5 Weeks in NYC

So I'm going into week six of being in New York City. Time is flying.

Quick recap of my life in case you don't know (or if you don't care you can skip this part): I'm currently "temping" at a PR agency in NYC, and while I'm temping I'm living in a studio with two of my best friends. 3 dudes, one studio. We call it The Brutal Tomb. I sleep on an aerobed that loses air overnight because either I'm too fat or it's broken. Could be a healthy combination of the two. If I sent you a picture of this place you would laugh. It's absurd. This temp period was supposed to last two weeks. It's week five. It could result in being hired or it could result in nothing. That's my life right now.

These are my thoughts on the city so far, but some of them combine with working full-time.

1) There aren't enough hours in the day. Seriously. If you work 9-6, that's 9 hours of your day, give a hour to travel, hour to get ready, that's 11 hours of your day. If you get your 8 hours of sleep per day, you've only got 5 hours left. 1 hour for the gym, down to four hours. That's brutal. There are so many things I would love to do if I had the time/money/energy for, but it doesn't work.

2) New York doesn't sleep. Original line, but it's so true. This city literally goes and goes and goes. You can be out at a club or bar until 6 am, and by then you can get breakfast from the diners opening up. It's absurd. There are those days where you go from work to dinner to bar/movies and you don't go home once. That's more of a general observation, and I was spoiled in college when I only had 12 hours of class a week.

3) You will see every type of human being here. This isn't a jab at any type of person, but you see all walks of life. I guess in a city with over 8.5 million, that's the result you get. I couldn't tell you how many times I'm on the subway and I see strange people doing strange things. That being said, it's also surprising how many times I feel like I see the same people - mainly on my commute to work. You would think that dividing between 8.5 million my chances of being on the same subway car at 6pm at night as another person every other night would be slim.

4) Gotta have thick skin or this city will spit you out. While the people here are a lot nicer than I expected/heard about, there's still people who will be an asshole to you for no reason, and you can either fight back or just let it go, but you can't let it get to you. Cab drivers have told me to go eff myself multiple times. I was kicked out of a bar the other night because "you're not drinking." Nothing that is all too serious, but if you can't handle it you won't make it.

5) Every corner seems exactly the same. There's a Starbucks/McDonald's/Subway/Dunkin/Random Pizza place/ATM everywhere. It all looks the same. I couldn't tell you the difference between one corner and the next.

6) Speaking of pizza, it's delicious here.

I'm sure I'll have some more once I start actually living here in a real apartment and start making more friends. Until then, don't stop believing.