Me 'n' My Schmoopie Go To Manhattan

a Slippy Village tale…In which Bryan and Beth go to Manhattan, eat, walk and get engaged.

Friday, 2 March 2001

Beth and I rise bright and early…well, okay…we drag our sorry butts out of bed at 5:00 in the morning to get to the airport. Our flight leaves at 7:30, so we want to get out to RDU in plenty of time. We head out for the airport 'bout 6:00 am, so the morning rush hour traffic has not yet started. When we get to the terminals, I'm very pleasantly surprised to see so many empty parking spaces in the daily lots right outside of the terminal entrances, mere yards from the door. We breeze right on into the terminal, and this will become typical of the low-stress travel experiences we, fortunately, are to experience the whole weekend, despite every bit of evidence to the contrary.

The flight (on Midway) takes off on time, and is very, very pleasant. As we fly into LaGuardia, there is a bit of snow and rain, so the sky is completely overcast with low clouds. I'm a bit disappointed, since I want to see and take pictures of the skyline as we make our descent, but otherwise it's okay, since we get right in and land pretty quickly despite the weather. Unfortunately, there are delays in other flights, and we have to sit on the tarmac and wait for a gate to open up. The twenty or thirty minute wait wouldn't have been too bad if only our bladders weren't so full.

Since we packed pretty light and didn't check our baggage, we breeze right out of the terminal—after an immediate stop at the restrooms, of course. We grab a cab and make our way into the city. Once again, despite the weather, we are out of Queens, across the Triborough Bridge, and on the FDR in no time. Our first destination is our hotel, The Gershwin, in the Flatiron district of Manhattan.

The Gershwin is a recently renovated hotel that's just wonderfully funky, designed to appeal to the young, hip, artsy traveler. You immediately recognize the difference when you first glimpse the building, with large, white illuminated translucent forms (are the horns? flames?) protruding from the building's red painted facade. The lobby features an internet-connected cafe and an attached art gallery, although the entire building could really be considered a gallery. The hallways are lined with Warhol paintings, Kenny Scharf sketches, photographs of New York art, music and underground scene celebrities of the 70's and 80's, like Lou Reed, the New York Dolls, and Andy Warhol's Factory regulars.

We drop off our bags and head out to the nearest subway station, taking the 6 uptown to see a couple of the Upper East Side museums. We've made great time this morning—it's only 10:30 by the time we hit the street. We head first to the Guggenheim, and stand outside for a while to snack on some street pretzels and a Coke. We go in just long enough to appreciate the building's architecture, then head over to the Whitney Museum of American Art. It turns out that the exhibitions galleries are closed for the morning (the galleries have been reserved for tour groups of school children that day) and won't be opened to the general public until 1:00, so we poke around the gift shops before heading into the neighborhood to find lunch. Thanks to the Vindigo application on my Palm, we are guided to the absolutely charming and unbelievably lovely restaur ant at the classy The Mark hotel.

Let me just stop a moment here to describe a major theme for the weekend…did you ever see the Albert Brooks movie Defending Your Life? It's a absolutely terrific movie about the immediate afterlife, where folks arrive in "Judgement City" to await their final destination. While the souls wait there, they are treated to luxury and comfort, where, for example, every morsel of food they put in their mouths is the best they've ever had in their lives, no matter where they eat. This is New York City. If you stay away from the "touristy" establishments, you can rarely go wrong. If you weren't aware already, New York City does, indeed, get the best and the freshest produce, meats, seafood, flowers, etc. anywhere.

Our first real meal of the weekend at The Mark is the perfect example. From the "simple" baby greens salad that Beth started with, to the amazing seafood risotto entree (a lobster sauce so light, and the amazing, absolutely fresh morsels of seafood in the bed of yummy risotto) to the succulent mandarin orange crème brulée for desert. Wow. And we're just starting here. Suffices to say that, in comparison, the tastes of the food back home now seem like dry ash.

Our tummies satisfied (and with the magnificent fragrance of the flowers in The Mark's lobby lingering in our nostrils), we head on back to the Whitney. We wander around its galleries, finishing up with the most recent pieces, which represent everything bad, wrong and misdirected with the contemporary New York art establishment. But I can rail against that at another time. By this time, my lack of sleep from the night before was catching up to me, and I was shutting down. So, Beth and I headed back downtown to the hotel, where I crashed hard and took an hour nap.

