March Weekend - Aimless Walking and Photography

Saturday

After Leena and I got off the phone I had a tough time getting started on my way out... Trying to decide to carry a backpack, not carry one, etc...

It was later than usual by the time I got dressed and out the door...  In the subway station near the apartment I missed a photo op, when I was heading down to the platform on one set of steps were a huge crew of subway construction workers in their orange safety vests and hard hats standing watching a supervisor give them a speech about their workday.  I caught something about "and remember there will be trains passing..."

I walked to the far end of the platform where there was only one other person.  After she noticed the construction workers' lamps going down onto the tracks she asked me if there were trains today and I told her there were, they were probably working on the express track in the middle, where there are no trains this weekend.  But I told her the trains would probably be going slower near this station to reduce the risk of hitting any workers...

In Manhattan I got off the train at 8th Street - NYU, which has some nice tile mosaics in the walls that my father asked me to photograph.  I took a bunch of photos, trying to avoid getting hit by people walking around the platform and being sure to keep an eye on how far back I was from the wall so I wouldn't step off the edge of the platform.  Actually, I planned for that and carried my widest lens, the 11-16mm, that would get whole mosaics without having to step back too far from them.

I couldn't photograph the mosaics on the opposite platform without going up and out of the station, then running my card through on the other side as that station doesn't have a connection between the two directions, or at least, not one I know of.

Up on the street, I got turned around, never having used that station before, I didn't know exactly where I'd exited it.  I walked a little in the wrong direction before I recognized some stores and realized I was on Broadway, not 8th Street like I thought.  So, I turned and went over the direction I wanted, to work my way to the corner of 2nd Avenue and 12th Street...

That's where Shima Japanese Restaurant is, and I was in the mood for sushi for lunch, if you can imagine that...  Lunch was good, sushi...  This time I got the regular salmon roll instead of the spicy salmon roll and it was a lot better.  I think the spicy one they use a specially spiced mayonnaise, which adds a texture I don't like

As I was finishing and paying the bill a couple of slightly older women came in and couldn't decide where to sit.  As soon as I put on my jacket and hadn't even grabbed my backpack from the chair by the window (I'd sat at the one facing the window) and before the busser cleared the table they sat down at it, saying "ah, this one has nice sunshine."

Out on the street I walked up towards Union Square, intending to catch the subway up to Times Square. There was a fancy looking Food Emporium next to it and I stopped in, planning to see what sort of chocolate bars they had.  I wandered around but couldn't find the chocolate section, though I did wander into the tea aisle, where I picked up a few packs of various green teas I hadn't tried before.  It was the first time I've ever used a self checkout at a store, too...  You put all your things on a scale on one side of the scanner, then as you scan each item you put them on a scale on the other side and it tracks the weight to make sure you ring everything up...  Interesting, and convenient for not having a whole lot of items...

I took ended up taking a different train than usual, a 5, from Union Square, up to Grand Central Terminal, which was good for a bathroom break.  From there I walked over to Times Square, stopping in Bryant Park to look at the empty, sand covered space where the wintertime ice skating rink was until a couple of weeks ago...

At Times Square I wandered around a little.  The red stairs where I like to go at the north end were blocked off for some kind of maintenance or something.  I tinkered with the IncrediBooth app on the iPhone 4, which simulates an old style photo booth...

Then I went down into the subway.  The Times Square station has some interesting artwork in the walls in the tunnel connecting it under the street to the Port Authority Bus Terminal, so I wanted to photograph some of that.  Closer to Times Square are big, chunky glass cubes with lots of cermaic stuff inside them and some are interesting.  Under the bus terminal are mosaics with themes related to marbles, the little glass balls for playing games with.  In between are mosaics of people who appear to be celebrating...

Finished up some photography there I used the bathroom in the bus terminal, then went back out to the street.  I walked towards Times Square and checked out a few souvenir shops for fridge magnets.  I got a few, but didn't really like most of the selections.  There were lots of them, but mostly they looked very cheaply made.

Doing that I worked my way down Broadway to Herald Square, by the big Macy's.  Then I noticed the Empire State Building in the sunlight and wandered around it, taking photos with my wide angle lens, until I'd circled back to Broadway.  I followed that down to Madison Square Park, and then walked up 5th Avenue a few blocks until I was getting too close to the Empire State Building for new photos.

I cut across 28th Street, intending to take the subway up to Central Park, but passed a shop selling cheap miscellaneous stuff, that had a sign about watch batteries in the window.  I stopped in there to see about getting the battery replaced in my Seiko, since it's getting warmer and I don't want to wear my Rolex around much of New York City with short sleeves (no need to make myself a conspicuous target...)

An older, Indian fellow in the store said he'd replace my watch battery.  I almost walked out because after I handed it to him, he set it on the counter and then got distracted by another customer coming in and saying "I'll take one of the fake G-Shock watches" and the Indian guy said "no, no, is real" but took one out of a cheap looking cardboard box with a bunch of them in it, and only charged the customer $10 and no sales tax (looking online, Macy's has the same one for $99).

Then he got to my watch...  He popped it open and immediately asked me if anyone else had ever replaced the battery in it, because it looked like someone had done it wrong before.  I told him lots of times, I've had the watch since the mid-1980's.  I mentioned the last time it was replaced was in India and he asked me where, so I told him Pune.  He asked if I was there for a business trip, and I said I lived there for about ten years, got married there and all.  He said "ah, you must speak our language very well?" and I disappointed him by saying "thora, thora..."

I noticed that whoever replaced the batter in India scratched the date and what may be initials or a name I can't read clearly into the inside of the cover.  I know it was from someone in India because the date was 18-6-2009.

While he was working on it another Indian customer came in to pick up a watch that must've been repaired or something and had a conversation in Hindi with him.  I understood a bit of it, and when the other customer left, the guy asked me if I knew what they talked about.

Getting the battery replaced was just $8, and he gave me his card for any other watch repairs I ever need.

Then I took the N train from 28th Street up Broadway to 57th Street and 7th Avenue.  I got off there as there was a building nearby, on 58th Street, I wanted to photograph.  It was a couple of blocks from the station, but I think I got a couple of interesting ones of it.  I don't even know what kind of building it is, except it's 70's sort of modern or something and looking up at it it just looks interesting...

I took some photos from Pulitzer Fountain, a park across from Central Park, in front of The Plaza Hotel, facing the 5th Avenue Apple Store.  At one point while I was there some guy had the nerve to stop right there, on the sidewalk, and take photos...

Then walking up 59th Street I saw a big commercial building with dark, purple glass that was reflecting nearby buildings in an interesting way, but couldn't get a picture of it I was happy with.

A few blocks further on and I caught the subway again, thinking of a hamburger down on 23rd Street at the New York Burger Co.  This time I took a 6 train downtown.  Me and everyone else standing got a surprise when it made a curve on the tracks.  It was on the map, but maybe the driver took it faster than normal or something, as all of us got thrown around a little.  I was ready for the second one, though, since I was standing near the map and looked at the route after the first one...

I got off at 23rd Street, at Madison Square Park and walked west along the bottom of the park, until I got to 6th Avenue and didn't see the restaurant.  Then I remembered it was two blocks down, on 21st Street and went there.  I got a regular New York Burger, which is just a beef patty, lettuce and tomato on a toasted bun, sweet potato fries and a blueberry milkshake.  It was good, just what I expected.

After dinner the sun went down and I walked a few blocks over to the High Line to use the bathroom and enjoy it for a little while before walking up 14th Street to Union Square to get the subway home.

