I love eggs benedict. I even like them when they are called “bagels benedict” because they are served on a bagel. I love homefries. I love brunch.

For any of those who know me in real life, or have been reading this here blog for a substantial period of time, you should know that I spend wayy too much time in an area called Long Island City, in Queens, because my two best boys live there. This past weekend was my third weekend in a row going there and sometimes I think if I was smart, I’d just move there, but I’m a Brooklyn girl at heart and home. Not to mention I’d like to keep Grand Central Station out of my daily commute.

Anyway, this is Kaitlin. She’s awesome and she’s lucky enough to live in P’s building. She also took us to brunch on at this new restaurant called Breadbox, which used to be an auto garage and is still smack dab next to a gas station:

P got salmon benedict and also this oatmeal which he says he put syrup on.

Really?

Breadbox was fun. The service was off. The food was good. I’d give it another shot except that for how much time I’ve spent in LIC, it’s amazing how little of their restaurants I’ve actually been to. Next!

This was a strange weekend and I can’t really figure out why. Here are my two boys in Long Island City. We were chilling on these fancy chairs having a chat. I actually got a little pink from the sun! It was gorgeous out and the park right there is really nice. A waverunner gang went by us and we were jealous.

Other things I did this weekend:

Met up with two lovely girlies for dinner and drinks (margaritas!) at Tortilla Flats. Tequila is an acquired taste and I’m working on acquiring it. These margaritas are pretty good! Tortilla Flats is kitschy, fun, and PACKED on Friday nights! Well, at least when we left. We got there at seven and waited probably five minutes for a table, which they gave us on the condition that we could only have it for two hours and twenty five minutes. Ha! So yeah, that was a really fun dinner and I hope to go out with those girls again (Kimberly and Victoria, are you reading?!).

And the other thing I did this weekend:

These lovely pancakes are blueberry with ricotta and mascarpone. Mascarpone! Ummm… do I even have words for this? Everyone else’s food was lackluster but I will go back to Cranky’s Cafe simply for this wonder of griddled goodness.

That was my entire weekend. I thought about going to the Hester Street Fair, but didn’t. Besides dinner with the ladies, I just hung out with the boys! Plus it rained Sunday so my only adventure was going to church.

Wow, I can’t usually sum up my weekend in one blog post but I’m feeling it today and I think this week should make up for it. ;) Happy Monday!

I believe this is the last of the City Mitten: Abby V edition, but the picture goes with a story.

If you’ve read this blog for longer than two weeks, you know that I spend a lot of time in Long Island City, Queens, because two of my best friends live there. Well one time, two years ago, when just one of them was living there, my friend Kayti and I went over to visit. For whatever reason the 7 train was not running so when we wanted to go back to Manhattan we had to wait outside for a shuttle bus. The shuttle bus stop was RIGHT in front of Cafe Henri and it was FREEZING. Without even realizing it, Kayti and I were staring at all these people inside the cafe and looking at their giant bowls of hot chocolate, basically with our jaws dropped. Once we realized they were staring back at us, we had to knock it off, but we have always wanted to be those people on the inside, sipping out of a giant bowl of hot cocoa while everyone else freezes outside.

So what did Abby and I do when we had time to kill in LIC, waiting for my friend P to get back from the airport? Go to Cafe Henri, of course! Sorry, Kayti! :)

I got my giant bowl of hot chocolate.

I’m not gonna lie though, it was kind of bitter and I had to add a few packets of sugar. Eeek! So it wasn’t my favorite. But it was big and I would like to eat an actual meal at Cafe Henri one day because everything they brought out looked delicious and smelled great. And the place is cuuuute. I was quite happy to finally be the person on the inside (two years later!).

Saturday was rainy, sleety, and gross and I spent the whole day helping my friend P move from one apartment to another in Long Island City. It was freezing and a little bit dreadful but we had an entire team and after 8 hours (seriously) we were done. Yep, it took us EIGHT hours to move him across the street. We’re sweet.

When we were done, we unpacked his entire apartment and organized everything and then went out for a late dinner at the restaurant Shi that’s right in his building. At this point it was snowing a little!

I knew there was a sushi restaurant in his building, but I had no idea it was as nice as Shi. Shi is a restaurant/lounge with a huge bar area, chandeliers (as always a selling point for me) and a DJ above the lounge area. It was a pretty classy place. And there was me in the same jeans, tee and sweatshirt I had been doing God knows what in all day. Lookin’ good!

For whatever reason, my friends and I decided to spend the entire meal speaking in Southern accents. Actually, I don’t think we ever decided, I think it just happen. And we made it all the way to dessert before giving up. It was hilarious (to us anyway) and the people next to us must have thought we were crazy. because we were cracking ourselves up. I don’t even know what started it, I said something with a twang upstairs and the next thing I knew we were eating sushi, pretending it was our first time in the big city. Oh, we are nuts.

