NY and back again.
Spent 4 days in New York last week and boy, was it cold!! Frigid actually. I don't think I felt warm one minute I was there.
Let me see if I can sum up my trip...
Went to 30 Rockefeller Center and saw the ice skaters and the Christmas tree at Rockefeller plaza. A quintessential New York Christmas spot. Walked the windows at Sax and decided I was just to Western to get it. They were beautiful and the Hermes dresses were to die for, but I never quite figured out the girl in the beret or the glass bubbles...hmmm...
I stayed on the 33rd floor of the Millenium Hilton overlooking Ground Zero. It was pretty stunning actually. To have a birds eye view of the construction going on at Ground Zero, to sleep in a hotel that was all but destroyed when the towers fell, to walk to work everyday past the fire house (Engine Company 10 and Ladder Company 10) on Liberty directly across the street from Ground Zero, to see this memorial... you couldn't walk around down there and not feel a reverence for the victims of 9/11 and an infusion of the post-9/11 patriotism we all remember.
I think I get it now. A memorial there is important. To leave it with nothing would literally be a gaping hole in lower Manhattan, a significant reminder of loss. To rebuild with new office and commercial space would feel like ignoring it every happened. A memorial feels like the right way to honor lives lost and a truly compelling moment of American History. It has the resonance of Gettysburg or a Pearl Harbor. It deserves the reverence and respect of a memorial.
On a lighter, or maybe not because it was a French restaurant, I at at an Anthony Bourdain bistro. It was fantastic food.
I discovered a delicious deli on the main floor of 2 World Financial Center called Cosi. Isn't that a cute name? It was in a bit of a wind tunnel with doors on both ends of the building, so you had to wear a parka to lunch, but they make fresh flatbread in a wood burning oven. Delish. I found out it is a chain and I'm thinking I should open one here. I would weigh 400 lbs from eating warm flatbread at every meal, but it seems like a reasonable sacrifice for a great baked good.
Finally, I got an earful from my driver about flying out of JFK in the rush hour window. An earful. Laguardia, he said. You go domestic, you go Lagaurdia. If you go JFK you sit in traffic for an hour every time. Who wants to sit in this car for an hour, just so I can fly out of JFK...
I wanted to be real snotty and say "Look, the only direct flight home is through JFK. I can either sit in traffic for an hour or I can sit for 3 hours in the Detroit airport. hmmm...which would you choose? Yeah, I'm going with 1 hour in traffic." Instead I just said, "good to know."
There was no one in my row when I flew home, so I laid down!!!! I slept for an entire hour.
All in all a good trip, but a long one, so I'm really glad to be home.
Let me see if I can sum up my trip...
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| 2010 Christmas tree at Rockefeller Center |
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| building the memorial at Ground Zero, December 2010 |
I stayed on the 33rd floor of the Millenium Hilton overlooking Ground Zero. It was pretty stunning actually. To have a birds eye view of the construction going on at Ground Zero, to sleep in a hotel that was all but destroyed when the towers fell, to walk to work everyday past the fire house (Engine Company 10 and Ladder Company 10) on Liberty directly across the street from Ground Zero, to see this memorial... you couldn't walk around down there and not feel a reverence for the victims of 9/11 and an infusion of the post-9/11 patriotism we all remember.
I think I get it now. A memorial there is important. To leave it with nothing would literally be a gaping hole in lower Manhattan, a significant reminder of loss. To rebuild with new office and commercial space would feel like ignoring it every happened. A memorial feels like the right way to honor lives lost and a truly compelling moment of American History. It has the resonance of Gettysburg or a Pearl Harbor. It deserves the reverence and respect of a memorial.
On a lighter, or maybe not because it was a French restaurant, I at at an Anthony Bourdain bistro. It was fantastic food.
I discovered a delicious deli on the main floor of 2 World Financial Center called Cosi. Isn't that a cute name? It was in a bit of a wind tunnel with doors on both ends of the building, so you had to wear a parka to lunch, but they make fresh flatbread in a wood burning oven. Delish. I found out it is a chain and I'm thinking I should open one here. I would weigh 400 lbs from eating warm flatbread at every meal, but it seems like a reasonable sacrifice for a great baked good.
Finally, I got an earful from my driver about flying out of JFK in the rush hour window. An earful. Laguardia, he said. You go domestic, you go Lagaurdia. If you go JFK you sit in traffic for an hour every time. Who wants to sit in this car for an hour, just so I can fly out of JFK...
I wanted to be real snotty and say "Look, the only direct flight home is through JFK. I can either sit in traffic for an hour or I can sit for 3 hours in the Detroit airport. hmmm...which would you choose? Yeah, I'm going with 1 hour in traffic." Instead I just said, "good to know."
There was no one in my row when I flew home, so I laid down!!!! I slept for an entire hour.
All in all a good trip, but a long one, so I'm really glad to be home.
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