So, all in all, a good day.  I suppose if anyone tracked my movements on a map they'd be confused because I was all over the place, and going back and forth a few times to places, with no obvious pattern except my whims...


Sunday

I was really confused in the morning with the time change, which after ten years in India I'd gotten used to not doing at all.  I had a slight headache, too, but not a terrible one, with my stomach a little but not awfully upset (which usually goes with a migraine).

It was around 12 noon, I think, that I got out of the apartment because I missed an hour there somewhere.  I don't know where the hour went, it seemed like I got up at a reasonable hour, but then it got late fast.

I decided to take my longest lens, the 100-300mm zoom lens.  It's not the most useful for city photography because to get interesting shots of architecture I have to be a long, long way away, which is hard, since there's then buildings in the way.  But there's been a few things I wanted to try it with.

I got off the subway at 14th Street - Union Square and walked up to the High Line where I took the camera out and started taking some photos.

There's one part of the High Line where there's a view of the Statue of Liberty a long, long, long way away.  But I'd never taken the right lens for a decent photo there before.  By coincidence, a block or two from the High Line was a digital traffic sign, and lined up almost directly under the Statue of Liberty it said "expect delays - use alternate route."

With the weather warming up again there were lots and lots and lots of people on the High Line taking photos.  There was hardly any place to move without getting in the way of someone taking a photo.  The wooden lounge benches were full of people once again, and there was a long line of people waiting to look through the viewing box at some modern artwork...  Spring is here!

After using the bathroom on the High Line I made my way back down to the street and zig zagged a bit on the streets, intending to head to Madison Square Park.  When the traffic lights were right I tried taking some photos looking up the avenues while crossing the street, but at my height, it's hard to get good ones over the nearby stopped cars, and having been hit twice before in my life, I'm probably a little overcautious about taking the photo and getting out of the street quickly.

At Madison Square Park I put my camera away and bought a pretzel and bottle of water from a street vendor, then sat down on a bench to eat that while watching the squirrels and birds wandering around looking for food.  That was entertaining for a little bit...

After finishing the pretzel and putting the 2/3 full water bottle in my backpack I hit 5th Avenue...  I worked my way up about 15 blocks to 42nd Street, where I headed off to the right to use the bathroom in Grand Central Terminal.  While I was there I picked up a take-out package of sushi from a counter in the food court.

I took the sushi over to Bryant Park where I grabbed a small, green table and sat down to eat it outside.  It was pleasant there, sort of away from many things, in the middle of the city.  Unfortunately, it was about the worst sushi I've had...  Oh well...

Once I finished eating, I threw away the trash and headed to Times Square.  It wasn't as crowded as the most I've seen it, but still pretty crowded.  It turns out the red steps actually are open and yesterday I was mistaken.  It's not maintenance or construction scaffolding blocking it, it's a stage for some kind of performances.  Nothing was going on in it, but it did obscure the view from the steps.  I hope it won't be there all spring and summer...

By then it felt like it was getting late, since Monday was a workday, so I headed down from 47th Street, where the red steps are, to 42nd Street to get onto the subway and head home to Brooklyn.  The first train that came was an R, which goes right to my apartment.  I sort of dozed off a bit, but got woken up in Brooklyn when a family got on with a screaming kid, who didn't want to get on that train...  Ug...  Fortunately the kid fell asleep within two stops and shut up.

Bring Us Your Poor, Your Huddled... Expect Delays...

I'm sure it's just a coincidence...  But now that I've started the paperwork for Leena's immigration stuff, I was out today and for the first time carried a lens that would let me photograph the Statue of Liberty from the High Line park.  Normally I carry wider lenses, with which the distant statue is barely a few pixel blur, but today I carried the 100-300mm zoom.

Coincidentally, in my line of sight, right under the Statue of Liberty was a digital traffic sign.  Unfortunately without a traffic context, the sign's message could apply...

Minute to Lose It

I've been seeing ads all over recently for a new New York Lottery game called Minute To Win It.  But I really don't like these ads...  They just seem so wrong...

First off...  It's just like the game show?  I looked up the game show, Minute To Win It, since I'd never heard of it (not a surprise as I don't have a TV).  A scratch-off lottery ticket doesn't sound even remotely like the game show.

"But a whole lot easier?"  Isn't that pretty much contradicting that it's "just like the the game show?"  If it's really a whole lot easier, it can't be a challenge like the game show...  Every card is predetermined to be a winner or a loser, with no skill involved what-so-ever, it's all plain luck...

"No Time Limit..." Hmmm...  That bugs me, too, for two reasons...  First of all the name says "minute" in it, and that it's just like the game show, in which contestants have a time limit of one minute.  Plus, the graphic by it shows what appears to be a countdown, sort of making it seem like there's a time limit, you have to what, scratch off the whole card in a minute?

The name having "Win It" makes it sound like it's already a winner...  Never mind the odds of actually winning, especially the $1 million they fuss over, is so low, it's more realistically like "A Minute to Lose 5 Bucks".  And raising hopes of winning up can't be good, considering the majority of people buying losing lottery tickets are the lower income people who can least afford it.  There's a reason it's jokingly called "a tax on people who can't do math."

Cold Hands

As a teenager my mother got worried about my cold, white fingers and a doctor diagnosed me with Raynaud's Phenomenon (fortunately my hands never look as bad as the ones shown in the article!), so it's not uncommon for my hands and feet to be really cold, and sometimes really pale coloured.

In India it was rarely bad, since it's tropical and hot most of the time.  And so far here in New York City, even though the winter, it never got bad, either.  Once in a while in the office, and I usually warmed up one hand at a time wrapping them around a hot cup of tea (fortunately I can use the computer mouse with either hand).  After warming up one hand, when I grab it with the other, the part I was holding onto is often cooler than the rest of the cup.

But I really notice it on the subway, holding onto the metal poles.  They're usually chilly.

But if someone else has recently held one it's hot there.  Sometimes I'll grab onto the pole and then someone else gets off at a station.  It could be several stops later, but I change my grip and hold on where they held on, and the metal still feels hot.  Then if I move my hand to where I'd been holding on for a few stops it'll barely be warmer than the parts no one touched.

When outside most of the winter I walked and walked and kept moving, so that kept my blood flowing without much trouble with circulation.  My fingers got cold when taking photographs, but not the same as the Raynaud's symptoms...

Reading through that Wikipedia article, there's an interesting fact, "Sufferers are more like to have migraine ... than controls."  No doubt...  I certainly have the migraines...

Now that I think about it, maybe that's how I developed my love of long, hot showers...

A Rainy Sunday - MoMA - Japanese food in the East Village

After talking to Leena on the phone, then preparing some papers for the apartment broker, I got dressed and decided to go to the Museum of Modern Art.  I'd purchased a membership in October or November, but the only previous time I went the lobby was crowded I left immediately.  Knowing I was going there, I didn't take my backpack, since those have to be checked, nor my camera, since I wasn't fully clear on the camera policy from their website.

I took the R train, and at 36th Street transferred to an N express train to get there faster.  The MoMA is near (or maybe part of the complex) Rockefeller Center, having been founded by Rockefeller's wife.

I got off the train at 49th Street, near the top of Times Square.  Walking to the MoMA, across from Radio City Music Hall an Indian fellow all by himself stopped me to ask me to take his photo, with his camera.  I asked him what he wanted for a background and he said "the tall buildings" so I did that, and had him move a little over so I could get the Radio City Music Hall sign behind him in a couple as well, as that's a major landmark in the city.

