Zachary A. Martz

Vacation ready at Bushgardens Tampa

There’s a particular kind of energy you can’t fake—the moment right before a day gets big. The kind that shows up in a quick selfie, in the easy tilt of a hat, in a grin that says we’re already halfway gone.

We were vacation ready at Busch Gardens Tampa, standing beneath a canopy of bold color, letting the place do what theme parks do best: pull you out of your usual rhythm and set you down somewhere louder, brighter, and a little unreal.

I like these in-between moments as much as the rides. The pause before the first line, the small plan that isn’t really a plan, the feeling that the day is wide open. It’s funny how a park built on spectacle still leaves room for the quiet details—the way the light hits a face, the closeness of someone beside you, the sense that you’re making a memory while it’s happening.

Some days don’t need a complicated story. Just comfortable shoes, an open afternoon, and the person you want next to you when the world starts moving faster.

Busch Gardens Tampa delivered the rush, but this was the part I wanted to keep: the calm, happy start of it all.

Sunday second brunch at The Richardson

| #boyfriendswhobrunch #brooklyn #brunch #richardson | ???

| Finally, I had the time and was in the right location to try the Richardson (@therichardsonnyc). I have to say the cocktails were pretty great and the sandwiches were better then I expected for bar food. The Richardson is your classic cocktail bar with a slight pub feel. They serve many drinks and have a larger selection of whiskey & bourbon; I had a vesper.

The layout of the bar is great to sit and people watch and the patio a a decent size. You can normally find a seat either inside or outside if you get there a bit early, but even at a peek time there is not much of a wait.

| Read Insta-comments -> http://bit.ly/2pUmwiP

From Crema with Love

There are mornings that feel like they were arranged on purpose—light slanting through the window, the street outside moving at a patient pace, and a small tray set down like an offering.

Two cups from Crema, warm and simple in the hand, the kind of coffee that doesn’t ask for much beyond your attention. Beside them, croissants with their careful layers and a soft dusting of sweetness, cradled in paper as if that’s where they belong. Everything looks unhurried.

I like the quiet honesty of places like this. Not polished into something sterile, not cluttered with noise—just settled. Coffee that tastes like it was made by someone who expects you to notice. Pastry that flakes and bends and reminds you to slow down long enough to make a small mess.

Greenpoint has a way of doing that, offering little pockets of calm amid all the walking and errands and half-made plans. You sit by the window and watch the day happen without needing to chase it. For a few minutes, it’s enough to be warm, to be fed, and to let the simple things hold their shape.

From Crema with love, then—because that’s what it feels like when a morning lands gently.

Hanging with Harry on Friday

Friday has a way of softening the edges of the week. Everything ordinary—hallway light, scuffed floor, the quiet pause before plans—feels a little more forgiving.

Harry doesn’t care what day it is, of course. He just knows the small rituals: sit close, settle in, let the world move around us for a minute. He stretched out across my lap like he belonged there (like he always has), and I caught myself smiling at how quickly a room can feel warmer with a dog in it.

There’s something comforting about these simple, almost forgettable snapshots. A peace sign and a tired grin. A white coat against denim. The kind of moment that doesn’t announce itself as important until later, when you’re looking back and realize it was.

We didn’t do anything remarkable. We just hung out. But in the quiet way the week finally exhales, it was enough. Harry’s calm weight, the steady patience in his eyes, and that brief feeling that time slowed down just to let us be still.

If your Friday found you running hard, I hope you get a small pocket of rest. And if you’ve got a Harry nearby, give him a little extra room on your lap.

A Pilgrimage for the Almighty Monthly Metro-card

In the elevator’s mirror, the city folds in on itself.

The patterned screen between me and my own reflection turns a simple selfie into a kind of stained glass: a hooded outline, a face half-found, the light flattened into warm, tired amber. The subway has a way of doing that—taking whatever you bring down with you and translating it into something quieter, more private.

Somewhere above, the day is moving without me. Down here, it’s all small rituals. Waiting. Listening. Holding a plastic card that decides how far you can go and how long you can linger between places.

A monthly MetroCard is such a strange little promise: unlimited movement, but only within the same familiar corridors. It becomes a talisman you check and re-check, as if losing it would mean losing the map of your own routines. You tap, you ride, you climb the stairs, you find the elevator when your legs or your patience ask for mercy.

Calling it a pilgrimage feels almost honest. Not because it’s holy, but because it’s repeated. Because it asks you to keep showing up—descending into the same tiled tunnels, trusting the same rattling doors, letting the city carry you even when you’re not sure what you’re heading toward.

And in the mirrored hush between floors, you catch yourself and think: I’m still here. Still moving.

Fantastic Flamingo Cocktail Fun and Happy Bday Wishes to Devon

There’s something quietly perfect about a drink that doubles as a little sculpture. A pink flamingo, glossy and bright, leaning into the dim light like it belongs there—half decoration, half celebration. The kind of detail that turns an ordinary table into a small scene you’ll remember later.

The room feels warm and hushed, the background patterned like a screen you might look through to another world. Leaves crowd in at the edges, as if the plants are listening, and the straw angles upward like a tiny flag planted in sweet, fizzy territory. It’s playful, sure, but also oddly still—like someone pressed pause for just a moment so the night could keep its shape.

And in that pause, the birthday wish lands: happy birthday, Devon. Not loud, not rushed—just a bright little message tucked into a glowing moment. A flamingo cocktail is a funny kind of toast. It doesn’t pretend to be serious. It just shows up, pink and unapologetic, and reminds you that joy can be simple: a drink, good company, and the feeling that the evening is on your side.

