Living the Life

I took this picture lying on my back on Summit Rock.

I worked from home today so instead of taking my afternoon break in old industrial Long Island City I took my break in Central Park - stopping first to drop off my laundry and pick up a cappuccino and hamantash at the Gastronomie 491 the delightful bakery/cafe next to my laundry. I don't know why I took so long to discover this place - here I had been going to Starbucks since I moved in two months ago and meanwhile this great place was even closer than the two Starbucks on Columbus.

The crowded but fragrant Pinetum.

There seems to be quite a few French-type pastry places on the UWS, but then there seems to be quite a lot of French people up here too. Even with my half-assed French language skills I can sometimes understand what they're saying as they pass by me - for instance today a woman who was probably a nanny said to a little boy -

"Timmy, Qu'est-ce que tu fait? Arrêté."

(Timmy, what are you doing? Stop it.")

Of course the context helped a lot.

The park was looking good today, but so full of people. I mean this was three o'clock in the afternoon and there were people everywhere, including kids. Well I guess quite a few might have been tourists, but still.

So I had been hoping to sit at a picnic table in the Pinetum and check my work email but all the picnic tables were taken. And all the benches in the shade were taken  too, but I finally got one, next to the people in the photo. But it smelled like pine trees so it was all worth it.

Then I headed up to Summit Rock, which, while not completely empty had fewer people than the Pinetum. I lounged around for quite a while, enjoying the sun and wondering if it would be worthwhile to do an NYCPlaywrights production of ten-minute plays in the amphitheater of Summit Rock. Probably in September, if I decide to do it.