When I got to the MoMA it was jam packed.  I had to go around the revolving door twice because the woman before me stopped right inside and didn't give me room to enter the lobby while she fiddled with her dripping umbrella.  The second time she'd moved away enough I could squeeze past her, but still got splashed slightly by water from her umbrella.

I found my way through the lobby to the entrance to the museum proper, where I gave the attendant my membership card, which she scanned, and I went through.  The other side was pretty packed, too...

I explored all five floors of exhibits.  I liked some of the art and didn't like some of it.  The exhibit on photographs used to prepare for filming action scenes, for instance, just wasn't very interesting.  Some paintings here and there were interesting.  I was more fascinated by an exhibit of industrial designs, like chairs and tables and what-not, most of which were designed by architects.

A few galleries had exhibits that I never would've associated with the term modern art, like Picasso, Cezanne and Monet?  I thought modern art started as sort of a rebellion against those, but now that I'm looking it up online after going there I see my impression was wrong.  There were some works by a famous modern artist, Marcell Duchamp, whose works I'd seen before were mostly kind of silly, but they had some that were actually kind of nice.

Another gallery was full of just Jackson Pollack paintings, some of which I'd seen in art books before.  But none of which I actually liked.  I mean, sure I remember in junior high, it was fun to splatter paint like Pollack, but the end result isn't much to bother looking at…

The single largest crowd of people was standing in front of Vincent Van Gogh's Starry Night painting.  Although there were a tremendous number of people sitting on the benches across from the room-wide Monet triptych, Water Lilies, so many I was uncomfortable walking between them and the painting to get to the other side of room...

It was fun, but super crowded.  In places it felt like trying to walk through Times Square or something.  Lots and lots of people were taking photos, so almost everywhere I tried to walk I stepped in between a photographer and their subject, "oops, sorry, excuse me".  And people reading the little explanations next to paintings would step back without paying any attention to whether someone, like me, was behind them, "oops, sorry, excuse me..."

I don't think I saw it all.  The galleries have lots of entrances and exits between them, so I'm sure I missed something.  But there's also things I'd go back and see again.

Back out on the street I was thinking about sushi again for lunch, down on 12th Street in the East Village, since I quite like a Japanese restaurant I found there.  At the moment it wasn't raining so I sort of considered grabbing a knish near Bryant Park and then walking 30 blocks down and being hungry enough for a full lunch.

But while I was walking from 53rd Street down to 42nd it started raining pretty heavy...  Too heavy to eat a hot, fried snack outside without it getting wet, cold and soggy...  So, I went into Grand Central Terminal, used the bathroom and contemplated getting sushi in the food court there.  However theirs was all packaged and I figured it'd be better to go to a real restaurant and get it fresh.

I grabbed a subway train from Grand Central.  First I got to a platform with one train on either side, so I dashed into the one with an open door closest to the staircase, which turned out to be a 6 local.  The other train, a 5 left, while the 6 just sat there, with the conductor playing the "we're being held momentarily by the train's dispatcher, please be patient" message every couple of minutes, but without going anywhere.  Then a 4 pulled up across the platform, so I went over to that, and immediately the 6 train left, while the 4 I just got into played the same delay message...  Fortunately it didn't play it long, and we were soon underway, with that one being an express train, so the next stop was 14th Street Union Square, exactly where I wanted to go.

At Union Square I got out and got wet in the rain walking a few blocks over to 2nd Avenue and 12th Street, where Shima is located.

Shima was virtually empty, with the only other customers being a Japanese couple at the corner window.  The hostess told me to sit where I wanted so I took a seat looking out the window onto 2nd Avenue.  I ordered the sushi lunch and asked if they had sunomono salad, which is a Japanese salad made with thin sliced cucumber, a little thing sliced carrot, vinegar, sugar and salt that I like.  I didn't see it on the lunch menu anywhere, but she said they had "sunomono mix" on their dinner menu and that it wasn't included with the lunch, but they could "mix it" if I wanted.  I agreed, since I hadn't had it for a long time...

I got my miso soup first and burned my tongue on it as it was piping hot.  When I finished that she brought the sunomono mix, and it was not at all what I expected...  I expected a small bowl of salad, but this was a large square plate with sashimi, slices of fish, mushroom (I think?), crab, a prawn, some things I couldn't identify, and two slices of octopus tentacle.

I never really wanted to try octopus before, and I always wondered what I would do if it ended up on a plate in front of me.  Now I know.  It doesn't have much flavor, and its texture is very, very rubbery, like it was a rubber octopus toy or something...  It was easier to eat it while I was by myself, without someone else watching to see what I do.  I ate both pieces and I wouldn't say they were really bad, but there's so many better things available I definitely wouldn't go out of my way to get it again.

The things I couldn't identify also had a rubbery texture, and I actually don't know if they were animal or vegetable.

Underneath the other stuff there was a bed of sunomono salad that was what I actually thought I was ordering...  And once I found that under there, it went great in combination with the other items as a single mouthful.

I definitely enjoyed the fish, prawn and crab pieces, delicious!

As I was nearly finished with the sunomono mix my plate of sushi came.  This time for the roll I picked spicy salmon, and now that I've had it, I prefer the regular salmon or tuna rolls...  Not that it was bad, but the spicy flavor from it stayed in my mouth and overpowered some of the rest of the subtle sushi flavors, which is quite subtle indeed...  And the fish on the sushi pieces was fresh and tender, melt-in-your-mouth...  Mmmm...

All in all, a delectable meal...

When I finished and paid I grabbed my jacket off the chair back, and the earlier rain had had time to soak through it at the shoulders, so it was kind of cold putting it on.

Back out on the street it was raining harder again and I got wetter on my way to Union Square.  There's a Whole Foods store across the street from Union Square so I figured I'd pop in and see if they had chocolate bars with bacon in them, something I saw a few years ago at a Whole Foods in Los Angeles, which seemed gross at the time but I've been thinking of it since then and would like to satisfy my curiosity...  The store was jam packed with people, although not as crowded as the MoMA.  I passed a truly overwhelming tea selection before finding the chocolate bars.  They didn't have what I wanted, so I didn't buy anything.  And when I returned to the front of the store where the checkouts were, I was glad I didn't find it, or I would've been stuck in that insane line for the checkouts and I have no idea how much longer I would've been there...

So, I got the train home and here I am...

Park Slope, Here I Come - 2011 Apartment Hunt

Okay, it worked out today...  And I don't have the nagging feeling at the back of my head, "uh oh, I may have made a mistake," that I had when I last got an apartment in September.

Late in the morning I got an email from the broker from Rapid Realty, Jason, asking for my phone number.  I emailed it to him, but he didn't call right away.  After a while I got antsy and impatient sitting in the apartment, so I called him up and he asked me some questions about what I was interested in and then we arranged to meet at Rapid's 4th Avenue & 21st Street office at 2pm.

I ate a quick bowl of soup and then got dressed and headed out.  I got to his office around 1:50pm or so and the receptionist told him I was there.  He was still organizing things and getting some keys ready to go out.

Once he had all that he said a new broker, Rico, was going to shadow us to learn the ropes.  Rico ended up having a car, so we drove everywhere instead of walking or taking the train.

