Well wasn’t that the pussiest hurricane that ever hit America. We were all hoping for some excitement this weekend, and all we got was a shitton of rain. With all the evacuation mandates, I wasn’t concerned about my or others’ safety — what I was really fearing was: 1) will Seamless be up and running on Sat and Sun, and 2) if our power goes out, how the fuck was I supposed to watch True Blood and Curb Your Enthusiasm on Sunday night. I was in Zone B (if my disapproving Asian father had found that out, he would have angrily asked, WHY NOT ZONE A?!?!??!), and I knew that if Seamless or power went out anywhere, Stuy Town was going to be the first to suffer.
So with those two major concerns in mind, I packed my bags and sought technological refuge two avenues away at S’s apartment for the weekend, which was on the edge of Zone C. I contemplated moving to an even safer zone at B/T’s apartment, but I changed my mind after realizing that would mean having to listen to their literal gay love making sounds in the middle of the night in their nice studio apartment. Also, S was better prepared for the weekend — he too fearing that Seamless would be down for the weekend and no delivery boys would be available for service, S had gone ahead and ordered about 6 meals for himself, which I had also obviously planned to partake in.
S's Fridge
The day was still young and in keeping with our weekend daytime drinking routines, B/T/S and I went searching for bars in the area, but unfortunately pretty much all of them were closed because none of the poor workers who lived in the other boroughs could get into Manhattan to work the kitchen due to the subway shutdown. It seemed the only bars that were braving this storm were Penny Farthing and Pourhouse, which is exactly where we spent Sat drinking while we all waited for the storm to come.
Oh, and I guess Pete’s Tavern was open too:
Pete's Tavern
Unfortunately after almost the full day had passed it was still barely even raining, and we were all getting a little frustrated with Irene — seemed like Irene needed a good ass raping to get her to start shedding her tears on NYC. Given this weather disappointment and in true frat form, M was actually hosting a bday drinking fest in LES, so I left the popped collars at Pourhouse to join some hipsters down at some unknown bar in LES followed by another unknown bar in th East Village followed by McSorley’s. By then I had lost track of time with one too many drinks in me, and when I finally took a second to look outside it was suddenly already pitch dark with some ridiculously heavy rain pouring down on the street. I quickly took a cab back up to S’s apartment where B/T had already gone several hours ago (apparently every cab was charging a flat rate of $10 to get anywhere within a few blocks, which was bullshit — despite the fact that I took a cab, I somehow still managed to get completely soaking wet just crossing from one side of the street to the other). Luckily S had found the one restaurant that was still delivering a few hours before the heavy rain had hit and had ordered yet another huge meal of fajitas, quesadillas and chips/guac to last us all through the night.
Hurricane Storage
Fast forward a few hours to 1am when I was already passed out from one too many bourbon drinks, and I get a call from F who was just coming home from the wedding he was at. Peripheral friend E had gotten married at the Harvard Club on Sat, which probably could not have been worse luck. Poor E’s hair and makeup person had already canceled earlier in the day, and A had to bring her computer to the reception as backup in case the DJ canceled as well. The most ironic thing was that E’s mom’s name is Irene — yikes, she’s probably really blaming herself.
Despite the natural disaster, apparently the wedding was still a blast and F was completely shitfaced when he came back to S’s apartment. By the time he came home the storm was actually pretty ridiculous outside, yet F was determined to go back out there to find some late night food at 7 Eleven. I wished him luck and fell back asleep, but when I suddenly woke up at 4am to find F still gone, I got a bit worried. I went to the bathroom to find – oddly – Chinese food spilled in the bath tub; I went to the front door to find it wide open; I went to the living room to find no F. Confused and concerned I went to S’s bedroom to – oh there he is – to find F snuggling with S with both of them snoring loudly. I should have figured. The next morning I found out that F had indeed gone out in the storm to get some 7 Eleven, had lost S’s umbrella to the strong winds, had found some really old leftover Chinese food in S’s fridge but then had spilled it all on the floor so had attempted to flush it all down the bath tub, then had disrobed, changed into one of S’s polo shirts, and joined S in his bed.
After a long, restless night, the next morning we all awoke to find some seriously disturbing post-disaster scenes:
Hurricane Casualties
On top of that, Seamless still wasn’t working. “No damage done” my ass. The true test of when NYC will be restored back to normal will be when ethnic delivery boys are running around on their bikes again, those unwanted Brooklynites go back to their own borough instead of infecting ours, and the city rats go back underground to the sewers and subways where they belong instead of roaming the streets of Manhattan. Only then will I feel safe again in this city I call home.
Poverexic in NYC 