I have a funny story about my first day in the City That Never Sleeps

[Rabrrrrrr]

When I first moved to NYC, I lived in the Columbia (Morningside Heights) area. I arrived on a Saturday, and of course had no food or anything to cook, and on the first night I was busy doing stuff and whatnot in getting moved in, and late at night I got hungry, so I went out to find some food.

I walked up and down Broadway trying to find something, anything, and nothing was open (Broadway, in that area at the time - 1992 - was kind of shitty). And I was walking upping and down the street, the first night in my new hometown, I kept saying to myself, "'City That Never Sleeps' my fucking ass."

I was very disappointed.

Thankfully, in a few years, that area came back to life and changed a hell of a lot with plenty wonderful restaurants and other places to eat and do things. It's a fantastic area now.

But that first night - I was really, really, disappointed in the promise of NYC that it "never sleeps".

:rofl:

[matcom]

1. didn't you have a bag of fresh Spinach on hand?

:eyes:

[Rabrrrrrr]

2. Why aren't you tombstoned yet?

:eyes:

Besides, I accidentally dropped the spinach in my urinal and the taste was a little off, even with a lot of vinegar.

[matcom]

4. because I paid the admins to keep me - but what is REALLY important...

why aren't your stories funny when you subject line PROMISES us funny? x(

you stumbling around Broadway late at night looking for scraps from a dumpster isn't funny at ALL!

oh wait. yeah, THAT would be funny :think:

[Rabrrrrrr]

10. Maybe the problem is with your face!

:rofl:

[sir_captain]

3. At least West Side Market existed back then

and was open 24 hours. I've heard that they might actually reopen soon, which would be awesome.

[Rabrrrrrr]

9. Yeah, it sucked when that closed, and Columbia Bagel and Koronet

I couldn't believe it - there were no signs of warning or anything. One day I was in there shopping, and a couple days later I went back and BAM! All closed.

But long before then, I'd become a Fairway shopper anyway since I moved into Harlem, so it wasn't a big deal, but it was handy when I was in the area and needed to pick up a few things.

And I almost never used UFM - high priced foods, and rude people there.

[trof]

5. Did you ask anyone?

You know...
"Excuse me. It's my first time in New York. Do you know a place I can get something to eat now, or should I just go fuck myself?"
Old joke.

[matcom]

6. no.

he just went into an alley a fucked himself :hide:

[trof]

7. Pre-emptive strike.

Sometimes it's just easier that way.

[Rabrrrrrr]

8. Nah, I just shared some carboard with a homeless guy outside Woolworths

:eyes:

[In_The_Wind]

11. That's a better story than mine.

The first time I saw NYC was back in 1969. I cried when I saw Queens and thought of all the people who would never see a meadow of rolling fields dotted with livestock. Auto-mats still existed in the city then. I spent my free time volunteering in The Merton Buber House in the East Village helping young men find legal ways to avoid going to Vietnam without moving to Canada.

[Elidor]

12. My first day there, a guy stole a car from in front of a police station

He was down on his hands and knees on the sidewalk, directly in front of a Manhattan precinct house, down there working on that lock in broad daylight in front of god and everybody, and he was inside that car in less then 5 seconds. As he drove off, he waved at a cop who was crossing the street to the precinct, who kind of slumped and rolled his eyes and couldn't be bothered to fucking care about it. After a slight hesitation, he just walked on calmly. I see nossing! Nossing! My buddies and I laughed our asses off about that.

Then we stopped off at Tompkins Square Park. Needing a bathroom, we examined a huge pile of trash spread out in the middle of the park, only to find that there were people living inside it. Naturally, they were not too keen to have people just randomly pissing on their homes. We felt badly about it.

That whole first day became a painful lesson in the economics of free restrooms: Manhattan doesn't fucking have any, unless you're buying a meal somewhere. We went from laughing at all the poor people urinating on the streets to doing it ourselves out of desperation when no business owner would let us pee.

We left a trail of metal whippet containers everywhere we went, and their happy metallic "ching!" against the curbs of Manhattan was a happy little tune. Our youth was exceeded only by our stupidity.