The first apartment we looked at was right on the same block as his office, on the corner of 4th Avenue and 21st Street.  It was four or five (I lost count, I was out of breath) floors up, without an elevator, and it wasn't a really nice building.  In the apartment the living room and kitchen combination was tiny.  It had two bedrooms, both fairly big, and a huge bathroom with a fabulously huge window looking out over Brooklyn, and it would be easy to imagine showering in there at night with the lights off and looking at the city, without the city looking back...  One downside was the kitchen was tiny and had almost zero counter space or cabinets.

He said he wasn't sure I would like it, but it was close to their office and he said getting a client into an apartment and asking what they do or don't like about it is an important first step, often more valuable than talking on the phone.

Rejecting that one, for several of those reasons we then hopped into the Rico's car and went a few blocks up to another apartment building on 17th Street, between 4th and 5th Avenues.  Rico has kids so he had a child lock on the door, so when we parked I couldn't get out.  Jason was walking away, not knowing the door couldn't be opened from the inside and gesturing to me to come out, while I shrugged and made a face because I couldn't...  Then Rico apologized and opened the door from outside...

This building looked like it had been grand and luxurious at one time, once very wealthy accommodation, but was fairly decrepit now.  Lots of old carvings in the stone of the building, but long faded and dulled, some cracked off.  Jason was on the phone and using the intercom to try and get us into the building, but no one answered the intercom to buzz us in.  He kept trying and trying until some people were just coming out and let us in.  The lobby was like the outside, really fancy, with grand tiles and details on the moldings and ceiling, but worn out, broken, dirty and obviously not maintained.

We were stuck in the lobby, as we couldn't get in the next door to the hallway and elevator without someone buzzing us through.  Again, we got lucky and some people going out, actually another broker and client, let us in.  Jason asked "where's the elevator?" and they said there isn't one.  He said he was told there was...  He asked me if I wanted to walk up five flights of stairs to see it, and I said forget about it, not another long stair case, not that far up.

Back at the street he asked me a few more questions about what I was looking for, whether I wanted to look at more of the apartments in that part of the neighborhood or what.  I said I wanted to be on lower numbered streets, closer to the top of Park Slope, in a somewhat better building than he'd shown me, and he asked if I was flexible in my budget because that would cost more.  I said I could go another $100 or even $200 a month for something better.

So, we went back to the office for him to do a bit more research on the computer.  I sat in a room by myself he while he did a computer search out in the main area.  After a few minutes he came in and said he wasn't having much luck, as most things that I was really looking for were all not available at the time, with notes in the computer listings like "don't show till May" and stuff...  He said he'd check a bit more and then let me know if there were any options or if it would be a bust.

He came back again and said he found one that wasn't yet listed in the computer on 8th Street, between 5th Avenue and 6th Avenue.  That sounded promising, that's in the heart of Park Slope, a great location.  So we hopped in the car and Rico got lost, he mixed up the Avenues and Streets, but then Jason corrected him and we found it.

It turned out to be the least attractive building on the block, the only one that's not a classic brownstone, but an apartment building with hardly any character on the outside...  At first I thought "ug, oh no..."

We went into the first part of the lobby, and Jason kept trying to buzz people on the intercom to let us in.  Inside the locked door it looked somewhat fancy, modern and rich, so that was more promising than the outside.  Jason was talking to the building superintendent on the phone who was telling him to try buzzing one apartment after another on the intercom, 2C, 3C, 3D, 2D, 4C, 4B and so forth, but only one person even answered their intercom and didn't stay on the line to talk to us...

Eventually some people were leaving, yet another broker and client, in fact, and we went through the door as they left.  The elevator was pretty fancy for an apartment building, with doors on both sides of it, quite high tech, and that took us up to the 2nd floor.  Stepping out of the elevator was like being in the hallway of a nice hotel.  Of course, once away from the elevator, the hallway was a bit shabby...

The apartment itself was nice, though.  It's big.  One bedroom and a large, large living room and dining area.  The dining area has mirrors on the walls which make the room seem a lot bigger than it really was, and helped reflect light from the windows so it was quite bright in there, despite being cloudy outside.

The bedroom was big, the bathroom was good sized.  The kitchen had a lot of cupboards, with shelves low enough for me to easily reach them, and a lot of counter space.  It even has a dishwasher (but since I prefer to hand wash dishes, it's still useful as a drying rack without taking up counter space on a drain board).  There were a couple of closets in the apartment, including one with a hookup for a washer and dryer, which aren't included, but can be purchased.

So, I said I'd take this one.  And it's still a couple of hundred bucks a month lower than my initial maximum budget...

We then drove up to one of their farther offices in Bedford-Stuyvesant, where they have a debit card machine and I filled out some applications.  I paid a month's rent to reserve it for now.  I have to supply some financial paperwork, bank statements and salary slips, and then if my credit check passes we'll arrange a time over the next two weeks to actually meet with the landlord and sign the lease and I'll pay the rest at that time.

After wrapping up at their distant office, in a part of town I hadn't been, Rico gave me a lift back to a more familiar neighborhood.  We had an interesting chat in the car.  He works half the year doing movie making stuff, but now that he has two kids wants to do the real estate brokerage work to earn money the other half of the year.  He asked me a bit about India and said that his 6 year old daughter picked India as a place to visit, and he told her if she could find it on a map of the whole world, then he would save money to take her there, and she instantly pointed right to it, so now he's saving money to go there.

After he dropped me off I walked around a bit in Park Slope, then at 9th Street I took the subway home.

So, that's that...  It's a great location, just a block and a half walk from cool restaurants and shops on 7th Avenue and a good neighborhood.  It's not on the "fringe" but right in the heart of it.  Close to two subway stations a couple of blocks either direction.  A big park, Prospect Park, is also nearby.

Here's a link to it on Google Maps.

7th Avenue, to the right of it is the key restaurant and shopping street, with 5th Avenue and 4th Avenues to the left of it being a bit less classy shopping and restaurants, but probably lots of useful things, including 24 hour small food shops and take-away delicatessens.

For me it's probably about an hour walk to the office, though that could be reduced if I learn my way through the park.

Rico and Jason

Jason in the doorway

There's Rico on the left

Art - Code on the Subway?

I've seen this poster on the subway lately and I like it (I took the image itself from the MTA's website).

I didn't notice it the first time I saw it, but what's with the letters and numbers on the bottom?

They're presented as the symbols for the various subway lines, including the colour the subway system uses on trains, signs and maps for each line, but there's no obvious order and the strings are different lengths.  Several are duplicated, but not all of them...  All of the subway lines are represented.

I suspect it's an encrypted message...

The symbols are:
LZN ABG3S FRJME76D R41CBS 5MQL2

Any ideas?  I've tried a few simple, basic decryption attempts, but no luck so far...

-------------
Follow up on March 4, 2011

I wrote to the artist, Takayo Noda to ask if I was on the right track...  This is her reply:

Thank you for your Question / Comment.
I wish I had an exciting code to give you but the line numbers and letters are placed for the visual purpose. However, I was careful with not spell out any words with the letters.

Safety in Crown Heights

I work in the Crown Heights neighborhood of Brooklyn, which is predominantly lower class black, along with lots of French speaking blacks from Caribbean area, with a smaller, but very visible community of Hasidic Jews.  Unfortunately it's not one of the safest neighborhoods in New York City...

I'm sometimes a bit nervous walking from the subway station to the office.  It's about five or six blocks, but I go through the sort of edge of the neighborhood where I see the ethnic mix pretty strongly.

