1) Proximity: It's funny, because growing up in Hanover--and even going to school in Middletown--some people's reaction is, "Oh wow, that's in the middle of nowhere," somehow implying, that we have access to absolutely nothing. Now, I will happily concede that the opportunity for cultural experiences, shopping, and generally acquiring things is greater in a place like New York (though between Dartmouth and Wes, cultural experiences in the arts abound for the community), but I have to say, access to necessities is surprisingly similar. People are shocked when I say that I have to drive 25 minutes (with traffic) to get to Best Buy/Home Depot/big chains like that, but honestly? To get from my apartment to pretty much anything not in my neighborhood, it takes me about that much time! For me, it feels like no time at all, because I'm used to it, but I think this situation is similar almost everywhere. You have your neighborhood, and then you have the rest of the city, and getting places requires use of public transportation and/or your feet, and those things aren't instantaneous. Maybe this just strikes me as interesting not having grown up as a 'city child', and it didn't necessarily surprise me, per se, just struck me in general.
2) Gray's Papaya. Okay, so the hot dog...perfectly yummy, thank you very much for the sauerkraut, nice and cheap. But. The Papaya Drink. Praise the universe for the "Papaya Drink"! Last weekend, I spent much of Friday walking (and subway-ing) around Rockefeller Center and the Upper West Side checking out apartments I'd found through various people and shopping to kill time (woe is me). I hadn't been in the mood for lunch, it was probably 90 degrees, and as 4:30 rolled around, I was feeling exhausted, dehydrated, and ready to collapse in a heap. I'd heard about Gray's Papaya from my Aunt Jane and figured it was as good a time as any to cross the street and try it (it's conveniently located next to the 72nd St. subway stop I use to get to and from the museum so...yes). I ordered a small 'papaya drink'--whatever 'papaya drink' means--thinking it was the styrofoam cup I saw behind the counter. When the man at the counter handed me my order, I realized I'd overestimated, but happily took my food to the counter to munch. I took one sip of my drink and was blown away. BLOWN. AWAY. This thing was frothy, it was sweet, it was so ice cold I thought I had passed cloud nine and ascended straight to cloud 147. Well, I finished everything in record time and contemplated another drink, but the line was getting long. On my way back to the subway an hour later, however, I stopped in for a larger size to take with me. The hype, people, is real. If you haven't gone, please, please do, and take me with you!
3) Work. Ahhhh work. Life at the museum is pretty interesting. There are 8 interns, and I think we're finally starting to get our bearings around the place without traveling in a chaperoned pack! We just got our badges, which allow is to swipe the sensor in the elevators and hit the "Staff Only" 5th floor button in front of the poor visiting public confined to the first 4 levels. I doubt they notice, or care, but hey, I feel cool, so don't take this away from me. Ironically, we need to be swiped into our actual lab since a bunch of collections are housed in the hallway between the lab and the door at the top of the stairwell, but we won't get into that. I'm just a little bitter.
Life in the lab consists mostly of sorting. Well, consists entirely of sorting. We've been told we'll get to start cataloging and washing this week, about which we ware all extremely excited. We have a bunch of samples that have been put through 1/4" and 1/8" screens, and we essentially dump one bag at a time onto a lunch tray and sort through it to separate fauna and artifacts from other organic materials. This means lots of fish vertebrae, unidentifiable bone, some cool fish ear parts (otoliths), whelk, a few ceramics, and some burnt clay (and the very occasional bone pin, of which I found one highly-decorated specimen!). It sounds uneventful, and is, but the information on amounts of fauna in particular levels can be used to determine a lot about diet and population density at the site, which is really important. Fortunately, everyone is incredibly nice and we do a lot of pandora-listening and chatting while we sort. The museum also hosts a big dance party/club/bar night on one Friday of every month in the big planetarium cube, so we have serious plans coming up for this week. Word on the street is it's epic, so we'll have to see.
Tomorrow I plan on actually visiting the museum to poke around and using my handy dandy badge to do so admission-free. I can do this at pretty much any cultural institution/museum in the city, so if anyone wants to go...the guest vouchers...I have them.
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