It's now early evening, and we've rested long enough—time to get back out there and hit the streets again. Besides, we have a wedding to get to at 7:00 just west of Times Square, so we need to get going again. We hoof it up Broadway and head to Times Square. We stop along the way at Macy's, and go in for a little shopping—I'm looking for a hat (still), and Beth is looking at shoes. Not much luck for either of us, despite the overwhelming selection, and we hit the street once again.

We drift up and down Times Square, looking at all the lights and advertising—cool! We bop up to glimpse the Ed Sullivan Theater, currently home to The Late Show with David Letterman, and we pop into K&L's Rock America, where we poke through the souvenirs and exchange a quick smile and greeting to Mujibur—or was it Sirajul?…the shorter, balding one of the two, whatever his name is…

We are supposed to be fed at the wedding we are about to attend, but we neither know how much food we're going to get, nor how good it might be, so we stop at this little french fry place on Broadway as we head back to the heart of Times Square from the Ed Sullivan Theater. It's a Belgian french fry place, and it's darn good. The fries are crisp and golden, but not greasy. They're served in this cool pasteboard container, which is an elongated inverted pyramid, like a squared-off cone, with one corner bent in and forming a little pocket where you put the dipping sauce of your choice; this way you can easily walk and eat, carrying your fries and dipping them before popping them into your mouth, and you even get this handy little wooden fork to keep your fingers clean. Now, you can use ketchup if you want to be ordinary, but since this comes from a Belgian place, you may as well try them the Belgian way. You remember in Pulp Fiction, where Vincent regales Jules with the eccentricities of fast food in Europe, he tells Jules that they put mayonnaise on their french fries in Holland? Well, they do that in Belgium, too, apparently, and that's the condiment of choice in this place, and it's mighty tasty. It's not your domestic Helman's supermarket mayonnaise, but a nice, creamy velvety Belgian recipe. Yummm.

Enough about the french fries, already, and let's talk about the wedding—Tony n' Tina's Wedding. Where do I even begin?

Basically, this is an off-Broadway comedy that's been playing for a dozen years or so, starting in New York, of course, but it now has runs in many major cities. It's about a New York Italian Catholic wedding, where you witness the ceremony and the reception. That's it…no major story lines, no moving plot, no in-depth character development. The difference is that this is a total immersion, interactive theater experience. You don't just watch the wedding and the reception up on a stage somewhere—you actually attend the wedding in the basement of a church, and then everyone goes down the block to a hotel for the reception. It's an actual sit-down meal, and you, "the guests", are assigned tables in the hall and watch—and participate, if you want—while the family celebrates the wedding. You eat (baked ziti, salad, bread), you toast (with real champagne), you dance (if you want to), and you laugh at what is going on around you (and sometimes, right on top of you and in your face). It's a party, and it's funny. You never know what's going to happen next, or where. It's not the show for everyone, however…while the cast members do try to include everyone without pressure or putting anyone on the spot, it is still pretty intrusive into your space—they do talk to you and interact with you constantly. If you'd rather just relax and watch a show, this is not the thing for you. However, if you're in the mood to mix it up, this is one loud, funny and occasionally slightly naughty experience.

After the show, we made our way back to our hotel and its surrounding neighborhood. Beth didn't feel like eating the meal at the reception, and I only ate a little, so we hit the streets looking for food. We did more wandering than actual food-location…we were trying to find this late-night sushi place that we knew was over a few blocks, but I forgot to bring the address with us, so the search was somewhat futile. We settled on this little all-night deli around the corner for chicken salad sandwiches. The place, tiny as it was, was filled with foreign cab drivers and whatnot of apparently the same nationality as the store owner, and they were all just hanging around, yammering about lord-knows-what. We brought the food back up to the room, ate, and drifted off to sleep, 'cause we were mighty tired.

Saturday, 3 March 2001

Rise 'n' shine, 'cause Saturday's food day!

Beth's roommate, Kevin, sent her a link to a website advertising a walking tour of the foods and history of Greenwich Village and Soho. For $30 per person, you spend three or four hours going around the West Village and Soho mostly, looking at several historical establishments and learning where to find the "real McCoys" when it comes to foods, markets and dining. Wow. Wow. This was a fantastic experience. You get to experience the best of the best, learn to avoid the tourist traps, and learn what only the locals seem to know. If you ever go to New York, get yourself some reservations for this tour. You get to sample a little of everything, so be sure to skip breakfast on the day of the tour.