This New York Times article from early December last year mentions that there had been 66 shootings up till that point in the year in Crown Heights.  Later in December there were at least two more murders that I know of, both on the same block as our office.  One was a body the police found in the empty derelict building directly across the street.  The other was an armed robbery gone bad in the laundromat in the same building as our office.

After the laundromat one a coworker of mine recognized the victim as someone he hadn't met but saw in the same Russian immigrant synagogue he went to, so he bought a bullet-proof vest that he wears everything he comes in and out of the office, even for lunch or a quick walk to the office of our biggest customer, two doors down from us...

Now that my apartment lease is almost finished I mentioned at work that I'm about to start looking for a new apartment.  One of my coworkers, who lives a few blocks from the office asked, "why not move ot Crown Heights?".

I told him I don't feel very safe there.  He said it's safe, there's nothing to worry about.  I mentioned I feel a bit uncomfortable walking to the office from the train station and he said "well, that's just the fringe of Crown Heights where it's a bit rough, other parts are much nicer."  I mentioned the two murders in December and thought about it and said even his wife doesn't feel safe there, but he hadn't really taken her seriously before, but now that I brought it up she might actually have something...

In any case, I'm more interested in the Park Slope neighborhood for now...

Old Business Plan....

I was just reading a blog by a woman, Kelli, who moved to New York City last year and in one post she mentioned $6 for Cheerios in Manhattan.  I'm only paying $5 (plus tax) here in Brooklyn...

But it reminded me of a similar situation a little over a decade ago when I lived in Beaverton, Oregon and worked for First Insight in Portland, Oregon, before the office moved out to Hillsboro...

A bunch of my coworkers lived in student housing in downtown Portland.  They were paying significantly higher for Nestle Quik chocolate milk mix in downtown Portland than I was paying out in the suburbs.  So for a while I was buying it for $4.99 and selling it to them for $5 in the office.

When the boss announced the office was moving and that everyone who lived in downtown Portland would be moving out to apartments in Hillsboro (and consequently shopping at the same store I shopped at) I told him it wasn't fair, that he was putting me out of business, and explained that I had a good business plan in place, earning $0.01 per tub of Quik, with my expectations for my friends to drink 30,000 glasses of chocolate milk a month, each...

MTA Apps are Whiz Kid Certified

Lately the subway trains have had ads posted on them by the Metropolitan Transit Authority, who runs them, about the various improvements they're making to New York City's transit system.  As one says "a city is only as good as its transit system."

One of them admits that they didn't create their own apps, "Our apps are whiz kid certified.  Instead of developing transit apps ourselves, we gave our info to the people who do it best."

Now, as what they would probably qualify as a "whiz kid" I don't think I'd certify the app based on the screen shot they show.  From a UI perspective it looks awful.

A quick glance at it and I'm confused.  Those are definitely subway lines, but if I was looking for one, they don't seem to be in any order.  The rectangle in the upper left makes sense, 1 2 3 and 4 5 6 on the next line.  But why is J between 3 and 7?  That makes no sense!

My first thought was maybe they were ordered by their routes, although that might make sense for someone who really knows the whole system, knows that 2 3 4 & 5 all run pretty near each other for long distances.  But if that was the case, why isn't J by Z?  J and Z run perfectly parallel their whole routes and are so tied together a famous singer even used the J & Z lines as his stage name...

Or maybe I should make an allowance for half the screen being cut off from the ad?

Hopefully it's not made by the same people who wrote the software that creates their status alerts on their home page.  During last week's blizzard one had this:

MTA Service Notice

Due to ongoing snow related conditions:

There is no train service between the Astoria-Ditmars Boulevard Station and the Coney Island-Stillwell Avenue Station in both directions.   

There is no train service between the Coney Island-Stillwell Avenue Station and the Whitehall Street Station in both directions.

Please allow for additional travel time.

Ok, sounds reasonable.  One of my coworkers, who very, very rarely takes the subway, went to the Q station nearest her and found out it was closed.  She thought it was running.

I did, too.  Until I looked at a route map.  Turns out Astoria-Ditmars and Coney Island are opposite ends of the lines.  Basically, that Q notice translates to "there is no Q service" because it's not running from the stations at each end of the line.

My guess is the MTA must have some application which lists the lines and they just check the first and last stations that are out of service and it generates the message for their web page.  But it doesn't recognize that if the first and last stations on a line are checked, then the whole line is out of service.

New Year's Eve in New York

Whew, that was fun.

Nitu and I arranged to meet at the 40th Street Port Authority Bus Terminal at 4:30pm, then Meenakshi and Deepak were supposed to get there around 5:30pm.

I work up with a nasty headache in the morning and took a long, long shower with the lights off, took Excedrin, aspirin and a Suminat through the late morning and early afternoon, and cooked a high protein breakfast of a salmon fillet.  The medicines had some side effects and shortly before I left the apartment my hands were shaking so much I thought I might end up trimming a whole finger while I was trying to clip my nails.

But things eased off in transit.  I got to Manhattan around 3pm, and got off the train at 23rd Street & Broadway, figuring a bit of a walk would be nice, and I was early.  The streets were more crowded than normal, and there was a lot of really dirty snow, or partially melted and refrozen as ice all over.  At all the curbs when stepping off the sidewalks there were puddles of slush, and some were just blocked by the plowed snow.

At Madison Square Park a young couple with some kind of foreign accent stopped me to ask "is there a liquor store near here?".  I didn't know of one, off hand, but I've seen so many around Manhattan that I told them I didn't think they could walk too far and not see one if they pay attention.  I also pointed out a lot don't say "liquor" but "wines & spirits".

The higher up the streets I got the more police were out and about, within a few blocks of Times Square there were walls of them along the buildings at every intersection.  Even more than them were street vendors everywhere selling 2011 glasses and paper hats, and unfortunately, vuvuzelas...

I got to the Port Authority Bus Terminal around 3:30pm, used the bathroom then decided I was still pretty early, and it was quite warm inside, so I headed out to walk for half an hour or so.  I was on my way back, around 4pm, two blocks away when Nitu called to say she'd arrived, so I hurried back in.

We met up at our usual spot, above the stairs leading down to the subway and Nitu wanted to see what Times Square looked like with the celebrations just starting.  We got out on 8th Avenue, but it was packed.  Across the street the police had barricades and walls of cops at every street leading towards Times Square and weren't letting anyone in.  We walked a few blocks up, but it was al the same, and the sidewalk was super packed with people.

Back in the bus station we checked out the bowling alley on the second floor to find out the prices.  We thought about playing a couple of games while we waited, but by then my feet and shoes were wet and I didn't want to take my shoes off, and then have to put them back on wet after we played.  That would be too uncomfortable, and it's hard to put wet shoes on comfortably.

We waited in a Casa Java cafe in the station, talking about work stuff.

Meenakshi and Deepak were a bit later than we expected.  They'd made 7:30pm reservations at an Indian restaurant, Bay Leaf, for us.  Nitu expected them around 5:30pm, but they turned up closer to 6:30pm.

We took the subway over to the restaurant on 56th Street, though it took two trains to get there. I would've just taken one, the R, but when I said "it's not far" they didn't trust my measure of walking distances, since they all know I walk long, long distances on a regular basis...

Dinner was good.  We started with a round of drinks.  I got a lychee martini that was okay, I think my expectation was more fruity than it was, which was more alcohol.  We got a plate of paneer from their tandoori menu for a starter and that was delicious.

We stayed there for a couple of hours, visiting and talking and having a good time.

