After two sunny weeks in Brazil, the missus and I
landed in New York last Sunday, exhausted from a
thirteen-hour trip (not counting the two-hour wait for a
connection in Rio) that brought is back to a
fifty-degree, rainy New York City.
The weather has since changed, and as I look out of
my Staten Island apartment, is a beautiful day with
temperatures around 84 degrees. Great as we approach
Memorial Day, a national holiday in which we remember those
fallen in the many wars this country has fought in throughout its history.
After resting from the flight, we set to get back to
our daily routines - after all, the bills are not going
to pay for themselves, and there is work to be done.
Last Tuesday, I attended an event for the launch of
Central Park Summerstage the two-month long series of
concerts to which I eagerly look forward to every year.
On Wednesday, there was a reception for an collective
art exhibit of Lower East Side artists (will be writing
about it for the NY Press) and then on Thursday (the day
I write this) there is a local event here on Staten
Island.
In the meantime, I also did a bunch of interviews
including The Indigo Girls and Rio Gringa (with whom you
are probably familiar with by now) that have kept me
quite busy right now, I am working myself through the
pile of CDs that arrived in the mail while I was away
(you can imagine the dirty looks I got at the Post
Office when I went there to pick them up).
Soon enough things should be settling down to
normality.
It was great to be away for those two weeks, but at
the same time it's good to be home. I sort of got used
to living in New York ,walking around with my MP3 player
(it's not an iPod) without fears of having it yanked
away from me Rio and Fortaleza are wonderful cities with
warm people, but to have to be constantly looking over
your shoulder it a bit of a hassle. But of course there
are the amenities the 2-real caipirinhas by the
sidewalk, the sea breeze in your face, the friendliness
of the Cariocas and Cearenses this is something I always
look forward to.
