An (Unexpected) Day Off

I need to burn some personal days before the end of the fiscal year, which is the end of June. It was pretty eventful, if I do say so myself. I started the day with a movie. It was a bad movie that I do not recommend, but matinees (or movie before noon) are actually affordable in NYC. (Translation: It's under $10!)

Then I headed to Queens to do some exploring in Astoria. I walked around. It was nice, definitely more diverse crowd there. I went to a grilled cheese place called The Queens Kickshaw. Apparently, it started off as a coffee shop, but the owners decided to serve food - hence grilled cheeses - and do craft beer. It was actually a really nice space. I sat at the counter by the cook/chef as he made the grilled cheese. (Another plus to sitting there was that it was warm.) The downside to sitting there was that everything looked good. I had a hard time deciding what grilled cheese to get. (And for a second, I thought about skipping the grilled cheese and going with their stuffing option. Yep, as a main they offer stuffing!

Blueberry Vinegar Cordial

I didn't go for the craft beer though, I tried a vinegar cordial instead. They do a lot of their own pickling, and they add some of the liquid (in my case, the blueberry pickling juice) to seltzer water.

It gives it a nice tart, blueberry flavor. I thought it went nicely with the Gruyere grilled cheese I (eventually) decided on. While I'm not a rye fan, I thought I'd give it a go. I liked the idea of the use of mustard with the grilled cheese. I guess I should explain. The Gruyere grilled cheese was on rye bread with whole grain mustard and caramelized onion and came with a side of cabbage slaw. It was tasty and all the flavors went well together. But sometimes I just crave the grilled cheese from when I was young. American cheese on white bread. The gruyere was not that -- it was definitely a more sophisticated, upscale grilled cheese. It was worth the trek out to Queens. And I'd go back again. Kickshaw is open late! (Given my work hours, that's a plus!)

Gruyere Grilled Cheese

After my wanderings in Astoria I headed back to Manhattan. I was craving some dessert so I went to Columbus Circle with the thought of going to Bouchon Bakery, but instead I walked north to Levain Bakery and got one of their warm chocolate peanut butter cookies.  Then I headed home through Central Park.

Earlier in the week, I had seen the line for Shakespeare in the Park tickets and thought I'd swing by the box office to see if there were any tickets left for the night's performance -- there were! So I got one.

I've always wanted to go to a Shakespeare in the Park performance. Forget the fact that it's free and it has some great actors performing, it's a play outdoors! The show I saw was As You Like It and some of the actors that were in it included Andre Braugher and Oliver Platt. It was a good performance. I liked the set and the chorus was musical. But I kind of wish it had been a bit more cutting edge. Maybe it was from all the Shakespeare Theatre Co. performances I saw, but I tend to like productions that had a different twist to them. This production seemed like the hill-billy version. Still, I'm glad I went and it was a good way to spend an evening.

My $8 champagne.

Oh, and the other plus? When you order a drink (which you can take into the theatre), they really top it up!

All in all it was a great day to spend an unexpected day off. I have another day off that won't be that action packed, I'm sure. But hopefully, it won't take me two weeks to write about.