Monday, July 5, 2010

Good Fun, Good People

This weekend was full of good fun and good people.  Friday night, we had our Graduation/Welcome party for the outgoing senior dermatology residents and the incoming first year residents.  The party took place at Hooman's (our outgoing chief's) apartment. His apartment was incredible! It's located in the Flatiron District right between 5th Ave and 6th Ave.  Here were the views from his rooftop garden.


That's a long way down!


This is the outgoing chief's wife, Cindy, and their little one Kai. He was dancing to the music and sporting his NY Yankees cap.  Such a cutie!


The other residents in my program are awesome! While I enjoy many things about my new residency, I have to say my colleagues are the best part so far.  When I interviewed with the program, I just felt like I cliqued with them.  I get the feeling that they felt the same way since I am now where I am, but there were a lot of programs where I interviewed and that just wasn't the case.  Sometimes it felt too tense, too competitive, or like they were doing anything they could to find something wrong with me.  I went to my interview at this program in January and came out feeling like I had fun! In the end, everything worked out, and I think I ended up where I belong. I am looking forward to working with everyone for the next 3 years.  However, I might have have a talk with Laura about her margaritas she served.  They pack a punch, and my excursion on Saturday to Bed, Bath, and Beyond was not very pleasant.  I did manage to buy some things to help me get this apartment in order, and I did find another jewel of a restaurant in the meantime. 

I woke up on Saturday feeling like I needed a big greasy hamburger.  That's all I wanted, just a big, juicy, "grease dripping on the paper wrapping and a slab of mayo" hamburger - don't forget the pickles!  But in my attempts to not feel like the Shamu of New York City, I tried to find something healthier and stumbled across Good Health Cafe.  This place had numerous Vegan and Vegetarian options (I am neither vegan or vegetarian, but I don't indulge in meat as much as some), and their entrees are supposedly known for being healthy.  I tried the Black-Bean Bacon vegan burger which was described as "an earthy flavor burger with crispy veggie bacon strips, pepper Portobello, onion, guacamole, dairy free sour cream and vegan mayo BBQ sauce." I wasn't entirely convinced that I wanted my burger to taste earthy, but I figured why not?  It was wonderful! It satisfied my craving for a hamburger and cut down on the calories.  I am going to ignore the fact that I likely recovered those calories by ordering this...

The Banana Cream Pie

This was described as being prepared with dairy free cream cheese and sour cream.  However it was prepared, it was good.  Denial is a girl's best friend (or enemy depending on how you look at it).

My Fourth of July was equally full of fun and good friends.  Lauren and I met my friend Farron and his girlfriend Julie out at Central Park with a group of their friends.  We just sat under some trees on blankets on the Great Lawn and snacked on picnic food and beverages.  We met a lot of new people, and we thoroughly, thoroughly enjoyed it.  It was great to see Farron, whom I have known since I was in middle school, and I always enjoy making new friends. 

From Central Park, Lauren and I headed to a rooftop party on 5th Avenue...a completely different scene from earlier in the day.  We ended up missing the fireworks (dangit), but the view from the roof was nice.  And the weather was nice.  It didn't really take us long to grow a little weary of it since we didn't see our waitress for an hour and a half, our other friends kept us waiting for two hours, and some obnoxious British guy (who I think was using a fake accent) seemed convince that rude comments are the way to pick up girls.  So we headed to the Green Kitchen cafe up in my neighborhood.  We picked this place because Lauren had very fond memories of it from a previous trip to NYC.  She told tales of this earth shattering goat cheese omelet, and she needed one.  Oh yes, she needed one.  We hopped the subway and headed up to the Upper East Side to indulge on our egg white goat cheese omelets.  These babies were filled to the brim with creamy goat cheese, spinach, tomatoes, and onions.  Such a treat.  I think Lauren took everything in her To-Go box with the exception of the plate, but including part of her food, part of my food, the leftover toast, the jelly packets, and the butter packets.  Yeah, she likes food too. 

All in all, I had a great July Fourth in the city.  I would have liked to see fireworks, but there is always next year.  I also considered going to the International Hot Dog Eating Contest down on Coney Island yesterday morning, but figured it was too crowded.  This would have been an interesting year to go since the legendary eater Kobayashi (who didn't compete due to contract issues) went postal and stormed the stage only to be arrested while holding on to the barricades.  That's some hot dog drama right there.  I hope you all had a great July Fourth too filled with food, fun, fireworks, and of course some hot dog drama. 


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