Friday Night Drag Queen Show At Lips

Lips
227 E. 56th Street
New York, NY 10022
www.lipsnyc.com

For my mom's birthday last month I decided to take her out for a girl's night out just the two of us. My mom doesn't get out much and I wanted to do something both different and memorable. I could have taken her out for dinner and drinks, but I just wanted to do something outside of the box. So I decided to take her to Lips for dinner and a Drag Queen show. I decided on a Drag Queen show because I thought it'd be a lot of fun. I had to have Google every single Drag Queen show with dinner in the Manhattan area. I chose Lips because all the reviews on it were great. People really seem to like this place.

When we got there everything was dark outside and it only had a sign that said Lips in hot pink, which is good cause it kept the mystery going. My mom was so excited and asked what kind of place it was about a hundred times. Then as we're walking in you couldn't miss the hostess' big orange wig and her reaction was priceless. She looked at me and said "Oh My God are we watching a Drag Queen show!!!". She was super excited about it. Turns out she had always wanted to go to one, which is great for me.

So we checked in with the hostess and waited to be seated. The place is not too big, I'd say about a medium size room so you get a more intimate feel. Everything about the restaurant just screamed out glitz and glam. Since it was just my mother and I we actually got seated at a table for two right next to the stage.  The hostess seated us and said look you have a VIP table. It was nice that we didn't have to share a table with other people since we were celebrating her birthday.

Once seated the menu is just like any other generic restaurant menu. Nothing screams out try me. Instead of ordering all this food, we decided to order just appetizers and share everything. We got the calamari and Mistress B sampler platter. The food wasn't bad at all. It didn't taste like something was heated up in the kitchen which was another plus. For drinks we ordered the Drag O Rita (which was a margarita), and I was very surprised when I tried it. They were made strong. Not that it tasted bad, but it had a lot of alcohol in it which was great.The food came out fairly quick I would say within fifteen minutes and then the show started about fifteen to twenty minutes afterwards.

This place was on schedule from the moment we walked in. They do about four shows a night. The first Drag Queen to perform sang a song about Vaginas and I couldn't stop laughing throughout the whole thing.
Once that act was done then they called everyone who was celebrating their birthdays to come on stage. Those people got a crown and received a slice of cake and got to take a picture with two of the Drag Queens. I didn't tell our waitress that it was my mom's birthday because she's a bit shy and she would've killed me if she had to go up there. So I knew better than to do that to her. Once they were done introducing all the birthday girls and making fun of them (in a good joking kind of way) then it was on with the show.

The songs they performed were a good variety. These drag queens performed songs from the 80s, 90s, and today's top songs. For example one Drag Queen performed a Boni Jovi song from the 80s, my waitress performed a song that was in the Clueless soundtrack, and towards the end of the show one of the Drag Queens performed Can't Hold Us by Macklemore. Also the performers interacted with the audience so everyone was part of the show. It just felt like we were all in one big party.

After the show you're able to take pictures with the Drag Queens. It does get crazy though because they're both performers and waitresses. So as they're trying to close out people's tabs they're also busy taking pictures as well. I don't know how these ladies do it, but kudos to them. Everyone did an amazing job and both my mother and I were impressed.

Altogether with the dinner and show everything took about an hour and a half. On the website they suggest making reservations about a week ahead of time. I booked my reservations about two weeks ahead of time just because I knew their busy days are always on the weekend. I was beyond happy with my decision. Everything that I read online was right on and Lips was awesome. If you're looking to go to a Drag Queen show then this is the place to go because you'll have a great time and you won't regret it.

The Stage

Some Glitz and Glam 

The First Performer

My Waitress Eva (she was such a sweetheart)

The Ladies Doing A Performance Together

This Diva Reminded Me of Diana Ross

San Gennaro- Little Italy, New York

When you're a New Yorker you know fall has arrive because the fest of San Gennaro is going on in Little Italy. The feast normally begins by the second the weekend of September. To find out the history and activities of the feast you can go to SanGennaro.org. At the feast you can get your favorite Italian American sandwiches, pizza, pasta and many desserts.

