Pics from Friday Night

Darren Hayes concert pics can be seen at my Flickr site. Click the linky to go there :-)

Darren Hayes Pics

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Now playing: Savage Garden - Gunning Down Romance (live)

Something I wanted to share

I've been a Savage Garden fan since 2000, and was pretty sad when they split in 2001, after just two albums. I credit several of their songs with helping me get through some times when I was very depressed, and really had a hard time believing life would ever be better.

One of those songs is "Affirmation", and the lyrics go like this.

"Affirmation"

I believe the sun should never set upon an argument
I believe we place our happiness in other people's hands
I believe that junk food tastes so good because it's bad for you
I believe your parents did the best job they knew how to do
I believe that beauty magazines promote low self-esteem
I believe I'm loved when I'm completely by myself alone

I believe in Karma what you give is what you get returned
I believe you can't appreciate real love until you've been burned
I believe the grass is no more greener on the other side
I believe you don't know what you've got until you say goodbye

I believe you can't control or choose your sexuality
I believe that trust is more important than monogamy
I believe your most attractive features are your heart and soul
I believe that family is worth more than money or gold
I believe the struggle for financial freedom is unfair
I believe the only ones who disagree are millionaires

I believe in Karma what you give is what you get returned
I believe you can't appreciate real love until you've been burned
I believe the grass is no more greener on the other side
I believe you don't know what you've got until you say goodbye

I believe forgiveness is the key to your unhappiness
I believe that wedded bliss negates the need to be undressed
I believe that God does not endorse TV evangelists
I believe in love surviving death into eternity

I believe in Karma what you give is what you get returned
I believe you can't appreciate real love until you've been burned
I believe the grass is no more greener on the other side
I believe you don't know what you've got until you say goodbye

[repeat ]

It's called "Affirmation" because when Darren Hayes wrote it, it started out as a series of affirmations about his beliefs in life. I adore it, because every single line matches my own beliefs, and some of them are extremely relevant to me, my past, present, and hopefully future.

Watch the video!



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Now playing: Savage Garden - Crash And Burn (live)

Another Night Out!

This evening I went out for a meal with Clare, one of my oldest, and bestest (yes, that *is* a word!) friends. We went to "Spice Merchant", a new Indian restaurant at the top of my road - 100 yards from home is always good.

Southern Comfort & Lemonade to drink - OK Daniel, you were right, it's a *very* nice drink! Puppadoms with three different dips while we waited for our starters, then Tandoori chicken for me, Lamb Rogan Josh as a main course, and *then*, Baileys cheesecake for dessert. (Clare made me do it!). All totally yummy, and very far away from my healthy eating, but it had been planned for a month. Not that that's a reason to justify going any further off track, and I shall be straight back on track in the morning.

We're planning to go to Dublin for a long weekend next year, which will be fantastic. And maybe a day in London later this year. It was a nice way to spend an hour and a half though, and something that we can hopefully do a bit more often. The restaurant was great - a bit pricey, but reasonable for an infrequent meal out. Service was great, as was the food, and when we left at about 9:30, the queue for a table was out the door! A sign of a good restaurant!

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Now playing: Darren Hayes - Dirty

Darren Hayes Concert!

I've *just* walked in from the Darren Hayes concert at the Dome in Brighton. Full reprt coming on Sunday, but I have to say, not only am I glad I went, even though I was alone, but I actually think I enjoyed it *more* on my own!

It was fantastic. Darren was funny, emotional, appreciative, and above all, he's got the best voice of any of my favourite singers, and *man*, was he on form this evening. I have a lot to think about, things that came up during the concert - either as a result fo the lyrics to some songs, or from things that Darren said when he was talking about how his latest album came to be.

I'm tired, emotional, and still on such a high ... I didn't even take many photos, because I was too busy singing along, jumping up and down, and clapping for all I was worth! Best bit though? During "I Want You" I was one of the few people bouncing along, singing and clapping my hands above my head, and Darren smiled and waved at me! Me! Wahey!

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Now playing: Darren Hayes - Casey

Wednesday already?!

Blimey, has it really been a week since I posted?

Not much to tell really. On Friday I went out with 15 colleagues for a fish and chip supper on the Bluebell Railway. It's a preserved steam railway, and the line runs from Sheffield Park, to Kingscote. it was a very nice evening, and the fish and chips was lovely! Served with bread and butter, and a cup of tea, and wrapped in traditional newspaper too! The journey, and the meal for only £8! It's a shame the evening didn't last longer though, I was home by 8:30pm!

I'm going to Morrisons tomorrow morning, to stock up on healthy food, then after coming home from Seaford and unpacking, I'll be hopping on the bus to Brighton. I've decided that even though I can't get anyone to come with me, I shall get myself a ticket to see Darren Hayes at the Dome on Friday night. I have the money, I have an early finish booked specially for it, and why should I miss out just because I'm too scared to go to a concert 8 miles away, on my own?! I've been a huge Darren Hayes fan ever since his Savage Garden days, and who knows when he'll be in this neck of the woods again?

