4 Take a Church of Scientology “Free Stress Test”.
5 Sit on a rock at Coney Island, shivering from midnight through the first sunrise of the new year, then jump in the Atlantic for the 1PM Polar Bear Plunge.
6 Get drunk at home alone on my couch, listening to Taylor Swift’s 1989 on repeat, and kissing my cat when the clock strikes midnight.
7 Go on a date with the Naked Cowboy.
8 Walk across the Brooklyn Bridge topless (this is legal in NYC!).
9 Ring in 2015 at Belvue Hospital with a pap smear, a colonoscopy, and a wave “hello” to the patients of the Ebola isolation ward.
10 Give a full body massage to the guy who turns the whole subway car into a Stinky Place of Doom.
11 Watch a seven hour performance art piece of “Artist Recites Decimal Places of Pi”.
12 Go up and down the elevators at Toys R Us until one gets stuck and I’m trapped with a bunch of strangers and screaming children.
Hope you’re all having a lovely holiday! Warm wishes to you and yours.
Here are some of my favorite pictures from this holiday season in the city that never sleeps!
Even the buildings in this city put on festive attire this time of year. The Empire State Building and Madison Square Garden lit up for Hanukkah and Christmas!Giant sized Christmas lights on the west side 6th Avenue and Radio City Music Hall on the east!“New York Christmas” on a rainy/snowy afternoon in Little Italy.A night uncommon sight: New Yorkers bring Christmas trees home on the subway!These stars cycle through all the colors of the rainbow, looking out from the Time Warner Center over Columbus CircleTiffany’s on 5th Avenue, sparkling even more than usual, trying to out shine the giant snowflake that hangs over the 57th Street intersection.Candy canes are bigger in midtown Manhattan.Ice skating in Bryant Park (it’s free…if you have your own skates!)Christmas trees all down Park Avenue. “Deck the Halls”? In NYC we deck the streets!Roommate Christmas tree with hand crafted snowflake ornaments and Pip the Cat enjoying the considerable paper trail.Family photo at the Rockefeller Christmas tree! Uncles, aunts, and lots of cousins! Christmas was never a big family affair in my youth, so this was a really exciting reunion!
While most kids were running around the soccer field trying to score tricky goals, my friends and I were standing entirely still on risers, trying to master tricky notes in musical scores. I was a choir kid through and through, over a decade before Glee made it cool. These days I don’t sing as often as I’d like. Which is why I look forward to my favorite Christmas tradition with the same anticipation as little tots on Christmas Eve. Christmas caroling!
NYC Caroling at the NY Public Library 2012
Since our teenage years, the group of gals I grew up singing with gets together to sing Christmas carols. In high school we went door to door singing in the most wealthy neighborhoods in San Francisco. When on winter break from college, we’d meet on Bay Area streets known for boutique shopping and serenade the customers. Post college a bunch of us found ourselves in NYC or near enough to make a holiday trip. Almost every year I’ve lived in this city I’ve caroled on the streets of New York. One time we put a hat out and made enough money to buy tickets for In the Heights on Broadway.
NYC Caroling at Columbus Circle Holiday Market 2013
So I can say I’ve been a street musician. For ya know, one or maybe 2 days every year in December. Never had any trouble with the cops- one time we tried to carol for the people sitting on the stairs of the Met Museum. It took about 30 minutes before two apologetic security guards came down and said we couldn’t sing with out a permit, “If it was our choice, you could be here all day, ladies!”
Earliest caroling picture I have! 2007 (I think) in San Francisco!
Reception from passers by is always nice. Always. No one has ever said, “Fuck off, carolers!” Some stop and listen for several songs. Some ask us questions- they usually think we have a religious agenda. The majority of the songs we sing are crazy religious, for example the 2nd verse of “Hark the Harold Angels Sing” starts off with Christ by highest heaven adored, Christ the ever lasting lord. The funny thing is none of us are particularly religious and the chorus we grew up singing in (in super liberal San Francisco!) wasn’t religious at all.
NYC Caroling in Herold Square 2011
We grew up with these traditional carols from the Christian choral tradition. We love them and will keep singing them, despite their un-PC messages. Honestly, they’re so much prettier to hear and more fun to sing than “Frosty the Snowman”! We do have a great four part harmony for “Deck the Hall”- every ones favorite especially because it’s about festive drinking rather than Jesus.