Deepak taking photos

After dinner we went out onto the street and walked down 6th Avenue, with Deepak and I using our cameras a bit.  He's a lot taller and probably got better shots over other peoples heads than I could get.  Meenakshi and Deepak wanted to get to the 7 train to head back to Queens, while Nitu wanted to get to the Port Authority terminal, but it was on the opposite side of Times Square, that was completely closed off by police.

A police officer said to cross over to the other side would require going down to 38th Street, the highest open cross street.  But going down 6th Avenue they'd blocked it off, so we couldn't go down anymore.  Another office said we could get the subway shuttle train at Grand Central Terminal, so we went that way.

The shuttle took us under 42nd Street to the Times Square station.  In the station there was a wall of police preventing people from going to any exits to Times Square, leaving only transfer to other trains or the under street tunnel to the Port Authority, so we went that way.

We said goodbye to Meenakshi and Deepak there so they could get the 7 train, while Nitu and I went through the turnstiles to the Port Authority.  She got a bus ticket and after using the bathroom I hit the streets again.

I walked around, but 8th Avenue leading up towards 42nd Street was like a wall of people and I couldn't move anywhere, so I turned around and went down.  I thought maybe I'd check out 38th to see if I could get to 7th Avenue from down there.  At 38th the police had barricades set up, and they were letting people out from where I was, but no one in.  One guy even went out but then tried to turn around and they just grabbed him and told him "you left, you can't come back" while the guy was pointing to someone near me saying "but my friend is right there, I have to get in!" and they wouldn't let him.  When a few others of us wanted to get out, they dragged the guy out of the way so we could pass.

I walked up 38th Street, but before 7th Avenue it was so crowded I couldn't move anywhere close to next avenue to see up, so I turned around headed back to 8th Avenue where I walked down to 36th Street.  Not seeing a big crowd in the distance, I walked up there to 7th Avenue and had a narrow view of Times Square between the buildings up the street.

Fireworks in Times Square
at midnight.

I got there just about midnight so I could see the fireworks being fired off from a building in Times Square.  After a few minutes it was over and there was a mass migration of people down the street.  For once I was in a crowd and it was all going the same way and easy to walk in...

I cut across to Broadway and walked down there, to walk home.

Going down Broadway, here and there I passed people, mostly women, crying and from the little bit I could hear as I went by, they were talking to friends about break-ups.  Must have been the night for changes for people...

At 32nd Street & Broadway some guy asked me "hey, do you know how to get to 14th Street?" and I pointed down Broadway and said "straight that way".  Then he asked "how far is it?" and I couldn't quickly calculate it, but said something like "12 blocks or so" and he said "no, it can't be that far...  What?  4 blocks?".  Then we stood there, struggling to calculate that it was 18 blocks. Must've been tired.

Near the Flatiron I was waiting to cross a street, while a few others were around on both sides.  Some woman in a short skirt and knee high boots came running through and then tripped and fell in the street, sliding on the wet pavement and scattering her bag and hat all over...  She rolled over, didn't instantly get up, and people were asking "are you alright?" but she didn't answer.  Then as people approached her, she crawled, gathered her things, stood up and started running again the same direction.  Halfway down the block she was waving and yelling to get the attention of someone much farther...  People said "well, I guess she's okay..."

Champagne cork at the end of the
night...

On my way down Broadway I passed a lot of drunken people, but almost all pretty cheerful, wishing random strangers a happy new year.  One woman was going the opposite direction, carrying a bottle and some big plastic party favor or something and as she neared me she stumbled on her high heels, arms flailing, but didn't fall.  She looked at me, smiled and giggled a bit.

I made my way to the Brooklyn Bridge, near City Hall, and crossed over that.  I wasn't sure about how safe it would be, but figured I'd keep an eye on people in the distance and behind me.  It turned out nearly everyone walking on it was either a couple, or two women with one man or three women groups (well, and me).  Except for me, nearly everyone was pretty well dressed, too.  I think I scared one woman, though.  I was making a good pace on foot, but she kept stopped to take photos, and even though I slowed down a little so I wouldn't end up overtaking her, I did because she stopped near a tower for longer, and when she finished and turned around to see who was behind her, I was much closer than I'd hoped to be by the time she noticed me...  Once she saw me she nearly ran to catch up to her group.

Glitter on the sidewalk

The view of Manhattan at night from the bridge was fantastic.  All lit up and everything.  Very nice.

On the Brooklyn side I was making good walking time, but up ahead, on a long, long, straight walking path in the middle of the street, with no way on or off except ahead or behind, there were two more obviously drunk women,  all dressed up for a party and stumbling pretty bad, weaving back and forth, taking the whole width of the walkway (which was narrower than usual because of unmelted snow on the sides).  As I got closer and closer I started saying "um, excuse me, behind you" a few times so they'd know I was behind, but they didn't acknowledge me at all or turn around, but they both managed to weave left at the same time and I dashed past them on the right and scooted ahead...

By the time I hit downtown Brooklyn my feet were aching bad.  Going through the Brooklyn streets there were more, and deeper puddles than I encountered in Manhattan, and my feet just got wetter and wetter and more uncomfortable. I could feel the blisters forming and hurting...

I used my iPhone to find exactly where I was and how to get to the Atlantic Avenue - Pacific Street subway station and worked my way there.  Crossing a street on Flatbush Avenue there was a deeper puddle than any others and got both feet soaked, which in one way was good, they were both equally soaked instead of an imbalance of one of them more than the other...

At the Atlantic Avenue - Pacific Street station there was obvious signs of people having been sick in the station.  Near the turnstiles a large police officer was talking to several young women, one of them utterly hysterical, sitting on the ground and I thought she was tearing her clothing.  I couldn't make out anything she was yelling, the officer was forcefully telling them to calm down, and another was yelling at the hysterical one, "he don't fuckin' need you!".

But that faded out as I went down the steps to the platform.  On the platform there was vomit at the bottom of five or six pillars in a row, and I just kept going past that, far enough not to smell it.  Lots of very tired people were down there waiting for the train.

When I got out of the 53rd Street station near my apartment shortly before 3am the sidewalk was filled with extremely well dressed people with more going in and out of the church on the street corner, so it looked like they had some event that evening.

I stayed up just enough to drink, without gulping, some seltzer and then off to bed.

Weekend Adventures and Lens Shopping in Manhattan

Saturday

After Leena and I got off the phone in the morning I got dressed and made the dry cleaner my first task, to pick up this week's clean laundry.  I also set up the humidifier with a completely full reservoir to run while I was out so the room wouldn't be too dry when I returned.

After getting my laundry I packed up my camera with my best general use lens, put the MacBook into its neoprene sleeve and my backpack, put on my sweatshirt and jacket and headed out to the subway station.

The train felt slow, like it wasn't running fast and spending longer than usual at the stations, with the announcement that "we are being held momentarily by the train's dispatcher, please be patient."  I got off at 14th Street - Union Square, where much of the station was full of people dressed up like Santa Claus, whooping, hollering and jumping over the turnstiles, then walked a few blocks to the Apple Store on 14th.

I ran into roving bands of Santa Clauses, many drunk and drinking, all the way from Union Square throughout my walk up to Times Square, but none at all farther up than Times Square.  The largest groups of them were smoking and drinking outside all the bars between Madison Square Garden and Times Square.

In the Apple Store, I started asking one guy for help, who got another guy, who got another guy.  In the end, it turned out they didn't have RAM for my "legacy" computer in stock (legacy being two years old) at the store, where they keep only things like that for the current models.  The final guy I talked to recommended I go to another store, Tekserve, on 23rd & 6th, and said they'd definitely have it.  He gave me detailed instructions to get there on the subway and said when I got out to look for the red Apple logo.