I've just ordered a spare battery, larger memory card, and battery charger for the Canon Powershot SD750 camera that I bought in New York. It's a tiny camera, so I'll have no trouble getting it into concerts and the like, and apart from the fact that I'm having to buy a UK charger as it came with a US one, it was a real bargain! Even with the cost of the charger I'm still paying less in total , for the camera, two memory cards, two spare batteries, screen protectors, and case, than I would have paid for the camera alone, in the UK!

Nothing much to tell, other than that. Off to get me some dinner!

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Now playing: Bon Jovi - Runaway

Not much to tell...

The time has flown by since I came back from New York - can you believe I'll have been home for a whole month on Tuesday?! I don't seem to have achieved much though - in that time, I've still not even unpacked my suitcase properly!

I have managed to get my photoc edited and uploaded to my Flickr site though - 900-odd became 432 when I was finished. They're not all captioned yet, but I'm working on it.

I'm also working on my strategy for becoming healthy once and for all, and am in the process of setting up a separate blog for that purpose. Blogger hates me at the moment though, so although I've been trying for days, I haven't got very far yet!

I'm looking forward to the whole weekend off, with an evening out on Friday. The social comittee at work has organised a "Fish and Chip Supper" on our local preserved steam railway, which should be a nice way to pass a few hours. I shall be taking the camera of course, but am not sure how many pictures I'll be taking.

It's payday next week, and after several months of having every spare penny either pay for the trip to new York, clothes for New York, or spending money for New York, I will actually have some of my money to spend on photography gear, work shoes, and frivolous things like a month's proper groceries! Woohoo, how exciting!

Work is still going well. I've been signed off on all three levels of safe keyholder now, and am a fully signed off Advanced safeholder, which means I can do any cash office tasks. It also means I'll only be in the cash office enough to keep my hand in now, and that I'll be spending more time in the general office and on the shop floor doing audit and shelf edge ticketing work, until I'm completely familiar with all of that, at which point I'll probably get something of a happy medium between the shop floor, office, and cash office.

That's about all from me at the moment. Off to fight with Blogger once more!

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Now playing: Jon Bon Jovi - Learning How To Fall

Friday!

Friday then. I was up at 7:30am, and in the bath shortly after. I'd peeked out of the window when I woke up, and it looked as though it was going to be the first really hot day. By the time I was dressed it was really warm, sunny, with a gorgeous blue sky. In typical New York fashion though, along with the heat came a stifling humidity, and I soon closed my window and turned the air-con on again. I sorted out my money for the day and settled down to watch some TV until it was time to met Daniel at 9:30am. An episode of "The Golden Girls" started my day off nicely - I used to watch it about 20 years ago, and had forgotten how good a show it was.

At 9:30, I called Daniel's room, but there was no answer. I didn't think much of it, thinking that he was probably in the bathroom, having overslept, and just tried again a few minutes later. Still no answer. Hmmm. I tried on and off until about 10am, then waited a bit longer, before trying again at about 10:15am. *Still* no answer, so I went and knocked on his door - no reply. By this time I was beginning to wonder if everything was OK. He'd been fine the previous evening at midnight, but I wondered if maybe he was ill. I thought it was unlikely, but I didn't think he would have just gone out somewhere without letting me know, as we'd had plans. I went down to the lobby, and used the payphone to ring his mobile - I couldn't text him, because my phone hadn't worked since we'd been in the US, although his and Debbie's had. He didn't answer his mobile, and I guessed that he was rejecting the call so that he didn't have to pay to take a call, as you do when you're roaming on a foreign tariff. At that point, I gave up, rang Mum as I had been doing each day (only $1 for a 3 minute call to the UK) and told her what was going on.

After I rang Mum I went back up to my room, and tried calling Daniel's room a few more times. It took a while, but eventually when I tried knocking again, I realised the "Do Not Disturb" sign wasn't on his door, as it would have been if he was still in there, so realisation dawned that he *had* in fact got up, gone out on his own, and not bothered telling me. I was *not* happy. I'm not the most independent of people at all, and almost everything scares me, so having been left alone in a city of 8 million people, in a hotel of all places, three and a half thousand miles from home, with no way to get hold of any of the three people I was travelling with, had me alternating between seriously *seriously* p'd off, and on the verge of a full blown panic attack. I#ll admit it - I was upset, hurt, and downright furious. I get more emotional when I'm angry than when I'm sad, so I stuck the DND sign back on the door, closed the curtains, laid on the bed, and had a good cry. By the time I was done with that, it was after 11am, and now I was just mad. How *dare* he be so inconsiderate and rude as to go off without even calling me to let me know? I thought after being friends for nine years he would know me well enough to *know* that as well as being annoyed, I'd also be worrying ...

