Weathering the Storm

Yesterday the entirety of New York had a visitor none of us wanted and none of us will soon forget-Sandy.

Being New Yorkers and cynical by nature, Sandy's impending arrival wasn't taken as seriously due to the previous (lackluster) "hurricane" Irene that barely nudged our busy island. Sandy, on the other hand, bursted onto the New York/New Jersey scene bringing high tides, swift winds and strongs rains with it. 

My skepticism of Sandy's strength was washed away as quickly as the tide rose; one step outside my apartment revealed a scene straight out of The Day After Tomorrow film-waters swelling up the streets, FDR completely submerged, windows shattered from debris & trees falling left and right.

Today, Manhattan remains at an eerie standstill with the subway system flooded and the path trains cut off; we are all confined to our cozy corners of the island and stranded at home with growing cabin fever. 

Nevertheless, we are safe and it is at times like this that I tip my metaphorical hat to the FDNY and NYPD that never cease to be a beacon of hope and support at trying times in this city.

Now that the worst is thankfully over and we are left only with ample time to battle cabin fever and boredom; here is how I've been weathering the storm:

• Twitter-even with the island inaccessible; the world has been at my finger tips and the information hasn't stopped flowing; even when the local cable networks were down. 
• Magazines-I now have an excuse to catch up on all my "girly" reads and bring myself up to speed on Marie Claire, Vogue, Glamour and all the other mags that I only have time to flip through on a normal day.
• Cooking-I can't think of a better time to play Top Chef and get creative with the spices.  The wrench in this plan though are the closed grocery stores and lack of food available so instead I've been getting creative with what I can find; today's entree? Spiced Pan-fried salmon with creamed corn..not too shabby.
• Blogging-True, when the area you live is considered in a "state of emergency," your blog post might go unread but it does distract from cabin fever.
• Pesky, long overdue tasks: We all have those few things we've been bumping to the end of our to-do list for the past couple weeks; well when there is literally nothing else to do I guess there is no time like the present. 
• Apartment TLC: If you're going to have cabin fever you might as well make that cabin clean, right?
• Home Pampering: After giving your home some TLC, turn that on yourself-Need a manicure? Do you nails. Need a pedicure? Paint your toes. Hair feeling lackluster? Blow it out. We usually never have time in the morning to master our look so we might as well play around with it now.