Tre - $21.95

YOU GUYS, JOE IS GONE.

HE'S GONE! The Fulbright Program and the Republic of Colombia have joined forces to pull him away from our magical summer of endless mimosas, and have, as of exactly one week ago, received him in their warm and character-building embrace. It's been hard, for me. I don't know whom to text when I can't sleep, or when someone says something ridiculous on Facebook, or when I want to get absolutely wasted for as little money as possible.

It's been hard.

But New York marches on.

This weekend, my childhood friend L. came to visit! I decided that brunch was in order, as we hadn't seen each other since the previous summer (!), and many life events had occurred to both of us, and really, nothing breaks the long-time-no-see barrier like a few liters of champagne. Right?

We decided to go for Tre, which Yelp describes as "Romantic, Trendy, Casual, Intimate."(Seriously, click on the link. You can get the vibe of the place from looking at that website for .2 seconds.) Their bottomless brunch is Saturdays and Sundays, and has a 90-minute limit; however, you can do those 90 minutes any time between 12 pm and 4 pm, which was good for us, since it was already 2:30. We walked in, and the waitress greeted us, seated us, and gave us our menus.

The first thing I noticed was that the menus were prix fixe, brunch drinks included. That is, there was no "bottomless brunch" option. They assumed that you were going to do it. That was part of the brunch. I had a good feeling about this place.

(The second thing I noticed was that there were only two vegetarian options, which is kind of unusual for New York. Nevertheless, when I requested that they replace the meat in my meal with vegetables, they were very accommodating!)

The mimosas were...fancy? What makes mimosas such a delightful morning drink, I think, is the sunniness they get from the two-sweet, too-bright orange juice that our country (myself included) has grown up loving; but these were good, too: more of a dull orange, much less sweet, and tasting strongly of champagne. Very strongly of champagne. We had about two mimosas each before the food got there. We had not yet eaten anything that day.

"I'm super-drunk, oh my god," L. said. "I'm so sorry." She took another drink from her mimosa. "No," she declared, after thinking about it. "I'm not sorry."

We ate our meals (which were super-yummy!) and talked and talked and talked. The waitress was generous but not always attentive with the refills, which I normally would have been anxious about (90-minute limit!), but after I got into an animated conversation with a stranger while waiting in line for the bathroom, I realized that the refills were just right. I did ask for one last refill after she brought us the check; she obliged, but seemed a bit grumpy about it.

L. and I left the restaurant, and ended up sitting in a park for a little while. She called her boyfriend (who's in the navy!); I spoke to him for a bit, but I don't really remember what we talked about. He had a very nice voice! Then we heard "Call Me Maybe" blasting from a nearby bar, and so of course I insisted that we go in. L., kindly, agreed.

The bar happened to be Epstein's bar, which itself is pretty cheap (!) and EVEN OFFERS THEIR OWN AYCD BRUNCH -- FOR ONLY $13.50! I had received a tip-off about Epstein's before, but I was thrilled to have stumbled upon it by accident! We sat at the bar. L. got a beer. I didn't have any cash left. I kept trying to buy something with my two dollars, but the bartender kept scoffing at me. Finally, the other bartender, making his busy way down the bar, looked at me, shook his head, pulled out a Corona and slammed it down in front of me. A free beer! I used one of my dollars to tip him. He  laughed.

Eventually, L. said, "Do you wanna go?" and so we left. Her sandals were hurting her, and she had a blister on her left foot, so we switched sandals, and walked west, similarly-mismatched.

"You're, like, my sister," I said. "You know?"

"Totally," L. said.

When we hit Houston, we went into Crate & Barrel. Why did we go into Crate & Barrel? I have no idea. I don't remember. We lay down on some of the beds and then we sat on a couch for a long time. "Can I help you, ladies?" various salespeople would say to us, and we, grinning, shook our heads. I had no idea what was happening. I didn't care. I was having a great time.

We left at some point (?) and bought some french fries and ate them and went home.