Anger was definitely the predominant emotion as I pondered what to do. I had two options, as I saw it. I could either stay in the hotel all day, only going out for meals, which would be McDonald's, as it was the closest place, and effectively waste a day. Or, I could grab my bag, realise that people travel alone all the time, in far more dangerous places than central Manhattan, and spend the day exploring, and doing *exactly* what i wanted to do, without any concern at all about fitting in with the others. I was really in no mood to be considerate of others at that point anyway, and I knew that Dom and Debbie would think I was with Daniel, and he would either try and find me at the hotel at some point, or assume I'd gone out. I did write a note that I considered sliding under his door, but decided against it, and just left. I was still mad though, and I really had no plans as to what I was going to do. I waked down 8th Avenue to 42nd Street, then along 42nd Street to 5th Avenue. I'd decided that as Central Park was only 14 blocks away, I might as well go and explore. As I walked along 5th Avenue, I kept seeing groups of police officers and firefighters, all either in full dress uniform, or with their caps and jackets over their arms. At first I saw them in ones and twos, then in groups of ten and more. I didn't know what was going on, but soon I found that a whole section of 5th Avenue was cordoned off, around St. Patrick's cathedral, Realisation still didn't dawn, but later that evening I would discover that it had been the funeral of Robert Beddia, one of the two NY firefighters who had been killed in a fire at the Deutsche Bank building at Ground Zero a week earlier. The building was in the process of being demolished, as it was so badly damaged in the 9/11 attack, but a fire had broken out, killing Beddia, a 23 year NYFD veteran, and survivor of 9/11 and another firefighter. The funeral was at St. Patricks Cathedral on 5th Avenue, and as is traditional, thousands of uniformed firefighters from all over the US and Canada had travelled to honour their colleague.

I turned off of 5th at this point, and walked along 46th Street to 6th Avenue, where I carried on along to Central Park. When I got there I think i breathed an audible sigh of relief - it was lovely just to be among trees, and away from the city for the first time in days. While I loved the buzz and high-energy feel of New York, for a small town girl like myself, it was a bit of a shock to the system, and I found the peace and quiet in the park restoring. It's amazing how quiet it is there. Apart from the clip-clop of the horse drawn carriages that give rides around the park, and the shouts and laughter of children playing, it's a place where there is barely any sign of the city surrounding the park, save the skyscrapers peeking over the tops of the trees. You can here the birds singing, and actually feel as though you're completely away from the city despite being only a few hundred yards away.

I had no set idea of where I wanted to go, but I did want to find Strawberry Fields, the memorial area to John Lennon that Yoko Ono designed, paid for, and still pays $1million a year to maintain. I knew roughly where it was, and headed over to the left hand edge of the park, making my way out onto Central Park West, where the Dakota Building is. The building where John Lennon and Yoko Ono lived, and where he was killed at the entrance as he left, it stands opposite Central park, and I knew that Strawberry Fields was just inside the Park, more or less opposite. Unfortunately, when i went back into the park, I searched for a while, even looking at the maps that were dotted around, but managed not to find it. I pressed on, and on ... and on. I eventually found myself walking around the reservoir, which I knew was towards the top end of the park. I didn't know how far I'd walked, but I guessed that I was somewhere between 90th and 100th Streets, and when I eventually found my way out of the park (there are no signposts!) I was back on 5th Avenue, where I wanted to be, but on 97th Street. I was 52 blocks up from our hotel, and three blocks over, so having walked probably 3-4 miles at that point, I was still a minimum of 3 miles from the hotel, *if* I walked straight down 5th and over to 8th where the hotel was.

It was heading towards 2pm by now, and I hadn't eaten. I had taken a bottle of water with me, and refilled it at a water fountain in the park, but kept thinking I'd get a hot dog at a street vendor, then realised that I only had $20 notes, and decided to get one when I broke a note, rather than give them a $20. I walked down 5th, stopping in at the Guggenheim Museum, which was free with my New York Pass, and found that although the building's spiral design makes it architecturally breathtaking, the art that was currently on display was ... boring. Hey, it was free though, and the building is gorgeous! Sadly there is no photography allowed above the ground floor, so I couldn't get a shot from the 7th floor, looking down into the spiral.

I left the Guggenheim, and realised how hungry and thirsty I was. Despite that, I pressed on, and stopped at 86th (I think, definitely 80-something!) street to visit the Metropolitan Museum of Art. It's *massive*, and although I paid $20 to get in, I never did find the Impressionist galleries that I had wanted to see. I wandered through the Roman and Egyptian galleries, and realised how beautiful the whole building is, before deciding that it was heading towards 3pm, I still hadn't eaten, and I was flagging, so I should move on.

Continuing down 5th Avenue, I re-entered Central Park at 64th Street, for the zoo. It's only 6.5acres, and it's really a children's zoo, but it was free with the New York Pass! I saw my first polar bear, as well as the penguins, puffins, seal, turtles, and the brilliant rainforest exhibit (note to self - don't go into an indoor, artificially created rainforest on a day when it's pushing 100F, and 90-odd percent humidity!) After that, I decided enough was enough, and headed straight back to the hotel, via McDonald's where I bought a very late lunch, getting back to the hotel at 4:30pm to eat it. Around 5pm Dom and Debbie knocked on my door, and let me know that they were back from their day, and getting ready to go out for dinner. They hadn't heard from Daniel either. I sat and watched TV - an American comedy called "Hope and Faith" that I watched on and off all week" and then at 6pm my phone rang. Guess who it was?

