Everyone tells me this cool weather is nothing..but I'm from Queensland dammit!

Well the autumn weather has hit the city and I'm feeling the cold! It will be interesting to see how I fair come Christmas. I am however looking forward to it snowing here. I think that will be quite novel.

But enough about the weather. This week has been a fun one. I have been doing a lot of sight seeing with Tracey before she leaves on Wednesday, so we have been uptown to the MOMA, dined all over the town, been to Harlem for a church service, gone skating at Rockefeller centre and scaled the Empire State Building.

Harlem was awesome. Finally I got to see the Shout! trombone band Irene had been telling me about since I met her two years ago. We've tried to see them twice but always arrived too late, so this time we weren't going to miss out. This time we arrived early and sat through a long service which in itself was extremely interesting as church in Harlem is not the same as church in an all girls private school! And then the music started and it was amazing. There were at least 12 trombones, a sousaphone, baritone and about 3 percussionists. The sound these guys achieved was phenomenal. Had I been brought up in a church like that I'd be a very different person where it comes to religious views! A must see for any brass musician.

moma views

skating fun

city views from the 86th floor

A date with lady Liberty

Well it's about time I blogged about something stereotypically New York. Today Tracey and I made the trip to the Financial District, all the way down the bottom of Manhattan to see the lovely Miss Liberty. It was an unfortunate overcast and windy day however the benefit there was that it deterred most sight-seers and left us with room to move. Feeling peckish, we decided to head through Battery Park past the many men pretending to be the Statue of Liberty for photo opportunities, and into the world of business. And what did we stumble open as we drew close to the statue of the charging bull...a television set. I noticed that there were many director's style chairs with names printed on the back. The first one I see...I have no idea who it is, then scanning across I see "Vincent D'Onofrio". Immediately I look at the guy in the chair (well where else would I look first?) but alas, someone else was sitting in his chair...And then Tracey spots him with an excited squeal from both of us. So I made the use of my zoom lens today and snapped my very first "star spotting" pictures. We watched them film a scene and then headed to TGI Friday's for lunch. Fried food anyone? Vincent, a bite to eat?!

Then off to the Statue of Liberty as she had been patiently waiting for our arrival. Through crossed communications we managed to miss out on Ellis Island (something I recommend everyone see) but got to Liberty Island with plenty of time to spend wandering. Thanks to the wind though, this wasn't exactly enjoyable so we took our photos and left.

I also have realised that most people American perceptions of Australia have been shaped and influenced by that one episode of The Simpsons. Lucky for us, we are simple minded folk.

Battery Park

Cue excited squeals

Bcause you need MORE than one man in a liberty costume

Geeky cool...I couldn't resist

Sometimes you just get lucky

The last couple weeks I have gotten quite lucky. In my working life of course. Lots has been happening as I find myself meandering through uncharted waters of my new existence here. We finished filming on Saturday after a great week on set, and I have also had many other opportunities fall into my lap. Dog walking prospects, an animation interview and future art department work are all on the table for me.

Moving is quite a scary thing. You uproot yourself to start a completely new life, make completely new friends and commit yourself to gym memberships and newspaper subscriptions. What's even scarier is the feeling that all this has happened and you're actually living in this new life. Today I took my first walk by myself through town in a long time. I started thinking about how nervous and homesick I was when I did similar walks just over 2 months ago. Today's walk was completely different, not only did I have the purpose of buying home wares, but it felt like any other walk one takes in their daily life...it felt normal. And that is one scary feeling. Not a bad scary, a good scary...but scary nonetheless. It is definitely one of those weird feelings.

So when I got home I decided to decorate my apartment...I'm slowly getting the things I need, and some things that just look cool. So I thought I would finally share with you pictures of my apartment (au naturale) and will add some pictures of the area soon.

My hallway...

my front door, apartment A

Living room with new funky space invaders stickers (one of the "just looks cool" addition)

Kitchen area...taken from the couch

Bathroom with more funky cool sticker art

Bedroom...flowers from Richard :p