A New York Christmas!

Christmas in NYC is one of my favorite things! From the lights on all the apartments and streetlights to the Christmas tree vendors on every corner, I get so excited to see New Yorkers in the Christmas spirit every year. This year, when I wasn't drowning in finals, I managed to get festive myself. 

The Rockefeller tree--I hear it's a Hurricane Sandy survivor.

Kiara and me in front of the tree. You can KIND OF see us...tourists aren't the greatest photographers.

30 Rock + tree

Some Saks window displays

This whole shelf was all twisty-turny

This was at Bergdorf's, I think?

More Berfdorf's, I believe. These were my favorite!

Another very important part of NYC Christmas is...Hannukkah! My roommate, Eliana, is Jewish, so naturally, it is NECESSARY for us to have a Chrismukkah party. Latkes and Christmas cookies...you get the best of both worlds!

Decorations!

Even our elephant is in the Christmas spirit :)

We're not allowed to have candles, so we settled for a stick-on menorah.

Even our bathroom had some Hanukkah cheer!

You can't tell, but these cookies were awesome.

The Chrismukkah hostesses! (Kirsten=Chris, Eliana=mukkah)

Some quality photobombs here

Merry Christmas, y'all!!! Hope you and your loved ones have a great holiday. We're supposed to get snow here in sunny Texas... it better not ruin my Christmas plans!!!

An Open Letter to Texas About Why It Shouldn't Secede

Dear Texas,

Listen. You know I love you. You know that I miss you every single day that I'm out here in Yankee Land. I know that you're a little upset right now. But secession is not the answer.

We tried it once, remember? We did the whole be-your-own-country thing. And it was awesome. We were really cool. But, real talk: it failed. It simply did not end well. There were feuds. There were financial problems. I mean, if Sam Houston can't lead us, NO ONE CAN. 

So now that you want to do it again, I'm sorry, but I just can't support you on this one. Dallas and Austin both voted blue, and our money is in Dallas and our capital is Austin. It simply won't work. We get a lot of benefits from being a part of the U.S., no matter who's running it (no matter what you think, Obama isn't going to turn it into a socialist country). Do you really want to give that up? It's simply not practical.

OK, now it's time for some even tougher love. Everyone is laughing at you. No one is taking you seriously. You're like a little kid who keeps saying he's going to run away from home, and then once he steps out the front door, he doesn't know what to do with himself. You're making yourself look dumb. Everyone judges me even harder for being from Texas now. That's just unnecessary! You're a wonderful, beautiful, lovely place filled with plenty of lovely people! Why cant you show that side of yourself to the world? I think we can all agree that Rick Perry embarrassed us enough with his short-lived run for the Republican nomination. This really isn't helping our image.

Texas, I'm begging you. Please just stop all your nonsense and go back to being a normal state. Or as normal as you can be. 

Love,

Kirsten

A Concerned Citizen

Halloween / Sandy

I LOVE HALLOWEEN. I really do. I attribute it to the fact that I have always had amazing costumes. My mimi is a top-knotch seamstress, and she always made me elaborate, crazy-awesome costumes. Everything from the Statue of Liberty to Glenda the Good Witch (complete with gigantic beautiful crown) to Harry Potter. And she was sweet enough to make my (surprisingly complicated) costume this year! I went with a Game of Thrones Daenerys Targaryen costume (KHALEESI)!

Amazing, right?

So anyway, Eliana and I had a Halloween party!

So if you know anything about Game of Thrones, you know that Daenerys Targaryen is the mother of dragons. Therefore, Eliana dressed up as a dragon.

My dragon trying to eat me?

Trying really hard to pose for a serious picture

...our best attempt at an in-character picture. This is who we are, people.

Hanna dressed as a Freudian Slip. GET IT? I love this costume.

Sam and Patrick. not sure what's happening here...

David (who is maybe dressed as Ira Glass?) and Sarah, dressed as Flo from the Progressive commercials!

Chioma (dressed as a witch, even though you can't see the top of her hat) and me!

Captain Dragon

Rachel and Mikey aka Wendy and Peter Pan!

That was Friday night. And then came...Sandy. All day Saturday, all my family members were calling, texting, and e-mailing to make sure I was prepared. Eliana (my roommate), who is a born-and-raised New Yorker, p'shawed. "It'll just rain a little bit." I agreed with her, but I was also a little anxious. So I stocked up on bottled water, SPAM, and triple-A's, just in case. Sunday is when the rain started and when NYU canceled class. Of course, I was psyched. By the end of Monday (having been INCREDIBLY unproductive due to canceled school), I was getting a little bored. Well, Sandy took care of that! I live in lower Manhattan, so around 8:30 Monday night, we lost power. Naturally, our immediate reaction was to build a blanket fort.

BLANKET FORT!!!

Sign on the door to the emergency exit in my dorm.

Our rations during the blackout.

Only I would make a salad in the middle of a blackout. (Gotta eat those veggies/cheeses before they spoil!)

Ensuring everyone that I was okay and safe in my blanket fort.

"I'm ready for the lights to come back."

The next day, after it stopped raining, we ventured out to see what we could see. Here are some Hurricane Sandy pictures.

Stoplights were out.

Only a few intersections had traffic cops. New Yorkers seemed to be driving civilly, though (for the first time ever).

Working on the subway 

The entire facade was ripped off

Below the facade-less building 

The small yellow taped-up sign says "Cell Phone Charging" 

Lots of downed limbs everywhere

Tuesday night, when told to evacuate, instead of squatting in the student center, we high-tailed it out to Queens to Eliana's home! (Although, Alec Baldwin did visit the refugees staying in the student center. But showers and sleeping in a bed beats Alec Baldwin, I must say.) We ate a lot of junk food, watched a lot of Friends, and I saw Star Wars (Episode IV) for the first time (I KNOW, HOW HAD I NOT SEEN IT BEFORE). We had a nice, long Sandycation, but I must say, I was glad to get back to normal life. 

I am proud to say I survived my first hurricane! I was very fortunate to not be all that affected by the storm, unlike a lot of other New Yorkers, who have lost their homes. I highly encourage all of you to help in any way you can! Feminspire.com posted a fantastic list of ways you can lend a hand here: http://feminspire.com/how-you-can-help-victims-of-superstorm-sandy/. 

Stay warm, everyone! A "nor'easter" (I still don't understand what this means, even after having it explained to me several times and comprehensively scanning the Wikipedia page. IT JUST SEEMS LIKE A BLIZZARD TO ME.) has hit us, and it is fierce. This Little Bitty is not accustomed to all this extreme East Coast weather. Throw a tornado my way, I am a champ. But hurricanes and nor'easters? I haven't got a clue.