Kathleen’s Day (more or less)

May 24th, 2007 , 23:18

Got up and headed out to MoMA. Had to stop for breakfast, coffee and bagels in Central Park (well, the edge of Central Park but at least we found a way in!) Then to MoMA. Finally met some rude New Yorkers – the museum staff are pretty unhelpful. However the exhibits are good. Loads of work by dead white men, but other than that it’s good. Of course, one of the pieces I wanted to see, Dali’s The Persistence of Memory is at the Tate Modern right now. So have to go there when I get home! We didn’t spend that long in the museum, only about 3 hours. Then we were off.

Stopped at a hot dog stand and had a hot dog, you have to do that! I must say here that the weather has been wonderful since arriving in NY. It was a bit cold and rainy while we were in Red Bank, but since Monday it has been sunny and warm. Lovely outdoor weather, so we have been walking every where. And for breakfast and lunch today we joined the New Yorkers sitting outside.

We then went to Bloomingdales which claims to have everything but doesn’t. No electronics. So out to go to Macy’s. New Yorkers are very helpful, you can’t open a map without getting directions from someone. Which can be nice but at the same time sometimes we’re just working out the route we want to take. Still we had a couple tell us to take the bus, so we took the bus right to the door of Macys’ – saved us the walk. Macy’s had something like what we were looking for but the salesperson was so awful we decided we’d keep looking. We couldn’t be sure it would do what we wanted! So we walked to the UN building for a look, big boring building; then to the Chrysler Building, big beautiful building. The Chrysler Building is spectacular, especially the lobby. Just lovely. I would have stood and stared for ages but Joe dragged me down the lovely Art Deco staircase to the subway to get back to the hotel. <humph> Still the stairway was nice.

Cooling down before deciding where to go for dinner. Tomorrow we’re off to see more art!

Frog Blog

Empire Day

May 24th, 2007 , 3:18

We jumped on the appropriate tube/metro/underground/subway train to have breakfast at the Empire Diner. It’s an old diner done up in proper style (Art Deco). I had ham and eggs (cooked properly even) and Kathleen had pigs in blankets (K: a bit odd as they were hot dogs in pastry rather than sausage but ok). After a leisurely breakfast we strolled past the Flatiron building to the Empire State Building. Went up the ES and had a good look around. From there took the tube/metro/underground/subway to Chinatown (more Dynasty), strolled around looking at jewelry, food, and the take away aquarium. From there to Little Italy back down the tube/metro/underground/subway and popped up in Greenwich where we sat in the park listening to the bands play. Had a good stroll around looking at architecture (K: yea, right, that’s where all the, um, well, sex shops are! Architecture, right.) before completely our round trip on the subway to 79th Street where we stopped for dinner. We went to a really good Chinese/Japanese restaurant called Ruby Foos.

Kathleen’s report: Short cause we’re tired. We did a little less walking today or rather planned to do a little less walking today. Ended up doing quite a bit anyway. The diner was nifty and the food good. We also saw several odd things today, like a woman on the underground in full graduation regalia, a woman in a clown suit, two guys walking a bunch of dogs, and a bunch of dancers in the underground, including a Micheal Jackson look a like. Fun. It was a day for just stopping and looking at stuff. The Empire State Building is wonderful, great views of course, but also just the decoration on the building, the lifts, the lights, the whole thing. Of course, I love the Art Deco theme. We just walked through the other areas, not really taking a lot of time, but still enjoying everything. A slow look at stuff walk. Of course, Greenwich now has a large gay scene and loads of sex shops, so of course when we get back on the underground we are in a carriage with a bunch of sailors in full Navy uniform. And what do I start thinking? Yep, Village People. Managed not to start laughing though Joe did give me a look; I believe he was thinking the same thing. Dinner was lovely and now off to bed as we’re going to MoMA tomorrow.

Frog Blog