We got up and headed out the door around 10:00 that morning, and made our way down to the tour rendez-vous in the West Village on Bleeker Street, heading down Fifth Avenue, so as to get a nice view of the arch at Washington Square. We bopped on through the park and through the heart of the village and made it in time for our 11:00 am tour. We sampled homemade Italian rice balls and two types of homemade sopresatta (Italian salami) from Faicco's Pork Store, three types of cheeses and olives from Murray's Cheese Shop, the best New York style pizza from John's Pizzeria, fresh-filled cannoli from Rocco's Italian Pastry Shop, and proscuitto bread and onion focaccia from Zito's Bread Shop.

We went by the Yatagan Kebab House for felafel and kebab on pita bread. Now, you've seen those big ol' cylinders o' meat they use for gyros at your local mediterranean sandwich shop—the ones that sit and spin vertically by the roasting elements, and when you order your gyro, they shave off the lamb 'n' beef goodness. Well, my friend, you ain't never seen one the size they have here. This thing is huge, and it lasts the day—that's right, they do enough business at this place each day to use up the entire shank. It's because it's convenient for the city's taxi drivers to pull up to the curb for a quick meal, and that they do.

We hit the quiet neighborhoods of the West Village for some fascinating building histories and dining secrets. We then walked down through the western fringes of SoHo, just a block or two over from the overpriced, trendy areas, to find the better values in food and atmosphere. We finished up our tour at a New York wine shop (meaning they only sell wines produced in New York state) for a quick wine sampling. This was the only slightly disappointing stop on the tour; the New York vintages aren't very good…North Carolina wines (and I speak of Biltmore Estate wines in particular) kick their butt.

After the tour was over, Beth and I wandered up through SoHo, poked through the street stalls along Houston Street, and headed back to the West Village, where we had passed quite a few funky little shops along the tour, and we had made mental notes to come back to shop at these places. We picked up some t-shirts, other cool clothes and books. We passed the Comedy Cellar, which I did hope we could visit one evening while we were there, but, unfortunately, we had learned from our tour guide, Todd, that the best time to get there for the evening show was by 8:00 pm. That wasn't a problem for Beth, but I knew I had other plans for us that night, and we couldn't really do both.

So, as we sat down in a pastry shop for coffee, hot chocolate and a bit of a rest, I checked my maps and plotted my little scheme. I needed to get us down to the South Street Seaport sometime after sunset, and it was still early evening. Fortunately, on the tour, we met a couple from California, who had actually lived in North Carolina (where the wife had been an administrator for both E.C.U. and N.C. State while both Beth and I had been in college—it's a small world). They recommended Iso, a sushi restaurant in the East Village. So, I suggested that we walk back through Greenwich Village and up to Kiehl's on Third Ave, where Beth wanted to do some shopping, and then back down a couple of blocks and over to Second Ave for dinner at Iso by 6:00, before the dinner rush started.

Iso was fantastic. The portions were huge, the fish was fresh, and Beth got to try the most exquisite of all sushi—toro—for the first time. Toro is the soft, buttery belly of the tuna, and you'll only find it once in a blue moon back home. We sat at the sushi bar (natch'), and the sushi chefs—as well as the incredibly gay wait staff—were very friendly, courteous and attentive. We bought a couple of their t-shirts with their logo, which was designed by the late Keith Haring—his original drawing hangs above the sushi bar. Wow, what a great meal—and very affordable, too…a terrific value.

With our bellies satisfied, we went outside and caught a taxi to Fulton Market and South Street Seaport. The sun had set, and I told Beth that I wanted her to see the view, 'cause it's spectacular at night (and it is), but I had ulterior motives…

It was quite chilly, but it wasn't too bad as we made our way out onto Pier 17 and around the Seaport's shopping mall. And it was there, by the lights of the Brooklyn Bridge, and all the other magnificent lights of New York City, that I 'fessed up—her engagement ring was indeed ready, and the whole point of the trip that weekend was to bring her to that very spot to propose to her. She said yes.

After a few moments, we went inside the mall and sat for a while. After that little rest stop, we caught a taxi back up to the hotel. In my opinion, this was the best taxi ride of the whole weekend; I like my New York taxi rides to be thrill rides, and at one point, our driver was fed up with the slow-poke in front of us, so he crossed the double-yellow line and accelerated into the on-coming traffic to pass him. Boy, that looked dangerous! Cool!

We went up to the room and called our families and a few key friends back home to tell them the good news. We also wrapped some tape around her ring, 'cause it was a bit loose, and she, naturally, wanted to start wearing it without fear of it dropping off!

