Home Safely

[catsittingstill]

Cleaning the house was a big job, but I believe we made a dent in the problem.

I went into New York City twice, and saw the Statue of Liberty (on the second try; if you want to see it, show up at the ticket window first thing in the morning--and don't bring anything you couldn't take on an airplane.) and the Empire State Building and the Museum of Natural History, which is a wonder and an amazement. I had to leave when my brain got full. The mimmoth was especially excited by the elephant video in the Hall of Biodiversity. I saw the outside of the Library, and took some pictures of the Lions, but wasn't allowed inside because I had food.

Interestingly enough, the place on Manhattan where I felt closest to comfortable was Central Park. Everything I recognized by name (the Sheep Meadow, the Village Green, Strawberry Fields) was smaller than I expected, but it was green and the bedrock of the island poked up here and there and it was something approaching quiet; I could hear the birds. My guide and I spent a few minutes off the path, resting on the living stone.

The subway stations are noisy and quite hot. I was surprised by the heat, but since the subway cars are airconditioned, all that heat has to be pumped out somewhere, and it ends up in the tunnels. I was more comfortable, noise wise, after I put in my earplugs. Fortunately we never had to wait very long for a train. The plethora of trains and lines were confusing, especially the way they kept swapping local and express service, but fortunately my local guide could decipher what was going on, and a couple of times New Yorkers chimed in and suggested the best way to go.

I did not find New Yorkers to be unfriendly; I'm not sure where that stereotype comes from but I didn't encounter anybody like that.

I got a couple of chances to game, helping playtest a new system a friend of my friend was working out. It took me a while to figure out how it worked, but I had fun.

The friend whose house I was helping clean, moved apparently by a combination of gratitude and a desire to show off the amenties of Long Island, took me out to eat for every lunch and most dinners, which was tasty, but hard on my diet. Between plenty of work and skipping breakfast and snacks, I think I managed to not gain weight.

The drive home started at 5:00 am in an attempt to make my way through NYC before the traffic got bad. I ended up on the far side of the George Washington Bridge, in New Jersey, in a torrential, pounding rain that turned the sky black dark at 8:00 am. That faded after an hour or so, and the rest of the drive was in fine weather and even good traffic conditions, so I can't complain.

Now I just have to clean my house before my dad and brother come to visit.