Im dreaming of New York....

and viewing the images on The design files does NOT help! Listening to friends talk about their travels to the fantantic Gotham City does not help either!!! Im surrounded!

The stories and brilliant research that the blog The Design Files went into while visiting Brooklyn and Nolita was truly inspired and Lucy should be congratulated for all her efforts! I mean - when I travel - I can bearly handle trying to find accommodation and a decent coffee! But this young lass was blogging while sampling all the delights of NY at the same time and that in a word is... impressive!

The info on the restaurants and cafes was what I enjoyed looking at the most, as you rarely get an opportunity to see these places on the web unless its in a review for the joint! My favourite image was of Juliette, a cafe/ bar in Brooklyn NY...fantastic rooftop venue that you can find in Melbourne but alas not in Sydney...

Speaking of bars, there has been alot of press about the small bar licences that were promised to be allocated in the inner city - but as yet have not appeared in force... Its sad how in Sydney we STILL have not produced the small bar culture that you can find overseas and in Melbourne - and as a few start to open - they really havent made a new night atmosphere and an impact on the collective culture as yet...

One place overseas that I still dream about is a cafe/bar called Bikoffee in Ljubljana Slovenia... That city has the most amazing places to sit on your own with a book and a wine up at the bar while listening to great music and never feeling out of place! I had no idea this city had such a small bar culture and it was such a fantastic surprise! I ended up staying much longer than I had intended and this was one of the reasons why...

But back on the Sydney front a new bar in Darlinghurst called Ching-a-lings in Little Oxford St has just opened...Its not quite a revolution but I guess with a few venues popping up in Surry Hills recently- its a start! My old favourite that is still good is The Lounge and last time I went it was a Sunday evening and the music was brilliant... Its seems old school hip hop can still be found on the decks!

Worth getting off the couch for..even on a Sunday!

On another note... if your wanting an art fix in the next week or so Ken Unsworth's piece A Ringing Glass on Cockatoo Island is only a ferry ride away... its on until 28th June and im hoping to get out there myself in the next rain break!....

And if looking for music... Mos Defs new album The ecstatic has dropped and the track Quiet Dog - that he released on an EP a few months ago - has been permanently on repeat on my ol' ipod... Talk of the album is pretty good...