Back in the Big Apple

I wrote a huge blog entry for y'all on the train ride to New London, but still haven't had a chance to hook my poor little wireless-impaired lappie up to the net - so here I am, at a ridiculously overpriced internet cafe wasting time explaining my dilemma. Oh dear.

So...I guess the point I'm trying to make is that a) this is not that blog entry and b)I will post it and fill in the gaps in my adventure at some later point. Just think of this technique as a stylistic choice, with me being the Quentin Tarantino of blogging and everybody's happy.

Ooh, I love it when I feel post-modern.

To be honest I was feeling a little scared about returning to New York. Not in a 'terrified for my safety' kind of way, just in a 'I've only just gotten into my comfort zone in Boston and now here I am breaking it again' kind of way. But I emerged from the 2+ hour train-ride happy, namely because:

a) I sat next to the most talkative American I've ever met - she was actually a pretty cool character study. A Californian twenty-something self-confessed techno geek who dropped pearlers into our 'conversation' (if by conversation you mean a monologue with the occasional obligatory response on my part) like:

"I hate flying, they check all through your bags. I come on here, and nobody knows WHAT I've got in there!" Chuckle.

Picture me smiling and then having a sit-com like dramatic dawning realisation of what her words could potentially mean.

She also said "So..." at the end of almost every sentence. I'm estimating that between New London and New York, she squeezed in about 12,683. You've gotta love efficiency.

And, the only time not spent verbalising was spent playing with her cyber-dog on her Nintendo - a kind of mini video of a computerised dog that, she informed me with pride, she'd taught to 'sit', 'roll over', 'beg' and apparently react to some sort of command that involved her blowing onto the screen, then giggling. I didn't dare ask. The entire contraption struck me as completely bizarre, until I realised how super convenient that was: you could feel all the cool things about having a pet - the obedience, the visuals, the cuteness - without any of the bad stuff (the smell, the cleaning up, the having to resist the compulsion to lock them in a cupboard when they're naughty).

There has gotta be a market for a cyber-baby.

Alas, I digress. The second reason I emerged happy from my train-ride was because:

b) I jumped straight into a cab that has, according to the cabby, transported such luminaries as Matt Damon and Whoopi Goldberg!

At that I subtly rubbed my arms all over the seats in an attempt to soak up cool germs. I even licked the seatbelts. Then he went on to mention his other passengers...

Mariah Carey.

I stopped licking.

Monica Lewinsky.

I dry-retched.

So that's New York for you baby. It's all the way from crappy to cool and everything in between.

(Not really, but damn it does sound good, doesn't it?)

I'm now going to continue my stroll around uber-cool Soho, and then head off this afternoon to my very first BROADWAY SHOW!!!!!!!!! I'm seeing "Bridge and Tunnel" which is apparently a tres cool one-woman show featuring a heap of different characters. I can't wait. Then, going on the hot tip from Jeremy from Improv Asylum (who I interviewed the other night) I'm going to try and check out the Upright Citizens' Brigade's Sunday night improv show.

*sigh*

A woman's work is never done.