IceQueen and I visited the Brooklyn Museum of Art (pictured) yesterday. We arrived late in the afternoon so didn't get to see all of it, but there was a very small New Zealand exhibit (which consisted of a couple of Maori carvings) grouped in with the Polynesian display, which was good to see, even if it was relatively insignificant compared to the rest of the museum. The Egyptian area was kewl ...for some strange reason Ancient Egyptian artifacts and hieroglyphs appeal to me ...go figure. As I said, we did not get to see much of the museum, I was expecting it to be more of an art gallery rather than a museum but apparently we didn't get to the art area (they closed at 6pm) so maybe next time. IceQueen said we will go to the Metropolitan Museum next time as it is a lot bigger and takes the best part of a day to see it all - no doubt there's some amazing art work there. Groovy.

Ok, that's it, New York is just plain freaky. There's been terrorists, buildings collapsing, anthrax, planes crashing for no apparent reason, and now there's meteor showers - yes, meteor showers. I was leaning out the window having a cigarette and for some reason I was imagining meteorites (possibly because there was a really suckful movie on TV Sci-Fi channel called 'Meteorites' at the time, starring that Luke Duke dude from Dukes of Hazard of all people) and where was I ...ok yeah, leaning out the window imagining meteorites when all the sudden I saw one! I was like, "IceQueen, hey wow, that was freaky!" and told her why it was so freaky. It was because the last time I had thought of meteorites was one night in New Zealand when I was standing outside talking to IceQueen on the portable phone, and hello, I saw one then as well. Anyway, shortly after this I see another meteorite bouncing across the atmosphere so IceQueen joins me at the window to check it out.

Within ten minutes or so we have seen about a dozen of these 'shooting stars' flying across the sky - this is at about 2am - so IceQueen hops on the internet, and sure enough, there is a meteor shower predicted for precisely this time! I have a great idea: lets go up to the roof and check it out! IceQueen asks me, "can we even get onto the roof?" ..well, only one way to find out.

Ok, so we have now found a great place to go during summer (yup we're on the roof), fifteen floors up so we can see pretty much the whole sky since ours is the biggest building within half a kilometer. Wanna know how many meteorites we saw? Over forty of the things! How amazing is that? If you don't think that's very amazing, then hey, you must be a freak, because it is very amazing, dammit! Particularly with the heavy light pollution here in NYC.

Why am I here typing this and not on the roof watching god throw rocks at us? Because it's kinda cold - what do I look like, a penguin? Don't answer that.

Final note: IceQueen just told me that if you made linguini with a penguin, you'd have penguini. I'll just leave you to ponder on that one for a few moments.

..couple of hours later..

I woke and looked out the window at about 5am and there were heaps of meteorites shooting through the sky, and i mean heaps. There were moments when two or three meteorites struck at the same time! In the space of about ten to fifteen minutes, there would have been over a hundred of them visible to the naked eye, and no doubt a whole lot more that I didn't see, it was amazing! Just thought I'd let you know.

What an interesting start to the day. I just walked IceQueen to the subway to go to work and her train had just left when down below I heard someone yelling abuse (the station is above ground, and the street is below it). So I start coming down the stairs to street level and there's this big Pepsi truck on the road and the driver is out on the street running after a silver sedan, which at first slows down, then takes off. The truck driver yells some abuse and starts to return to his truck. At this stage I presumed that the car had cut him off or something and I was seeing a little bit of road rage going on, as ya do. But wait, there's more.

A minute later the car comes back (after driving around the block) and stops behind the truck and the driver gets out. This could be interesting. Within 10 seconds these two gentlemen (and I use the term very loosely) are nose to nose abusing each other, and then the truck driver throws a punch. The driver of the car is a Jewish guy, so seconds later, being a Jewish neighborhood, a bunch more Jewish guys appear from all directions to join in (the truck driver is quite a bit bigger than the other dude) so more punches fly and there's a lot of yelling and pushing and shoving.

Just then another truck which happens to be passing by stops in the middle of the road and the driver jumps out and immediately joins in, fists flying. It's all on - truck drivers versus Jewish dudes. Within seconds there are about seven or eight guys having a big fight - all I could do is shake my head and think 'cavemen'. I considered going over and telling them to grow up but the fighting stopped pretty quickly and someone was calling the police as I walked away (this all happened in a very short space of time) but I have to wonder if this was stress release of people being worried about attacks (terrorism I mean) or whether those people were just natural born asshats.

This is the second fight I have seen in the neighborhood - and this is a good neighborhood apparently! For what is considered to be an enlightened, advanced, civilized and free nation, some of the citizens have a lot to learn.

Well today was... entertaining. I caught the subway with IceQueen and she got off at her work just outside of Manhattan while I continued on to an interview, which involved catching two more trains (which went without a hitch). I arrived about half an hour early so I took a walk along Madison Ave and found a Country Road Clothing store! I thought they were only in Australasia - will have to go back and buy a shirt or two sometime.

The trip home was where things went awry. I rang IceQueen when I finished the interview so I could meet her for a coffee. About two hours and seven different trains later I arrived there. Omigod the subway system can get confusing for the uninitiated. I hopped on the correct train eventually, except it was an express and went flying right past where I wanted to get off. I even passed some stations several times coming from different directions during my little tour. At one stage I ended up at Rector St station, the closest currently operating station to where the World Trade Center station used to be, and it smells bad - there is still stuff burning under WTC, and many hundreds of unrecovered bodies *shiver*. Not pleasant.

Eventually I arrived at IceQueen's work and we went to a cafe for a while which was great - sticky buns and fresh orange juice *yum*. It was great being able to visit her like that. At about 3.30pm IceQueen returned to work and I went home on the subway (got the right one this time) and that's the story for today. Enjoy it? Good.

Here are pics of the new Pierre Cardin watch and Andrew Marc NY leather jacket. Like them? I do. *grin* The watch has a silver strap with a small amount of gold color in it as well... you can't really tell much about the jacket from this photo, but it's pretty awesome, believe me. Clothes and watches etc here are insanely good value, compared to NZ at least.

I think IceQueen has a camera at her parents house, so eventually we will get it around here for a day and take some pics around the apartment if anybody is interested. Right now we just use a $5 webcam, and it kinda shows. Ok, hasta la vista baby.