new york in summertime. horrors! never again. maybe in the winter at xmas, but summer, not likely. not unless someone picks me up in an air conditioned limo from the airport where i have flown in on first class...
i have to say that other than the heat and the chinatown bus, things were fine. i have nothing but good things to say about the LATHAM HOTEL on 28th street. it was conveniently located 2 blocks from subway stations, east and west, and was in the heart of the financial district between 5th avenue and madison. the hotel is actually a hostel, and we had to share a bathroom. but we had our own key and the bathroom was clean, large and marble tiled. it was also right across from our room, so we knew when it was occupied. the staff at the latham were hugely helpful, even giving us our room at 9 a.m. vs. the 3 p.m. check-in. i am thinking that my state of utter exhaustion and totally drenched in sweat appearance helped. they were probably weighing out the two possibilities: rescue squad? give her a room? hmmm...let's give her a room! they did, and it was fine. the bed was comfortable, the a/c was working and was cold, we had a sink and cable tv. what more do you need when you are about to phase out of this world?
we took a nap until 2:30 and then took the subway down to houston street to katz's deli. this is where the famous harry/sally scene takes place in the movie. austin had a reuben and i had matzo ball soup. both good.
we took the 4 and the 6 subway to 161st street in the bronx: home of yankee stadium. we had good seats, got to see a good game with tampa bay (who were in lst place at the time.) the ride back was a trip...i have never been squeezed into anything like that! i was holding on to austin when he got in, but my ass was hanging in the subway door. i didn't think i could squeeze my fat in...that is, until i was crushed in by 3 more people behind me. it was quite the intimate situation! we laughed the whole way to grand central, where we made the switch to the 6! if you had farted in there you would have killed half the crowd and blown out a window!
we learned a whole lot about the subway system and austin pretty much had it down. he was frustrated with my inability to run down stairs and leap on a passing subway. i noticed there were no fat people in manhattan, and i know why...they are racing up and down the stairs to get to the subway, racing for the subway itself, pushing heavy steel cages to get through to the subway, and then hanging and bracing themselves on the subway itself. all of these are excellent forms of exercise...lifting, squatting, running, pushing. austin declared he could make it here, but doubted i could. maybe...
we went to papaya king for a hot dog in the morning, then over to times square and on to the grayline bus tour of upper manhattan. we got lucky, in that we did NOT want to sit on the top of the bus, so we got to the head of the long line and on to the bus because we craved the a/c versus the view. we saw what we wanted in the 2 1/s hours we were on there, and got off into times square again and wandered around looking at stuff there and at 42nd street until we saw the oasis in the sea of glitter: BUBBA GUMP SHRIMP COMPANY!!! having been already to 3 of them (chicago, charleston and mall of america), we gleefully went in and had a nice lunch! we bought a bunch of stuff (t-shirt, bear for amy, magnet, little shrimp stuffed animal) and back to the hotel, where we changed clothes and headed out for the sewer of new york, better known as chinatown. what a stink and how dirty! ick. i was NOT expecting that at all, having been to chinatown in san francisco, which is nothing like the one in new york.
all in all, i was glad we got to go to yankee stadium and austin had a trip to nyc. both of us, however, were on sensory overload and were glad to be back home when we got there.
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