Just for a change I thought I would wake up at 3 am and see if NYC ever does sleep. Certainly the Emergency services don’t and thinking of starting a new business adventure here – selling silent sirens. CLP and I line up our relative time zones for a Facetime early morning me ( 5 am) and early evening for her (8pm) After the first one she said that seeing a 57y year old at 5 am in the morning had shaken her badly so we gave today’s hookup a miss. Lets catch up with Dead Set Legends podcasts instead. Then it was time to see if somewhere buried in the world shattering news reporting there was a chance of a weather report. Looking at the grim face of the weather man it looked bad until I realised he was only pissed off because he couldn’t use “bone chilling” today. It was going to be a positively balmy zero degrees. My initial plans went out the window as I quickly googled “nude sunbathing beaches NYC”. Sadly it was a forlorn search so went back to Plan A
First stop was breakfast at Little Collins on Lexington – another Aussie invader. Very good and shall return. I had a 9 am booking at 911 Museum/Memorial so did the subway thang but arrived way too early and strangely the 7 foot security guys were wary of someone hanging around decked out in sunglasses, hoodie and beanie and looking pissed off. When I explained that Tony Abbott was our PM and I had suffered enough for one year they let me stay around. 8:45 rolled around and went through the security check etc and then into the museum. For people that can be over the top patriotic the Yanks can do sombre reverence well and it is a moving and worthy memorial. Maybe the absolutely wrecked fire truck was the most memorable for me but it is not the place you go looking for highlights of the tour. For family members it must be a haunting experience. So then it was time to head back home and maybe start the gift hunting for the kiddies but not a lot of success finding suitable kids T Shirts etc.
I was nervous as I approached home because the biggest challenge of solo travel in a big foreign city still awaited. The basement Laundry! Understanding washing machines is in Sheila’s DNA – they know which buttons to press and why. Luckily a man had written down some instructions and the apartment owner kindly provided a loaded card to get things rolling. Or spinning as it turned out. Of course once you start the process the next 2 hrs pretty well involves you being nearby. By now I was a tad shagged and the next several hours became a bit of a fog between just lying down for 10 mins and waking up 40 minutes later and then down to the basement. Then the process repeated. It was a booteeful day but really the hours between about 11 am and 3 pm are lost in time. The drivel that passes for daytime TV in USA luckily had a segment on the restorative powers of beer so thought would give it a go.
It worked. Suddenly the washing machine looked simple although clean clothes were becoming less important by now
Friday and Saturday have prebooked tours which leaves tomorrow as a rest day – as opposed to today which ended up being more of a zombie day. Time to walk the streets and get into some local kulture. Having been to NYC previously helps in a way as you have already seen most of the must sees but does require careful planning now or the day can be a tad wasted. The colder weather is supposed to return. Boo. Heading out for the beers at 4 pm it was so nice to just walk around in suitably warm gear but actually feel fine without the normally present biting wind. This was the weather I was expecting this time of the year but we all know what that bitch Nature, M. can be like.
Still ya wouldn’t be dead for quids eh
flashman181 