Here’s to the kind of birthdays that leave behind small, vivid snapshots—something you can return to when the week gets heavy and you need proof that fun is real.

Say Goodbye Equinox

There are endings that arrive with a grand speech and a slammed door, and then there are the quieter ones—the kind that happen in the space between errands, between keys in your hand and a receipt in your pocket.

Saying goodbye to Equinox felt like that: less a breakup and more a slow realization. You show up enough times to learn the rhythm of the place, the familiar weight of routine, the way a room can make you feel like you’re moving forward even when you’re mostly staying in place.

Then life shifts. A new apartment. Different streets. Different light in the mornings. You start noticing the ground beneath you again—ordinary stone, speckled and worn, the kind of surface that has seen thousands of steps and never asked where anyone was headed.

That’s what I keep thinking about: how places hold our habits without holding onto us. How easy it is to confuse a membership, a commute, a shared schedule with permanence. Some people bounce. Some plans dissolve. You learn what fits when you’re the one left carrying the boxes.

I don’t have a dramatic moral. Only this: routines can be useful, even comforting, but they’re not vows. Sometimes the best thing you can do is let the old pattern end cleanly, and walk—quietly—into the next one.

Look at those Bunz – fried oyster bao

There’s something quietly satisfying about food that arrives in a small bowl, as if it’s trying not to brag. These bunz did the opposite anyway—soft bao tucked around fried oysters, a scatter of pickled cabbage and herbs, and lime wedges waiting at the edge like a punctuation mark.

The first thing you notice is the contrast: the bao looks calm and cloudlike, and then the oyster comes in hot and crisp, a little rough around the edges. The toppings do what good toppings always do—cut through, brighten, wake everything up—without stealing the scene. A squeeze of lime makes the whole bite feel sharper, cleaner, like someone opened a window.

It’s an easy thing to miss how much work goes into a bite that small. The balance has to be right. Too much crunch and it’s heavy. Too much softness and it disappears. Here, it sits in the middle: warm, briny, and comforting, with that quick, tart snap that keeps you reaching back in.

Look at those Bunz isn’t just a line—it’s the only reasonable response when your lunch looks this neat and vanishes this fast.

That Club Life

There’s a certain quiet choreography to a good store display—the way it asks you to slow down without ever saying so. In this corner, denim folds into softer knits, blues leaning into gray, as if the whole scene is trying to be useful rather than loud.

Two mannequins stand guard in the back, dressed in the kind of layers you reach for when the day can’t decide what season it is. A shirt-jacket, a dark crewneck, easy pants. Nothing pleading for attention, everything hinting at a life outside the fitting room.

On the table, the details do the talking: neatly stacked jeans, low sneakers ready for miles, small accessories arranged like the calm aftermath of someone getting ready with time to spare. Even the glass cases feel like a pause—space for the everyday objects that become oddly personal once you wear them long enough.

That’s what I keep thinking about with “That Club Life.” Not velvet ropes or bright lights, but the quieter membership: the club of people who like their clothes to hold up, to fit into real routines, to look better the more they’re lived in.

Maybe that’s the point. Among the polished shelves and careful lighting, you can still sense the ordinary world pressing in—cold air outside, errands waiting, a familiar walk home. And somehow, that makes the whole scene feel more human.

Philly weekend with Bae – Mom’s Bday

| #boyfriendswhobrunch #seafood #philly

| Truth be told, we were in Philadelphia for my mother’s birthday. My mother is a seafood fan and we decided to take her to Devon Seafood Grill for lunch and then some shopping.

Breakfast of champions

Some mornings feel like they’ve been waiting for you.

A plate with a blue rim holds a thick slice of something sweet—soft in the middle, browned at the edges—finished with a drizzle and a scatter of crunchy bits. Beside it sits a small bowl of fruit, bright and cold-looking, the kind that pops when you bite down. There’s coffee too, because there’s always coffee: the steady, familiar warmth that makes the rest of the table feel arranged on purpose.

It’s an easy thing to call it a “breakfast of champions,” but what I mean is simpler than that. It’s a small celebration disguised as an ordinary morning. The kind of meal that makes the day feel a little more livable before you’ve even stepped outside.

I like how breakfast can be both routine and strange—how it can taste like sugar and comfort and still carry that quiet promise of getting started. Maybe it’s the mix of sweetness and bitterness, the way fruit cuts through the heavy parts, the way coffee keeps everything grounded.

For a few minutes, nothing else is urgent. There’s just a table, a plate, and the soft sense that you’re exactly where you are.

Birthday Don for Angel

There’s something quietly ceremonial about a bowl you don’t have to dress up. Just warm rice, a dark rim of a bowl, and an arrangement that feels like it was placed with care rather than urgency.

This birthday don for Angel arrived like that—simple, vivid, and complete. The salmon is folded into soft petals around the edge, glossy and pale, as if it’s still holding the cold of the sea. In the middle sits a mound of ikura, each bead catching the light, translucent and steady. A small dab of wasabi keeps its own sharp secret, and a scatter of nori cuts through with a clean, briny whisper.

I keep thinking how birthdays are often made loud on purpose, as if volume proves meaning. But sometimes the best gift is a small focus: one bowl, one table, a moment that doesn’t ask you to perform happiness, only to notice it.

If you’ve ever eaten something and felt the room go a little quieter, you know what I mean. The ordinary turns bright for a second. The day doesn’t change, but you do.

Happy birthday, Angel. May the year be full of meals that feel like this—careful, warming, and exactly enough.