Anyway. Did I tell you how nice the view was? You could see straight to Manhattan through the windows. This next picture I took from my circa 1998 non-smart phone:

Gorgeous. And that’s the Chrysler Building. I posted the picture on twitter and someone thought it was my apartment. Not quite!

So, we got lots of apps (steamed shrimp dumplings for one) and then ordered some sushi rolls.

Sushi is so good. And I’m a major pro with my chop sticks, just so you know.

After all that, P suggested we got dessert so I opted we share the molten chocolate cake (duh). It was very warm and very moist and very delicious. Pretty, too:

I forgot to mention that the service here was impeccable, too. It was a very enjoyable dining experience and we stayed around for quite a while after our meal drinking hot tea (well, P and B were drinking tea, it’s not really my thing) and talking about life. A perfect night, I think.

When we finally got our bill it came in a cute little tin.

It’s all in the details. :)

When I was a senior in college, I had a ginormous one bedroom apartment all to myself. It was dirt cheap compared to NYC standards. My living room was huge, so a friend and I decided to paint it. We painted one wall with huge polka dots in two different shades of green and the opposite wall solid. It was fun to do for the first five minutes and then when we realized how long the wall actually was, it wasn’t such a great idea anymore. But, we pressed on and in the end it looked sweet.

This time around, the painting was a bit easier. Probably because I had my friend P, who could reach all the spots that I couldn’t and who would round out all the edges for me. My job was strictly the roller.

Funny enough, we weren’t even painting P’s apartment. We were painting D’s, and D didn’t help at all. He said we were doing too good of a job and he didn’t want to ruin it. Reminds me of how my mom used to make the same argument to get me to rake the lawn. Or was it shovel the driveway? Either way, two things I don’t have to worry about now.

D did make us lunch though, so it worked out in the end. And his apartment looks really good so I’m proud of our accomplishments. I’m also excited for Round Two, ’cause I’m probably going to help P paint his apartment and I’m even more excited for Round Three, when I’m gonna do a little something something to my bedroom. It’s not very big, but it’s gonna be sweet. Just you wait.

We went to Ulysses’ in the Financial District on Friday night. One of our friends in Chicago just got a new J-O-B so he and his girlfriend flew out here to celebrate. We tried all different kinds of beer: wheat beer, peach beer, raspberry beer, pear beer and (tis the season for) pumpkin beer. The pear was so good, my friend bought a case online the next day. Yep, online.

I am loving that all the bars are getting ready for Halloween with all their decorations. Ulysses had spiderwebs covering the entire ceiling, which made me even MORE excited for Halloween. Just gotta get my costume together!

Before Ulysses, we grabbed dinner at Tuk Tuk in Long Island City. I ordered the grilled shrimp and it was crazy pretty, as well as delicious.

I can’t believe for all the time I’ve spent in Long Island City, that I had never been here! The food is good, it’s cheap and they have really cool lights at the bar with cars and trucks inside.

It rained all night. Look, there’s a ghost!

We took a cab. Oh, but don’t tell anyone because there were five of us passengers and the legal limit is only four. :)

Back in New York! And it feels great. Even when I was going through customs on my way back, I just had the hugest smile on my face because I’m so happy here. I love traveling but I also love coming home.

Thursdays are early days at work for me so when I got off today I was like, “What am I going to do with myself?” It was so strange to have hours that were unaccounted for since it’s been go go go these past two weeks. I couldn’t just go sit at home, so I went to Long Island City and sat on a friend’s couch instead! Well, there was also some dancing to some great 90′s pop music. But’s that’s why you’re getting a picture of some hot orange toes and a skyline when I decided to take a seat while talking to my friend Mara on the phone. Good ol’ LIC.

Right now I have:

1. Three Time Out New Yorks to read
2. Groceries to buy
3. A boy who needs to call me

How about that.

I spend way too much time in Long Island City for a girl who lives in Brooklyn and has to travel by way of Manhattan to get there. But two of my best friends in the city live there, so what’s a girl to do?

Yesterday we went to a barbeque on my friend P’s roofdeck. It’s a huge roofdeck, which is what you get when you live in a huge high-rise.  We had burgers and skewers and someone brought brownies that they ruined with nuts. We played some football and lost it over the edge and someone had to try to throw it up six floors back to us. Well, they failed and threw it into the parking lot below us but we were able to get it from there.

This really cool girl started playing football wish us and boy did she have an arm! I wish I could throw like that. Turns out she played Division 1 softball in college. Nice. Her and P were totally hitting it off so my other friends kept saying “ABC” and singing, “ABC, it’s easy as 123″ and I was like, “Why are you guys singing that?” and apparently it’s sales talk: Always Be Closing. They were telling him to seal the deal and get her number. It was hilarious.

Anyway, it must have gone well between us because when we all went out later, P stayed behind and texted us asking where we were because “we” could come join us.

And for another glimpse of Long Island City, here’s my very good friend D in his very brand new apartment: