I knew I was up too early when the McDonald’s I was counting on for a hot, nutritious breakfast was…not yet open. Hey, shouldn’t all fast food eateries be 24 hours? Or at least open by 4am? Well, that’s what hungry belly and American mindset thought. The more rational part of me thought “there will be another one. There always is.”
And there was. There always is.
I ate 2 Egg McMuffins. I was hungry. I’d been up since 2am and it was already 4:30am! Was it lunch time yet?
I got to the Birmingham International Airport with plenty of time to spare. So much time, in fact, that I was able to knit a third of a cowl with some new yarn I got. The morning wasn’t a total bust.
So at the late hour of 7:30am I was on a plane to New York City. I can’t say those 3 words without thinking of that subway scene in Rent. So just know that whenever I type/say/think the words “New York City” I’m following it up (silently) with “times are shitty….”
Despite it’s formidable name, the Birmingham International Airport is not that big. In fact, I wouldn’t really call a 10-gate airport medium sized. Which means that their planes are that big either. The plane I was on had 2 rows of seats–a row of 2 seats on one side and a row of 1 on the other. I didn’t realize when I requested a window seat that 2/3 of the seats were, in fact, window seats.
The plane was so small that the flight attendant’s chair was attached to the bathroom door.
I just held it.
Once landed, I headed to the cab queue. I was directed to a cab, I hopped in, and he hopped out, saying “just a minute! I must clean up spill! I had yogurt!” Odd. So I waited while the cabbie blocked traffic with his car door as he wiped up his yogurt. Then the conversation went like this:
“Where to?”
“Radio City Apartments.”
“I’ve never heard of that.”
“Well, that’s where I’m going.”
“Do you know where it is?”
“No. I don’t live here. You drive a cab here. You don’t know where it is?”
“No! You sure about the name? You got an address?”
“Nope. Just the name.”
He stopped the cab in the middle of the road, put it in park, and strolled over to another waiting cabbie. Apparently he had never heard of it either, because my cabbie kept walking down the line of cabs. Horns are honking at the cab blocking traffic. I feel conspicuous.
He finally comes back and says, “It is in Manhattan?”
Oh gosh.
“Ummmm…..yes. Probably near the Radio City Music Hall.”
“Ah! Yes! I know that! We go there! Though I still not know these apartments.”
So we go there. And he drives like a maniac. Now, I’ve ridden in all manner of transportation in various European countries, all over Kenya, and even across a Chinese province. But this was scary. We almost hit an ambulance.
Eventually I had to lend the cabbie my phone to he could use the GPS to find where I was going. This is not the New York City cab experience I had envisioned.
the library
By the time I arrived (somehow safely) at the apartments where we were staying, I could have licked the cabbie’s yogurt off the seat, I was so hungry. Two Egg McMuffins at 4am weren’t doing the trick at 1pm. So I walked about 30 feet down the sidewalk and stopped at the first restaurant that smelled good.
It was called “Bella Napoli” and was sort of ugly. But, I reasoned, aren’t some of the best restaurants ugly? Sure!
While I waited for Angel and Katie to show, I ordered fried eggplant stuffed with ricotta and mussels in a fresh tomato sauce. A basket of The Best Garlic Knots Ever arrived just as Angel and Katie did.
so garlicky
mussels
Angel put in an order for calamari. Katie exercised restraint and got a coke.
calamari
The calamari was rubbery and Alton Brown wouldn’t have been happy with the mussels. But the eggplant with ricotta was really delicious.
beautiful eggplant
After fortifying ourselves, we decided to walk to Bryant Park.
It was chilly. Really chilly. So chilly in fact that my ears felt like someone was wiping boiling water on them with a Q-tip. So we swung by Lord & Taylor and I almost got the winter version of a garden hat but opted for the more full coverage earmuffs instead.
Now snuggly warm, we walked. I’m amazed at all the trash on the street. I knew there would be. I watch TV. But this was a lot. And rank in places.
I also noticed that every female in New York has the same coat, and many have the same hairstyle. Angel and I have neither, by the way.
concrete jungle
Every block here is totally different yet pretty much the same. I have a terrible sense of direction and if I couldn’t count I’d still be somewhere on 43rd.
We walked until we saw a bakery, and since we hadn’t eaten in 2 hours we decided to stop in.
the bakery
There were some beautiful edibles in there, but most of all there wasn’t wind.
tarts
So we settled down with mini tarts, brownies, madelines, and liquids to wait for my brother Peter, who now lives in New York, to show up.
Once he did, Katie said goodbyes and we decided we should go to dinner. We hadn’t eaten in 45 minutes, after all. So Peter took us to Georgio’s, his favorite restaurant.
The menu at Georgio’s was a combination of traditional Italian meets Kountry Kitchen meets diner. It was a weird mix.
crabcakes
olives as appetizer
We decided not to go for the fried chicken livers or the patty melt and opted for Penne a la Vodka with grilled shrimp, mini crabcakes, and grilled salmon with fresh veggies.
salmon with capers
Oh, and they had a juicer, so we got some juice, too.
We looked at the time as we finished up and realized that we didn’t have much time at all to get to Silence of the Lambs the Musical. And we didn’t know where it was.
Long story short, there was running, stairs, 2 subway trains, powerwalking, and hurting people by the time we got to the play. Peter kept wanting to look in stores or gaze at lights as we hurtled down so many city blocks that it’s all a glaze and I kept yelling “GO! GO! GO!” and kept powerwalking past people. I even had the arm swing going for momentum.
We showed up right as the last people were getting there. I grabbed a beer from the concession table to rehydrate (just kidding), and settled in for the show. Which was wonderful. And possibly one of the crudest things I’ve ever seen. They even managed to make the ballet parts obscene.
The long journey home shouldn’t have been long, but it was. By the time we got back it was all I could do to fit the key in the lock. It was 11pm. I’d been up since 2am.
Bedtime, you never looked so good.
So today is not yet started, but there will be culture. Museums and the yeast from beer, at least.
