Adam Carolla has a bit called "Rich Man, Poor Man" where he talks about things that only those who are really rich or really poor have. An outdoor shower is an example. Either you have a palatial estate with an outdoor pool and spa or you're a hillbilly -- nobody in between has an outdoor shower. The bit came to mind this weekend when I was hanging out in New York. The Big Apple has a little "Rich Man, Poor Man" to it. For me to enjoy living there I'd either have to be super rich -- able to afford what would be a normal, modest home somewhere else -- or I'd have to be a struggling 20s-something -- willing to live in a two bedroom apartment with two other people just for the adventure of it. At this point in my life, I wouldn't want to live in the NYC.
Visiting, on the other hand, is always a blast. The whole GG Crew (S, Lil' S, and I) went up Friday afternoon and came back Sunday evening. I did an in-person draft for a 16-team fantasy baseball league I'm in, which isn't nerdy at all, and we visited some friends. S knows too many people in New York, so when we make a weekend trip we have to confine ourselves to a single borough. This time it was Brooklyn.
Because of space limitations, sleeping arrangements are always an issue whenever I visit NYC. I've slept on a small patch of wooden floor (like 6 ft. by 6 ft. small) with two other dudes (worst night of sleep of my life), a twin bed with one other dude, a bunk bed that was over 10 ft. off the ground, a big chair, and countless sofas and air mattresses. Air mattress are the most comfortable, but they usually take up the lion's share of the apartment, so it's like nobody can move from room to room while it's inflated, and you're putting your head by the TV and your feet by the stove. You usually don't have much privacy.
On this trip we stayed with our friends K & B, and they have a (relatively) spacious two-bedroom apartment, so we got an air mattress in our own room. But the air mattress had a leak. Not a by-the-end-of-the-night you'll almost be sagging to the floor leak, but a this-thing-is-completely-useless leak. K & B insisted that we take their bed, but I knew there was no way that was happening -- not with my deferential wife. You can't out-Indian an Indian, after all. So K & B slept in their bed, I slept on the sofa, and S and Lil S' made beds on the floor out of blankets and mats. It worked out fine, actually. The sofa was a little short, but when your NYC-standard is sleeping within inches of another grown man on a hard wood floor without padding, a little-too-short sofa feels pretty damn comfortable.
The trip was fun, but I think we took a step backward in our ongoing struggle to get Lil' S to sleep through the night without excessive coddling. We tried "cry it out" on Monday, and it was awful. He woke up in the middle of the night and cried for at least 35 minutes* before we couldn't take it anymore, and S brought him into our bed, and I slept in the guest room. For S it's more a matter of not being able to listen to her baby crying, for me it's more a matter of needing to sleep at some point so that I can actually function the next day (of course I don't like listening to him cry, but it doesn't effect me on the same visceral level as it does with S -- it's probably biology), but we both reach our thresholds after about a half hour. I think we're done with "cry it out", at least the laissez-faire brand we've been experimenting with. It's too stressful, and I'm not convinced it will work for Lil' S. It could just be a lot of headache and lost sleep for nothing. So, it's back to shifts for us -- I've got 7 p.m. to 1 a.m.
It's frustrating too, because everybody I talk to with an infant** tells me that their kid sleeps through the night, at least in six-hour chunks. Man, if we can get Lil S' to go six straight hours, S and I are high-fiving like we're Maverick and Goose -- it's a real rarity. But maybe those parents are lying. I get the feeling sometimes talking to other parents that they're stretching the truth to make their child sound better, even about trivial things. Eh... who knows?
Alright, that's all I got time for now. Until next time...
*I came up with this number because we started a timer after he'd been crying for at least five minutes, and we stopped when it got to a half hour.
**Now that I have an infant it seems like I know way more people that I used to who have an infant also. Must be one of those now-you-notice-it things.
Because of space limitations, sleeping arrangements are always an issue whenever I visit NYC. I've slept on a small patch of wooden floor (like 6 ft. by 6 ft. small) with two other dudes (worst night of sleep of my life), a twin bed with one other dude, a bunk bed that was over 10 ft. off the ground, a big chair, and countless sofas and air mattresses. Air mattress are the most comfortable, but they usually take up the lion's share of the apartment, so it's like nobody can move from room to room while it's inflated, and you're putting your head by the TV and your feet by the stove. You usually don't have much privacy.
On this trip we stayed with our friends K & B, and they have a (relatively) spacious two-bedroom apartment, so we got an air mattress in our own room. But the air mattress had a leak. Not a by-the-end-of-the-night you'll almost be sagging to the floor leak, but a this-thing-is-completely-useless leak. K & B insisted that we take their bed, but I knew there was no way that was happening -- not with my deferential wife. You can't out-Indian an Indian, after all. So K & B slept in their bed, I slept on the sofa, and S and Lil S' made beds on the floor out of blankets and mats. It worked out fine, actually. The sofa was a little short, but when your NYC-standard is sleeping within inches of another grown man on a hard wood floor without padding, a little-too-short sofa feels pretty damn comfortable.
[We were in Bedford and Red Hook]
The trip was fun, but I think we took a step backward in our ongoing struggle to get Lil' S to sleep through the night without excessive coddling. We tried "cry it out" on Monday, and it was awful. He woke up in the middle of the night and cried for at least 35 minutes* before we couldn't take it anymore, and S brought him into our bed, and I slept in the guest room. For S it's more a matter of not being able to listen to her baby crying, for me it's more a matter of needing to sleep at some point so that I can actually function the next day (of course I don't like listening to him cry, but it doesn't effect me on the same visceral level as it does with S -- it's probably biology), but we both reach our thresholds after about a half hour. I think we're done with "cry it out", at least the laissez-faire brand we've been experimenting with. It's too stressful, and I'm not convinced it will work for Lil' S. It could just be a lot of headache and lost sleep for nothing. So, it's back to shifts for us -- I've got 7 p.m. to 1 a.m.
It's frustrating too, because everybody I talk to with an infant** tells me that their kid sleeps through the night, at least in six-hour chunks. Man, if we can get Lil S' to go six straight hours, S and I are high-fiving like we're Maverick and Goose -- it's a real rarity. But maybe those parents are lying. I get the feeling sometimes talking to other parents that they're stretching the truth to make their child sound better, even about trivial things. Eh... who knows?
Alright, that's all I got time for now. Until next time...
*I came up with this number because we started a timer after he'd been crying for at least five minutes, and we stopped when it got to a half hour.
**Now that I have an infant it seems like I know way more people that I used to who have an infant also. Must be one of those now-you-notice-it things.
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