Tag Archives: nyc

Jay and Kanye at The Garden

Watch The Throne Tour @ Madison Square Garden

For the Nov. 7th Watch The Throne show at Madison Square Garden, Jay-Z & Kanye performed for a solid two and a half hours. No cameos, no breaks.

With two rising light cube platforms, the two took turns throwing out bits from WTT and their own albums.

This list of songs performed is not 100% accurate (since I knew all of Kanye’s but not every last one of Jay-Z’s):

H.A.M.
Who Gon Stop Me
Otis
Welcome To The Jungle
Gotta Have It
Big Pimpin'
Can't Tell Me Nothing
Flashing Lights
Through The Wire
Jesus Walks
Diamonds from Sierra Leone
Public Service Announcement
U Don't Know
Run This Town
Monster
Power
Made In America
New Day
Hard Knock Life
Izzo (H.O.V.A.)
Empire State Of Mind
Runaway
Heartless
Stronger
On To The Next One
Dirt Off Your Shoulder
I'm A Hustler Baby
Good Life
Touch The Sky
All Of The Lights
Gold Digger
99 Problems
No Church In The Wild
Lift Off
Niggas in Paris
Niggas in Paris
Niggas in Paris
Encore
Lucifer
Money Ain't A Thang
Can I Get A...
Get Em High
All Falls Down
Why I Love You

The performances were strong and relentless. Most of the full songs performed were from WTT, while their own tracks were cherry picked.

Liked:

  • Jay-Z & Kanye West took down The Garden for a full 2.5 hours, no breaks
  • Kanye’s set included Jesus Walks, Flashing Lights, Through The Wire
  • Great, affordable seats – thank you Citi pre-sale
  • Allowed to bring in phones/cameras/food – security didn’t care

Sucked:

  • 2 hour delay of absolutely nothing between the 7:30p start and the 9:30p actual start
  • The Garden robs you blind – $5 for a bottle of water, sans bottle
  • Illicit drugs in the air, hard to breathe throughout the show
  • No guest appearances – not a game breaker, but the audience expected it

It’s great to be able to cross off watching Jay perform at home from my bucket list.

The elevator of success is out of service. So please take the stairs.

The elevator of success is out of service. So please take the stairs.

That’s the great opening line from EggsTravaganza, a local NYC food cart, in the video below. I’m sure they didn’t come up with it, but it’s a great saying.

This reminds me of Mark Cuban’s post about how he fought the good fight non-stop to get where he is today.

Staten Island September 11 Memorial

Went to Staten Island today. The free ferry is convenient from downtown.

Staten Island Ferry Terminal

They’ve gotten very efficient with loading/unloading the ferry (I think, but I don’t have to take this as part of my commute).

St George Terminal Architecture

The terminal architecture is very photogenic.

Staten Island September 11 Memorial

The Staten Island memorial is very tastefully done. It contains granite plaques with a silhouette to honor each victim.

Staten Island September 11 Memorial

The memorial faces ground zero.

Staten Island September 11 Memorial

The memorial is situated in a park next to the Staten Island terminal and baseball field lighting is visible in the background.

Staten Island September 11 Memorial

Each silhouette bears the person’s info and can hold memorial flowers.

Staten Island September 11 Memorial

From the memorial site, NJ & NY fill the skyline.

Walkabout NYC – May 2011

Inspired by Danny Choo‘s long running A Week in Tokyo series (possible NSFW link), I want to post an odd assortment of photos taken around NYC in the month of May. Instead of one off twitpics, a series of unrelated NYC photos makes for good juxtaposition.

NYC Subway Ad

Dorky yet amusing.

Kalbi from Shilla Ktown

You can never have too much Kalbi.

Vintage Bowling Set

I don’t remember what UWS furniture store this came from.