SF Caroling in 2008 (I think?)
As I finish up this post, I’m running out the door for- you guessed it- NYC Caroling 2014! If you’re in Bryant Park tonight and hear stains of choral singing, that’s us! Say hi and request a song! Or follow from anywhere with the hashtag #NYCarolers- hoping to get Twitter/Instagram/Facebook tuned in to our tunes!
New York City has a tradition of holiday shop windows. People come from near and far to view the decorations and displays department stores showcase this time of year. Fifth Avenue and Macy’s are where sightseers flock. There is only one store New York locals go out of their way to view: Bergdorf Goodman. It shouldn’t be a surprise that the most high end department store, where a t-shirt costs $80, has the best windows. Only the 1% can afford to shop here, but at least the rest of us can appreciate their holiday finery!
You can check out my blog post featuring last year’s theme of American Holidays. This year the theme of the Bergdorf Goodman holiday windows is The Arts. As you can see, these windows are works of art them selves! Designer David Hoey is to thank for these creations.
The detail in this one was really incredible, so many author likenessess. I also like the play of the reflected lights in the glass.SculptureFilmDance
If you’re in NYC this holiday season, they are absolutely worth braving the 5th Avenue crowds. If you’re elsewhere, my pictures give you a pretty good idea! But of course, Bergdorf’s website has much better shots!
Christmas pageants were my gateway drug into theatre.
I was a pageant queen, but not in a “Toddlers in Tiaras” way. No fake tans in our Episcopal Church. Over a decade, from age seven to seventeen, I tried my hand at some of the most iconic roles of western civilization. The Virgin Mary at age 9 with actual live infant as my baby Jesus. Terrifying but I didn’t kill her (yes, baby Jesus was played by a girl, this was a church in San Francisco, gender norms weren’t strict)! The Angel Gabriel at age 10, the first year a substantial script was paired with the pageant. Memorizing an intimidating monologue full of religious jargon, “The holy ghost will come upon you and the power of the most high will over shadow you”, for me that was easy compared to holding a baby. A wise man, several years of shepherding, the angry inn keeper, and finally, when I felt entirely too old for the whole thing, a narrator.
Christmas pageants will always hold a special place in my heart. Don’t worry, I wasn’t the lone super nerd teenager amongst scores of little kids. I had a group of friends at church, for a while we formed “The Junior Choir”, we all grew up performing together. It’s funny, most of us became passionate about theatre, even to this day. Coincidence or did these pageants somehow shape our sensibilities?
Age 10, I’m the Angle Gabriel and just entering my awkward phase!
Full-blown awkward, horrible posture shepherd! We’re probably singing “Ding Dong Merrily on High”. Oh man, I can’t believe I’m sharing these pictures with you guys. This is as embarrassing as it gets!
When we were teenagers and the whole thing finally made sense intellectually, we liked to joke about ways to parody the script. Mary’s famous line, “But how shall this be since I have no husband?” “Well, Mary…” we used to say, our knowledge fresh from high school Health Class, “There’s this thing about the birds and the bees, honey…no ‘husband’ necessary.”
What Christmas Eve church-attending teenager doesn’t do that?
We never got around to writing our parody of your classic Christmas pageant. Surprise, surprise, it wasn’t exactly an original concept. A decade after my final Christmas pageant bow (just kidding, we never actually bowed in church, it’s frowned upon), I was introduced to a delightful and provoking play with the longest title you’ve ever seen: The Butterfingers Angel, Mary & Joseph, Herod the Nut, & The Slaughter of 12 Hit Carols in a Pear Tree. Guess what: it’s a fresh re-telling of the old Christmas pageant story written by a Pulitzer Prize winning playwright! Creative and humorous, it addresses the doubts of believers and non-believers alike, while still maintaining reverence and wonder. The play manages to be its own unique piece of theatre as well as a cheeky homage to the Christmas pageants of our youth (at least if you’re a WASP nerd like me- anyone? Anyone?).