Yes, the winner of the "Best Disappearing Act 2007" award. I didn't flip out, having not only calmed down a lot since the morning, but being tired out after what had turned into a pretty pleasant day, though I wasn't about to tell him that just yet! It turned out that he'd got up at 8:30 and gone straight out, without even thinking about letting me know. Around midday he had gone back to the hotel and called my room, hoping that I wasn't there - partly because he knew what sort of reception he would have had if I *had* still been waiting there, but also because he had hoped that I would have actually been brave enough to go and explore and not waste the day. While I was still peeved, if you know Daniel you know that that's just what he's like ... he gets an idea, and just goes with it, then thinks about it later! We talked for a few minutes then he came along to my room, and we decided to go and get dinner. Although I'd only had lunch a couple of hours earlier, my body's meal clock and my blood sugar were all out of whack from not eating until so late, and I was hungry again already. Daniel said he wasn't feeling brilliant and probably wouldn't eat much, but was happy to go out with me for dinner, and told me to decide on a destination, as he didn't want to pick somewhere, look forward to eating something nice there, then not really want or enjoy it when it came.

I picked Planet Hollywood, where we had eaten on the Wednesday evening, and we were there in about ten minutes. We didn't have to wait more than a couple of minutes for a table, and were soon seated, with menus, and a *very* cheerful and attentive server, called Jonathan. He told us all about the menu, recommended drinks and food, and was generally great, as well as being very on the ball with refilling drinks, clearing plates etc. Considering he hadn't wanted much, Daniel made short work of the huge burger and fries meal he ordered, as well as two beers, and ice cream for dessert, while I started with an "Oatmeal Cookie" shooter - a blend of Baileys Irish Cream and Kahlua hazelnut liquor, which was not only gorgeous, but I got to keep the shot glass as well. My main course was great too - Jonathan's suggestion of grilled mahi-mahi, which is a white fish similar to cod, served on jasmine rice with seasonal vegetables and a pineapple and coriander salsa. I decided to push the boat out and have Key Lime pie for dessert as well, which was fantastic. it was probably my favourite meal out of the week, and turned what started as a no good, horrible, very bad day into a really nice evening.

After we left Planet Hollywood we looked in some of the gift shops, and I managed to get Debbie a rubber duck. Not just *any* rubber duck though - a yellow rubber duck with a Statue of Liberty crown and torch! I realise this doesn't sound like much of a present for a 24 year old, but you have to know the back story, which is that for several years there has been a rubber duck in the office at work, who was christened Ducky. Ducky liked to travel, and went on holiday every time Debbie did, as well as other trips with office staff. Somewhere along the line, he acquired a girlfriend - Doris. Doris and Ducky were looking forward to their trip to New York, until tragedy struck, and they went missing a few days before we left. Nobody at work has seen them, and Debbie was quite upset, so when I saw a "New York" duck, I had to buy him for her!

We headed back to the hotel after that, and were back there before midnight. I was shattered by then, so it wasn't long before I was off in the land of Nod ....


That's Friday for you - five days down, three to go!

By the way, the map shows my route from the hotel, and back to it again. Outward in red, return trip in green!

I Haven't Forgotten ...

... the photos from New York! Or the rest of the trip report, but you'll have to wait until Thursday evening for the next instalment, as it's after 10pm and I have to be up before 6 for work tomorrow. I still have a couple of hundred pics to edit, but will plough through them in the next two evenings, and then upload over the weekend!

New York Trip Report

I'm sorry it's taken me so long to get this up! It's still only the first four days, but it's a *long* read, even though I tried to be brief! I'm working my way through editing the pics, but there are over 900 to wade through, weed out the bad ones, and edit and upload the good ones, and now that I'm getting more 'into' my photography, I do more to them, which makes it slower! I'm working on it, promise!

New York, Part One

Monday - I met Debbie, Daniel and Dom at the railway station and travelled to Heathrow airport by train and Tube. We got there at 1pm, collected our boarding passes and dropped off our suitcases at bag drop, then went through security control and had lunch at O'Neills, before buying last minute sweets and reading material for the plane and heading for the departure lounge. Our flight was called for boarding on time, and we took off at around 4:30pm, arriving at New York's John F Kennedy Airport on time at 7pm, after a smooth but boring flight. Immigration was pretty quiet, and we were through in less than half an hour, so headed to baggage reclaim and customs, before making our way out to the cabs. We hopped in a cab immediately, and were at our hotel, the Milford Plaza on west 45th Street and 8th Avenue, in about 30 minutes. Checking in was simple, though as the only person without a credit card I had to leave a $75 cash deposit for any incidental charges, which was fine. After we checked in, we went to our rooms on the 21st floor, and I was pleased to find that our position on a higher floor afforded me a view of at least a tiny snippet of Times Square, though mostly, I could see more of our hotel and a building below.

After we'd all had a chance to look at our rooms, and freshen up a bit, we met in Daniel's room. Debbie and Dom weren't hungry, and didn't want to go out again, but Daniel and I were, and did! It wasn't even 10pm, and we were in New York for heaven's sake, so we went off to explore Times Square. We didn't stray too far from the hotel - with it being only a couple of hundred yards from Times Square, we had no need to, but we did find McDonalds. Traditionally the staple diet for our breakfasts while on holiday, today it was our evening meal instead, and although the food was up to scratch when we finally received it, all I can say is that it was a good thing that branch is open 24 hours - they'd need to be to make sure everyone eventually gets served! It was raining hard when we left, so we didn't go anywhere, just walked back to the hotel, and arranged to meet up at 9am the following morning. I unpacked the essentials, set my alarm for 7:30am, and nodded off - with the time difference and the extra hour or two that Daniel and I had spent out, it was almost midnight local time - which was almost 5am for me!

