All Around Albany [3.21]

I live in a suburb outside of the city of Albany, NY. It's a great city, and I plan on raising my children here. Only not in the suburban part... I'd move closer to the city.

I'll start with some random and most-likely useless facts about my city.

-The estimated population is somewhere around 300,000.

-It is the capitol of New York State.

-Last year on Earth Hour my states Capitol (which can totally be seen at exactly 2:33 on the Earth Hour video that Caitlin posted on wednesday) turned its lights out.

-The popular american folk song Yankee Doodle was written right here (I don't know about you but I think this is FRACKIN' AWESOME.)

-Because in 1777 New York replaced its colonial government with the current state government the Capitol building has 17 steps approaching its western entrance and 77 steps approaching its eastern entrance.

-Aaron Burr (the man who killed Alexander Hamilton in a duel after Hamilton refused to shoot him) is from Albany.

-People from Albany are often referred to as Albanians... LOL

-The Capitol building here is the oldest in the United States that doesn't have a dome or tower of any kind.

-The Ferris Wheel was invented by Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute (RPI) graduate George Ferris.

Now onto my favorite places in my favorite city.

Where to have the best burrito you will ever eat in your LIFE:

Bombers!

I came to bombers for the first time when I was 13 years old with my friends Zach, Zora, and Fatimah. It was the most amazing experience of my life. I posted a "PRIDE" sticker that I got from a store down the street called Romeo's (that I'll include a picture of) on one of the mirrors that they used to have that were pretty much covered in stickers (they got rid of them a few months ago when they redecorated the place *sadface*). Their food is UHMAYZING. There's also this really great tea shop about a block down that is absolutely fantastic for lovers of bubble tea.

Where to find the best books you had absolutely no idea you were looking for:

Dove & Hudson Old Books

I came here for the first time when I was 14, I was walking down the street and right next to this ridiculous wig store there was this place called Hudson & Dove located strategically on the corner of Hudson Avenue and Dove Street and I saw books inside and they looked used! So I went in. Call me naïve but it was my first experience in a used book store and I must say I feel in love immediately. The only two people that I've ever seen working there are these two old guys who always strike up conversation and always act like they know you or whoever you're with.

I've also found some amazing things here. And they're ALWAYS cheap. I don't think I've ever payed more than 12 dollars for a book.

Some of my favorite finds here are:

The Complete Tales and Poems of Edgar Allen Poe

The Berlin Stories (one of which was made into one of my all time movies Cabaret) by Christopher Isherwood

Me Talk Pretty One Day by David Sedaris

Secret Water by Arthur Ransome

The Pianist by Wladyslaw Szpilman

and so many more. It's such a great place.

Where to have the Perfect Nerdfighter gathering:

Washington Park

It's PERFECTLY HUGE AND MAGNIFICENT AND AWESOME!

I have too many words to say about this amazing place and very few bad things to say about it.

Great things, it's a great place to people watch or to bring your dogs/ puppy sized elephants or to watch other people's dogs/ puppy sized elephants be ridiculously cute! Or (if you're into this sort of thing...) smoke a lot of marijuana and not get caught.s

Bad things, do not go there at night unless you are in a group of 10 people and at least 4 of them are really, really big. It gets creepy.

Where to go during a torrential downpour (of which there are not many, which is unfortunate because I'm one of those people that loves rain):

THE MUSEUM (which I didn't get to take any pictures of because it's closed on Sundays now and me and my BEST FRIEND EVER [she made me put that] were too lazy to walk over there. GOOGLEEEE)

It's literally the coolest place ever. There's this section that just has a bunch of fire trucks from history. There's also a section for kids where they have checkers (this might not seem significant but I love checkers so much that this is pretty much a deal maker for any place on earth. If you want me to go somewhere, just say there'll be checkers and I'll go if it's physically possible for me to get there and I will pwn you the way Hank's [whose name is really William so from here until the second I die I will refer to him as Billy on this blog. If he ever reads this I hope he laughs.] guitar pwns noobs only 10x worse... ). And a section with all of the birds of New York and all of these really cool rocks that light up in the dark, they also have THE COOLEST GIFT STORE EVER where you can buy really cool rocks that light up in the dark and even books about really cool rocks that light up in the dark. They also have A FRACKIN MERRY-GO-ROUND.

Toocoolman! Tooflippincool.

(as you can probably tell I've been there way too many times)

Where to watch movies:

The Spectrum! (We didn't even consider walking here. It was pretty far.)

I've always loved small movie theatres. And even though this movie theatre shows the same movies that the bigger ones do I like the atmosphere a lot.

This might sound wrong but I had so much fun skipping church to go to all of my favorite places yesterday. I think I might do this way more often (go to my favorite places, not skip church.)