Usually one must wait until Christmas Eve to behold the wonder (and inevitable/unintentional humor that is small children attempting performance) of a Christmas pageant. This year however, NYC is in luck! The comedy ensemble [By the Mummers] is taking on The Butterfingers Angel, Mary & Joseph, Herod the Nut, & The Slaughter of 12 Hit Carols in a Pear Tree by William Gibson, performing the play in its entirety! This holiday season! This week in fact! At the Secret Theatre in Long Island city, shows start at 8pm December 11-13 on December 14th at 7pm. Directed by Frank Cardillo with a cast of “comic knockouts” (to quote Backstage!), it is sure to be a funny, festive, fearless production.
A play is the perfect pre-Christmas party event, let’s be honest. It’ll give you a perfect conversation starter and a great excuse to be fashionably late! Plus with tickets at only $15 it’s truly win-win-win all around. For more info and to buy tickets check out their website at www.bythemummers.com
Maybe I’ll even see you there!
Okay, seriously, if anyone else has Christmas pageant stories or memories, please share in the comments!
Think New York at Christmas time and what immediately pops into your head? The colorful lights and stories high evergreen of the gigantic Rockefeller Christmas Tree? I’d say it’s NYC’s biggest Christmas cliché. And if I say it’s the biggest, you better believe it.
Last night was the tree lighting ceremony for this iconic fur. I was all torn up about it. I had to go, right? It’s an ultimate New York cliché! But the other cliché is that no one who actually lives in NYC attends this event. Unlike the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade which is attended by a fair number of locals, the Rockefeller tree lighting is notoriously for tourists. Why? Because locals know they can stop by the next night, or any other night of the week and the tree will look as beautiful as it did when it was first lit. We won’t wait hours in cold, claustrophobic, Christmas hoopla for something we’ll be able to see the whole rest of the month!
I love playing tourist in my own town. That’s super obvious. But my local sensibility (and snobbery) won out this time. I’ll see the tree all lit up at some point. On a Monday, Tuesday, or Wednesday night, probably after 9:30PM- that’s the time to go, the crowd will be manageable.
I walked through Rockefeller Center on Monday evening. It was rainy, remarkably few people were out. The tree was all up and ready, a solid green. Naked. It was actually beautiful just like that. A reminder that it’s a piece of nature, a stark contrast to all the surrounding concrete. A natural beauty. Sure she looks good all jazzed up with glittery lights. But I almost like the pristine green better.
I count 10 stories tall! That is one big and tall, beautiful tree! She makes the iconic deco statue look miniscule.Take all the pictures you want, but you’re never gonna get very close. She’s the ultimate holiday VIP (VIT?) after all.Ice skaters below (not too many of them!) and snow flakes above- projected on the buildings. It wasn’t even the night of the big event, I wonder if they’ll be projected all month long.The rest of the year, Rockefeller Center features flags from countries around the world. For Christmas they replace them with these silver flags. I guess they don’t want anything to compete with the tree, but the feeling of worldly camaraderie is a bit missed!The iconic shot. The simple blue, green, yellow, and black is striking, no? So beautiful.
So I say now. I haven’t seen it all lit up yet this year! Betcha I’ll change my tune!
Have any of you been to the Rockefeller Christmas Tree Lighting? How was it? Are there fun Christmas tree lightings in your area that aren’t crazy crowded but just fun and festive? Are you looking forward to seeing NYC holiday cheer & clichés on my blog this month (if you are, I may feature more posts!)?
I was in NYC for Thanksgiving this year. Bet you can guess what that means!
5:40AM on Thanksgiving morning. In puffy parkas, each wearing multiple pairs of socks, several sweaters, long johns, with whiskey shots warming our empty stomachs, there was only one place in town my roommate Rose and I could be headed. I’ll give you a hint: it wasn’t grandmother’s house. Nope, we were off to the ultimate New York holiday cliché: the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade.
“To actually doing this!”
“To a Happy Thanksgiving!”
We clinked our glasses and threw back a shot of Jim Beam, wincing as the whiskey hit our freshly brushed teeth. “Oof. Let’s get out of here, before I sweat through all these clothes.”