Instead of the subway I walked, since my plan was to walk all day, except for time in the store.  It wasn't too hard to find, except their big flag with the Apple logo was blue, not red.  It wasn't an Apple company store, but another dealer that specializes in Apple.  At the front information desk they asked what I wanted and I said RAM for my MacBook installed so I got a blue ticket and was told to go and wait by the big fish tank.

I waited.  The iPod help desk went through five or six numbers while I was waiting by the fish tank, and after about fifteen minutes of not hearing any calls for blue tickets, and noticing another whole row of seats on the opposite side of the fish tank, possibly all people waiting for computer service, I gave up and left.

From there I planned to check out all the grey market camera, computer and souvenir dealers that are all around the Times Square area and look for the lens a friend recommended, which also has really good reviews on Amazon and other camera sites.

Beginning around Broadway & 34th, by Herald Square, I started popping into every one of those shops I saw and asking for the Tokina 11-16mm lens, and every one of them shook their head and said they didn't have it.  A few were pretty hardcore salesmen who then tried to sell me other lenses.  One salesman asked, "why would you trust your friends' opinion instead of a pro, like me, would you smoke marijuana if your friends suggested it?"

I stopped at the north end of Times Square to climb up the red staircase and take some daytime photos of the crowds there, and the continued on..

Finally, after around 20 shops, at one shop the guys there said they had one, and did some digging around and some phone calls and said it was in their warehouse.  He asked if I wanted the f/2.8 or the f/3.5 and I said the f/2.8, which confused me.  I thought I'd done my homework on this and didn't know there was another one.  The price he quoted me was very, very low, too.  Maybe that was because it was grey market, but still, that was only 2/3 the regular price from all the legitimate dealers.  He asked if I wanted anything else and I said "no, that's all that's in my budget for now," to which he asked "so, what is your budget?" and I explained it wasn't fixed, just all I'd budgeted for was one lens and he kept on, "come on, tell me your budget, we've got lots of other stuff..."  I didn't, but I gave him my phone number and he gave me his card about when he could get the lens from the warehouse on Monday or Tuesday...

Back outside I kept walking up, in the direction of Central Park, still checking out more shops and all of them saying they didn't have it, eventually I got into a neighborhood with more classy sorts of shops and fancy hotels and no more grey market electronics dealers and started enjoying the walk a bit more and site seeing.

I made my way up to Central Park, but didn't cross the street to go in.  Just walked on Central Park South.  All the fancy hotels had big heat lamps set up over the sidewalk by their entrances and that felt nice, very noticeably warm.

On 5th Avenue, on the opposite corner from Central Park was another Apple store.  I'd seen it before, but never gone in.  It's so busy there it has a line to get in.  The store is below ground and on street level all that's visible is a big, glass cube with a big Apple sign and the elevator to go down.  The elevator is circular and all glass, with the glass bent into a circle.  Fortunately there were stairs spiraling around it, so I went in to check it out without waiting in line for the elevator...  But it was super busy and I didn't stay long, almost straight back up to the street again because it was crowded it was hard to move around.

From there I felt like using a bathroom, so I figured I'd just walk back down to 42nd Street and use the one at Grand Central Terminal.  It was quite a bit of walk.  On the way, St. Bartholomew's Church had a big Christmas shopping fair set up on the sidewalk, and some orange juice company was giving out free samples so I got a bottle of that for quick refreshment.

I walked down Park Avenue because from a distance I was curious what the buildings were that were sort of blocking the street.  That turned out to be the Helmsley Building and the Met Life Building, and though I didn't figure it out at first, Grand Central Terminal.  After going under the Helmsley Building I found out where I was and entered Grand Central Terminal, but a door I'd never gone in before and I got lost inside and couldn't find the bathrooms.  I exited it so I could see where on the streets I was and walk around to a place I knew, so that worked out.  Inside the line for the ladies' room stretched some way into the food concourse, with probably at least 50 women waiting...

Back on the street again I decided to walk up Lexington Avenue.  I watched the movie, The Seven Year Itch with the iconic photo of Marilyn Monroe standing on a subway grate, enjoying the wind blowing up from underneath (in the movie it's summer and the wind is cooling).  I figured out where that was and figured I'd walk up there.  The buildings are all different, or completely renovated at street level, so nothing looks the same and the older shops and restaurants, visible in still photos, are all gone.  But in the cold, the warm air blowing up from the subway, sure does feel good!

After that, on my way back down to a restaurant I saw on Lexington and thought might be good for dinner, if it wasn't crowded, I passed a good looking camera store, Camera Land, a real camera store, not a discount, grey market camera and computer dealer.  So, I went back and stopped in and asked if they had the lens I wanted.  One guy directed me to another, the "lens expert" who said he did have one stock.  I said I'd take it.  He had to search around the store a bit to find the cabinet key, but he got it out and rang me up and I walked out with it.  So, that was great, after all that searching and not even most online dealers having it.

A couple of blocks from there I stopped on a bench and swapped lenses, putting the new one on the camera and sticking the old one in the new one's box.  My first photos with the new lens ended up being the same St. Bartholomew Church where I got the orange juice earlier, simply because I was on the same street again, but the lens was great in the evening light.

I worked may way towards Times Square.  Last week, when those women on 5th Avenue in Brooklyn asked me about Rockefeller Center, I looked it up online and found out there was some park like stuff there and thought I'd go check it out.  And that was a mistake.  Because of the Christmas tree there, the crowd was insane.  I ended up in Rockefeller Plaza and packed in so tight I couldn't move at all some of the times, and couldn't not move some of the times as the whole crowd would just sweep me along.  A few times when a stream of people were actually moving, my camera strap would get caught in other peoples' accessory straps because we were all so close and it would take a bit of quick untangling to get loose.

It took around half an hour to move just over a block and get out of the worst of it.  Fortunately my camera, backpack, wallet and phone were all still with me.

It was a relief to get to the relatively uncrowded Times Square again.  Relative, of course, as it was as crowded as normal, but Rockefeller Center was just that much more crowded!

I wanted to test out the new lens at night in Times Square and see how it performed.  I worked my way up the red steps on the north end and had some fun playing around.  I tried various settings on the camera to compare how they came out.

Once I was done up there, I hit the streets.  I worked my way down, on Broadway, 7th, and 6th Avenues and some of the cross streets.  I stopped at Madison Square Park around 23rd Street to take some photos.  I thought I'd grab a quick bite at the Shake Shack there until I saw the line and decided not to bother.  Instead I continued my way down Broadway to Union Square, where I stuck my camera back in my backpack and hit the subway to Brooklyn.

Getting off at 53rd Street, I dropped my backpack off in the apartment and headed up to buy groceries, thinking I'd fry up another salmon fillet, but when I got to the store around 7:40pm, it was closed and shuttered.  I got a couple of slices of pizza next door instead.

When I returned to the apartment I found the bedroom, which I'd left closed hours earlier and the humidifier on, was quite warm and tropical.  I don't know if it was the door being closed, since I'd never actually closed it before, or if the humidifier really put out that much heat.  It was nice..


Sunday

Okay, a bit less today...

I didn't mention it one way or another, but I had a light migraine in the morning when Leena and I talked on the phone, and was in the "denial" phase of hoping it'd go away on its own (which is extremely rare).

