Karissa and Janyce's 150 Things to Do in NYC: #1: True Confessions About Kapers, and Bars We're Not Welcome to Pee In

OUR FIRST OFFICIAL ADVENTURE!

Dias y Flores Community Garden

East 13th between Avenues A & B

Lets start with a little background information on Dias y Flores Community Garden, shall we? According to their WordPress page (click on dis link): "[Their purpose is to] provide a green, beautiful, restful, safe, and congenial space for gardeners to garden and for the community to enjoy." They do cool stuff like have community meetings, other functions (such as readings for The New School). And they GROW stuff. And help to give local schools and health clinics to become envolved in the use of the garden. They offer cool stuff like classes for tai chi and yoga, and horticulture, and drawing, and herbal sciences. Seriously though, how freakin cool is this place?!

The rules of the garden soiree are simple: bring something to share. So everyone there read poetry, or short stories, or shared their artwork, or their ICE CREAM MAKING skills. It was really fantastic. Not to mention delicious. The day was full of great conversations, friend making, advice giving, story telling, and the discovery that two very simple things that can make a person happy: "orgasms and kapers."

There was also never ending wine in Sesame Street Dixie cups, beer, and a lot of ice cream. And after a serving or two of each, one obviously would need a restroom. So a small group of us headed over to this bar, the name I can't recall right now, and walked to the back to use the bathrooms. The other two went first, and Karissa and I stood outside waiting, the owner/ manager/ resident short latino man came over to tell us how "rude" we were for not asking if we could use the bathroom. "Did you ask anyone? It's just polite. It's just good manners. This restroom is only for customers you know. It's just good manners." So we quickly hurried up and got out of that place and went back to the garden.