Red Mango Fulton St Grand Opening

More pay by the ounce yogurt shops is a good thing. The white peach yogurt I got was a bit too runny

Soul Daddy sauces

South St Seaport area – Soul Daddy of American’s Next Great Restaurant fame

Xiao Long Bao sauce stacks

So great, so far away. Nan Xiang Dumpling House in Flushing

Shaved Ice topped with Condensed Milk

As you can tell, I’m never one to shy away from blanket generalizations! Condensed milk goes great with everything! So does tapioca pearls, aloe vera, and bacon (though not necessarily all in the same dish)

Also in Flushing, at Ice Fire Land

Uniqlo Captain Jack Sparrow Shirt

The Disney hype machine is building up for the latest Pirate’s movie. This shirt was spotted at Uniqlo

Goomba hats

From the Nintendo World store, goomba merch

Bowser backpack

You guessed it, from the Nintendo World store. I’d buy this, but $50 is too much for a novelty backpack

TSL3 Afterparty

From the TSL3 afterparty, you can see Thorzain in the background with the adidas three stripes garb

Brown Butter with Candied Bacon on Brioche Cookie

Coolhaus in NYC. That is one seriously heavy dessert

Monopoly Graffiti

Representing the streets of NYC

Chelsea Market exit

The Chelsea Market is a great example of repurposing old buildings (but this isn’t new news)

Whole Foods - Columbus Circle

Looking down at the Whole Foods in the Time Warner Center

Upcoming NYC Event: TSL3 After Party 5/15

Aiur Chef by Blizzard

From TeamLiquid:

Location: Break Bar and Billiards in New York City.
Address: 32-04b Broadway, Long Island City, NY 11106
Time and Date: Sunday, May 15th – 19:00 EST

Take the NQ uptown to Queens, get off at Broadway and walk one street southeast. Bar is located on the corner of Broadway and 32nd Street – Google Maps.

There is no RSVPing to this event. Break Bar holds 250 people. Yes, it’s in Queens, deal with it other borough residents!

*You must be at least 21 years of age to enter*

Some meta/random commentary about this post:

  • I’m posting this on my blog, because this is the kind of thing that *I* would love to find out about.
  • Using the Aiur Chef image since I’m rocking that on the battlenets version two point oh.
  • Patch 1.3.3, Y U NO LIKE PYLON RANGE?
  • Don’t really have a preference between Naniwa or Thorzain. Guess I’ll support Naniwa cuz he’s Brotossing it up.

There is No Such Thing as Perfect

If you’re into food, especially meals that you could never afford, there’s a great photo comparison of Thomas Keller’s The French Laundry & Per Se by TheFeast. The photos and accompanying captions do an excellent job of showing the similarities and differences between Keller’s Michelin 3 star restaurants.

Photo: Matt Duckor (TheFeast)

The sign that hangs in both of Keller’s restaurants reads:

When you acknowledge, as you must, that there is no such thing as perfect food, only the idea of it, then the real purpose of striving toward perfection becomes clear: to make people happy, that is what cooking is all about.

Replace the words ‘food’ and  ‘cooking’ with whatever subject matter you want. That is the recipe (sorry, had to) for success.

Uniqlo X Canon

Uniqlo rocks. I went there to return some stuff and ended up buying a graphic T while browsing. They have T-shirt collaborations with brands (such as MGS) that constantly cycle.

Naruto statue

While I enjoyed Naruto several years ago, I’m too old to be wearing Konoha merch.

EOS DSLR Body T-Shirt

They currently have a Corporate Collaboration theme for T-shirts. This includes brands like Canon, IBM, and Meiji.

EOS DSLR Parts T-Shirt

Not the sharpest shot, but this shows DSLR parts.

I didn’t end up buying either Canon shirt, even though Canon rocks. Maybe they could come out with a T-Shirt that has the DSLR (with a 70-200 please) & lens strap superimposed on it. Sort of like those tie shirts that are kind of cool, but not really.

Monster Hunter T-Shirt

As I mentioned, I picked up a T-shirt. I got this because it looks badass and I’d wear it in public. Plus, the games sell a metric ton in Japan, which is a plus.