lots of moving, more jobs, a little leisure time

Things have been pretty crazy since Oct. 1st. I decided to do the majority of my moving on Oct. 4th, including the piano, which was loaded and unloaded by big burly professional movers. Louie and I drove up in the U-Haul that Saturday afternoon. Last weekend I went back to Philly and brought up another huge carload of stuff, including Mark Bulter, who helped out tremendously unloading things for both me & Lisa. Luckily that night some former students of Lisa's and mine were in the city and also helped us carry stuff! (Thanks Gabe, Ryan and Ella!)

The inside of the apartment is still not ready to be shown, but here's a picture of our building:

Our apartment is on the top floor of that leftmost section of the building.

Sometime since my last post, I head back from the glee club director at the Buckley School on the Upper East Side. They are a pretty swanky private boys' school that goes up to grade 9. They require all students to participate in the glee clubs, and have a budget for an accompanist for all rehearsals and concerts (me!) It turned out the director is from the Philly area, is a friend of Donald's, and that we had been at many of the same concerts and gatherings! The school is very nice - the kids all wear jackets and ties, and call us "sir."

One other opportunity just arose yesterday. A little while ago, through the magic of Facebook, the sister of one of my childhood friends (who now lives in NYC) forwarded my resume to her voice teacher in the evening division at Juilliard. I'm going to meet her and play for a voice class this afternoon. There is a possibility I could accompany some of her evening voice classes at Juilliard! We shall see how it goes...

Finally, last weekend, while Mark was here, I got to take a little time and enjoy the city. On Saturday night we went out on the town, which was lots of fun. On Sunday we walked up to Columbus Circle and stopped in at the shops. While there, we decided to visit the big bronze statues in the lobby to try & get some good fertility luck for Rucia Ann and Maria Jose. Here's Mark, with the male statue:

As you can see, a certain part of the statue has been rubbed so frequently, that it has become polished to a shiny glow! After that, we went to Central Park for a while, since the weather was really beautiful.

We happened upon the Dakota, where John Lennon lived at the time he was shot:

Mark went to meet a friend for dinner, but I went home and practiced a while for my upcoming concert with Maria. Sunday night we went out again for some NYC nightlife, and Monday we drove back to Philly so I could do some more work tidying up the old apartment. This weekend I should be totally finished with that.

I will try to post again soon to avoid another mega-post.