So New York

Seems like the kind of person this guy apparently hungout with on a regular basis...

So, my friend Mark was in town this weekend from Philly, and after rehearsal yesterday we met up for brunch, just to hangout and catch up a bit. We started at this insane brunch place (super tasty, but like a 30-minute wait to order and get food/drinks), and then ended up at this Irish bar in the West Village. It was pretty empty (it was like 130 in the afternoon), but the bar area was almost completely full. We sat at the only two stools that were left together and sat next to this guy who was so stereotypically NY it was INSANE!

First of all, he talked so much that Mark and I didn't get a chance to exchange two words with each other for probably the first 30 minutes we were there. Then, you could just tell he was driving the bartender crazy. I mean, she had to humor him (been there, done that. The things we do for tips...), but you could just tell she did it grudgingly... And lastly, for a guy who lived in NY his whole life and delivered the Daily News until he recently retired (oh, yes, we got his WHOLE life story...), he name dropped like CRAZY. Talking about having dinner with "Danny" Day-Lewis and his father-in-law, Arthur Miller; getting asked to come talk to acting students by "Bill" Hickey; running into Phillip Seymour Hoffman in Washington Square Park; almost leaving an original Cezanne and Rothko on a crosstown bus (in the rain); and, of course, performing the entirety of Shakespeare's Richard III "Now is the winter of our discontent" speech (the WHOLE THING, at least 2 minutes long) for mafiosos (and us, of course).

I mean, Mark and I were both fascinated and completely annoyed by the whole thing. When he finally stumbled outta the bar, we just turned to each other and laughed. It was like, you could write a whole play outta the crap that came outta this guy's mouth... It was insane. Seriously. Insane. I mean, even taken with a grain of salt, this guy has lived a crazy life...