During the feast the street of Little Italy becomes a lot smaller. All of the restaurants set up tables on the sidewalk of their restaurants. Then you have your food carts or shops set up on both sides of the streets. It gets jammed pack when you go at night. Although I know it might be hard to go out the house without a stroller when you have a young child, but it's best to leave them at home. It takes up a lot of space and you don't want people to bump into the stroller and especially your child. That's just my opinion because you should be more practical in these types of situations.

So usually when I go to the feast (or any feast) I usually get a sausage sandwich with peppers and onions. This time I wanted to try something different so I got the pork barasoiel with onions and peppers. It was one of the best things I ever ate. With each bite I kept on saying how amazing and good my sandwich was. Also if you like the fat on your meat I definitely recommend getting the park barasoiel. There wasn't a lot of fat, but here and there you would bite into it.

After the sandwiched we walked it off for a while and started to scope out the other things to eat. I'm big on sweets so I passed by Ferrara's and saw they had gelato, but we stilled wanted to walk around. Plus I wanted to get calamari from Umberto's Clam House. At least my boyfriend and I figured out where we were getting our desserts from, so time was not wasted walking around. Then off we went walking and hit Umberto's Clam House. They had two stands, this year and I can only imagine the kind of profit they'll be making from it. Every time I go it's always been packed with people around. I love seafood so I appreciate good friend calamari. It was golden and crispy on the outside. Not too chewy either which was just perfect. We got the sweet marinara sauce on top of the calamari and everything was delicious.

Once we were done with that it was time to take a picture in the big chair. Usually my boyfriend and I take the big chair pictures at the feast in Brooklyn for Our Lady of Mount Carmel. It we don't get it at that feast then we'll take the pictures at San Gennaro and it's the same lady

Dinner at Nick's Bistro

Nick's Bistro
104-20 Metropolitan Ave
Forest Hills NY 11375

Greeks diners are the best diners period!! There has never been a Greek diner where I didn't enjoy their food.

So last night my boyfriend and I were in Forest Hills and all I wanted was a burger and buffalo wings. There's not many places to eat on Metropolitan Ave. First we decided to go to Blackwater Inn because that's our go to bar, but when we got there the place was packed. Turns out it was the first night they were open after being closed for renovations. I was so sad that we couldn't eat there because you could see from outside how packed it was and there were no seats at the bar either. My boyfriend reassured me that I wouldn't have wanted to eat there since you could still smell the fresh paint and I have a very sensitive nose.

So we decided to walk down the avenue to find something to eat. When we first saw Nick's Bistro we were across the street from it. We were a little skeptical about the place. At first we thought it was going to be an overpriced kind of restaurant. So we both decided we'll just check the menu first and we'll take it from there. I'm sure glad we took a look at the menu because they had your typical diner food. I was just happy I was going to get my burger.

Once inside we were seated right away and the waitstaff was very friendly and polite. After we sat down and ordered we got some pita bread and humus for starters while we waited for our food. The pita bread was nice and toasty and the humus was delicious. To our surprise the buffalo wings were really good. The sauce was good, not like your typical bar buffalo wings, but it was up there. Once our burgers came I was so happy that I got a cheese burger. They put American cheese on both the top and bottom part of the beef patty and the burger was on point. I had my cheese burger with onion rings and I honestly have nothing bad to say about it. My boyfriend had a turkey burger with fries and he didn't have anything bad to say about it either. For once we're able to find a good place to eat that didn't cost an arm and a leg.

So if you're in the Forest Hills area on Metropolitan Ave I would recommend going to Nick's Bistro. The food is good and the place has a nice atmosphere to it. It doesn't look like you're typical diner from the outside and it offers other great entrees as well. Sorry I don't have any pictures for the blog, I was too busy eating and I forgot about taking pictures.

Till next time.