Erin Miller

About two weeks ago I walked out of our apartment building to take our two large dogs out for a quick walk when I realized that both Broadway and the street that leads to the park were completely full of police and police cars, both undercover, and in uniform. Apparently the police busted at $4 million dollar a year cocaine ring based out of the bodega across the street from my building.
“Buyers would frequent the Fiesta Meat Market at 3661 Broadway, where they could order cocaine with their cold cuts,” explained the police commissioner.
Spectators (and probably would-be customers) filled the streets making it difficult to negotiate my 180 lbs of dog across Broadway. An tall man wearing an impressively heavy gold chain around his neck offered to escort me across the street, which I thought was odd until I saw his badge tucked into his waist. Apparently the gentleman was one of the undercover cops that made some of the 24 undercover purchases from the bodega.
I use to go to the bodega on occasion because they sold all sorts of fruits and vegetables late into the night. Occasionally when I got home from work I would want a banana, and I could tie Spot up outside and run in to get one. Of course, there was the risk of accidentally getting a platano (plantain), though I don’t know who would ever do that. I mean I spent several months living in Central America and I can tell you they look completely different. Anyway, I am sure if anyone ever did do that it would be really embarrassing. The bodega also sold my favorite hazelnut coffee creamer and I haven’t been able to find it on my block since they closed so I have been forced to drink my coffee with original-flavored creamer, and it really isn’t as good.
Anyway, if you want to read more about the rather comic story:
http://www.nysun.com/article/63127
Grandma, don’t worry about me, everything is fine and I am safe and living in a building with lots of friendly people and there are generally lots of police keeping on eye on things on the block.

I realized recently that I use lots and lots of stairs everyday. It’s quite an interesting shift from Honduras. A friend of mine suggested that I bring slinkies to give to my Honduran host family’s children as gifts when I arrived. I thought it was a terrific idea, but in the end I was glad I went with something different because there were virtually no stairs in La Esperanza. There was lots of space and everything could be very spread out, and therefore, virtually everything happened on the first floor. NYC is a different story. There are 63,000 elevators and escalators in the city. I am currently sitting in the 6th floor basement (as in 6 floors under ground). I live on the fifth floor, and due to the crawling speed of our elevator, I end up walking up those stairs more than I would like. I walk down to the subway platforms and then take elevators to the platforms below. I am constantly going to classes somewhere between the 6th basement and the 17th floor. And I am pretty sure that the elevators at the NY Presbyterian Hospital are even slower than the one in my building. My thighs ache; even Spot gets out of breath walking up to our apartment. I would go up and sit out in the sun in my break between classes, but the surface of the earth just seems too far away for now.

The weather in NYC is crappy and rainy right now, but it has been sunny and in the 80s recently, which has been bringing me endless joy, so I guess I have to put up with a bit of rain. Anyway, here is a picture from the shenanigans on the roof at the end of the all beer day fest over Labor Day weekend. I live in a pretty cool building.

Spot now has a boyfriend, or at least that is how our building super put it.
I spent Labor Day weekend moving, again. My old apartment was dark, due to its position in the building and because it was on the second floor, above the bodegas below, it had more than its fair share of roaches. I also met some super cool kids in the building, and they had an extra room. So now I live with three cool roommates and another cool large dog, named Max. Max is Spot’s boyfriend. They play some throughout the day and I think it is great for Spot to have some company. Max is a big dog, he weighs 120 lbs. So now we have 180 lbs of dog in or apartment which is equal to another large person, or a regular person and a small child. The apartment is about average size for New York City so when the dogs play they either run into the walls, hit their heads on the tables, or threaten the existence of the plasma TV, but they sure do have fun.
I can’t even begin to explain how much fun it was to move for a second time in three weeks, carrying most of my stuff up three flights of stairs. It was awesome.
School also started last week and I have been feeling somewhat overwhelmed between figuring out my work and class schedules and finding some way to transport myself between the two locations when there is construction, or explosions, on the subway. I have been stressed as I adjust to many new situations and my new life here. I hope things settle into more of a pattern soon, hopefully just in time for my school work to really pick up. I remain excited that I can pay someone 12 dollars to do my laundry for me. I can also tell you, that last weekend my girl friends and I did not go to a salon in midtown and spend 50 dollars getting manicures, pedicures, and messages while we looked out over Madison Square Garden. Or wait, maybe we did. When people at work saw my nails they said that New York was already rubbing off on me. I have also generally been impressed with my professors.
Here are a few pics of the new place:

Max and Spot

My new bedroom. Notice the curtain hooks, I think they really pull the room together. I am a master with tools.

The new kitchen. It’s small, but at least we have lots of shelves.

The new living room

There was a mariachi band playing on the subway today. They were standing up and balancing precariously as the car screeched to a halt and then zoomed forward. There was no place to donate money or anything, they were either doing it for the love or because someone in New York City council had decided to pay them. I enjoyed the music. Many people in the car just rolled their eyes with their ear buds securely lodged. I thought the scene said something interesting about the meeting of the past and the technological future, or something like that. It certainly said something about the cultural craziness of NYC.