Java Girl on E.66th near 1st Ave. is my favorite coffee shop in the city, not least of all because I used to live right up the street when I first moved here many years back. A cool, laid back, friendly and cozy place to get a good cup of coffee and just sit for a spell - it had (to me) a very L.A. feel to it, something I'd been sorely missing, and something that I'd been rather shocked at how hard it was to find here in the city. My only complaint about the place was that they closed so early in the evening.

Even after I moved downtown I still made it a point to stop by whenever I was in the area, which was not often as there isn't especially any reason to be in that part of town unless you lived there. Once the Schwartzes moved from E.57th to Central Park South, I really was never in the area at all.

This afternoon I go to see The Illusionist at the Paris. It's not as cold as it has been and I'm in no particularly rush to go home afterward, so I take a walk. As I slowly make my way higher uptown and further east, I suddenly think about Java Girl for the first time in at least a year, and wonder if it's still around. Probably not, I think.

Wrong. Not only is it still there, but it still looks, feels, and sounds exactly the same, the coffee is still good, and the place is as busy as it's ever been.

I need to not wait so long before coming back here again.