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A Brooklyn Affair

Monthly Archives: August 2012

Two Wheels Off the Road

21 Tuesday Aug 2012

Posted by erinjsimpson in Brooklyn

≈ 4 Comments

Tags

bicycles, Brooklyn, transportation

Bike riding through Brooklyn is an activity with which I have only recently become comfortable. Possessing a nervous disposition to begin with, I associated riding a bicycle through the city with inevitably dangerous consequences. As if one slight waver down a narrow street would find me on top of an unsuspecting windshield or spiraling across a driver’s door swinging open in front of me. I’ll leave the rest to your imagination.

But two years ago, Charlie found a vintage, maroon huffy on the side of a Pennsylvania road with my name written all over it. He brought it back to Brooklyn and taught me how to be a street-smart, urban biker.

This past Sunday morning, we walked outside to discover that someone had stolen my bike. Cut the metal lock and left no trace that it had ever been resting against that street sign. We’ve been scouring the streets ever since, doing double-takes on every bike that is chained to a pole or a fence or a tree.

We just got back from Cape Cod where we spent a few days soaking up the sun. I promise to post a few photos once the sting of my bike theft wears off. But for now, I’m reminiscing about my last ride through the dunes of Provincetown.

Bike thief, if you’re out there, do the right thing. Bring that bike back to the corner where you found it.

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Communal Living

15 Wednesday Aug 2012

Posted by erinjsimpson in Brooklyn

≈ 2 Comments

Tags

apartment living, Brooklyn, city life, sounds

Our tiny Brooklyn apartment is many things but bright is not one of them. We have five windows (Five! Glorious! Windows!) but all of them look out into this gray stone courtyard you see here. And with four more floors looming above us, sunlight has a hard time making it’s way into our home. But, for about one hour each afternoon, give or take mother nature’s whims, we get the tiniest rays of natural light beaming across our floor boards. Unfortunately, we only get to enjoy these rays on errant Saturdays and Sundays. Darn those 9-5 work weeks.

Despite our lack of light, we never have trouble discerning what time of day it is when we are in the apartment. With our small, enclosed courtyard and winding staircase cutting through the building, we hear the muted sounds of our neighbors, no matter the time of day. In the mornings, we’ll wake to the sounds of softly crying babies and the clink of dishes as breakfast tables are set. And in the evenings, as I’m winding down from a long day of work, I hear the  trumpet player on the third floor practicing his scales. I’ll hear keys rattling intermittently throughout the building as people come home to their families and roommates. And I’ll hear the tiny footfalls and shrieks of children eager to play. (We live in Park Slope, after all. Some things are to be expected.)

My first few nights living in the building, I could’t shake the feeling that I was living in a modern day commune. Alright, so maybe there are no communal dinners, no shared household chores, or even routine conversation. But I feel as though we have established a kind of intimacy with our neighbors. The kind of intimacy that can only be shared in close quarters and allows us to inadvertently share snippets of our lives with each other.

Some might find this living situation to be too intrusive (and I could’t blame them) but somehow I find it comforting. I like to think about all the conversations and dinners and bedtime stories that are being had all around us.

So, maybe we don’t have a coveted view of the street. But sometimes, looking right into our neighbors’ living rooms every night can prove much more interesting indeed.

Five Things Catching My Eye This Week

09 Thursday Aug 2012

Posted by erinjsimpson in Cooking, Style

≈ 2 Comments

Tags

Cooking, farmers market, paris, summer, travel

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This little tin of lip balm. Because it traveled all the way from Vermont and was given to me by my boss. And that made my Monday just a little more manageable.

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A jar of honey that made its way from Northern NY to a tiny Brooklyn apartment and reminds me of home. It’s begging to be swirled into a pitcher of freshly-brewed iced tea.

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A fresh batch of blueberry muffins. The perfect coffee companion for early mornings when I am staring down at an inbox full of unread emails.

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This pair of shoes, because they have been slowing falling apart for some time and this might be their last week traipsing city streets. But they remind me of the summer I spent in Paris with the most amazing friend and I’ll have a hard time letting them go.

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This pile of basil from the farmers market. Because, well, see post below.

What is making  you happy this week?

Summer Memories

07 Tuesday Aug 2012

Posted by erinjsimpson in Cooking

≈ 4 Comments

Tags

city life, Cooking, Memories, pasta, summer

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One of my favorite things about food is its ability to evoke nostalgia with the slightest smell, or spoonful, or slice. We so often in our lives commune around the table so it is only fitting that some of our fondest memories might include food.

For me, nothing spells summer like fresh basil picked from the garden and pulsed into pesto. Growing up in a small town in Upstate NY, summers were slow and languid. Progression in the summer months was marked by the height of the corn rows and the yielding of a tomato plant. But it was the promise of summer pesto that I looked forward to the most. Kneeling in our garden, plucking those little, green leaves, and then leaning over the sink, soaking them in a warm bowl of water.

These were the images that popped into my head when I spied my favorite greens at our local farmers market this past weekend. The first pesto of the season is like a rite of passage. Or so I tried to impress upon Charlie as I dreamed up our elaborate, last minute dinner plans. As if autumn might never arrive if we don’t consume an unspecified amount of pesto.

So, we headed home with our bundles of green and uncorked a bottle of wine (a privelege my childhood summers lacked) and set to work. With a generous helping of olive oil and some freshly grated parmesan, basil becomes my favorite pasta sauce.

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With our apartment full of the smell of summer, we sat at our narrow kitchen table and listened to the air conditioner humming in the window. And the baby crying next door. And the sirens blaring off in the distance. But mostly, we marveled at how lucky we are to live in a city where we can still reap all the benefits of a garden without having an ounce of soil between the two of us.

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What are some of your fondest summer memories?

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Invasionista

Bucket List Publications

Indulge- Travel, Adventure, & New Experiences

The Best Remedy

hula seventy

Red Otter Creative

Unruly Things

Butter Me Up Brooklyn

baking makes friends.

Hither and Thither

A Bloomsbury Life

Honey Kennedy

Sail Away to Fancy

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