Two months?! Hold up- No, I've been here longer than that. Right?

I am a workin woman once again! And gosh it feels AMAZING to have some structure back in my life!!

I have been employed at Dolce Vizio Tiramisu for a few weeks now. They hired me last month but I didn't start working until Nov 14th. My one training session consisted of me proving a could make bomb coffee drinks and the owners (a young Italian couple from Milan) explained the way the tiramisu works. That's it. Tiramisu and coffee... oh an croissants. Filled with nutella. I might get fat at this job because I definitely eat one every shift. I work 6 days a week. Most days I'm only there for 4 hours (starting at 7 am - I know, I would get a job that has me up before the sun...) and have the rest of my days to do whatever my little heart desires. Excepts for Sundays. Sundays I work a 9 hour shift, which isn't so bad if you're working in a theatre or at some other job that is face paced. But when it's a ghost town from the time you open until 2 hours before you close it gets REALLY boring. It's a cute little place but I'm kind of ready for the next thing.

Kelsey's dad also hooked me up with a job doing in-store demos for Zola Acai. It's a pretty awesome company and I'm not going to lie, I'm shocked that a drink as good as Zola can actually be REALLY good for you!! I wont give y'all the who sales pitch but you should try it. Iz real good. The job itself is pretty simple: show up to a grocery store, set up the table, sample/talk up the drink/hand out coupons, tear down and find out how many bottles you sold. And the people at corporate are super nice! I love it when you can tell over the phone that someone likes there job and really believes in what they are selling. Plus they pay well :)

This Thanksgiving was my first turkey day away from home and my family. Thank GOD I have Kelsey and her awesome extended family!! They scooped me up like I was one of their own. We step out for our mini tour of New England on Thursday morning. Our bus was leaving Port Authority at 9 am, so we left our apartment around 8 - and thank goodness we did! Kelsey and I both did not know the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade route surrounded our block. So that was super fun to discover. It took us 30 min and a subway to get there when we could have walked there in 5 min any other day of the year. So once we got there we asked a guy in Port Authority uniform and asked him if he could point us in the direction of where we could figure out where our bus was leaving from. He told us our gate so we hopped in line. I don't know what it is about us but people kept coming up and asking us where their terminal was... like we would know that. It was pretty amusing, especially because we realized we were in the wrong line. Kelsey and I were the last 2 people on the bus! If we hadn't made it we would have had to wait a few hours for the next one.

We took the bus to Southbury, Connecticut where Kelsey's Aunt Kathleen and Uncle Brad live. There were 25 people at their house for Thanksgiving! It was crazy! Most of it was Kathleen's brothers, sisters, and their kids but I did get to meet Kelsey's grandma, Pricilla, and her Aunt Sally and Uncle Mike. It was fun getting to meet more Foltzs. We pretty much ate and drank all day starting at noon, with dinner being served around 3. It was a little weird eating so early but man was it delicious! Then we rested for a few hours, stretched out, and went back for desserts :)

Sally and Mike surprised us with a hotel room in town (we were prepared to sleep on the floor), and boy was it nice sleeping in a full bed by myself! It was SO sweet of them to do that for us, and we couldn't thank them enough!!

The next day we got breakfast at this tiny dinner in town called Dottie's. And I found donuts that are comparable to Anna's cake donuts. So. Good.

After breakfast, Sally and Mike drove us to Kelsey's brother David's house in South Grafton, Massachusetts. It was great seeing David, his wife Alyssa and their ADORABLE kids Jonathan and Olivia again. I had met them briefly at graduation. We spent the rest of Black Friday and Saturday hanging out and playing with the kids. It was so relaxing and fun. We headed back to the city Saturday night because I had to work all day Sunday.

Miss Olivia and I

This apparently is my family's new post Thanksgiving dinner tradition. Bunch of crazies....

Marcel and our little Christmas tree :)

I took this one a run through the park a while ago. I still can't believe I live here sometimes.

Fall on the High Line.

Coming home from work on Sunday night. It was incredibly creepy.

NYFD. Doin work.

There are times when I'm walking to the subway on my way home from work and I realize that I've only been here for two months. TWO. It's crazy. I feel like I've been here for at least six months. I've had so many adventures, met so many awesome people, and am slowly but surely living my dream. At the start of my long career. And I suddenly don't feel so bad that I haven't gone on an audition. That I haven't been cast in a show yet. That I'm not already starring on Broadway. No, it's all about the baby steps. The small victories. 

I know I have a long way to go, but I can't tell you how excited I am for the journey. No matter where it takes me.

Wait a minute- What happened to Thanksgiving?

I spent most of this last week either in bed or on the futon, waging a battle with a gnarly head cold.

But I did have a few short hours last Tuesday where I was feeling human and took myself on a power walk around Central Park. This might have been a mistake seeing as I walked from my apartment, up to the Reservoir, around the Reservoir and back..... roughly 7 miles. It was a down hill battle for a while after that.

Since moving to the East Coast I've noticed a lot of difference between here and home. People say "Can I help the next on line?", donuts are not NEARLY as good as Anna's Bakery donuts, restaurants and places of business stay open later... Oh, and the Christmas season starts the day after Halloween. Many places have their Christmas decorations up already: Radio City Music Hall (where the Rockettes have begun performances of their Christmas Spectacular - which Kelsey, Leah and I are seeing on New Years Eve!!), Macy's has decked their halls (it's like walking into a Christmas movie), and even Duane Reade has Christmas decorations for sale already....

