Welcome to Monatin

Yesterday was awesome.  When I got back to the hostel last night I was so exhausted I hit the pillow and sunk like butter into the hardwood mattress.  It felt like a giant cream puff.

I made a friend on my flight from Bmore to NY, a guy named Jessie who is doing mission work and invited me to come help out at this place in Brooklyn some time this week.  Very cool, thanks Jessie.

please turn off all electronics, Michael.

At the airport I immediately bought my metro card, and was trying to figure out how the hell I was going to get from LaGuardia to the Upper West Side.  I walked outside and saw a few buses.  I went up to one, confused.  "Excuse me, do you know where this bus is going?"  I asked some guy.  "Monatin," some guy said.  "Sorry?"  "Monatin."

Screw it, I'm getting on the bus.  Really hoped he was trying to say Manhattan.  He was.

The bus led us through Harlem towards the west side, and when I felt we were getting close I got off, looking for a subway to take me south.  Couldn't find the subway.  So not that anything's wrong with Harlem, but...  I stood out.  Maybe I didn't, I don't know.  I'm kinda white.

Eventually bussed my way south past central park, and when I got to my hostel at 12:45, they told me check in wasn't til 3.  No big deal though; I dropped my bags and walked around Broadway Street for a while, which was awesome.  There were lots of people walking dogs, so I knew I was pretty much safe. I mean honestly, who's gonna stab and rob you while they're taking little Roscoe on his afternoon walk? Then again, it's probably happened.

this is my safe neighborhood.

it smells like urine sometimes.

After that I went to Times Square - Jason was planning on meeting me @ 3, so I still had time to kill.  And this part of my day was probably the best.  Not because of Times Square, I only stayed there a few minutes.

What I DID do is walk from Times Square over to 5th Avenue, which was a really cool street.  I remember seeing these two mobsters - and yes, they absolutely had to be mobsters - walking twice as fast as everyone else, as if they had just committed murder and were trying to get away.  I wouldn't be surprised if it were true.  They were dressed in your typical boss and consigliere attire, carrying the same sense of authority that ants have over tiny rocks.  And they were bilingual!  Cincinnati doesn't have bilingual mobsters, New York is so cool!

And then I found it, what I was looking for:  Rockefeller Plaza.  (Side Note:  my dream job is to be a writer for an NBC sitcom.  Rockefeller Center is the location of NBC headquarters.  And also the location where the show 30 rock takes place.  SNL happens every Saturday in Rockefeller Center.)

I walked in and am just in awe.  I'm starting to get really tired, because I had woken up at 4:30 that morning.  But yet, I'm walking around in this weird half-zombie half-awestruck state, in the building I want to one day work in, all by myself and having very little clue of which hallways I'm supposed to stay out of.  Turns out I made a non-tourist turn, and was stared down in passing by a suspicious maintenance worker.  I turned around and just headed to the gift shop.

The NBC gift shop was the highlight of my day.  Amidst Starburns t-shirts and TGS mugs and a huge array of other NBC merch, I was in heaven (financial hell, but emotional heaven).  As I was calling a friend of mine, a guy at the gift shop commented on my Cleveland t-shirt, and said there was a guy who worked in the shop who was from Ohio.  Cincinnati, actually.  "Oh wow, I go to Xavier" I say.  And me and this guy Pete started chatting for a good 5 minutes.  He was a young guy, and said he found the job on Craigslist.  Lucky bastard he is.  We talked about The Chris Farley Show, biography which both of us had read.  We talked about other NBC stuff, and how both of us want to one day work doing actual production stuff for NBC.  After I walked away, I briefly thought wouldn't it be funny if we ended up working together some day.

After I grabbed a job application (shut up,  there's a chance...), I walked outside and this was the icing on the cake:

30 rock.

I ended up meeting with Jason, and having been running since 4:30 am on an Auntie Anne's pretzel, it was time for dinner.  We went to this awesome family-style Italian restaurant called Carmines and ordered baked ziti that was probably the best baked ziti I've ever had.  Don't ask me how much it cost.

After that we went to Soho and met up with Jason's brother Keith, and we went to another restaurant, where I drank 5 glasses of water and passed on the food.  Then it was time to go, and then I got lost.

The train that I thought would take me to the west side was actually headed to the east side, and before I knew it I was on Roosevelt Island.  There was a really beautiful moment before the chaos started when I was looking out from the Island onto Manhattan.  I'm really happy to be here, I thought.  I was too exhausted to really probe for thoughts deeper than that.  I just wanted to get back to the hostel.  I saw one of those lift things that carries people over water and to Hitler's mountain hideout, and other things like that.  This is where Green Goblin almost killed Spiderman.  Cool.

All in all, it took me 2 hours longer to get back than it should have.  But it was a freaking awesome first day.

ronnosevelt island.