Quick thoughts on New York

Some thoughts on an interesting trip

This was only my second time in New York City– and when I say that I mean midtown– as an adult, and the first time I didn’t stray from 34th and 8th the entire time.  A few stray thoughts.

  • I stayed at the Hotel LOLA on 29th.  Before I saw the place I was told, “there’s a great bar in the lobby there, you have to check it out.”  Well the lobby IS a bar.  It’s like a small night club, complete with the dim lighting and the retro-Euro soundtrack.  And the room, which was an incredible example of space efficiency, made me feel like I was in a men’s razor blade commercial.
  • Pretty much everywhere I turned, when I looked up I saw a building I’d seen destroyed by aliens in a movie.
  • I did not know until now that when people describe areas of the city as “upper East side” and “lower West side” and so on, that the streets are actually numbered and labeled this way.  Forgive me for not knowing this, but I’m from Boston, where the streets aren’t straight for more than 20 feet, and the biggest roads don’t run parallel to one another; they converge.
  • It is entirely possible to walk right past a major tourist attraction and not even know it.  I did this twice, with the Empire State Building and the Flatiron Building.
  • Directions in New York were all of this variety: Walk two blocks; turn left; walk… until you get there.  Very convenient.
Two conversations

#1: I was walking back from the TV studio to the hotel on Friday morning, standing at a corner and waiting for a walk signal, when a woman to my right took two steps back and held up a camera.  She was getting a shot of the people she was with, who were between me and her lens.  Realizing I was in the shot, I stepped back two paces.

“I liked it better with you in the shot!” she said, after getting the picture.  “I was going to be like, ‘look at the cute guy we picked up while we were in New York!'”

Thank you, random lady.  I had been coming from a TV interview that had gone very well, my book sales were taking off as we spoke, and this might have been the highlight of my morning.

#2: I climbed into the elevator with a woman who’d already hit the 10 button.  She asked me which floor, and I said, “seven, I think.”

I pulled out my room key and looked on the back.  “Yep, seven.”

“Oh good,” she said, “you have a room here.”

This would have been a much more awkward conversation if my room had also been on the tenth floor.

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  1. Donna Doucette on May 12, 2012 at 6:26 pm

    OK, next time I think Debbie needs to go with you. Like on Monday to L.A.

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