Day Two of Phase One

It's Day two of Phase One and one of my favorite local restaurants has reopened. 

 New York City, which may be the last place in America, to begin reopening has now officially completed its second day. After 100 days of (mostly) being closed we have reopened for manufacturing, wholesale and retail curbside pickup. Life in the neighborhood is still relatively quiet, but definitely livelier than it's been and I noted that the bus was more crowded than I'd observed for the last month. 

I was particularly pleased to see Ollie's had reopened because it closed at least a year ago, due to a gas issue in their building. I walked by on Monday and it still looked as shuttered as it has since it's been since it closed. There didn't appear to be any signs of life of imminent reopening. I was thrilled to get an email with the happy news this afternoon.  As a note to recent blog friends, my building also lost gas service last summer and it gave me hope that our seemingly endless gas-less existence may be coming to an end, too. I was an infrequent customer, but to to celebrate I ordered hot and sour soup, which made a delicious dinner.  

In honor of Phase One I took a walk down Broadway yesterday to see what changes had taken place. I probably took this walk at least fifty times in the last few months and I was familiar with which stores had been deemed essential and were open. 

Pleased to see curbside pickup at Barnes and Noble

 Harry's Shoes very graciously set out chairs for customer who were waiting. 

My favorite pizza place reopened, too. To be totally accurate, it reopened last week, and it's a welcome addition to the neighborhood menu. Almost all of the local restaurants in my immediate vicinity have reopened for takeout and delivery. I'm still cooking almost all of my meals, but it is fun to break things up with pizza or an iced coffee. 

I also passed the local movie theater. Yes, I've walked by many times, but this was the first time I noted the date on the poster. I felt I'd been caught in a time warp, and in many ways, we really have. 

I'm hoping the numbers of cases continue to trend downwards and New York can proceed with Phase Two. It's totally trivial compared to all the suffering of illness, but I will be so ready for a haircut.

I've got a post office trip on my list for tomorrow and I'm going to walk over to the Community Garden up the street to see if it's reopened. I'm looking forward to "seeing" my Weight Watchers friends tomorrow morning on Zoom and and session on how to photograph birds on Thursday. What are your plans for the rest of the week?

As ever, thanks for visiting and take good care. Much love and be well.