To the Beach!

Another thing I will miss when we leave New York is the ability to hop on my bike and be at the beach in an hour. Granted, it's not up to (what I imagine are) Hawaii standards, but for a place I can get to from my apartment, taken together with all the other places I can get to from my apartment... it's pretty good.

Technically, you can also get to the Rockaway peninsula by train, bus, or car. None of these options allow you to explore much once you're there though, and none are quick. If you're not up for the full bike adventure though, you can always bike down and around, then hop on the subway back.

Aside from speed and convenience, the other nice thing about biking is it allows you to really appreciate your arrival at the seashore. My route goes straight down Bedford Ave until it ends at the water; from then on it's a breezy ride along the sand, hands off the handlebars and waving at the cars backed up on the Belt Parkway.

Your first item of interest, coming this way, is Floyd Bennett Field, NY's first municipal airport and now a part of Gateway National Recreation Area. I wouldn't call it thrilling, but there's something to be said for the wide-open emptiness of abandoned tarmac, dotted with occasional dilapidated hangars. There's also a campground, though you have to make a reservation and hammocks are prohibited. I have a friend who regularly spends Memorial and Labor Day down there, and apparently the proximity to the beach makes up for the lack of any real wilderness.

Across from FBF, down through the trees, is Dead Horse Bay. If you're looking for the detritus of the ages, this is the spot. Broken bottles, whole bottles, crockery, shoe leather, etc. all come burbling up from the old landfill. Etsy raw materials heaven.

Next up is the Marine Parkway Bridge. (Alternatively, you could stay on the greenway and continue to follow the Belt Parkway around to Cross Bay Boulevard, thence down to Rockaway Beach.) No matter how sticky and awful the day, crossing that bridge is a breath of fresh, salty air.

The view back towards Manhattan.

On the other side, you have a choice: left to Rockaway, straight to Jacob Riis, right to Fort Tilden. We'll get to that in a second though, because in front of you (come down off the bridge, cross the street, look right) is the unmissable milkshake truck. Sure, it serves hot dogs and whatnot, but the milkshakes are why they -- and I -- am here. $6, and you've got lunch. My personal recommendation is vanilla malt snickers, but feel free to change vanilla to chocolate and snickers to Reese's or whatever just don't leave out the malt. R has yet to take my advice on this, and it drives me nuts. He thinks the shakes are great without malt, and I think he's like someone who thinks candy corn is great because they've literally never had any other kind of candy.

Now. If you just want to sit on the beach and drink your shake and watch the ocean, carry on straight ahead and you'll be at Jacob Riis. Nothing wrong with this. As of last year they've even got a little Brooklyn Flea sort of thing and a selection of food vendors. Easy.

Hankering for that hipster haven you've heard so much about? Turn left and keep going. (To give you an idea of how far: Jacob Riis is at around 160th St; Rockaway is around 96th-86th. There's a bus that runs inland, but it's an easy flat bike ride. Or a serious trek on the sand.) Here you'll find surfers, Ripper's, and a host of other options. If you want to try some surfing, watch some surfing, sit around and drink micheladas on the boardwalk, Rockaway is where it's at. And if you did happen to take the train, this is where it drops you.

I have, however, saved the best for last: Fort Tilden. The edge of this beach is just next to Jacob Riis; you can sit there and still have access to the bathrooms and tacos. However. The best bits lie within. The beach itself offers no boardwalk, no toilets, no food, no direct access to public transportation. You might regard this as an inconvenience, until you realize that the further west you go, the emptier it gets. So if you do want to have the sand to yourself and your thoughts, Fort Tilden is perfect. If you also want to explore abandoned military buildings covered in vines and graffiti, it's even more so.

MAP

RECIPE: Tamale Pie, for those weeknight, I-don't-want-to-think-but-I-want-this-to-be-good-and-more-interesting-than-pasta meals.

It Will Waffle

I'll be honest: This post is more for me than anyone else.

For our second Christmas (the one where he actually moved to NY), I got R a waffle iron. It was the best kind of gift -- one I knew would benefit both of us. And for our first waffle breakfast we turned, as we so often do, to Alton Brown.

His recipe, of course, was good. It also made far too many waffles for two people to comfortably consume. Since then I have, with a few adjustments, halved it. I don't have the halving written down anywhere though, and I'm tired of doing it in my head every time. So here it is, where I can find it when I need it.

My take on the Good Eats waffles, for two:

1/2 cup flour
1/4 cup whole wheat flour
1/4 cup corn meal
1/4 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp salt
1/2 tsp cinnamon
2 eggs
2 tbs melted butter
1 cup buttermilk
1 mushy banana (or other fruit; optional)

Instagram

It's not been there long, but recently I gave myself an Instagram tagline, "Square like sonnets." I doubt anyone has been wondering what that means, but if you did, you're in luck.