We ventured out one last time to find bedtime snacks. We decided to find a different place than the taxi-driver-all-night-foreign-chatfest from the night before, and there was no problem locating another all-night deli in the neighborhood. We came back to the room and started keeping an eye on the Weather Channel, and then a little Mad TV before calling it a night.

Sunday, 4 March 2001

Last day. We are beat. We've seen just about everything we want to see. There's the threat of a major winter storm starting later in the day, and we need to get out before it starts, but our flight is not scheduled to leave until 7:30. What to do? What to do?

First things first—check-out time is 11:00 am, so we get up, shower and pack, then go down to the front desk, check out and leave our bags with the clerks one more time. Then, it's around the corner to this little grill for a quick and tasty breakfast.

We've got to kill some time—it's about 11:00 in the morning, and we've got all afternoon—so we head down to Chinatown to poke around for a while. The air is colder than it has been all weekend, and the snow has started falling, so the first thing we do when we exit the subway on the edge of Chinatown is to duck into some little street-side shopping stalls and locate some hats and gloves. I love street-shopping in New York—we picked up nice, warm knit hats for four bucks each. Beth also got some new gloves, and I put on the ones I still had from my last visit to New York—got 'em off Houston Street for five bucks that time.

Now, nice and toasty warm, we meandered through the some of the shops of Chinatown. Just the coolest stuff ever. Little Sanrio knick-knacks and clothing and little Buddha statues and jade jewelry and bootleg videotapes of movies that have just been released in the theaters and everything imaginable and even more stuff beyond imagination. We cross a street and—bam—we're out of Chinatown and in the city hall area, with the courthouses and government buildings. Since we're just a few block away at this point, we decide to go back to Fulton Market and the Seaport to see it all during the day.

We get down there. We see it. That's it. Not much else to see. We're just tired. We've had enough of the walking and walking and walking. I'm anxious about the potential storm as it keeps snowing and snowing—it's still in the upper 30's, and the snow is melting quickly as it hits the ground, but you never know when that's going to change. We figure we can kill time better in nice warm coffee shops and bookstores, so we duck back into the subway and shoot across town back to the West Village.

We walk along Christopher Street—the heart of the Village's gay population—and do a little window shopping. We stop for a pizza meal back at John's, one of the stops on our walking tour from the day before. We decide to go back over to this Barnes & Noble back at Astor Place we saw the day before and sit and read there, like we do back home. Unfortunately, when we get there, the place is packed, and there isn't a free place to sit. It's now getting close to 4:00 in the afternoon, the weather shows no signs of letting up, so we may as well stop wandering the city, play it safe and go on out to the airport to wait out our remaining time.

We take our last subway ride of the weekend back up to the hotel, and we just sit for a moment or two in the lobby. I make a quick phone call to check on our flight—still okay. I start to worry about the traffic to the airport. I have a bit of cash left in my pocket; if we take a taxi, I need to make sure we have enough cash to cover the fare and tolls and tips, and I don't want to make another trip to an ATM. If the taxi gets stuck in traffic—what with the weather and all—that fare's just going to start tick, tick, ticking, and if it ticks too long, we're not going to have enough cash to cover it. I go over and talk the concierge for a bit about different options, and she offers to call a car service…it's a little bit more than a normal taxi ride, but I can put it on my credit card, and it's a flat fee that includes fare, tolls and tips. It sounds like a good deal to me, so the car is called, we get our bags back from the clerks, and the car is at the front door in no time. We are on our way home.

Despite the weather, the traffic all along the way is not bad at all. As we leave Manhattan and start to make our way through Queens, the driver says to us, "Here's a little good-bye to New York for you," and he puts Frank Sinatra and Tony Bennett singing "New York, New York" on the CD player. We continue to listen to the Duets CD the rest of the way back to LaGuardia, and we are at the terminal in no time. Very cool.

There are a few minor scheduling delays, and more than a little confusion about departure gates, but the terminal is not very crowded at all, and the wait is actually quite pleasant. There's a little concern as flights start getting cancelled—including the next scheduled flight back to RDU an hour or two later! But, everything turns out okay. I grab us some Wendy's from the terminal's food court for dinner, and time passes. We board our flight by 8:00 pm, and we lift off through the snow (and a bit of good, solid turbulence) by 8:30. The plane is practically empty, and it's one of the nicer flights I've had. We touch down, wait a little while for a gate to open (again), and head out through the practically deserted terminal to the parking lot. We are at the car around 10:00 pm, calling our moms to let them know we beat the storm and made it home okay, and we head home…tired…exhausted…but very, very, very happy.

The End.