hil's social calendar.

i'm just a social lil' butterfly this weekend, aren't i?

friday:

+it was too gorgeous out to go to the gym.  i met up with los for a lovely lunch at crema cafe in harvard square and i had quite possibly the most delicious grilled chicken/cotija/avocado sandwich of my life.  we walked over to utrecht, where i picked up a few canvases and some more paint, because i have presents to make for a couple of boys.  we moseyed back to my place and i got my first sunburn of the season in the process, and then we spent the rest of the afternoon drinkin' beers and listening to lykke li with every single window in my apartment open.   love. ly.

+my mom came down for a visit to drop off my bike (!!!) and we had a nice dinner at the independent.  i just got a cheeseburger, nothin' fancy.  and of course the deviled eggs.  ohhhh the deviled eggs.

+i met up with james in coolidge corner last night and we went to the brookline booksmith, which is something i've been meaning to do for AGES.  a leisurely stroll through the bookshelves made me realize a few things: 1) i have entirely too many books in a stack on my bedside table that i've been meaning to read for ages, including infinite jest [still haven't started gah], crime and punishment, and el coronel no tiene quien le escriba [no one writes to the colonel 2) i have entirely too many books that i want to add to that list, including more stuff by chabon, brautigan and bukowski 3) i cannot be stopped around used books that have anything to do with picasso.  while poking through the booksmith's used section, i stumbled upon portrait of picasso as a young man by NORMAN MAILER.  i love norman mailer. i love picasso.  i had NO IDEA that this book existed until last night. so good.  other used books i've procured regarding pablo picasso are picasso's war by russel martin, picasso on art: a selection of views, edited by dore ashton, and life with picasso, which is a memoir written by francoise gilot, one of picasso's companions and the mother of his two youngest children.  here's a shot of my growing collection.

anyways, after the brookline booksmith, james and i moseyed up beacon street for beers at the publick house, only to shy away from the place because it was PAAACKED.  for a laugh, we continued on a beer at mary ann's, the infamous BC watering hole where my father and his best friend in college got into a massive fight that resulted in 23 paddy wagons hauling up outside the cleveland circle dive.  not much has changed: the place was chock full of BC underclassmen who probably got in with their older brother/sister's expired license so we booked it outta there fast.  eventually, we wound up meeting up with marcy and we settled for beers at the road house before calling it a night.  low key and pretty great evening out, if i do say so myself.

saturday:

+caught up on some reno 911 episodes while scarfing down a delicious breakfast of tomate frito, manchego and french bread.

+going to work on my fitness as soon as i finish this post.

+and, finally, getting all gussied up for the double-header i have in store tonight: wine riot takes place tonight, and after my very first wine tasting, i'm heading back over to my neck of the woods, where mcalister drive is headlining a show at precinct.  my smokin' date tonight is the one and only jessie and we've been counting down to this all week.  no pressure. haha.

sunday:

+brunch with los, jessie and maya at deep ellum

+BIKE RIIIIDES!

+and, duh, the sea monsters at precinct. 

i'm not even gonna touch on what's going down monday because iiiii am too excited.

zaftigs, you are most deeefinitely my bashert.

see this stacked, meaty, cheesy, saucy monstrosity of a sandwich?

that, dear readers, is the new yorker sandwich served up in all its pastrami and corned-beefy goodness at zaftig's.  i'm ashamed to say that i'm totally a "my side of the river" kind of girl (meaning i very rarely make a concerted effort to cross the charles river to get to allston, brookline or jamaica plain unless there's something really fantastic in it for me), and therefore have refrained from experiencing this cozy jewish deli on harvard street in brookline until this evening.  after roughly fifteen inches of snow fell on boston, a few of us drove over to larz anderson park in brookline to go SLEDDING, which seemed like a fantastic idea... until i realized an hour into it that my boots were hardly waterproof and that i was in need of hot tea and comfort food to combat the coldness.  enter: zaftig's.  after chucking our socks in the dryer for a bit and digging out the car from a snowbank on comm ave, we needed something hearty and zaftig's was riiiight down the street, so it was a no brainer.  

zaftig's serves up breakfast all day, diviiiiine knishes and latkes, incredible looking desserts and absurdly decadent sandwiches, as is evident by the MONSTER that i wound up with at dinner tonight pictured above.  (other selections ordered at the table: a delicious, classic reuben, one of the freshest garden salads we had ever seen and a thanksgiving-style turkey/mashed potatoes/stuffing open-faced sandwich that kind of made me want to bury my face in it.) the chicken noodle matzoh ball soup is delicious as well, and every single item on the menu was enough to get us salivating before we even ordered.

long story short: though my sandwich above was, in fact, the most intimidating meal i've had in a looong long time, zaftig's could not have been a more perfect choice for a meal at the end of a bitter, blizzarding, blustery day.  it's easily accessible by way of public transportation and literally steps away from the coolidge corner stop on the c line.  though lines out the door may prove to be a nuisance on weekends, but brunch at zaftig's seems well worth the wait on a sunny saturday morning.  if anyone happens to try their challah french toast or the infamous breakfast sandwiches before me, drop me a line and let me know how foodgasmic your experience was!