3/9/05--New York, NY...the city so nice....they named it twice

Back from New York.  Lord, what an experience.  Its a place that everyone should visit at least once.  Its fun, crazy, loud, bright....its like Vegas with bad weather and bums.  Here's my recollections, beginning at the start:

FRIDAY
1) So we fly up to NYC on Spirit Airlines, or as I like to call it--ValueJet renamed.
The flight up was highlighted by the complete asshole in the seat in front of me who wouldn't just...ya know...."sit down" in his chair.  He had to "plop down" so that half the cabin shook.  That and the two little bastards one row in front of us who kept getting up and running up the aisles.  I'm thinking kids should be kept with the luggage in back of the plane so they don't annoy everyone else.
2) So we land at Laguardia, and we're supposed to be met by SuperShuttle for a ride to our hotel in Manhattan.  I emphasize "supposed to" because we ended up waiting for an hour and a half for the Shuttle to arrive.  The guy shows up and I ask him whether or not he's our ride.  I show him our confirmation number and he calls in to his dispatcher--since naturally we're not on his list of passengers---and is told to take us, which he responds to with a rather disgusted....."get in".  We then have to wait another 1/2 hour while we wait for him to pick up other passengers.  Meanwhile its like 30 degrees outside and even inside the van, we're freezing our asses off.  So finally we head towards our hotel and I get my first taste of driving in NYC.  You don't have to be insane to drive in the city--but it helps.  We pull up to our hotel.....The Radisson on Lexington Avenue.  Kim is waiting by the door as I'm getting the bags when:
3) I'm approached by Kendrick the panhandler.  I mean, I haven't been in Manhattan 10 freakin seconds.....and Kendrick approaches.
"Hey man....how you doing tonight?  Everything going okay?  Say you know, I was wondering if maybe you could help a brother out....I'm trying to raise money for the young children and was wondering if....."

At this point the doorman from the Radisson--looking slightly like Dolph Lundgren, approaches......

"How many times have I told you about bothering people?" (thick Russian accent)
"Yo man!  I'm just making conversation here!"

I walk up to Kim.
"Jeezus cripes....I'm here 10 seconds and the bums are already looking for money."

4) So we go intothe hotel and check in...and we begin to notice that apparently we've checked into the Russian Radisson.  Seriously.  The whole freakin staff at the hotel is Russian.  We check into the 27 floor hotel and are given a room.....on the 3rd floor.
We go into our room....which apparently has had the thermometer set at approximately.....157 degrees.  Let's remember (and I'll say this more than once) that its like 30 degrees outside.  So we decide to go look for something to eat, and begin to walk downtown.  We get to 42nd street and suddenly realize that we are in front of:
5) Grand Central Station.  We're just standing there looking at everything when this woman walks up to us....
"I'm pregnant and hungry!!"
Uh, maybe you should rethink your leisure activity there sister.  So we go into GCS and its absolutely massive.  We go downstairs where there's a zillon stores and restaurants and so we decide to eat at a deli--one of the places Kim said she wanted to eat in NYC, so I figure we're getting that one out of the way.  So we're eating a sandwich at Jimmy's, and you know, you start listening to the people next to you.
And I realized that the two guys sitting next to us were:
6) George & Jerry from Seinfeld---they must have been.  They had the stupidest conversation I'd ever heard.  One of the guys is talking about how he's given up on alchohol because he realized that the last 5 girls he had "made out with" were all drunk.  Hard to believe this guy is still on the market, huh?  Meanwhile, the other guy starts up a conversation with a couple of girls at the table next to them.  And he actually told these girls (who I guess were like 18 or 19) that...."you could seriously pass for 23 or 24 with no problem".   Smoooooooth.  After dinner we continued to walk and went back to the hotel to find:
7) The room is still at 157 degrees.  This was when we figured out that the thermometer was NOT adjustable.  So Kim (who almost lives in fear of the cold) and I walk over to the window to figure out how we're going to open the damn thing.  So we finally get it cracked, whereupon of course, the 30 degree temperature and wind blow into the room like we're on a fjord somewhere in Norway.  So its either sweat our asses off (Stop it!  No jokes) or freeze them off.  We settle for door # 2.  So we're getting ready for bed when my beloved suddenly says:
"Hey...what's that smell?"
No, it wasn't me smart ass.  We realized about that point that we were located on the floor right above the Chinese restaurant in the hotel.  So not only are we freezing, but we're breathing in the sweet aroma of moo goo gai pan.
Welcome to the Big Apple.

Tomorrow--day # 2--and the freak show REALLY begins.
Later,
Jeff