Friday 5ive- June 26,2020

Welcome to the Friday 5ive, a weekly blog post about five things that caught my attention during the week. New York City has moved into Phase 2 this week, and that means restaurants can have people dining outside and retail can move to curbside pickup. So far, so good.

1)  This week's photos of flowers comes from our own apartment balcony. Our planters have really exploded this week, I'm not sure how much longer they will be able to be contained.

2)  Now that Phase 2 has started, restaurants in NYC can have outdoor seating. The problem with that is that there is very little space outside many restaurants. They have gotten creative in building outdoor dining areas right in the street, which I find a little disconcerting. It may work on a side street, but the first restaurant pictured has tables in the bus lane on Second Ave. I like what Petaluma did with their outdoor tables on the sidewalk- they have tall dividers that give some measure of privacy.

Formerly a bus lane, now fine dining

Tables on a side street

Tables on a sidewalk behind tall dividers- I like this one

3)  We were lucky enough to travel to Italy the last two years, and had hoped to return this year, but that was not to be. Our friend Alberto at Cortona Wine Tours started a Wine Club, and we were able to order a case of wine from him. It arrived this week and we will doing a live online tasting with him on Sunday. It's the next best thing.

4)  We had tickets to go see comedian Jim Gaffigan at Radio City Music Hall in April, but that too was a no-go. I signed up for text messages from him, and he has been sending videos of his comedy bits every day. They are just short 10 minutes or so, and it's always good to have a laugh during the day. You can subscribe on his YouTube Channel here. 

5)  I got a lot of reading done last week. For my Juneteenth Weekend Reads, first up was Jesmyn Ward's memoir Men We Reaped, about five young men (including her brother) from her hometown in the rural South who died at a young age. It's heartbreaking and illuminating, about race and poverty.

Saeed Jones' memoir, How We Fight For Our Lives, is about his life as black gay man growing up in Texas. He is a poet, and every word is deliberately chosen in this powerful, searing book. He won the LAMBDA Award for memoir this year and it is well- deserved. It's a good read for Pride Month too.

Imbolo Mbue's novel, Behold the Dreamers, was also a good read for Immigrant Heritage Month. It tells the story of an immigrant couple from Cameroon who come to New York City for a better life for their young son. The husband gets a job as a driver for a Lehman Brothers executive, and his wife studies to be a pharmacist. They work hard and life is pretty good until the destruction of Lehman Brothers at the beginning of the economic crisis of 2008 threatens everything. So many people recommended this one, I really loved it.

Connie Schultz's The Daughters of Erietown takes place in an industrial town in Ohio from the 1950s to the 1970's. Ellie, a young high school girl, becomes pregnant, and she and her boyfriend Brick put their dreams for college on hold, marry and move to Erietown, where he gets a job as a maintenance man and she raises their family. Like Behold the Dreamers, it's about what happens when your plans are derailed, and how that effects everyone. It's a terrific novel.

I hope you enjoying the warm weather and that you are staying safe. Wear your mask, socially distance, and wash your hands.