Tuesday - I woke at 7:30am, looked out off the window, and saw that far from the sunshine I had expected, it was grey, foggy, and raining. Hmm. I jumped in the bath, which was lovely and deep, though not long enough really, and got ready for the day ahead. At 9am I called Dom and Debbie, and Daniel. Daniel replied to my "Are you ready?" with "Ready? I might have already had breakfast at McDonalds, walked to 31st street and back, and been back in the hotel for half an hour .... "" and we all met in my room, and headed out for breakfast. Debbie had brought an umbrella with her, as well as full length trousers and a sweatshirt, but me being optimistic, had only brought a thin cardigan and cropped trousers, though it wasn't raining too hard yet. Dom, Debbie and I had breakfast at Café Europa, a deli/café chain that we saw all around Manhattan, and we all went for a traditional American breakfast of French toast and maple syrup, with sausage for me and Dom, and bacon for Debbie. Rather yummy, too! Debbie was a bit overwhelmed at the speed at which the deli staff take orders, and the fact that they were constantly shouting "Next!" while she was still trying to decide what she wanted, and never did really get used to the fast pace of New York life!

After breakfast we went to Madame Tussauds, as it was just a couple of streets away, on 42nd Street. our New York Pass got us in free, and after being taken up to the seventh floor in the elevator (glass, and outside the building - very cool!) we were told to follow the floors downwards, ending on the second floor. As for the floor we were starting on, our hotess told us that "the exit to the next floor is right behind Whoopi Goldberg, and restrooms are in back of John Travolta ...." I'd never been to a Madame Tussauds before, and was pleasantly surprised by the standard of many of the waxwork figures, as well as by the people who were featured. I asked everyone to let me know if they saw Jon Bon Jovi, as I wanted my photo taken with him, though I didn't actually know if he had ever sat for Tussauds, but as it happened, Daniel spotted him later. I also had my picture taken with John Wayne, who was a favourite of my grandad, and whose films I like as well. We rubbed shoulders with people like Robin Williams, George W Bush, Bill and Hillary Clinton, Martin Luther King Jr (another hero of mine), Ghandi, Chief Sitting Bull, Duke Ellington, Billie Holliday, Jennifer Aniston, Susan Sarandon, and too many more to remember, yet the whole museum took only an hour to get around, then we had a quick look around the gift shop, where I bought a keyring and a Madame Tussauds umbrella, and we made our way out.

Our next stop was the Empire State Building, though as it was now even foggier and raining pretty hard, we knew there would be poor, or even no, visibility. We decided that we could still get a look at the building, the lobby, and do the NY Skyride, which is a simulated helicopter ride over, under, and through, New York City, with actor Kevin Bacon as your guide. When we arrived, we found that the observation deck was actually closed, as the visibility was indeed zero. We went to the news store and collected our tickets for the Skyride, which was also on our New York Pass, as was the Empire State Building observation deck, hence why we weren't bothered at having to go back later in the week. The Skyride was fun - definitely worth doing, though pretty violent at times, with the simulated motion of a helicopter. I was glad I'd taken a travel sickness tablet!

Because Daniel had taken himself off and eaten breakfast a couple of hours ahead of the rest of us, we had stopped at KFC on the way to the Empire State Building for him to eat lunch, so we were hungry by now, but he wasn't! We stopped at Subway, and grabbed lunch there, then headed for Madison Square Garden, where our New York Passes got us into the All Access Tour free. It was much more interesting than I had been expecting, and as well as the history of MSG, the facts and figures, etc, we got to visit the locker rooms of the New York Knicks and the New York Rangers, the rival basketball teams who both call MSG home, as well as sit in one of the 89 executive boxes that are hired out to corporate companies on an annual basis. One other British guy asked our guide how much it costs to hire a suite for a year, given the great views of the court, private seating, and table service dining, and was told to guess. He guessed at half a million dollars, and was then told that the guide couldn't give an exact figure, but double that ...!

We were tiring now, but at least it had more or less stopped raining! We made our way back to the hotel, where we had a couple of hours to relax, bath, shower, change, or just nap, before we all met at 7pm to go and have dinner. We decided on the Hard Rock Cafe. where Dom had a burger, Debbie had a chicken and pasta dish, and Daniel and I went for the herb grilled chicken breast, with mashed potatoes, broccoli, and a mushroom sauce. Daniel had had it before in Detroit, and raved about it, and I thought it was nice, but nothing very special. When you enter the Hard Rock Cafe, each group has their picture taken, and then the packages are brought to your table while you eat to see if you want to buy them. At $25 for two large pictures, four small ones, a keyring photo and a magnet photo, I thought it was a good deal, and wanted to buy one, as did Daniel, but he stopped me. i was puzzled at first, then he said that he was getting one, and only wanted one of the large photos, and we could go halves, which we did. He also put way more money towards the bill than he should have, citing the extra $40 that he'd been given at the Travelex counter in Heathrow, when he picked up his currency, as the reason! Thanks Daniel :-)
We were all pretty tired by the time we had finished dinner, so wandered through the Times Square area back to the hotel, and were back in our rooms for 10pm or so. I went straight to bed - the earliest I've been in bed for ages!

