This morning was a little crazy. After talking to Kelly until around 3 AM last night, this morning we awoke to the sound of hundreds of men shouting. Specifically, a guy with a bullhorn shouting, "What do we want!" To which a huge crowd responded, "Union!" And then bullhorn guy would come back with, "When do we want it!" And the crowd boomed, "Now!" Imagine two hours of that, from 7:30 AM to 9:30 AM. I looked out the window and could not see them. I have no idea if they were in front of a non-union theater on 42nd Street or not, but that is my own personal hunch. Needless to say, as soon as it was over we both fell back to sleep.
By the way, it is raining in New York today. No big deal. We actually have no concrete plans until dinner.
The view out of the hotel window, rain clouds and all. The building along the bottom of the frame is the New York Public Library. Barbie informed me that this library was the setting for the incredible same-sex wedding that opened the latest
Sex In The City movie. I saw the movie, but could not have told you this fact without Barbie's help.
Our room at the Andaz is not huge, but the ceiling is wildly high, making it feel larger than it is. The way that this hotel room is long and narrow, it is being quite stubborn about allowing me to get a decent picture of it. The above picture only catches half of the bedroom area, let alone the supercool design elements in the other parts of the room.
We went for a walk to get some lunch, and found ourselves ducking into an Irish pub. Can you say
Comfort Food?
I opted for the Open Faced Turkey.
Fish and Chips for Barbie.
After lunch, we walked over to 5th Avenue and got Barbie a new travel mouse at Best Buy. Then I headed back to the room to get some work done while Barbie walked up a few blocks to her favorite NYC cathedral to light a candle... and to do a little shopping on her way back.
Andaz Hotel, 5th Avenue, Candid. November 2010.
Barbie returned from her two churches, one Catholic and the other H&M, and soon enough it was time to head to dinner. Barbie had selected a place near Union Square called...
The City Tavern.
If you ask me what it takes to keep a good travel journal -- and I know that nobody is ever going to ask me this and I therefore ask it of myself -- I would say the discipline to detach from and reattach to the world around you just long enough to capture it without losing an appreciation for where you are. (I am going to just assume that nobody understood that on the first pass. Way too Philosophy 101 for its own good.)
I say this because as I took the above picture while Barbie was greeting and hugging my very good friend Mez, who without complaint waited for me to finish taking this shot before saying hello. Yes, I have become a man who delays greetings to take pictures for a blog. For you. For the Waste.
We hung out in the bar and had a nice, relatively perverse conversation while we waited for Denise and Kim to arrive. Once they did, the five of us headed up to the dining room upstairs.
Baked Figs wrapped in Prosciutto, with gorgonzola cheese and balsamic reduction. Barbie ordered it, Mez ordered it, and I ordered it. Not too photogenic, especially in this light, but considerably delicious. You cannot have too much fig in your life.
Barbie's Baby Spinach Salad, featuring apples. You cannot have too much apple in your life, either.
Denise got a shrimp cocktail. Considering the glass, the menu should refer to it as a Shrimp Martini. This would backfire, of course, because the words Shrimp Martini place the idea in your mind of a disgusting vodka cocktail that tastes like seafood.
Barbie got the Linguini with Manila Clams.
I got this pretty dang great Linguine Carbonara.
This picture was taken and is included because Kim, who is tiny -- like, a teeny, tiny woman who eats like a bird -- got this serving of Chicken Parmesan that could have fed an entire family.
This picture is significantly funny, if you were there. Someone at the table had consumed what you might refer to as more wine than they might have needed. For some reason, said person pulled out his or her wallet and a tin of Altoids and basically dismembered these items on the table. This is actually after much of it was put back together, but the mints are still scattered in that way that you could never, ever do on purpose. And if this picture and description did not amuse you in the least, imagine the wallet's owner saying something like, "My wallet, you said my, I need a, my wallet, want a mint, and where is my, mint, here, good."
It was a very fun dinner. We had an excellent conversation, particularly because many of us were enjoying the act of walking up to the line of good taste and then, well, doing something in very poor taste to the line that should only be done in the home or the occasional doctor's office. As you know, I never curse on the Waste.
We split a cab with Mez to get back to the Andaz, and even made a plan with him for the next night.
The hotel room's view at night, including many of the same buildings that you saw in the first picture of the day. Look at how drastically different the day and night pictures are.
The view to the Southwest. That red light intrigues me.
Time for bed.
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