No Sleep Till Boston

I think I’m just about back on track now. I went to bed early last night—well, actually I didn’t, but I took it easy. Worked on a psychology paper for a bit, then fell asleep watching the Red Sox get lucky. I peeled myself off the couch sometime around 1:45am, staggered to bed, and finished off a solid night’s sleep. 

I’ve been feeling a step or two behind ever since my adventures in New York City last weekend. The trip was well worth it, but not something I could pull off too often. The Big City was calling me for a few reasons, but the biggest one is that my beloved godsister was getting married!  And yes, no matter what autocorrect may try to tell you, there is such a thing as a godsister—especially when you spent every formative summer playing Marco Polo, catching potentially-rabid mice, and sustaining various cuts and scrapes, mostly at the hands of your older siblings. But the wedding wasn’t until Saturday, so let me back up.

Last Friday at noon—literally, at 12:00 pm—I darted out of my statistics class* and headed down to South Station to catch my Greyhound Bus. Now, the last time I had caught a Greyhound I swore it would be the last time. That was probably ten years ago, but now I’m back on the student budget, so after swallowing plane tickets to Los Angeles and Virginia Beach for recent weddings, I decided to keep it crusty this time. The trip was hassle-free—no gang-fights or clogged toilets—but it was a little longer than advertised. Technically, they didn’t lie. It took the advertised four hours to get to New York City. But then it took another two hours to get from Harlem to the Bus Terminal in Midtown. Apparently there’s traffic in Manhattan on Friday evenings. So, I missed the first half of the USA v Jamaica game, but got to Jack Demsey's just in time to enjoy two goals and the victory along with Javi Mi Llave and the New York City Chapter of the American Outlaws.

Once the game was over, we headed back to Bushwick for the real party. There was only way to hold a Costeño reunion—una rumba hasta amanecer! We even had a real live Costeña in the building, direct from Barranquilla... Que mas, Luz?!* Other than the the birthday boy and birthday girl, the real guest of honor was Drake Kitty**. What uuuuuuuuuuup, Wudduuuuuuuuuuup?

Luckily, the wedding was not in the morning, so I had time to recover and make my way to Manhattan for the festivities on Saturday. I killed a couple of hours looking to purchase a tie that did not cost more than my Greyhound ticket, and finally found one at Topman on Canal Street. Then I caught up with my brothers at their hotel room where we finished putting ourselves together.

The wedding was absolutely maaaaahvelous. A view of the city skyline from the Tribeca Rooftop, followed by ridiculous quantities of ridiculously tasty food and a few Manhattans (I thought that was appropriate)... all in the company of my family and extended family from around the country. The first after-party featured a surprise reunion with a few Oakland heads from the elementary school days. We capped it all of with waffles, fried chicken and eggs benedict sometime around 7:00am. By that time my brothers and I had just about maxed out on each other's company—we love each other, but in controlled doses. We found our way back to the hotel, and I crashed on the floor for a couple hours while my phone charged—honestly, I wasn’t quite ready for the trip back to Brooklyn.

Friday and Saturday were so epic that I spent most of Sunday and Monday holed up in Javi’s apartment, slurping down Ramen, getting caught up on my non-academic reading, and watching movies on my laptop. The Prestige was badass and Tron: Legacy was fun, but Blindness is a very mediocre adaptation of an awesome book.

Like I said, I’ve almost fully recovered from last weekend, but I’m still carrying a little sniffle and I can’t feel my right pinky toe. What does that mean? Well, at least midterms are almost over. Just one more psychology paper to go.

Pura Vida,

Drew

* This class has a fancy, interesting-sounding name, but I was lied to. It STATISTICS!!! I do enjoy it, especially when my professor gets worked about about social issues and starts saying things like "Holy Crow!"

** Javi and I do not qualify, despite living a year on the Colombian coast. He is Cachaco-American and I am just Regular Black.

*** Drake Kitty is the brilliant creation of Javi's roommates, Eve and Luz Mary. They hold the copyright on this hilarious image and should get all the credit when Drake Kitty goes viral.