Confessions of a Korean-American Man in New York City

Left work early to meet up with Ed and Joyce, the soon to be newlyweds. They picked Cafeteria to eat at which is only a block away from my apt. Oddly I've never eaten there my entire NY existence. In fact I hardly eat in my area since it's so easy to step out and check out any of the local eateries. Ed's known me since my early days when I was in a serious relationship and of course, relationships was top of mind this evening. It's good to get recalibrated by these two. Afterwards we had a quick dessert at Pinkberry in Ktown and soonafter I ran to the LES for a basketball league game.

Taking the F train took me back 6 years when I used to live in the East Village @ 4th and 2nd. Many days and nights I've descended down the 2nd Ave/Houston subway stop to head uptown. The East Village or the Lower East Side is filled with twenty somethings trying to figure out life or get a grungy taste of New York City living before they exit a few years later to suburbia or return home. If you ever saw Coyote Ugly then you'll understand what your first apt is like when you come to NYC for the first time. Btw, Coyote Ugly is located on 1st Ave and it's not a pretty place, and ironically, Hogs and Heffers is the real bar that the film is based on and not the Coyote Ugly on 1st.

So after coming up out of the Delancey subway stop, walking up Essex reminded me of my old days with Konman when we used to hit the Magician by Rivington. It was cheap drinks for all the starving actors and thespians that would congregate there. Nearby is Katz's where you stop by on a late weekend night to eat their famed pastrami sandwich. I can remember stumbling into the front door turnstile and ordering in a drunken stupor.

So tonight was a scrimmage to determine our team's skill level. I know I've lost a step because I can't deny the reality of the thirties. As we get older we're supposed to get wiser but inversely, our physical skills deteriorate. To mitigate this slower step I'm playing guys who are my age or older, and my peers are usually weighed down by many dinners at the office. I have the shooting avg and crossover of an Iverson, but unfortunately it's my ankles that get sprained and not my competitors because my feet can't keep up with my own crossover. Ahhh, aging is such a cruel reality. The best thing about a rec league is that there are no limits on fouls, so I basically foul anyone who comes into the lane. I've always taken the mentality of Bill Laimbeer of the Detroit Pistons when it comes to defense -- own the paint. Tonight, one of the guys I was defending yelled at me, "this is a F&%$in rec league!" And I barked back, "call the foul if you think it's a foul!" That shut him up. The other advantage of fouling in a rec league is that foul shots are actually nerve racking and hard when you play in a league. Anyway, we won our scrimmage and I scored ZERO points on 0-1 shooting. My team is composed of ball hogs that don't know how to spell the word "pass." Passing the ball to a teammate is like throwing the rock into a black hole because you'll never see it again. Onto game #1 next week. I'm shooting the rock next week.