Macy's

What happened to Thanksgiving?!?! Remember Thanksgiving? That day where lots of people watch the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade and then a football game? That day where you get to eat entirely too much excellent food and spend time with family? Thanksgiving is not a holiday to skip over people!

I guess I'm more aware of Christmas' take over of November because this year, and for the first time ever, I wont be with my family for Thanksgiving. This year I will be joining Kelsey's extended family for the feast since she has a TON of family surrounding us and my closest relatives live in Virginia. While I'm really bummed I can't be with my crazy family, I am STOKED to see the rest of New England, since I've never been anywhere on this coast other than NY and Virginia. ROADTRIP! Woohoo!!

But wait- there's more exciting news! I started my job at Dolce Vizio Tiramisu today! I went in for a quick training session yesterday. My bosses are awesome (thus far), the job is really easy, and I work mainly mornings (except Sundays when I get to work from 1030a-8p... yep, 9 hour shift....). I'm really excited about it and am getting really positive vibes from this job. Plus one of the walls in windows on a fairly busy corner in the West Village which means EXCELLENT people watching :) The one con thus far: it has me up before the sun again... I guess some things never change.

A month and a half in and I finally have structure back in my life :)

The Adjustment Period.

So, it's been a little while since I've blogged about life in the big city... I'm not going to lie, the last week and a half have been a little rough and not nearly as exciting as my first few weeks here but there have definitely been some good times.

• I got drinks with some old friends from high school that are living in the city. It was so good catching up with them!

• I got to babysit one of Kelsey's family friends 8 month old. He was just precious and their apartment was amazing! It's been a while since I've babysat a child that young but who doesn't love getting paid to put an adorable baby to bed and then watch tv?

• I spent more time in Central Park, walking all around the lower half of the park (everything below the Reservoir). Fall is definitely here. I brought Marcel along too. He quite enjoyed the fall foliage but is in need of a sweater....

the park is so lovely this time of year.

No big deal, just a an Egyptian Obelisk behind the Met...

• IT SNOWED!!! IN OCTOBER!!! Crazy right?! I was on the phone with my mama Saturday morning and glanced at the window to see snow flurrying down! It was so pretty :) Not quite as pretty to walk through though. It didn't stick at first so the ground was very slushy. But I survived my first snow in the city, now I just need some snow boots....

I wish I had taken more pictures with an actual camera but you can still see it on the rooftop of the church we live next to.

• That Saturday night Kelsey and I went to a Halloween party at her classmate Tristan's place up in Harlem. I dressed up as a bumblebee again and Kelsey went as a hipster (and stayed in character most of the night, it was hilarious!) Since it was snowing and we were going to Harlem we decided to cab it... good call on our part. It was a really fun party filled with beer pong and flip cup without the craziness of IV's Halloween craziness. We stayed there until 3 am, then decided to cab it back to Midtown, grab some pizza and spent the rest of our night watching The Shining (which we had started watching earlier that night). It was the perfect way to end a great night. 

Hipster Kelsey

Bumblebee and the Hipster

• The actual night of Halloween was pretty uneventful. I was really sad that we didn't get any trick-or-treaters but who wants to raise their kids in Midtown right next to Times Square? No one haha. Kelsey was in the Village Parade and was interviewed by NY1! My roomie's famous! I spent the evening watching the chaos of the parade on TV and watched Ghost Hunters live show. Here's a picture of Kelsey on TV:

• Kelsey's dad came to the city and took us out to dinner, which was awesome and delicious! We went to the Blue Water Grill in Union Square. Oh. My. Goodness! They had lobster mashed potatoes that were simply heaven. I want to find some lobster to recreate them!

• I FINALLY heard back from my new boss at the tiramisu shop. After weeks of back and forth emailing I finally start working this Sunday (Nov 13)!!! I have a quick training session and then start opening the shop Monday. They are just starting to do breakfast items (coffee and pastries) and I am so thankful I have so much experience doing just that! Thank you Anna's Bakery!!

• Last Friday Kelsey and I saw the second year's production of Execution of Justice at The New School. It was so good. They play is centered on the trial of Dan White, the man who killed Harvey Milk and the Mayor of San Francisco in the late 70s. There were some amazing performances and the show was just devastating, knowing the outcome going into the show and the fact that there's nothing you can do... Gah! It just rips your heart out.

I've definitely had more than one "What the hell am I doing here? Did I make the right decision moving out here? Maybe I should have stayed in SB for a bit longer... Do I really want to go into this profession? Why didn't I major in something useful?!?! WHAT AM I DOING WITH MY LIFE??" moments over the last few weeks. Those moments plus this cold I've been battling mixed with the fact that my grandfather is in the hospital and I'm 3000 miles away from my family resulted in quite the existential crisis. Thankfully, I live with my best friend. She is awesome and amazing and I really don't know what I would do without her sometimes. I'm not quite out of this funk, but I'm getting there. I'm trying to put more structure in my life, and I know once I start working regularly I'll bounce back to my hardworking self. I'm applying to a few theatre internships in the city, thinking about auditioning for grad schools sooner rather than later, and working on/looking for monologues and auditions. 

I'm starting to realize now what a bold move I made, one that not many people my age have the balls or gumption to do. And I'm glad I did. I'm living my voice project out, jumping off that platform in the dark knowing that if I fall flat on my face my friends and family will be there to help me pick myself off the floor. So here I go. I'm leaping, jumping, trusting it will all turn out for the best in the end.

The honeymoon phase is definitely over, the adjustment period is rough, but this is but a slight bump in the road that is my great love affair with New York.