June 10 - the center of the Universe

June 10- New York City, the center of the Universe.

I find it odd that when you want to be pregnant you always see pregnant people and now that I've been away from my wife and daughter for a week, I keep seeing little kids. Strollers here, Bjorn there. I like this trip but will not regret going home.

This morning we made our way onto the bus and towards the Lincoln Tunnel only to find things backed all the way up. Today is the first time since 9/11 that the Lincoln Tunnel is closed. It's flooding from all the rain. I bobbed along on the bus, with my hood over my head and neck pillow balancing my noggin' back and forth in rhythm with New Jersey potholes.

Two hours later we arrived over an hour late in front of the Dakota Hotel to meet our tour director who bared an uncanny resemblance to Molly Shannon. She gave us an abbreviated tour of the City starting with a walk across Central Park. The Dakota hotel was built over 100 years ago the builder was scoffed at because he was building a hotel so far uptown. His friends said the only people who would stay there were the Dakota Indians since it was so far away. So he named it the Dakota. On a winter day in 1980 Henry David Chapman, to impress Jodi Foster, shot and killed John Lennon out front. Yoko Ono dedicated a memorial mosaic across the street in the park called Strawberry Fields.

The park was lush green but the humidity was sickening as our clothes hung from our skin. We walked by famous landmarks and the ponds in various movies. We also saw the fountain in Home Alone and Ransom, not to mention about 186 other movies. Molly Shannon, tour director Julie, was very informative and I stayed nearby. On the opposite side of the park we met the bus and went toward Saint Pat's where we took a 5 minute photo-op that turned into 15 because one of the groups has disregarded all punctuality. We then walked down the English Channel into Rockefeller Center to the GE building past the ice skating rink and into the GE building where Kahlo's husband was commissioned to paint a large mural that Rockefeller destroyed because it represented Hitler and Communism, while Rockefeller was all about Capitalism.

We left our tour director at Time Square at 1pm and walked around looking for lunch. We got Sbarro's and paid too much before taking several photos of the entire area. J wanted Coldplay's new CD and we went into Virgin Megastore. We were to meet the bus to head to Sea Port Village eventually, but part of one group was over 20 minutes late.

The MET is not open on Mondays, but today was Friday. We went into the front of the museum and received small pink clip-on pins to make sure we paid. Then we snuck out the front door for Plan Q, which was to escape across Central Park on foot to the small café where Hanks and Ryan met in You've Got Mail for their date.

It was quite a hike and we were rank by the end of it, but nothing beats the lush greenery of the Park on a muggy June afternoon.

After eating the fluffiest cheesecake ever, we made our way quickly back to the MET and jumped our coach toward Seaport Village, which thrust us into rush hour traffic downtown, which sucked.

We then sat in traffic and made it about 10 blocks in about 2 hours. We drove through some interesting parts of town and saw a lot but got know anecdotal information from anyone.

After making it about 20-30 blocks in about two hours, we realized we'd never back it to Sea Port Village and back to Broadway before Phantom of the Opera, so we turned around. Yuck.

The bus carried us uptown to Time Square, and in over three hours we were where we started. We walked the Square and went into a small fast food joint with seating for dinner. We bought fried grease and I called home, while our small group made their way to the Toys R Us where there's a 4-story ferris wheel inside. I stood across the Majestic and listed to my iPod while waiting for Esther and the tickets.

Eventually we all met up and thrust tickets into their hands as we made our way through a crowd of beautifully people up to our seats. The theatre experience was well worth it, even with our nose bleed seats and me in my sweaty t-shirt, shorts, tennis shoes, and Yellow iPod earphones around my neck.

Afterward we made our way back into New Jersey through the now opened Lincoln Tunnel to our hotel room.