Take Me Back To New York

We’re really going back in time now, all the way back to my last day. (I know, still. I’ve dragged it out to three posts. It was that emotional).

I went and sat in Central Park with my fave frappe. The day before I’d been asked if I was having my ‘usual’.  It was beyond exciting. I am such a New Yorker. Even the guys trying to flog bike hire have stopped thrusting leaflets at me because I look like such a local. Hashtag proud.

I sat at the base of a tree and leant against its trunk and drank in the park and its people. I tried to take a mental photo and burn the picture into my mind. I looked back on the past two weeks and everything that we’d done and all that I’d completed. I just couldn’t believe it was done.

Then I opened my present. I did it really reallyyy slowly so that I didn’t rip any of the wrapping paper. And guess what Lisa gave me?? Guess, guess!! 

I finally unfurled the paper to reveal the hard back glossy cover of ‘Harper’s Bazaar: Greatest Hits’ with its stunning image of a sheer rose coloured ball gown caught in momentous movement. It’s a beautiful book. I just need a glass coffee table on which to place it now. And a lifestyle that incorporates a glass coffee table.

So I sat in the early evening sun – the hurricane threat had not yet been realised  - and poured over the images. I’ve had so many perfect New York moments it’s actually getting ridiculous.

I headed home in time to meet my partner in NY crime as she got back from work and we went a bit mental congratulating ourselves that we’d completed the whole internship shebang/being really very sad that it was over/generally being overly emotional. We’re both v in touch with our emotions so it was a bit of an emotional mess really. Lots of shrieking.

 Then, once that was done, we had to decide what to do that evening. The storm that had been promised suddenly rolled in across the Manhattan skyline (no hurricane. Phew) so that it got very  dark very quickly and limited our evening options to indoor activities. We pondered and we dithered. Obviously.

And then I remembered that my sister’s boyfriend Billy, who had jealously examined the New York map before  I left and compiled a list of must do activities, had told me that I had to, to make up for leaving him at home whilst we  all jetted off to New York, go to Billy’s Bakery and think of him. So we looked it up and that’s what we did.

The original Billy’s Bakery is in Chelsea (there are now two others in Tribeca and Nolita) so we subwayed off to 24^th and 9^th. Chelsea is a lovely district – really beautiful town houses split into apartments with elegant steps and wrought iron windows and neat little front gardens – with lots of quirky little shops. We found Billy’s Bakery very easily now that we’re so great at navigating the street/avenue/grid system (say nada about a six year old being able to do it. I know it’s easy; still proud) and, although it was tiny, we managed to get seats by squeezing into the quaint corner seats next to a very muscular gay couple. Again with the whole dither dither that follows us wherever we go. There were so many cakes and they all looked A-MAAAAZE-ING. Banana cupcake with cream cheese icing. Chocolate cupcake. Carrot cupcake. Red velvet cupcake. Classic cupcake. Red berry cobbler pie (what we would call crumble) which was on a platter to be sampled and was out of this world. Ice box cake (looked like stacks and stacks of oreos). Banan cream pie. Mini cheesecake. Peanut butter pie (obviously. Looked FAB).  Key Lime Pie. Huge three layer cakes. The choice was immense and entirely overwhelmed us and it took hours. We eventually settled for sharing a red velvet cupcake with a latte.

Omg totally judge books by their covers in this place. It looked delicious and it tasted freaking amazing.

We sat at the cute communal table and watched the storm thunder on outside. We felt so cosy as we nursed our coffees and prolonged the eating of our cupcake. We managed to drag it out for all of about ten minutes. TRUST it’s so hard to resist for any length of time.

Bily’s Bakery stayed open till 11 o’clock in true NYC style. I love that; I love that what is effectively a small neighbourhood café which happens to sell fantastic cakes stays open until nearly midnight. We were so happy and comfortable there, discussing our must have wardrobe additions, that we stayed until it closed. They had to kick us, and the very nice guys who had sat next to us, out. The very nice guys who had sat next to us were a couple of years older than us and lived in the area (we were jel) and one had studied for a year at York (so had lived, he informed us, in both Old York and New York, which I appreciated) and were enjoying a huge collection of Billy’s Bakerys’ goodies. One had the Peanut Butter Pie and promised me that it was heaven for one’s tastebuds. I vowed to return and experience it.

We eventually, reluctantly, left. It had stopped raining and our journey back was jolly, full of plans to try and recreate the wonders of Billy’s Bakery. I’ll let you know how that goes.

Random moment: as we were about to enter the Subway station, chatting away about God knows what (probably still how to make red velvet cupcake and how delicious ours was) a man stopped us to ask where we were from. On hearing London he shook us both warmly by the hand and congratulated us on our ‘damn fine accents’ and then loped off, readjusting his baggy jeans as he did so.

Only in New York, baby.