COSI

“Are you like the only person eating at this place?” asked my husband, sitting in front of the computer checking the stocks.

“Why?” I laughed, leaning over his shoulder. “Did the price drop again?” And that’s when I saw that it had, indeed, dropped again.

“Buy it anyway!” I demanded.

Call me crazy, but I’m not worried about falling stocks, not when I alone could keep the company in business. The company, the one I just bought five hundred dollars worth of stock in yesterday, is a teeny tiny little place – actually, it’s not quite a place, but rather a stand, half stand / half cart – called Cosi. Though Cosi has been around for awhile, it’s somewhat new at La Guardia airport, and has become the answer to my traveling food needs. I love, as in LOVE LOVE LOVE, the mozzarella tomato basil sandwich. In fact I love the sandwich so much I actually get excited about flying out of La Guardia airport, an airport I’ve been known to avoid in the past. For real. Thanks to reserve flying last month, I got stuck flying out of La Guardia airport eight times, maybe more, but each time I made sure to arrive early enough to make a quick stop at Cosi. Hey, you never know what’s going to happen in the world of travel. One minute you’re headed to Chicago, and the next you’re being diverted to (insert city here.) It happens. Which is why you have to come to the airplane prepared, people! Don’t count on us. I mean even we, the flight attendants, can’t count on us, not when it comes to food. Seriously, these days my job feels more like an episode of Survivor than the glamorous job of days gone by, which brings me back to Cosi and why I’m in love with the place. It’s the crispy flat bread that gets me every time. Not to mention, that flat crispy and delicious bread fits rather nicely in my stuffed tote-bag, so nicely in fact that there’s room for a bottle of water AND a bag of chips. Though it is a bit pricey, especially on a flight attendant salary, the freshness and the quality of the food is worth every cent. Trust me. So next time you travel, make sure to grab a sandwich for yourself, and don’t forget to pick one up for the crew as well. Because when your flight attendants are happy, you’re happy.

Hangin in the Hood

Due to a 30 in 7 (30 hours in 7 days) I was illegal to fly yesterday, as well as today, and tomorrow. WOO-HOO! So after I finished baby proofing the apartment (the munchkin will be in town next week) I spent the rest of the day wandering around my hood. That’d be in Forest Hills, which is in Queens. Oh how I love New York.

That’s a picture of The Forest Hill’s Inn (an apartment building that was once a hotel). I took this picture with my cell on the platform of the Long Island Railroad Station, which is an above ground train that will take you to Manhattan (or Long Island) in 20 minutes. I’ve actually taken this train on numerous occasions. It’s ten times nicer than the subway. Whenever I get called out in the middle of the night to cover a flight at the crack of dawn in New Jersey – every reserve flight attendants worst nightmare – I take the LIRR (Long Island Railroad). From door to airplane, that whole hellish ordeal takes about three hours. which is why when I go to bed at night during a reserve month, I’m always praying that I won’t get called out to cover a trip out of Newark. It happens more times than not. Okay, now back to the photo. The bridge connecting the two buildings is actually not a bridge, but an apartment, an apartment that’s been featured in Architectural Digest. You could say I’m a bit obsessed with it. Right around the corner from the train station is Pahal Zan, a teeny tiny fabulous restaurant that serves the best chicken pita with hummus and hot sauce I’ve ever tasted. I go there every time I’m in town. In fact, I ate there yesterday. And the day before. This is the same place where I met an interesting character named Mickey. If haven’t guessed, that’s Mickey in the photo on the right, and that photo does not do him justice. Trust me. It makes him look tough, kind of scary, like a character on The Sopranos. In real life Mickey has sexy eyes and a vibrant smile. He’s full of life and was so much fun to talk to. I’m not exactly sure what he does for a living, but it has something to do with the theater. I’m thinking off Broadway. Who knows. Anyway, after I told him a little bit about myself…okay, maybe it was a lot about myself, he suggested I turn SKYDOLL into a play. Honestly, I can’t see it. But Mickey can. When I told him I wouldn’t even know where to start, he offered to take me to a show. Hmmm….probably not a good idea. But I wouldn’t mind talking about it again over an order of babaganoush.

Too much food.

Yeah, umm, that’s what the middle-aged waiter said while rolling the husbands moo shu chicken into a burritolike wrapper Friday night. It was date night. There aren’t too many date nights around here anymore, not since the birth of my son, who just so happened to be the third wheel on our romantic night out at a local B rated Chinese restaurant a few blocks from our house. And as if that wasn’t enough, the waiter then shook his head in disgust, practically tossing the plate on the table, before mumbling, too much food, again! I’m sorry, but them is fighting words. TOO MUCH FOOD? Excuse me? Of course the husband let it slide. Now let me point out, snaggle tooth wasn’t exactly the picture of health with his little paunch hidden behind a black satin cumberbun. Oh no, he couldn’t hide that belly behind the stained white tuxedo shirt. My face, I’m sure, turned red, as I could feel the anger seething inside, and just as I was about to say something, though I’m not sure exactly what I planned on saying, the husband gently placed his hand on mine, smiled, and said, “let it go.” Then he took a bite of his oriental burrito and sighed in ecstasy. Let it go? Look, when you’ve got thirty pounds to lose, and nothing fits, NOT ONE THING, and you’ve been working out so hard with minimal results, harder than you’ve ever worked out in your entire life, harder than you did when you were a size 6/7 and at the top of your game, words like TOO MUCH FOOD have a tendency to trigger rage. In fact, 2 days later, as I sip my orange jubilee EAS protein shake, and as I wait for the munchkin to wake from his morning nap so we can pile into the mommy mobile and head off to the gym, I’m still bothered by it. But I’m also hoping to use the anger to fuel me through another long and torturous thirty minutes on the treadmill. Too much food my…