Wednesday dawned grey and warm, but not too warm, and it was dry! Hurray! As usual, we met in the corridor at 9am, and Daniel and I went for breakfast at McDonalds, while Dom and Debbie went to a deli they liked the look of. After breakfast was done, and we'd all met up again, we headed towards the United Nations headquarters complex, as one of the 'behind the scenes' tours that our New York Passes gave us free access to was the UN tour, which Dom and I thought would be quite interesting, and especially for Dom, as his dad used to live in New York, and work in quite a senior position at the UN.

We walked down to 42nd Street, and then merely had to walk on 42nd Street all the way over the the UN at the far East side of Manhattan, as it's right on the river. We stopped for a while at grand Central Terminal, which is the most beautiful train station I can imagine! Completely done in marble (the original quarry was reopened specially in the 1990s when another staircase was added inside the station concourse, just to ensure the marble would match the original!) and with absolutely gorgeous architecture, the station has over 117 tracks leading in and out of it, shopping and dining concourses, and the ceiling is decorated with constellations, that actually have little twinkling lights for each star. It's definitely worth a visit for anyone ever in New York, and I would have liked to stay and explore more of it, but time was getting on.

On arrival at the UN complex we stopped to take photos of the sculptures in the grounds, as well as the flags that line the perimeter fence. There is one for every one of the 192 member countries, and they fly only when the weather is good, and not at weekends. I wouldn't like to be the person who has to raise and lower all those flags each day! We had to go through security, just as you would in an airport - all cameras, wallets, belts, keys in the plastic tray, and those and your bags went through the X-ray machine, while you walked through the metal detector. Once inside, I was taken by how spacious and airy the interior of the building we were in was, as well as how many paintings, sculptures, and similar works of art there were around. We went to the tour tickets desk, and collected tickets for tour number 14, which was due to leave in 10-30 minutes, as 13 was just leaving. We sat down on a *very* comfy bench, only for those people waiting for tour 14 to be called to the glass doors, where we were issued security passes and given a few instructions.

I have to admit, I can't remember all the areas we visited, but our guide knew her stuff, though she was very quietly spoken, as well as being from South Korea, and at times it was hard to hear her, especially when there were other tour groups in the same area as we were. Debbie found her accent quite hard to understand, and unfortunately missed out on a lot of what was said because of that, but on the whole it was an interesting way to spend an hour. It was quite novel being on UN territory, as strictly speaking we were no longer in the US. The UN complex and the land it occupies has special status, and belongs to all 192 member countries. The obligatory "did you bring your passports?" question was asked by the guide, and it took one or two people a few seconds to realise that she was joking,

I took some pictures inside the buildings, but most of them are out of focus, as we didn't have very long to take pics. The ones from outside are much better, and will appear in due course with my other trip pics. After the tour, I visited the gift shop, as did Daniel and Debbie, who both bought batteries, and then we walked around the grounds again so that Daniel could take the photos he hadn't been able to before we went inside, as his camera batteries had been dead at that point.

It was around lunchtime by now, and we were all hungry, so we headed in the general direction of Rockefeller Centre, where we wanted to 'do' Top of the Rock, the observation deck at the top of the GE building. We had lunch at a very nice deli/sandwich bar, and continued heading back to midtown. When we arrived at Rockefeller Centre it took a few minutes to find the right entrance for the Top of the Rock, but we eventually did - right opposite Radio City Music Hall, so the photos had to be taken, of course! We made our way inside, and downstairs to the ticket counter, where we actually had to *pay* for this
admission! $17.95 plus sales tax, so it wasn't too bad. By now it was becoming misty again, and in the time it took us to buy tickets and watch the 3 four minute pre-show video clips, then go through security and ride the elevator to the 67th floor, it started drizzling again. The observation deck actually starts on the 68th floor, and you can then go up to the 69th and 70th as well, but when we got up to the top level, we were disappointed to see just how poor the visibility was. Although the Empire State Building was just visible, Central Park was nothing more than a faint green blur, and not much else was visible either. We didn't stay there very long, and I have to admit, i was very disappointed by how bad the weather had become, as Top of the Rock was possibly the thing I had most been looking forward to, largely because of the fact that the Empire State Building and all of Central Park should have been clearly visible, which they aren't from the ESB itself.

We headed back down, after a brief look in the gift shop, and made our way back towards the hotel. It was approaching 4pm, and we wanted to do the same as the previous day, and have a bit of a break in our rooms before going out again for dinner and whatever else we fancied in the evening. We ended up meeting at 6:30pm again, and going to Planet Hollywood, where once again we had to have a group photo taken, though we didn't buy this one. The service was great, and the atmosphere was fun - lots of loud music, and upbeat servers as well. I combined the buffalo chicken tenders with a side order of fries, and while it was really tasty, the chicken tenders were too spicy for me, and I only ate three of the six. I did have the *best* ever strawberry milkshake though - thick and creamy, and just bursting with strawberry flavour! I can almost taste it now ... yummy.

