As part of our efforts to find parity in leisure time, Steve kicked me out of the door on Saturday to play with two buddies in the city for the day. Margie had a full weekend of leisure time. Her husband got her a hotel room to herself, because Margie had a particularly tough month. We did what usually do, which is to wander around, window shop, and then settle in for long talking and eating sessions.
We spent some time browsing through ABC furniture store in Chelsea. It’s five floors of hand distressed and eco-friendly furniture. Some floors are bohemian red and cluttered baubles. Others are spare and modern.
We pondered deep questions, such as how come they only make credenzas for flat screen TVs, rather than discrete cabinets? Tada! Look at my TV! Is Donna Karan onto something when she bought the house next door to hers and set it up as a refuge from her family? Is it possible to own too many dishes?
We walked by Design Within Reach, but we didn’t go in, since their designs are not so much within reach.
A good sized immigration rally passed by. 
Margie and I compared notes on immigration and the suburbs. Mexicans are a big part of the workforce out here. They live in rental apartments above the hardware store and in sagging houses by the railroad tracks. They walk down Broadway with their baby strollers and cart back bags of groceries from Shop Rite. The neighbors employ them in their construction businesses, but send me scare e-mails that the Democrats are going to give them social security. The tensions and contradictions are pretty steep around here.
We cheered for the protesters for a while and then went on.
Later, we had some excellent Indian food on a little strip of Indian restaurants on Lexington and 26th. First time here. We’ve been many times to Curry Alley on 6th Street where there are so many Indian restaurants on one block that it always smells like curry. All the restaurants on 6th have pretty much identical menus, so we often joke that they share one common kitchen in the back. The 26th Street version was a step up in quality, but since almost all of them had “vegetarian-kosher” signs, they too could have the common kitchen set up.
Many chores today and many ideas for posts this week. Last week, I read several posts about parent-teacher conferences. There are very different expectations for schools out there. I’ll put something together on that tomorrow.
Apt. 11d 