whirlwind pt. 1

The variety of places and situations in which I find myself in the pursuit of professional and leisure activities continues to amaze me. Man, I feel like a lucky sonofabitch sometimes. Of course, if you agree with Benjamin Disraeli, “The secret of success in life is for a man to be ready for his opportunity when it comes.” Not sure how successful I am, but I was certainly prepared to seize several days and scenarios which recently presented themselves.

A few weeks ago I was approached at the office by a pair of  department directors with a project. I was half expecting something tedious, to which I would’ve of course agreed. But, what they had in mind was me traveling to New York City to meet up with another colleague in order to do some video production.

New York City? On the company dime? Wow. Though I’d always been eager, I’d never been to NYC. So, with stars in my eyes and the corporate card in my wallet I made arrangements to fly into the Big Apple. Our brief visit would focus on interviewing a U.S. congressman, around which other industry-appropriate appointments would be made. This would involve carting a huge bag of lighting and camera gear around Manhattan for two days. Ehh, well worth it.

My evening flight from Kansas City International to LaGuardia (MCI to LGA for those keeping tabs on the IATA location identifier scorecard) was an inauspicious introduction. It was simply the roughest, most turbulent flight I’ve ever experienced. The fact that I was seated at the tail of the relatively small ‘regional’ jet (serving the infamous … Kansas City-New York region) probably didn’t help. Another thing that didn’t help was listening to some rather edgy selections from The Mars Volta’s Frances the Mute while being tossed about somewhere over Ohio. I didn’t think even drinking beer would help soothe me. But, yes, I tried. As you might guess from the fact that I appear to be alive and typing this,  the journey toward Queens County, Long Island came to a successful conclusion. As the plane descended into the New York area the air became calm, the flying graceful. Something about it all struck me as so delicately alien and Kubrickian that I couldn’t help imagining strains of Strauss’ “Blue Danube Waltz.”

Then I deplaned. LaGuardia is kind of a shithole, eh? After about a million minutes I gathered my checked luggage—the boat anchoresque video gear—and hailed a hack. Yeah, that’s totally what I did.

Previous to actually setting foot in the city, most of my recent vision of New York City was owed to the detective novels of Kinky Friedman. And wouldn’t you know it—one of the first exit signs I noticed from the cab was for Vandam Street, location of Kinky’s loft in the books. Circularity at its finest. Minutes later, around 11:00 pm, my ass was deposited at Hotel Thirty Thirty, on (you guessed it) 30th St. between Avenues Park and Madison (serious Manhattan). I’ve become accustomed to the seemingly palatial rooms of convention-center-orbiting hotels associated with my standard business travel. So the closet like room I entered on the seventh floor was something of a surprise. Welcome to New York. I stayed in the room just long enough to muse at its compactness, yet functionality. Then I hit the streets.

Should a Pentax carrying rube really be wandering an unfamiliar and possibly intimidating city at such a late hour? I calculated that 11:00 New York roaming-unknown-streets-time was probably about like 8:00 roaming-unknown-streets-time in KC and therefore … still not necessarily safe. But, fuck it anyway.

... and pass me a loaf of bread.

Uhh, yeah ... nice try.

After a number of blocks in various directions I realized that working all day, then traveling through the dinner hour was starting to take its toll on my body and curiosity. So I endeavored to grab some dinner near my hotel—directly across 30th, in fact, at the Crooked Knife. Though I couldn’t get a table in the street, I still felt like I was walking in some perpetual Billy Joel song. Owing to my ordering dinner at damn near midnight, the Crooked Knife was out of several things I wanted. But the gnocchi and Harps were acceptable and it was about time to call it a night.

The view from within the Crooked Knife

Knowing I wouldn’t be meeting my partner in crime, arriving from Cleveland-via-Akron, until 11:00ish the following morning, I decided to get up early and take advantage of what free time I could carve. I took off from the Thirty Thirty at around 7:00 am, deciding I’d walk for one hour in some direction, leaving me over an hour to get lost and make my way back. The direction I settled on was south, toward Greenwich Village. Along the way I just tried to soak it all in, listening to Powerbill by The Semantics and, stirringly, Pieces of a Man by Gil Scott-Heron, an album recorded in 1971 not that far from where I was walking. Sites:

Archetypal "city shot" on 5th Avenue

Iconic images everywhere you look - The Flatiron Building.

Asleep in Washington Square Park

So, I made it to The Village in pretty short order. It was pretty much as I’d pictured it, waking up to the day as it was. Being there so early, most everything was closed, including Bleecker Street Records, a shop I figured I could get into judging from the window display.

Lou Reed's Metal Machine Music right up front

Speaking of Bob Dylan, I also passed by one of his reported former haunts, the legendary (and obviously closed) Cafe Wha?, a spot which also plays in the history of Jimi Hendrix. I enjoyed the atmosphere and noted the nearby buzz of crosstown traffic.

Wha? Foreground: Some flight-delayed Night Bird Flying?

