New York City, Day 3 (11/18/09):
This is really Day 2.5 as I had to head home to Boston this evening. I packed my stuff up and checked out of the hostel, the first stop would be to check out MOMA and then a bite to eat before catching the bus back home. One other thing, I woke up to find my D90 completely out of batteries – it must have been on the night before while I was out at the concert. Luckily I had my S90 with my as backup camera.
Last time I didn’t have time to check out MOMA, since this was a half-day and I had done most of the super touristy things already I figured it would good to chill out and look at some art. 2 things ended up happening at MOMA that I did not expect (1) there was a Tim Burton exhibit showing off some of his photography and illustrations and (2) Tim Burton was going to be at MOMA for a book signing. I didn’t realize the second part of this until I noticed a mass of people waiting in line at the first floor of the museum. When he arrived for the book signing I caught a fleeting glimpse of him from about 200 ft away, but I wasn’t quick enough with the camera to snap his picture. Besides Tim Burton there was an awesome exhibit about the Bauhaus movement on the 6th floor – very interesting. I don’t have a ton of pictures from MOMA because some of the areas were restricted from photography.
After the museum I decided to check out Grammercy Tavern near the Flatiron area, when I got there I found out that I missed lunch and that it was formal attire required. Luckily Craftbar was around the corner from there and I figured it would be worth the stop. I ended up having the risotto balls as an appetizer and went with the veal meatballs w/ linguini as my main course (I learned a lesson about being too adventurous the night before). Both dishes were good but they didn’t bowl me over with flavor. Still couldn’t complain, I think some of my problem is that I need a little bit of spice and I was expecting the pasta to have some kick to it. Usually I don’t hesitate to pour on the Tabasco sauce, but I never really do that when dining at a fancy joint because I want to taste the dish the way it was intended. Honestly that’s kind of a stupid practice on my part.
Finally I get back to Chinatown to hop back on the Lucky Star bus. I fall asleep pretty quickly and before long we make the mandatory stop at Arby’s somewhere in the middle of CT. I swear that Lucky Star owns this Arby’s and it is a genius profit making rouse to consistently deliver 20-30 customers every hour, on the hour, to their own business for food. Pretty industrious. Either way we hop back on the bus and continue along until suddenly the driver pulls over under an overpass. Shit, I thought, the bus must be on fire or something. True to their ways, the driver never tells any of us what is going on. So we sit there waiting for 20 minutes for an explanation in broken English, some hand gestures or just obvious body language to let us know what is happening. He starts the bus again finally but we never top 20 MPH, I guess he must have blown his transmission. Finally the bus an hour behind us catches up and we all are able to transfer over to get a ride home. I wonder if Lucky Star is making a profit with these cheap fares and grueling touring schedule, I guess it all depends on limiting the amount of buses that have engine failure… Still I can’t complain, my sunk costs for this trip amount to about $68 – not bad for 2.5 days in New York.