“Bye Pip!” We said to our cat, who looked utterly befuddled. I don’t think he was judging our pre-dawn drinking, he’d just never seen two of his moms up at 5AM before.
The parade isn’t on TV until 9AM! Why so early? Macy’s recommended arriving to the parade route at 6AM. We took our sweet time, stopping for donuts and coffee and arrived at 6:25AM. We were moments too late for front row, curb side seats. Seasoned parade goers brought folding chairs or blankets to sit on and claim space for large parties. Rose and I parked our butts on the steps of a church on 68th Street. An elevated view and a bit of a buffer to claustrophobia madness, we couldn’t have done much better.
We sat on the steps of that church in 34 degree weather for three hours. What did we do in those three hours? We made friends with the people sitting next to us, eavesdropped on others. One lady had a daughter performing in On the Town on Broadway. We ate festive frosted donuts, drank pumpkin tea out of a thermos and whiskey out of a Tupperware container. We created a new version of a “Hot Toddy”.
We took a lot of selfies. We wore light up crowns pilfered from an event I’d worked earlier that week. We watched the sun rise over Central Park. We wondered about the exclusive bleacher seating on the east side of the parade. Learned they’re only available to Macy’s personnel.
We got some video game character balloon sticks promoters were handing out, ended up giving them to kids later on. We stayed pretty warm, except our feet. We discussed our circulation issues. We watched truck that came to deliver hot cocoa and cookies to all the police officers on duty.
The sky threatened all morning, now and then a few flakes of snow floated from the sky. The nasty weather held out most of the morning but probably scared away plenty of would-be parade goers. Still by 8AM the place had filled up. Anyone who arrived after that got major stink-eye. We’ve been on this street since 6AM! Established ultimate street cred! Don’t you dare try to smoosh next to us! Here’s the parade route scene, before it got too crowded to venture from our church step camp.
I honestly didn’t mind waiting the 3 hours. It was kinda fun. Spirits were high and our covert container of spirits didn’t hurt either! As someone who claims to often prefer people-watching over movie-watching, it was like the box office smash of the season. At around 9:20AM we heard the first trumpets blowing down Central Park West. Here was what we’d been waiting for! Our official Macy’s Thanksgiving Parade In Person Experience commenced!
It’s a great combination of modern verses traditional in this parade. This turkey float has been featured for decades, so have some of the balloons. Then there are plenty of current pop culture icons like Thomas the Tank Engine, Snoopy, Hello Kitty, etc etc.
Another layer into current culture- all the celebrities riding floats. We never would have recognized with out the help of the tweens behind us who knew, and screamed, all their names.
Sorry…I can’t for the life of me remember who the celebrity on this Pirate’s Booty float is!
A bit of a different perspective than what you see on TV! Fortunately it was hardly windy at all. Cold is one thing, wind makes this parade scary, they’ve even had to cancel it do to gusts in the past.
The balloons are so big you can’t fit them into the camera frame when they’re right in front of you.
We of course saw a ton of marching bands but due to our unremarkable place on the parade route (no cameras) we heard few performances. Saw lots of poor color-guard high school girls who looked so cold in their outfits.
These ladies were awesome, “Red Hot Mamas”. They had a dance routine with their walkers. We did get a little showcase but did anyone see it on air?
There were a lot of clowns in this parade. It was hard to capture them in pictures but anytime there was empty space in the line up, Macy’s stuck in some clowns. Baker clowns, fairy clowns, viking clowns, fire fighter clowns- the list goes on. If you have Coulrophobia (fear of clowns) think twice before going to this parade! I’m guessing clowns are a tradition that lives on from the early days of the parade. By the end of course, clowns give way to elves and last but not least comes Santa Claus!
You’d be floored by the amount of energy this white bearded man has. You can see how much- here’s a video Rose took (the 2 of us have a special message at the end of it)! If he was this on at 68th Street, you can bet he keeps it up the whole parade long. I’ve met him, yep, I actually had a job as his hair dresser a couple years ago! No one embodies the holiday spirit like he does. It’s amazing.
So I had a blast at this parade. I would totally go again! Hope you all had an amazing Thanksgiving, at least the Americans among you! Happy Holidays to everyone! Get ready for plenty of New York Cliché holiday cheer!
