To see photos from the day click here
So for my birthday this year, I wanted to do something cheesy, and wouldn't you know it... Jane helped deliver :)
So the day started pretty early, we took a 9 am train I believe from Stamford to the city, playing a little mad libs on the way (you all remember those right :). When we got to the city we figured the best bet would be to go to the Empire State Building first because it would probably get busier as the day progressed. So when we got there... we took the elevator up to I think the 60th floor, where we had to take another elevator to the 80th floor, from here you waited in line for the next elevator to take you to the 86th floor observation deck... or you can do what we did and climb the remaining 6 stories... I must tell you from 86 stories up.. things do look pretty small... You could see the bridges on all four sides, the East river, the Hudson, Yankee Stadium, Central Park, lots of pigeons... it was fun.
From here, we had to take care of Jane's car... it had broken down near Harlem the other day and we had to arrange to pick it up. The name of the company was Expert Automotive Inc, European Auto Specialists. She was going to pay for it via credit card, but after they finished, they told her they didn't take credit cards for more than $200 and demanded that she get a bank check to pay for it. I got on the phone with them and told them they were violating the contract they signed with the credit card companies that say they can't set limit on acceptance for credit cards. They offered to do it 50/50 on the card, but I told them no way, and was calling AAA to let them know about how this station was treating us. They called back and said they would do the whole thing on the card, and we picked it up. A little bit of aggravation on the phone with them saved considerable time fighting with them, we got the car, and parked it near the start point of the tour company we bought the bus tickets from.
We took one of those cheesy double decker bus tours of the Upper East Side from Gray Line NY Tours. We saw a ton of really cool stuff along the way, Grants Tomb was pretty cool, we didn't hop off, but it look like the capital which was cool, and the inscription on his tomb is cool. He write it himself "Let us have peace", odd for a man of war, but couldn't be more right.
We didn't hop off until we got to Strawberry Fields Memorial and the Dakota Building. This was the site of Lennon's assassination, and sad as it is, it was unfortunate that a man calling himself the "Mayor of Strawberry Fields" or "Gary". I understand why he does it, and he is fighting for his freedom of speech to talk about John, but unfortunately what would have otherwise been a spiritual experience for a music fan, turns into a political spectacle and will always be remembered that way. Ehh... I almost wished I hadn't listened in to what he had to say.
We drove through Black Harlem, saw where the Cotton Club was, and the Apollo... in Muslim Harlem we saw the school, mosque and Bazaar created by Malcolm X's wife in honor of her husband's teachings.
I learned a few things too... you know those buildings over 6 stories require water to be pushed to the roof and stored in rooftop water tanks so they can have enough pressure for the entire building. Read about it here.
Also, the word Manhattan comes from the Lenape Language meaning island of many hills.
After the tours... we stopped at the Caswell Massey store on Lex, and I bough some of that Hair Wash I saw in the catalog because I like the bottle and wanted to try it. From there we went to B and H photo where I got a new lens hood, and looked at tripods to replace the one I had stolen from me.
We watched 21 at the 34th Street AMC theater and the headed home around 9ish and had ourselves a muffin at the diner before going to bed.
All in all, this was a great birthday... am a little tired from it still today, but that is OK... I'll live.
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