After the meal, we went back into Times Square, as we ended up doing most evenings. We had planned to do the night time bus tour, and waited at the bus stop until after 9:30pm, when it should have turned up. No bus though, so although we were a little disappointed, it wasn't the end of the world, and we hailed a cab to the tip of Manhattan, in order to take a ride on the Staten Island Ferry by night. It's free, and something we all wanted to do, and it was a nice evening by now. The cab cost $16 and I paid, giving the driver $20 with tip - only £10, and Dom and Debbie split the return cab fare between them later. On arrival at the ferry terminal, we discovered that the 10pm ferry was just leaving, and so sat down to wait for the 10:30pm one, When it came, we boarded, and went upstairs, to the open deck. It was a bit chilly, but the views of Manhattan as we sailed towards Staten island were more than sufficient compensation. I tried to get some photos, but taking pictures of tiny twinkling lights from a moving boat isn't the easiest, and unfortunately none of them were worth keeping. We sailed past the Statue of Liberty, and even in the darkness it was easy to get an idea of just how huge she is. When we got to Staten Island, Dom asked one of the workers whether this was the next ferry out, to which the answer was yes, and then asked whether we were allowed to stay on board, as we were returning to Manhattan straight away. This guy, a gruff, middle aged man, said "Ya gotta get off ..." and Dom didn't hear exactly what he said, so said "Pardon?". The guy then said "Ya gotta get OFF. GET OFF" ... okay, we get it! I understand that he probably gets asked that every single night by countless tourists, but a little politeness would have been nice - we actually found it amusing though, as it was our first encounter with a "typical" New Yorker! We got off....

... walked out into the ferry terminal, out of the exit doors, straight back in the entrance doors, and back on to the same ferry, to the same positions we'd had just a minute or two before! The journey back was just as nice, with general silliness from Daniel, and the same gorgeous views. Back at Manhattan, we grabbed a cab back to the hotel, and were in bed by midnight, later than we'd originally planned, as we had an early start the next morning.

Thursday ... we had an early start, leaving the hotel at 7:30am, for a quick breakfast at McDonalds, then on to 42nd Street/Times Square subway station, to get the subway down to South Ferry. We figured out the self service ticket machines and bought $7 one day passes - a bargain. The subway was quick and comfortable, and the air conditioning on the train was heavenly after a 20 minute walk through the station corridors to get to the right platform for our train! We were soon at South Ferry, and walked a short way to Castle Clinton, at Battery Park, where we used our New York passes to collect our free tickets for the Statue of Liberty and Ellis Island Ferry, and admission to the Ellis Island Immigration Museum. The first ferry took about 15 minutes to reach Liberty Island, and I got some great close up pictures of the statue as we approached, though sadly it was pretty foggy again and I didn't get any good shots of lower Manhattan as we left. Liberty Island and the grounds surrounding the statue are pretty, and although you can't climb the inside of the statue any more, because of security concerns since 9/11, we got a good look at her. She's pretty amazing - 305ft tall! We spent an hour or so there, then visited the gift shop, where we all saw the same British guy from Madison Square Garden on Tuesday! Small world!

Next was the ferry over to Ellis Island, which was another short crossing. Ellis Island was the main immigration centre where those immigration to the US through New York, by sea, were sent fro processing, and because of the harsh, cramped conditions, and the fact that families often became separated when members were sent back home, it gained the name "Island of Tears". It's been beautifully restored to the period between 1918 and 1924, which were the busiest years, and has some excellent exhibits, though we really didn't do it justice. We wanted to get the ferry back to Manhattan, as it was lunchtime, and I'd thrown a spanner in the works by suddenly feeling *very* sick and low blood sugary. Not ideal, but I ran to the gift shop and bought a regular Coke, instead of my usual Diet, and a bag of Jelly Belly beans, and munched on them until we were on the ferry, where I bought a cheap hotdog that was totally disgusting, pretty tiny, but was stodgy and plain, and eased my nausea. When we got back to Manhattan we walked back through Battery Park to the subway station, where we caught the subway to Rector Street, which seemed the closest stop to Ground Zero, which was our next 'destination'.

We had lunch at a pizza place, and it was great, though I was the only one who only ate one of their two slices. I'd had that hotdog not long before, remember. We walked to the World Financial Centre after lunch, and found ourselves right on the edge of Ground Zero, where we didn't linger more than a few minutes. It's really just a big square construction site now, and seems strangely normal. It doesn't feel like it *should* be normal though, given the horrors that took place there. It was a very strange and uncomfortable feeling, and none of us had any real desire to spend much time there. We thought about going to the Tribute 9/11 visitor centre, but it was way over on the other side of the site, and I think we all felt that there was no real need to. Not because it wouldn't have been interesting, but certainly for me, because I don't need to see that to remember, and be respectful of what that day meant. I think I might have lost it if we had visited the tribute centre, or St. Paul's Chapel, which was the church on the edge of Ground Zero that was miraculously undamaged, and used as a base to feed volunteers and those working in the recovery efforts. As we walked away, I noticed tourists taking pictures of the site, which I had mixed emotions about. I understand the desire to have visual reminders of such a site, but for myself, I couldn't imagine standing and taking photos. It's still too recent, too raw. Walking towards the subway station, I felt subdued, and then angry, when I noticed the street vendors selling World Trade Center pictures, T-shirts, crystal ornaments etc. To me, they are making money from the tragedy, and that's just disgusting. I was glad to be away from the area, but at the same time, am glad we saw it. People need to see it, to 'get' the sheer scale of the events. I said that the site was smaller than I had expected, but it's still vast, and when you realise that both buildings were 110 stories high ... I remember walking away, and someone saying something that I smiled at, then feeling guilty for it. It didn't seem right to be smiling *there*.

