When we moved to New York a lot of people asked how we’re going to deal with the NYC winters. Most would follow that up with how great Fall was in New York. We’re in Fall and its stunning. The weather is crisp, sometimes cold, but it makes walking this beautiful city even better. We were out and about most of October so it’s a great month to look back on!

RECAP OF THE MONTH

Our first weekend in October was absolutely stacked with things to do. We had a full day planned for the 6th. It started with us walking to Mentoku in Hell’s Kitchen where we had some incredible Ramen. We then walked too Midtown to see a matinee called The Nap. It was written by the same person who wrote one of our favorite plays One Man, Two Guvnors. Sadly The Nap was only so-so and wasn’t helped by a listless afternoon crowd.

We hopped on the subway, and went down to the Flat Iron district. We were a little early for our dinner at Craft and stumbled into and joined a protest for the newly appointed Supreme Court justice Brett Kavanaugh. It was one of the worst days of US politics that I can remember since 2016 when Trump was elected.

We washed the bad taste out of our mouth by enjoying an incredible meal at Tom Colicchio’s restaurant Craft. We both started off with a glass of champagne and the ricotta cavatelli with pork sausage that was phenomenal. Jenn had the duck and I had the rib eye and we split some absolutely incredible mashed potatoes. We concluded the meal with one of the best desserts either of us have ever had, freshly made donuts. After the big meal we walked the almost two miles from the restaurant to our apartment. An incredible evening.

The next day there was no rest of the weary, we were off to try a new church Time Square Church which was terrible and then were off to Rose Mansion. It was a pop-up here in the city that was full of picture spots and Rose tasting. It was made for photos and we took an absolute ton of them. We spent about an hour walking through the pop-up drinking a ton of Rose as we went.

In mid-October I was fortunate enough to get an early review copy of Red Dead Redemption 2. Rockstar (the makers of RDR2) were the first company to supply me with a review copy of a game when I first started writing so getting this game meant a lot to me.

The following weekend we went back out to the theater. Before though we had a great dinner at Harrow followed by seeing the very emotional and inspiring India Pale Ale. There was a brilliant speech at the end of the play that talked about all communities coming together even in this horrific political environment. Leave it to someone in the crowd to think this message of love was too preachy and yelled out to stop already. Luckily the crowd ignored and the beautiful message resonated with a lot of the crowd.

On October 25th we were back at JFK to fly back to Southern California. Our trip to JFK and subsequently to Ontario, CA was flawless. Jake was there to pick us up and we were off and running. The next day Jenn went to the Mission Inn spa with Ally and Amy while Jake, Ryan and I went to lunch and got ready for the wedding weekend. On Saturday we were off to Fallbrook to do the wedding rehearsal and to the hotel (Welks Resort San Diego) for the rehearsal lunch. It was a beautiful day at a beautiful site and it set up for an incredible wedding the next day. The girls went off to an Airbnb while the guys went out for drinks and to Pechanga.

The next day Jake and I met the girls at the wedding venue and brought coffee. Half way back to the hotel we were told they needed food so we turned around grabbed a bunch of food from a grocery store and dropped it back off. The groomsman were told to be at the wedding venue at 1 PM and on our way there we grabbed McDonalds for all the bridesmaids and bride and had the next two hours to get ready for the big day. The wedding and subsequent reception could not have gone better, everything was perfect. It was such a beautiful day and Jenn and I couldn’t have been more happy for Amy and our new brother Ryan. It was hard to see my baby-sister married, but couldn’t be happier for them.

We flew back home on the 29th and finished up the month recovering from all the travel and getting back in the swing of work. This was one of the first times we didn’t decorate or carve pumpkins (we were just too tired) and sadly didn’t have any kids asking for candy. Although it was a quiet end to the month, it was exactly what we needed after a very busy month.

TV WE WATCHED

As the weather starts to turn colder we’ve had more opportunities to watch some more TV. The highlights of this month were finishing another brilliant episode of BoJack Horsemen, finishing the first (and maybe only) season of Forever on Amazon Prime, and starting the very enjoyable Jack Ryan, also on Amazon Prime.

BOOKS I READ (OR LISTENED TO)

I have the goal of 32 books for 2018 and I was slightly behind at the start of October. But by the end of October I had read almost four books (finished 10% Happier a few days after) and am now back on track. It was a great month for some really good books. My favorite was The Last Wish which I wasn’t expecting to like but really surprised me.

MOVIES WE WATCHED

In the next week or two I will write up a full post but Jenn and I have started a new goal, and that’s to watch 100 of the best movies of all time. We combined the top-100 movies from a couple of lists and came up with our own list of 100 movies we wanted to watch over the next year or two. In October we watched Spartacus, Forrest Gump and From Here to Eternity. We also went down to AMC on 84th Street to see A Star is Born which was incredible.

GAMES I'VE BEEN PLAYING

I was fortunate enough to get an early review copy of Red Dead Redemption II which I played quite a bit of before it was released and it is incredible. But the game I played the most this month is Spider-Man which at the time of this writing I’m very close to finishing and have been loving every second of it.

2018 GOAL TRACKING

I'm modifying this section. Instead of talking about the various stats I'm collecting I thought it would be more useful for me to track how I'm doing to the goals I set out for the year. So here we go:

Goal #1: Read 32 Books: I've read 27 books and am currently on track to hit my goal.

Goal #2: 250 Days of Perfect Performance on Habitify: 153 days of perfect performance. Sadly I’m going to miss this goal in 2018.

Goal #3: Run 300 Times: I've run 237 days so far in 2018. Even with perfect performance the rest of the year I won’t be hitting this goal.

Goal #4: Keep Weight Under 140: I've yet to go over 140lbs

Goal #5: Write 12 Chef Joel & Jenn: I've written 2 so far. Won’t hit this goal.

Goal #6: Complete Travel Photo Books: I've completed one but have a lot more to do. I sadly won’t complete this goal either.

A Look Back - October 2018