But I didn’t have all damn day to sightsee. It was time to head back to the hotel and prepare to get to work. The walk back was just as great as the trek there, the streets starting to come to life and truly manifest the hustle and or bustle of the city.

Resting for a bit, I took in the scene that daylight provided out of my room, a very Rear Window vibe.

It's just another run-of-the-mill Thursday. The calendar's full of 'em.

Meeting up with my cohort for coffee on Madison Ave. (so cosmopolitan, see), it was time to get down to the reason we were there. The ensuing middle portion of the day was a damn busy affair which called for us to visit multiple veterinary hospitals (truly) wherein I unpacked and assembled our traveling multimedia array. Don’t get me wrong—I wasn’t hauling around a $30,000 ENG camera and a bunch of other high end gear, just a small, simple Canon HD unit and a few lights. Our multimedia department is still a work in progress, a work under scrutiny. It was still a lot of shit to carry around. I took it upon myself to assemble makeshift sets where I could, such as in the library of Manhattan’s legendary Animal Medical Center:

Instant set.

Later, between our second and third appointments we had a few minutes to kill. On 72nd St. I happened upon a hot and dusty shop specializing mostly in classical sheet music and recordings wherein I did not purchase a condensed score of Monteverdi’s L’Orfeo and a nearby cluster of street vendors, including table after table of books, including a slim biography of Lester Young which was also not purchased.

72nd & Broadway

It was a steamy afternoon and I could feel the back of my neck getting burnt and gritty. By the time we were finished with work we were ready for some hard earned relaxation. We grabbed another cab to take us back to the hotel, passing briefly and without ceremony through Central Park, rather near the Dakota. Plans were made to reconvene in the lobby and grab dinner and beverages back in Greenwich. The cabbie (a man with no meter in his black sedan type vehicle—should probably stick with the yellow variety) dropped us in the vicinity of MacDougal street where were ensured we could grab some Italian. Food, that is. After a false start in a joint that was cash-only (bad move—we were spending someone else’s money!) we found ourselves seated outdoors on 6th Avenue … I think. Passing on a bottle of white, a bottle of red, I settled on a bottle of Meroni. Oh hell yea.

Ambiance

After an excellent meal we shopped a bit in the area and, spent, cabbed it back to the hotel. So much for Thursday.

Friday would also be a busy one, capped off by flying home. We started out by heading to Times Square to shoot a news segment, rolling our crap out onto the sidewalk and acting like we belonged there. That’s at least half the battle, don’t you think?

Following my own formula for 'great shots in NYC': 1. Turn camera on 2. Point camera in some direction 3. Take photo - Instant classic.

Of course no one batted an eye at our somewhat ramshackle operation. Love it. Following this miniature success we sought out some breakfast. We had in mind some very New York type of scene in line with the previous evening’s dinner, say some Scorsese-like diner in which Henry Hill might’ve met up with Jimmy Conway. Of course, Times Square is mostly the caliber of McDonalds and MTV—strictly commercial. We wandered a while, passing Radio City (did you know they do not constantly play “You Get What You Deserve” and “September Gurls” by Big Star over the PA there? Weird.) and other notable sites. Finally, starving, we settled on dining at … Rockefeller Center. No sign of Jack Donaghy or Liz Lemon, but the waffles and French press coffee were excellent.

Our final assignment was actually the impetus for the entire trip. We were to meet with the aforementioned (yet still not herein named) congressman at Madison Square Garden, the site of Ross University’s graduation. And where would we shoot this segment? That’s right, in a ‘green room’ at the Garden.

Another improvised set featuring taxis.

After this most interesting session (the subject made me, for a few moments, not despise lawmakers—no small feat) there was some talk of attending the commencement. I cited need to get the gear back to the hotel and got the hell out of there. With only a couple more free available hours in the city I was not interested in lingering indoors. I did take the ball-and-chain back to Thirty Thirty, mind you. Then I wove my merry way up streets and down avenues in search of … whatever. Among the things I found were a ‘vintage’ clothing store where one could buy a t-shirt with a Beatles iron-on for $40, tons of wholesale clothing and fabric stores in the fashion district, Koreatown and yes, lunch.

Minar.

I had the fish curry, which was killer. It was a very interesting experience—I was the only ‘pale face’ in the place and the only English being spoken was to me or by me. Inside a busy Indian restaurant in Manhattan I felt very submerged in another culture within another culture, precisely the melting pot moment I’d hoped for.

Back out on the street I had a while longer to kill and so continued my hunt, which all along had actually been for a suitable artifact to take back to V, with whom I’d be celebrating our seventh anniversary in a couple days. I finally found the block I didn’t know I’d been looking for, a quiet street with several antique shops. I nearly made myself late for travel back to LGA by bargaining over a special ring with a proprietor.

Of course I took a photo.

Once we agreed on a price and transacted I hauled ass back to the hotel, then back to the airport where there was time for one (or two) final Samuel Adams(s)—the ‘victory lap’ as we called it. I think I made the most of the not quite 48 hours in the city. Now, about those re-shoots.

~ by dukewisdom on June 13, 2010.