It is hot in the city, these days. Really hot. Even so, I’m tooootally ready to spend some time outside of the air conditioned office. There are a few notable items on the agenda for this weekend.

Friday evening: I’ll be attending/shooting the “Love and Guts” art show in SoHo. It is a tribute exhibit to several skaters that I grew up idolizing.

Saturday: Reagan’s sister and brother-in-law are coming to visit. I’m not exactly sure what Reagan has planned yet. But I’m sure it will be a good time.

Sunday: Japan Day race in the morning. I’m not running. But I would like to make it down there anyway, to cheer on my teammates who will be running. Then.. we will be hitting the Renegade Craft Fair at Mccarren Park in BK. I’m looking forward to that one, too. Let’s not forget that MotoGP is at Mugello, this weekend (Rossi’s home track).

Of course all of this will be intermixed with PJ visits, and watching the BP cam. But, that goes without saying. Hehe

Reagan and I have a terrible habit of eating out at all of the same places, all of the time. We have a couple of “usual” spots in just about every neighborhood. It is a safe approach. We are never disappointed, because we already know what’s on the menu and what’s good. I’m not going to pretend like I’m some sort of foodie or something, but, there is nothing worse than shelling out the big bucks for an overrated mediocre meal. Ok, there are actually a lot of things that are worse, but overpaying for a sub-par meal is pretty annoying.

The downside to always playing it safe, is that we are missing out on about 9 million other great places to eat. But it is so tough to weed through all of the mediocrity and locate a place that really hits the spot.

There are couple of methods that we employ for branching out. Reagan will normally go by, either a place that she read about in some local mag at her salon, or a place that she walks past and thinks looks cute. I normally choose something that has been personally recommended to me. Actually, I normally just shoot down Reagan’s choice and go to one of the usual spots. Empirically, none of the above methods are foolproof. It is always a bit of a gamble, no matter how cute they look.

Wellllaaahhhh, there is a solution to this debacle that comes around every now and again, called Restaurant Week. During this time, the participating restaurants will offer three course meals at a prix-fixe lunch for $24 and dinner for $35. Summer 2009 Restaurant Week begins on Sunday and contrary to the name (which seems to indicate that it only lasts for one week), Restaurant Week lasts for three weeks! In past years, Reagan and I haven’t really taken advantage of it, as much as we would have liked to. I have already been checking out the menu and planning different ways to get fat over the next three weeks.

What better way to say out with the old, than to go out to your car, right as the parking cop is placing a ticket on your windshield. Yeah, I was 6 minutes late, to move it. On a Wednesday too! It is because I picked up Reagan from work last night, and we just left Bebe at a meter, since I didn’t feel like taking 20 laps looking for a spot. Anyway, I thought my alarm was set for 7, it was really set for 7:15 and blah blah blah. Maybe I can hit up the recently re-elected Charlie Rangel for some of his campaign donation money to pay for the ticket.

I was reading Gothamist this morning and realized that it is already 2009 in Australia. Nice. I guess that I need to get busy with resolutions, etc. 2008 was a huge year for Reagan and I. I don’t know if I am hoping that 2009 will be more, or less eventful. I suppose that it depends on what kind of events. This year:

-Piper only moved 3 or 4 times.

-I survived 2 massive rounds of layoffs.

-Piper continued to beat the odds, and decided to try out breathing on her own.

-Reagan was finally able to get her NY hair license.

-Reagan and I ran a half marathon together.

-Reagan and I ran a marathon together.

-We just gave 30 days notice that we are terminating our lease.

-We went to 2 family reunions

-We went to Puerto Rico

-I became listed among the ranks of the Mormons, again.

Next year:

-We will be moving

-Reagan will start snowboarding again (so will I).

-Piper will undoubtedly be moving again

-Reagan and I will undoubtedly run some races together.

I’m getting bored of this post, I can’t imagine that other’s also aren’t. Happy new year. Enjoy the snow, NY peeps. Don’t freeze tonight.