I flew to NYC from Washington D.C. The one thing that amazed me was how congested the air space is on the coast. In all the times I have flown from Phoenix to Los Angeles I rarely remember seeing another plane in the sky. In the short trip from D.C. to NYC I saw a whole bunch of other planes in the sky. Wow there is lots of air traffic on the east coast.

The one negative side is it is a police state. Honest ethical law abiding citizens are not allowed to have guns. The only people with guns are criminals, and the police. I and I guess it would be an oxymoron if we didn’t call the police criminals.

The other negative side it the government thugs had seized all my cameras when they seized my Phoenix home and I didn’t take any pictures.

One of the best things I liked was the deli’s that are everywhere. While the deli’s have mostly American food I was surprised that they also had Chinese and Indian food in them. I would buy stuff by the ounce. It was pretty good stuff, and not too expensive.

Also I went to Little India. It is in Jackson Heights, which is in Queens. It’s the first subway stop after you leave Manhattan. It is pretty much a clone of the Little India in Chicago or Los Angeles. You can buy Indian food like the Indians eat it. The food ain’t like the watered down worthlessly mild food they sell in Indian restaurants that cater to Americans. It is hot and spicy like Indians eat it. It will probably kill most Americans, but I love the stuff because it makes my nose run. I should note most of these places are run down dumps, but they have great food at good prices. You can also buy water buffalo sandals there. I bought 10 pairs to bring back to Phoenix. If you like gold you will like Little India. All the Indian jewelry stores sell 24 carat gold. Why Indians like 24 carat gold I don’t know.

I didn’t know this until it was too late but there are areas in Manhattan, I think Harlem that sell African ethnic food. I worked with an engineer from Cameroon, and he told me that African food was a lot like Thai food, very spicy and hot. If I had known that I would have hung out there and ate a few meals of hot spicy African food.

I stayed at a cheap hotel in Manhattan kind of between the United Nations and Central Park and just wandered around the city everyday just looking at stuff. New York City is a really cool place. I think it was $50 a night. I made a mistake by staying on the 6th floor. You really have to get a room as high up as possible or the traffic will wake you up in the morning. If you’re on New York time that shouldn’t be a problem, but I was on Arizona time which is the same as California time in the summer and it was waking me up very early.

At the subway station next JFK airport I bought a week long subway pass for something like $20 that allowed me unlimited use of the subways for a week. Thus no need for cab fare from JFK to NYC. The subways go everywhere. I think the pass is also good on buses, but I never took any buses, the subways took me where I was going. I think in the winter it would be possible never to go out doors if you used the subways to travel. Many of the buildings have tunnels that connect them. In that case the cold weather would not be too bad, even for a desert rat like me.

I got a PO Box at Grand Central Station to get my mail.

I liked Greenwich Village. It was pretty cool. I didn’t think much of Central Park, but I didn’t go there much. The UN sucks, but then I not a big fan of local government, much less an international government. The one thing at the UN that amazed me was how late people show up for work. If you had a normal job and showed up for work that late you would be fired. I hear they leave early, but I didn’t witness that.

No I didn’t go to the 2600 meetings. I should have. I did in Los Angeles. Same for Phoenix. They were really strange.

I am an atheist, but I still visited a few churches just to see what they looked like. I went to St Patrick Cathedral. It was a Catholic Church near my hotel. It was pretty neat.

I went by the World Trade Center, but I didn’t go to the top. I had already been to the world’s tallest building in Chicago. Too bad I won’t get a chance to go to it again, the terrorists blew it up. I don’t remember if I went by the Empire State Building. I didn’t go to the Statute of Liberty. For some reason I didn’t want to float on a boat and go see the stupid statute.

I went to that stupid park by JFK. I think it’s called Coney Island. It ain’t an island and it’s a long subway ride from Manhattan. And it was a pretty boring place. That’s where I stuck my foot in the Atlantic Ocean, just so I could say I been swimming in the Atlantic Ocean.

I didn’t go outside of Manhattan other then to Jackson Heights and Coney Island. I should have. I suspect I would have found lots of cool stuff. Next time I go there I will.

I think some of my relatives still live in New York City. I found their names. I bet they used to be Italian mobsters. I was not afraid to look them up for that reason. I was afraid to look them up because I am a very shy person. Maybe the next time I go to NYC I will try to look up my relatives and find out how Italians live in NYC.

One odd thing I found out is New York City of composed of several different counties. Each borough is a different county.

A number of New Yorkers apologized to me because their crackpot religious mayor ruined Times Square by removing the all the porn. I think that crackpots name was Rudolph Giuliani. From what I understand he was a big supporter of the police state, and a Bill of Rights Free New York City. I went Times Square, sadly all the porn and adult entertainment was gone. But Times Square was still an interesting place with out the porn.

One thing that amazed me was that nobody in Manhattan talked funny. I though everybody in New York talked funny. Several people told me that nobody in Manhattan is actually from New York. That is why all the people in Manhattan talk with a normal accent. You have to go to the other boroughs like Queens or the Bronx to hear the people talk funny.