On then, and we caught the subway to Canal Street, and Chinatown. We had all been told how great Canal Street is, for knock-off designer handbags, and cheap street stalls, and that's true. I was on a mission to pick up a fake Louis Vuitton handbag, and Daniel had a friend who had asked him to pick her up a bag too, so when we were approached by a woman with a laminated sheet of handbag photos in her hand, we went with her to the 'shop'. I knew what to expect, and it was a five minute walk to a plain building, with a plain front door, which she unlocked, and a flight of stairs leading down to another door, which was also locked. Inside, all four walls, including the back of the door, were lined with handbags - some of them quite nice, and most of them pretty good quality, with good stitching, and decent materials, but nothing that either of us liked - no fake Vuitton, anyway! We left without buying, and she wasn't particularly pleased, but hey ho. We walked onwards, past an endless line of stalls and shops selling handbags, T-shirts, New York souvenirs, discount electronics, etc, and fending off countless people trying to get us to buy. After a while we decided there was nothing more to see, and as some of us were beginning to feel really uncomfortable there, we headed back to the Canal Street subway station, and Manhattan, where we got off at 34th Street this time.

The weather had cleared up a lot from the fog that morning, and there were big areas of blue sky and some fluffy white clouds, so I had suggested going to the Empire State Building again, and seeing what the visibility was like now. It *had* to be better than it had been on Tuesday morning! When we got there, we got our tickets, and went upstairs, through security, then the elevator to the 80th floor, where we had to queue again, have our photo taken against the Empire State Building background, and then get the elevator to the 86th floor observatory. It was packed up there, but the view was amazing - it was only 5 mile visibility, and I was blown away by the views, and how far you could see - I can't imagine being up there on a crystal clear day when you can see up to 80 miles, and five states! I got some decent photos from all four sides, and after about an hour, we headed back to the hotel. On the way down, you pass the display of photos, but at $25 for two photos and the digital image on a CD, I thought it was a rip-off, and didn't buy. We headed back to the hotel for a couple of hours rest before dinner.

Meeting for dinner at 7pm, we headed to TGI Fridays, which was the restaurant I had most been looking forward to eating at. I chose the 12oz New York Strip Steak, with shrimp and fries. When the drinks came, Debbie was about halfway through her chocolate milkshake when she found two hairs! She got a replacement, but no apology, and although the food was great, the service was lacklustre, there were hairs in her drink, and the final straw was when we went to the bathrooms before we left. There was water and soggy toilet rolls all over the floor, as well as the wash absin area, one of the two stalls was out of use, and in the one that was in use, the toilet tissue holder was broken and hanging open, and the door didn't lock! We laughed about it on the way out, and we actually did go back there later in the week, for a much more successful visit!

We headed to the bus stop next, for the 9:00pm Night Loop, as we had the previous evening. 9:28, still no bus ... until Daniel said "Where do we want? 8th Avenue and 47th?" to which I said yes. he then said "We're on Broadway and 47th .... ". *That* probably explained the lack of a bus, as well as the same thing happening the previous evening! What we had done, was froget that although all the North-South streets in Manhattan are the avenues, 1st to 12th, Broadway is the one road that cuts across the avenues and sits in between 7th and 8th, so when we had walked one block over from 7th, it had only taken us to Broadway, not 8th! There were two buses still waiting at the right stop, and we found seats upstairs, on the open deck.

Our tour guide was Tim, a native Brooklyn-ite, who knew his stuff, and cracked some pretty good jokes too. The tour took us through the Garment District, Greenwich Village, Soho, Chinatown, Little Italy, across tha Manhattan Bridge to Brooklyn, around Brooklyn Heights, then back to Manhattan, through the Lower East Side, back up past the Chrysler Building, Empire State Building, etc, to Midtown, and our drop off point at Times Square. It was really interesting, and I'm glad we did it, finally. I always love open top bus tours of new cities, and there would be a couple more to do while we were in new York.

Dom and Debbie headed back to the hotel after we were dropped off - well, it was 11:30pm, and we had been up before 7. Daniel and I looked in a few shops, like Virgin Megastore, then made our way back to the hotel via a 24hr Duane reade drugstore, where I got some Diet Coke, and McDonalds, as we were hungry again! I got a Big Mac meal, and had the burger and drink, while Daniel had the fries! As we left the elevator on our floor of the hotel, to go to our rooms, we agreed I would call Daniel at 9:30am the next morning, as it would be just us, Debbie and Dom taking one of their two planned 'couple' days

Little did I know what the next morning would bring ....