And so the fun continues....

Wow. Every day has been better than the day before. Let's recap yesterday, {technically my 3rd day, but really my 2nd}...

Woke up in the morning and decided to grab a yoga class @ Usha Veda Yoga, which is next door to Milk + Roses. The space is adorable..cozy, clean, welcoming. Incense, candles. The works. My instructors name was Sarah, and she was delightful. It said on the price list that everyones first class is FREE, but I felt that taking advantage of this would be bad karma - because I only intended on taking one class, afterall I would be leaving town 2 days later. They didn't mind though, and the class was on the house. There were just two other people in class, both from the neighborhood. There was a good vibe, and we worked ourselves up into a great sweaty vinyasa flow. Towards the end of class we practiced DROP BACKS {this is when you go from standing to backbending and dropping backwards into a wheel}. We used straps: strapping the top of the thighs together so that when you press into the constriction that you are grounding down thoroughly through your feet. Raise your arms up, and strap them between the elbow and the shoulder, hips width apart. Stand with your back to a wall, beginning just a few inches away from teh wall - and working your way further away as time goes on. So as you are pressing into the thighs and the arms, WITHOUT pressing your hips forward, lifting through your core- lifting the heart, drop the arms back and press the hands into the wall as you would if you were in a wheel. I got a good distance from the wall, and began walking my feet away further from the wall and walking my hands down the wall - deepening the backbend. Okay - does that make any sense?

After a great class, I rewarded myself with an Americano at, you guessed it, MILK + ROSES! I kept it tame with just ONE americano, as I strolled through UrbanSpoon looking for a great place to eat lunch. I decided on PAPACITOS: Mexican Street Food.

Papacito's {999 Manhattan Ave., Greenpoint, Brooklyn} has what they call a "3-Way-Happy-Hour":

1st Happy Hour: 11am-4pm Monday through Friday

$1.50 tacos, $2 fish tacos, $2 tecate cans, $2 modelo especial cans

2nd Happy Hour: 4-7pm Daily

2 for 1 frozen margaritas, $2 tecate cans, $5 pints of sangria, $6 tequila + tecate, $3 regular nachos, $2 modelo especial cans, $5 house margaritas, $5 burritos, $4 meat burritos

3rd Happy Hour: The last hour of every night {1-2am Sun-Wed, 3-4am Thur-Sun}

$1 taco madness.

You can't beat the prices, and having eaten Mexican street food in Mexico, this is authentic and deeeelicious. I really wanted a margarita, but I was living on a budget. Their margaritas are the real deal: fresh squeezed lime just and tequila, splash of agave. MmMmMm.

Left Papacitos, thankful that I was in stretch pants. I bopped through the local thrift store and bought myself a "cool" NYC shirt. Headed back to Emilia's, showered and changed into a cute outfit for the upcoming evening. Walked downstairs and got my nails 'did' but the Asian downstairs. It's $7.50, and she smacks my hands and yells at me because I bite my nails. Yeah, Yeah, I know...bad habit. I still had some time to kill before Corks got done work - so I hopped off the L @ 1st Ave and cruised through the East Village. Checked in with my handy-dandy iPhone app, HAPPY HOURS and one of the 'readers choice' happy hours was at local Irish Pub, LUNASA. Well, I am so glad that I sat down here. Had 3 pints, a large bowl of shoestring cut french fries, and a lot of fun!

I went onto my YELP app and read all the reviews. People raved about it being a good community bar, where locals get together. The bartender Scott received rave reviews - he's been there since the day Lunasa opened 7 years ago. Sure enough, my fabulous bartender was none other than the original, famous Scott! He was great. We talked about dogs {his boxers name is Luna}, french fries, Costa Rica, and other odds and ends. I made friends with the people sitting next to me, and ended up leaving with 3 new friends. Scott insisted that I come back again, and my new friend David is bringing all of his friends to my next NYC show.

I walked down to Ave C and met Emily and friends for Jacinta's birthday party @ the fabulous new Austrian restaurant, Edi & The Wolf.

Edi & The Wolf has only been open over a week, but it has gotten TONS of reviews, ALL of them being 5 star. This one review kinda puts it into perspective:

"It was cold. It was rainy. But inside Edi & the Wolf, all was perfect. Which is pretty damn impressive, considering it was their third night.

Austrians do comfort food very, very well, which seems to surprise a lot of people (it goes back to the lousy quality of Viennese housing etc etc that led to the rise of cafe culture etc etc blah blah). Anyway, this place does a fabulous version of your Austrian favorites. What? You don't have Austrian favorites? Well, you should. Austrians, you see, like butter. And meat products. And fatty things. And bread. Washed down with lots and lots of booze. And coffee (that also is spiked with booze). And lots of cigarettes (well, that's missing here, obviously). In other words, to borrow loosely from someone a lot smarter than I am, they excel at a lush, baroque aesthetic culture. In simpler words, they eat and drink well. And you'll eat and drink very well here. For an extremely reasonable price..."

I had the pickled vegetable appetizer and weiner schnitzel. So f*ing delicious. Kasha was our waitress, and god-bless-her, she handled our table of 20 quite well.

Stuffed to the gills, a tad bit too much to drink, Em and I hopped a cab and then passed out. Another successful day.