RULE NUMBER 9.

Our street pre-dawn

Snow covered doggy

Central Park

Central Park

Central Park & city

Central Park & city

Central Park

Central Park - friendly NY lady loving the snow

RULE NUMBER 9.

This Title is Supposed to Rhyme...but i cant think of anything.

It's gonna be a long one people...

First things first - apparently people are having trouble commenting on our blog. All you need to do is click on the "comments" part at the bottom of our post. This should then give you a white box to type in. Underneath is a drop down box which allows you to "comment as". If you have an account, you can use this. If not, just choose anonymous. Then click "post comment"....that should do it! If you click anonymous make sure you sign off the post with your name so we know who it is.

Alright, so it's been a little while between posts. Let's do the rundown. This is Gem typing but I'll hand over to Adam a little later. I can't remember exactly what I did on each day but here's some of the highlights over the last week:

I took a walk into the Lower East Side again to take some more snaps with a little bit of fresh snow overnight. After my aunty's suggestion, I found "The Pickle Guys" - a small little hole in the wall shop that sells all sorts of pickled things - pickled olives, garlic, tomatoes, pineapple, mushrooms, carrots, peppers...pickled pickles! The smell was overwhelming but kinda delicious at the same time.

Feeling like another burst of Greenwich Village, I walked in from our apartment(a couple of km's I reckon) and wandered more around the side streets and admired all the cool houses and hidden shops and restaurants. Stopped for lunch at Cafe Reggio (a cute little italian place) and then walked on home. I also stumbled across a sandwich shop/cafe called "Peanut Butter & Co" - yep, everything has peanut butter with it (one for Brian Rule!). They make all these sandwiches...including the Peanut Butter BLT, The Elvis (Peanut Butter, Banana's & Honey grilled sandwich) and the Pregnant Lady (Peanut Butter & Pickles) - no, I didn't go there. BUT I did take note of the address in case I have a craving for something crazy.

A trip to Grand Central Station....beautiful building and just cool to stand back and people watch.

Other great things during the week have been an amazing dinner at Il Bagatto, a breathtaking experience at Central Park and an interesting trip to Coney Island. Over to you Adam....

...thanks Gemma. That was one cheesy introduction but i will play along.

Last Wed night we hit up Il Bagatto ( www.ilbagattonyc.com ) for dinner. This is the place we went to on our first night in NY and spotted a couple of celebs. Anyway, the food is awesome and we decided to graze for a few hours. Twas joy! We shared a serious antipasto platter, a main each of fresh pasta with slow cooked meat sauces (i had braised baby-back ribs and Gem had meat ragu) cooked by the 'mamma' and a dessert each, all for only $105....but wait, there's more. That number also included a nice bottle of pinot grigio and two baskets of freshly baked bread. One of the best tasting meals and most certainly the best value we have seen. For the record, Gem had a small glass of wine and i had the rest :) Sorry to harp on about the food here but meals like that are just awesome....especially coming from Perth!

Thursday morning started off walking out to 19 inches of snow. We knew there was a bit of snow on the horizon so we had always planned to get up before sunrise and head to Central Park to get some snaps. When we awoke to a foot and a half of fresh snow we were beside ourselves.

The train ride uptown to CP was interesting. There was a raggedy black dude with a comb in his hair dancing on the spot and singing what sounded like James Brown in a constant loop...for whole ride. He was clearly off his boobs on something...but he was also having a grand ol time and was loving the attention. He even busted out some robot every now and then - a personal favourite of mine. The funniest thing is watching people get on the train and first see this dude...non-stop awkward moments. You gotta laugh...but it is a little sad...that kind of thing is not an isolated incident.

Central Park at dawn was amazing...like another planet. There were people hiking their way through the snow on cross country skis! We got a bunch of photos and met a bunch of dogs (a few people too) and generally had a cool time wandering around the park together. My wife definitely makes for a sexy snow bunny...a sexy snow bunny with a belly. The schools were all closed and transport was largely down so my course was cancelled for the day...i had planned to go in after the park anyway so i went in and did a half days editing. Gem went onto Times Square after a quick Maccas brekkie together.

Friday - lots of work and then a quiet night in.

Sat was spent shopping in the morning (Soho) before training out to Coney Island to check out the snow covered beach/boardwalk. IT WAS FREEZING! Like, numb, blue fingers and ears freezing. The train ride out is about 45m mins with all of the stops but its a little quicker on the way back. Coney Island has been in a bunch of films and its pretty cool looking. It is however, still a little...ummm...grungy. We saw what clearly looked like a drug transaction within minutes of hitting the street (i know this because of my extensive research watching shows like The Wire and The Shield).....very cool....err...i mean dodgy.

We shared a famous hot dog at Nathan's (the home of NY's hot dog eating competition!!) and then hit the boardwalk for some photos. Aside from a few drunk people and the odd psycho fitness freaks going for a jog we were the only dummies out there...not sure if i mentioned this but it was BLOODY FREEZING. Got some cool takeaway Japanese for din dins that night.

Sunday was spent doing some work (me) and then meeting up near my course to see a flick - True Grit. We are trying to see all of the nominated films before the Oscars...cinemas are also warm. Gem got her usual bag of butter pop corn!! Apparently our baby likes it.

Course wise, all is good. Too much to learn so trying to keep my brain limber by only having beer and wine every other day...see - i am getting wiser with old age. I am kidding of course...its still daily. Still kidding.

Found out our friends Amber and Marcus (mates from Perth, living in Melbs) are meeting us in Cabo San Lucas for a few days after their trip to the SXSW festival in Austin, Texas...this is awesome because i now have some peeps to drink tequila with!!

ok, thats it for now. Missing you'se.

Love Ads and Gem x

P.S More photos in the post below