Up until relatively recently, the only way to post a non-square photo on Instagram was with an external app. IG became, by default, a place of square photos. Who, after all, had time to be dicking around on their phone with an extra uni-tasker app they didn't really have space for in the first place?

Well, I did. Sometimes. Every once in a while I wanted to post a photo that just had to have that extra millimeter on one side. But then IG upgraded, and now you don't need another app to post a non-square photo anymore. IG removed its own definition of what an IG photo should be. But I refuse to go along. Now that the option of non-square photos is baked in, I refuse to use it. IG defined itself with squareness, and I won't let the one social media platform I enjoy undefine itself.

This means there are limits to what I can post. That's good. No one, not even my parents, wants to see every single picture I take. I don't want to see them. So some photos don't work as squares: okay. So IG isn't the place for them. Maybe they're great photos and they belong on a wall somewhere instead (either physical or Facebook).

   

The word "limit" has some negative connotations, but I say it's limits that make things interesting and give them meaning. If anyone can do anything they want, anytime, you don't get creativity; you get a lot of people fucking around and annoying each other. Limits create focus. Focus is how the magic happens.

All communication, after all, from abstract finger painting to narrative nonfiction, has rules. (Otherwise you would spell purple "basdvio," and really mean green.) Depending on the form of expression, the rules expand or contract. Sonnets have more rules than free verse, so writing sonnets (as I haven't done since high school, but I remember enjoying) is fun and challenging in a different (not better) way than writing free verse.

    

I want Instagram to have that same sense of challenge. I want it to retain an internal consistency, a purity. I want to take a stand on all these tiny little details because taking a stand on the big things is easy; it's the niggling things that'll kill you.

(For more detailed thoughts on poetry and rhyme, see The Anthologist. While you're at it, read this poem and become a better person.)

RECIPE: Malted Milk Ice Cream. Just... yes. I bought a 2-pound can of malt powder just so I could make this ice cream over, and over, and over again. I've still never put the chunks in, but I don't see why they wouldn't be great; chocolate-covered pretzels too. (Tangentially: Always order your milkshake malted.)

Silver Bells

Two months after we were married, R was scheduled to fly here for a visit. His plane landed late afternoon on December 25th. "How will I get to your apartment?" he asked. It took me a while to understand the question. It didn't occur to him that the subway would be running; it didn't occur to me that it wouldn't.

Patience, NYPL

Just because the city doesn't grind to a halt though, doesn't mean the holiday isn't happening. For my money, NY is the best place in the world to be for Christmas. Whether you're doing it Jesus or Santa style, or at a Chinese restaurant and the movies, Christmas here is inescapable.

Where to go, exactly? Well personally, this is the only time of year I can bear to be in Midtown. I generally manage from about Central Park to Rockefeller Center, taking in the windows and light shows along the way. (Saks does a thing with projectors and Carol of the Bells that's worth standing around for.) There are also a million holiday markets, all of which are fun the first couple times but start to look extremely samey year after year.

Then of course there's ice skating, fantastic hot chocolate, tree tunnels, and just enough of a possibility of snow to keep things exciting.

Our own personal traditions involve a trip to the Grand Central Oyster Bar for oysters, champagne, and clam chowder; the painstaking selection of chocolates from a local chocolatier; stealing scraps of tree clippings from the sidewalk to strew about our apartment; sending cards; hanging ornaments; and playing the most eclectic holiday music I can find. (The Muppets, Nightmare Before Christmas, and Christmas in the Stars are a small, classic subset of this.)

Christmas Eve is tapas night. (It used to be pesto and shrimp cocktail night, but then we ended up with a regular guest who doesn't like pesto.) Christmas morning, whoever's up first plugs in the tree and makes coffee. I make french toast, as I have done since I was tall enough to reach the stove, which is served with breakfast sausages and fruit salad. (For a long time, it was the usual pan-fried version, but in recent years I've branched out to the baked, crème brûleé style. I also realized that if you're doing it in the oven, you don't have to keep the bread slices whole. Nowadays it looks a lot more like bread pudding, which... it is.)

Metropolitan Opera, Lincoln Center

Sated, we move on to stockings. I've heard tell recently that many families don't do stockings for adults, or stop entirely when the kids aren't anymore. Whatever. If we'd only ever done it for kids, it would have been me, all alone with a stocking while a bunch of adults looked on. Burdens of an only child.

The rest of the day continues in the same vein: eating, opening presents, drinking, eating, opening a few more. The main feast is in early afternoon, and it is ham. Oh, and we play with Legos. As of this year, a few rounds of Celebrity were added to the mix. And that's it. We make our weary way home, and snuggle the cat.

MAP

RECIPE: Minty Pea Dip. Serve with pita chips during any gathering requiring snacks.