It was raining heavily while we were talking, but after I finished with shower after we called and stuffed my camera with the new lens into the waterproof, underwater camera bag, got my shoes on (first time I've worn shoes instead of sandals in a couple of weeks) and my double layer of sweatshirt and jacket, the rain pretty much stopped...  It wasn't obvious from inside, with the rain splattered windows, though...

I got outside and took the R train towards Manhattan.  I almost gave up, as the train was running so slow.  The announcement was a problem on with signaling on the Manhattan Bridge, which was backing up train traffic with all the trains that share lines with ones that go over the bridge.  It took much longer than usual to get to Manhattan.

My first goal was to try out the new wide angle lens at a neat plaza, with an interesting configuration of circular and spiral benches, outside the Javits Federal Building, a few blocks up from City Hall, so I got off the train at City Hall and walked up.  I'd been to that plaza once before, but tried a funky program on the iPhone to take panorama shots, which didn't work well.  Only this time it was blocked off with fences.  I walked around it and found a notice on the fence that it was closed for construction, with an expiration date of the construction permit in April.  No idea when it'll be open again for photos.

A little bummed out, and no rain to try out the waterproof bag, I worked my way up and west towards the High Line.  It was fun walking through neighborhoods like TriBeCa, Greenwich Village and whatever else there was.  I stopped by at Washington Square Park, near NYU so I could use the public bathroom.  On a bench there I also removed my camera from the waterproof bag, giving up on any possibility of rain by then, as there wasn't even a drizzle from the sky...

Once I got to the lower end of the High Line, I took my camera out of my backpack and started taking pictures.  It was fun.  I walked the length of the park, trying out different settings on the camera to see how things would come out.  It's the first time I brought such a wide angle lens there, so my pictures are a closer approximation of what I see when not looking through the camera.

Fortunately everyone seemed to be up at Rockefeller Center, so it wasn't crowded at all.  I was even able to get down to the windows in the "Living Theatre" part of it, which is a set of benches going down to some windows that overlook 10th Avenue where it the High Line crosses it.  I got a bunch of photos of cars going by underneath.

After getting to the end of the currently open section of the High Line I went back down to the street.  It felt like it was getting a little late for a Sunday, especially given how slow the subway was getting to Manhattan, so I worked my way down to 14th Street.  On 14th I stopped for a quick frozen yogurt, then grabbed a train at Union Square back to Brooklyn.

In Brooklyn again, I got off at 59th Street, a stop past mine, so I could hit the grocery store on the way back and pick up another salmon fillet.  Fortunately it was open this time and I got what I wanted.

In the apartment I fried it up, pretty much like last time, but with a lid.  This time, though, I let the pan really heat up before I dumped stuff in.  I had the gas on kind of low, but the butter scorched the instant I put it in.  It was already turning black and smelling burnt after I put it in and before I even got the wrapper in the trash bag.  The fish got a bit burnt on the outside, and still undercooked on the inside, but less so than Friday's.

Sunday - Long Island City in Queens

So, Leena and I got off the phone I took a longer than planned shower because the hot water just felt so good, then got dressed, picked a couple of lenss and tossed the camera and a bottle of water into my backpack and out I went.

Even heading out the door I still wasn't sure what I planned to do with the afternoon, or where I planned to go.  The train ride felt slow, and I fell asleep somewhere in Brooklyn, waking up when we hit the sunshine of the Manhattan Bridge, and dozing again before the train went back underground.

I got off at 42nd Street - Times Square, then walked up 42nd to Grand Central Terminal to use the public washroom there (it's good to know where the handy public washrooms are in the city, and this is one of the nicest).  That's when I decided to take the 7 train from Grand Central under the East River to Queens and check out Long Island City, a neighborhood there with a state park, Gantry Plaza State Park I wanted to see.

Getting out of the subway station I didn't know exactly which direction to go at the intersection, so I made a guess based on the shadows from the sun, which turned out to be the right way.

The Gantry Plaza State Park is built from some old piers and industrial stuff for unloading cargo ships, but it's no longer used for that purpose.  Each of the piers has a slightly different theme, like one has a long, long bench, another has metal seats that look like a bar, another has more lounge-like wooden seating and so forth.  It's really cool!

Unfortunately, it was also really cold!  As it's on piers sticking out into the East River, there was a biting cold wind whipping down from the north and my fingers got kind of numb.

A few other people were there, but not very many.  It looked like a wedding party went there, too, for post-wedding photos, as the elderly groom was dancing and twirling the bride around, and a few bridesmaids had flashy, shiny satin dresses peeking out from under long, heavy winter coats.

I took a bunch of photos until my camera's batter ran out, then a few more with the iPhone.

A couple of the piers in the park are lined up just right so you look across the river and straight down 42nd Street in Manhattan.

Near the park are some new, modern, fancy looking high rise apartment buildings, too, that look like they could be nice to live in.

Once I was cold enough I went back to the subway station and back to Grand Central Terminal.  I out there and walked back to Times Square where I caught the subway back to Brooklyn.  It was another long subway ride, with a lot of stops, and at a couple waited for each of the parallel trains to stop and go for people to switch between them.  Some elderly woman was sketching pictures of people and showing a couple of little girls how she did it.

I got off at 45th Street, one stop before mine, and went up to 5th Avenue to get a couple of slices of pizza.  On 5th Avenue & 46th Street a couple of women stopped and asked if I could help them.  They asked "where's the Christmas Tree?" and I was puzzled and asked "tree?" and they said "the big one at Rockefeller Center?".  I explained they were in the wrong borough, that Rockefeller Center was at 5th Avenue and 40-something Street, in Manhattan, and they were in Brooklyn.  I gave them directions to get there on the subway (which is pretty easy, go down one block to 4th Avenue and both trains that stop there will go to Times Square...).

Then I got my two slices of Sicilian plain cheese and a small soda at Charlie's Pizzeria and walked back to the apartment...  Since my camera ran out of batteries I can't get the photos off it till the battery is recharged and I can turn it on...

What makes a book?

Nearly every day on the subway I see ads for audible.com, selling audiobooks, of mostly pretty popular titles.  Some trains have ads all the way across, from one end to the other, like this:

But one thing it got me wondering is...  

What is a "book"?

I've always thought of books as paper with printed words or pictures or combinations, and more recently with ebooks, electronic versions of printed words and pictures and combinations.  But the key thing to me is that a book is words.

But these audio books, are they still books?  Where's the dividing line between a book and a performance?  How often would we go to a play and after it's finished say "wow, that was an amazing book!"?  We might say it's based on an amazing book, but we don't refer to the play as the book.

I've only ever listened one audiobook, a performance, definitely a performance, of The Hobbit, performed by one of my favorite actors, Nicol Williamson (more famous for playing Merlin in Excalibur). This is something done long before audiobooks were commonplace, so I don't know if modern ones are similar.  In it, he did all the narration and all the voices, giving each character a distinctly different voice.  I've listened to it a hundred times or more since my mother got the tapes in the late 70's.  Williamson has probably become my favorite actor simply because of how many times I listened to that through my child hood...

And I sometimes wonder what a modern audiobook might sound like.  But I expect to be disappointed if I ever listen to one, because I can't imagine many actors doing as good a job as Williamson did for my favorite story.

But back to the original question in my mind, I have no doubt that the one I have heard was a performance, not a book.  I never thought of it as a book, but only as a dramatic performance of a story.  And maybe that's part of why I don't want to listen to an audiobook, by calling it a book instead of a story or a performance, my expectations are set for disappointment.