17 Nov 06

Time:

?

Money:

$6, pet food, gym store.
$18, Cuban food ordered in - it was quite good - at Anne's.
$13, yogurt, strawberries, and Pepsi, Gristede's.

More interesting things:

Rode towards Union Square with the subway version of the Iron Chef America judges' panel. On one bench, a guy was drinking Starbucks, a very small boy was thoughtfully consuming a bag of potato chips, and the lady who had been walking in front of me on the street worked away at one of those little chocolate-looking cake things from the bakery, which was impressive since you don't get to see forks in action on the train too often.

Watched the Princeton swim team check in at the gym's front desk, and was pleased to discover that although it is a little better tempered in this atmosphere - I did not line up with hundreds of other Violets to make rude noises at them as they made their way onto campus, probably because nothing athletic is viewed as all that fascinating here but on a personal level more because I already have a place to do that - forceful comments like, "You're gonna lose... you're gonna LOSE!" still leapt from my tongue. I just kept it quieter than I would have somewhere else.

Ran into Anne's husband as I left the gym; I always keep one eye peeled for him anyway, but since it's generally peeled in the direction of his store, it was quite amusing to see him on the street.

Realized that the Earth really DOES sort of angle away from the Sun at this time of year. I figured this out because while 1440 is a pretty well-lit minute in Florida no matter what season it is (well, unless it's raining for real), here all it took was one fairly measly, sketchy cloud in front of the Sun to make it look DARK outside - like, maybe, mid-evening down south.

Left the local to catch the express at Union Square only to follow Roey back onto another local when we realized how packed the other would be. Someone watching would have thought we were taking some kind of recreational interlude on the platform, but getting back on a later version of the train we'd started on afforded us a) a lot more room, b) the opportunity to feel like we were riding the Friday afternoon school bus home (which, in effect, we kind of were), and c) the chance to hear an older guy, who had in some way been annoyed or offended by one of the little creeps on the school bus, tell the kid "to go get smashed in the face, you little cocksucker." Awesome, and entirely worth the platform rest stop.

Saw, as I waited for the crosstown towards Anne's house, a NYC Parks Enforcement truck, ostensibly containing a city ranger. Pretty cool.

Heard, once I had gotten on the bus, a soft dinging sound from somewhere near the front, followed by an equally soft but still distinct "Aw, shit" from the driver. It didn't appear to indicate anything really terrible - I made it all the way across the park and to my stop with no problems - but it did seem like the sound and the comment were connected, and now I have to wonder what it means when a bus starts dinging.

Smiled inwardly as a lady who had just come into the station where I waited for the train home pulled a neighborly "left-right" move, presumably to figure out either from which direction the train would arrive or which direction was up- or downtown. (Of course, that doesn't matter much, if you've read the signs over the stairwells coming into the stations, but I suppose she might just have been double-checking.)

Listened to yet another one of those ostensibly homeless guys with a long prepared speech about why we should hand him some money and/or food, and who even paused so we could all understand what the conductor was telling us at each stop. He's right, of course - there really are people whose lives head downhill fast and who could use whatever specks we've got in our pockets - but the unfortunate thing is that every time I hear one of these speeches, I find myself wondering less about how much change I have on me and more about whether these guys have, like, presentation coaches and speechwriters or if they come up with it all and practice by themselves. They're so similar in delivery that it seems someone must have helped them, but if that's true, who does it? Is it, like, a department of one of the homeless aid agencies? Is there a PR person whose version of contributing to society is helping to develop professional-sounding explanations and requests? And this is why I don't have to bring the New Yorker with me everywhere I go.