal again which I am very happy about. On Wednesday I had drinks in midtown with A, my best friend from college.  She lives in Philadelphia but was in town for interviews so hopefully she’ll be moving back to NYC soon.  Thursday we were supposed to go to this interesting sounding event for Harley Davidson but I was completely zonked I just couldn’t do it.  Plus my one biker-inspired piece of clothing was recently stolen, so that was probably a sign.  Friday I really meant to go to a showing of Citizen Kane at a local museum, but the call of fresh sheets, a cuddly boy, and netflix was too strong.  This is random and not related to anything except maybe a general theme of movies, but since The Hunger Games movie has come out I have had three different associates from high school reach out to me separately saying how much Katniss reminded them of me.  I found this a nice compliment but pretty odd, because I am not an outdoorsy person, and even less so during that time of my life.  I mentioned it to S and he couldn’t imagine me climbing a tree.

Saturday we had multiple back-to-back commitments so I hauled my butt out of bed before noon, got my hair done, and then headed to brunch.  Brunch was at Beauty & Essex and really yummy as always, we had a bottle of nice champagne, lemon blackberry ricotta pancakes, a kale/walnut/goat cheese chopped salad, and these biscuit/chicken things with chipotle honey butter.  Then some sorbet to finish it off.  S wanted to show me all the nice new places just below Delancey (because there was nothing down there when we lived nearby!) so we took a nice long walk.  Picked up some coffee at 88 Orchard, an adorable little place, plus the coffee warmed up our hands for the walk.  Then we walked over to Soho to pick up maps for a local art gallery crawl.  Lots of fun, the first location was super neat and had a mai tai bar.  We hit a few more galleries, did some window shopping, and saw some really neat paintings/installations.  I also had never been to the Dia New York Earth Room, so we made it a point to go there.  The Earth Room is an installation in Soho where basically a whole floor of a beautiful Soho loft space is covered with 22 inches of rich black topsoil.  It has been there since 1977!  They do a really nice job of maintaining it, and it is weirdly peaceful.  After the Earth Room we went to (Le) Poisson Rouge for the afterparty.  Every event we go to lately seems to be sponsored by Appleton Rum, and I always drink whatever’s free, so we’ve been drinking a lot of rum lately.  The party wrapped up pretty early, so we walked home, picked up some groceries, and vegged out a bit before going to sleep.

Sunday morning we slept in nice and late, got dressed, then went to Chelsea Market to get a pepper grinder and some food for the week.  After that we headed up to Lincoln Center for the closing night of the New Directors: New Films Festival.  This was kind of cool because it was a totally surprise screening, we didn’t find out until we showed up and the movie actually started playing.  This was a very unique situation to view a movie, even at a festival I usually know the genre, plotline, actors, or at least the title of the film.  It was kind of cool, not to have any expectation.  The movie ended up being Beasts of the Southern Wild, recent winner of the Grand Jury prize at Sundance.  I don’t know if it was the context, or the movie itself, but it just really affected me.  It’s about a girl living with her family in a community of renegade folks living on the wrong side of the levees in an evacuation area…but so much more than that.  Some of the scenes just slayed me…really brought me back to being a child and how I grew up.  Looks like it comes out in late June so highly highly recommend.  It was a tough film to watch, and I don’t usually like things like that, but it had magic too.  Quvenzhane Wallis, the young actress from Houma, LA was ridiculously amazing (not even counting the fact that she’s um, six!)  Overall a very very good choice for closing night.

Monday was good, I worked from home and got an early start before ducking out to get my hair blown out, then coming home, putting on my dress and heels, and heading up to Lincoln Center again for the Chaplin Gala honoring Catherine Deneuve.  Absolutely amazing.  We started out in the foyer for cocktails (this time St. Germain elderflower liqueur was the sponsor, so St. Germain, champagne, and sparkling water cocktails.  Yum yum.)  Grabbed some nibbles and had another couple glasses of bubbly before it was time to go in for the tribute.  Tons of great clips from Tristana, Belle de Jour, Repulsion, the Hunger, and my personal fave, The Umbrellas of Cherbourg.  Speakers included Martin Scorsese, Susan Sarandon, and Chiara Mastroianni, daughter of Marcello Mastroianni and Catherine Deneuve.  And then La Deneuve herself came out!  It was so perfect…she headed to the stage with her back to the crowd in this amazing long blue gown, almost backless!  She seemed so touched, but appropriate and well spoken…vintage Catherine Deneuve.  It will be hard to top such a wonderful Monday, but I shall try my best.