● Macondo (Lower East Side) - Hero to gourmand alkies everywhere, Junior Merino has gone and done it again. His Aguacate and Mescal at Rayuela’s younger, cheaper, funner sis is probably the greatest thing to ever muck up a blender. Creamy fresh avocado, sweet agave nectar, and Scorpion mescal by the frosty, puke-green pitcher.
● Momofuku Noodle Bar (East Village) - The porky ramen bar takes 7-Eleven to school, son, with its watermelon lemonade Soju Slushie. Big gulp a couple and marvel at how all the blond wood is like getting smashed inside somebody’s cool balsa architecture project. Brain freeze!
● Rusty Knot (West Village) - Named after the most disgusting sex act ever, the eponymous frozen mojito is also a kitschy tiki classic. Spotted Pig via Key West is the perfect camped-out cruise -- supplement your plastic cup of rum-n-sugar with a pig in a blanket and sunset over the West Side Highway. Only thing missing is Gavin MacLeod.

For the second year in a row, All Points West will take over Liberty State Park in Jersey City this weekend. For most Manhattan dwellers, the thought of crossing that river is daunting -- but with a location just across the Hudson River from lower Manhattan, the commute is surprisingly easy and filled with great pit stops. Meet your friends for a pint or a bite at one of these fantastic bars and restaurants near your departure point, and enjoy Jay-Z, Coldplay, Vampire Weekend, The Ting Tings, and the Yeah Yeah Yeahs on a full stomach. With a seven-beer maximum and lengthy festival lines, you'll need the pre-party.

Ferry Service (Lower Manhattan)
Enjoy the sights and bites of lower Manhattan before catching the Ferry at Battery Park Pier, just south of Castle Clinton. The ferry is $20 if you buy this week; otherwise it's $25 on the day of the show. Prior to cruising by the Statue of Liberty and Ellis Island, fill up at these lower Manhattan favorites.
● Burger Shoppe - So close to the bottom of Manhattan you can feel the mist off the river. Crowd is largely lunch-breakers and FiDi residents; near empty on the weekends, which means you can pack in you and your posse pre-Silversun Pickups. Nothing really under $10 as far as food fare, but you'll be spending the same on street meat and beer at the festival anyway. Best of all, it's just a hop, skip, and a jump from your ferry.

It’s hard to stand out in a city populated by naked cowboys, that screeching guy who wears bird feathers and bells in Union Square, and Mike Nelson. But when the ships dock in New York for Fleet Week and its annual Memorial Day celebration, the Coast Guard and Navy mariners dressed head-to-toe in their white, starched uniforms aren’t exactly subtle. That said, a handy how-to on nabbing seamen might be helpful. (Full disclosure: They’re everywhere!)

Because sometimes a diner just won’t do.

10. Rusty Knot (West Village) - For those butter and salt cravings.
9. The Box (Lower East Side) - A memorable meal for sure; whether you trust what’s on your plate and/or feel like eating after watching the show is another story.

For a slice of New York that’s not all bright lights and tall buildings, get off the grid and spend a day in the West Village. The neighborhood’s former moniker, “Little Bohemia,” no longer applies (multimillion-dollar townhouses aren’t exactly anti-establishment), but relics of its former self still exist alongside stylish restaurants and boutiques. Bring a map; with an entire day to spare, we suggest getting purposefully lost.

Stay: A quaint neighborhood calls for an equally quaint hotel. Abingdon Guest House has the vibe of a small-town bed and breakfast -- it’s not for everyone, but its location is ideal for the atypical visitor.

‘Cause sometimes you need a spot where you can just work your patter.

1. Rusty Knot - Key West/West Village posh-dive mashup. Commence humming lyrics to “Brandy” now.
2. Marshall Stack - The simple, classic appeal of a fuzzed-out power chord.
3. Spitzer’s Corner - If Abercrombie & Fitch was a bar -- not entirely in a bad way, either.

Freeman's and Rusty Knot co-owner Taavo Somer talks about his failed busboy career, the proper use of porno paneling, and why he strives for simplicity when doing three jobs at once.

Point of Origin: I moved here when I was 27, for a job at Steven Holl Architects. And my first day was an immediate wake-up call that it wasn't gonna work out. I had been working in big firms for years, and this was my dream job. And when that disillusionment came, I thought: screw architecture. I'll do something else. A friend there knew Serge Becker. I thought I'd be a busboy, learn to tend bar. When I met him, he was like, "Why do you want to work in a bar? I have no busboy openings but I have a project." It turned out to be Lever House, which he was working on with John McDonald, and the designer Marc Newson. Serge didn't have a trained architect in his office, so he said, "Do this until a busboy position opens up!"

Chic, sleek, slick, elegant, and stylish are all words I’m guilty of overusing. Especially "chic." I have to admit that my posts are sounding a bit like the press releases that come attached to the invitations. It’s easy to name-drop the morning after when you’re able to copy and paste from a tip sheet, and I don’t know if there are any more ways I can characterize a chic event. (I've actually used the last alternative in the thesaurus.) Can you blame me? The amount of brain cells I’ve killed from the copious amounts of chic cocktails I've downed have made staring at the blank page in the morning a challenging experience. So here I am at the W Hotel in Union Square typing away (thank goodness for modern BlackBerry technology and boring friends!) on a review of my booze-drenched, celebrity-infested week. From Brooke Shields to Socialista, with Lauren Conrad’s bratty behavior in between.

I was shocked to wake up this morning and discover that not everyone loves the Rusty Knot (yes, restaurant news trumps international headlines any day). Since opening in March, the faux-nautical bar has been a shipyard of celebrity cool (Jay-Z and LeBron James are frequenters) and drunken hipsters (because in New York, hipsters have money). My one experience there was during a party for David Schwimmer’s comedy Run Fatboy Run, where I shared cheese balls with Judah Friedlander, who was incredibly stoked about all the free (and delicious) hors d’oeuvres. But not everyone is keen on the Knot.