There is No Place like The Big Shmapple

The Big Shmapple rocks. There's no other way to say it. As both BZWZ and Dancenik said over dinner the other night, they are both really happy to get home when they return to NYC, and note the word 'home.'

Plot has tawtabouddit and tawtabouddit, because this trip he felt it too, even though The Shmap is not his home and he only lived there for six years in his late twenties. A week ago tomorrow, as the Chinatown bus limped into Manhattan from Ballamer (having covered the first 99% of the distance in three and a half hours while the last five miles took at least another hour to merge, merge and merge again until finally there was a lane available to cross through the Lincoln Tunnel), the darkness and dankness of the tunnel yielded to brilliant sunlight and the boredom and discomfort of a seat near the rear turned immediately into the symphony of everyone on the bus breaking into applause. OK, maybe it was only Plotnik, but you get the picture.




There's nothing like that first glimpse of Manhattan, no matter how few hours or how many years you've been gone. No other place looks like this. You see huge buildings rising on all sides, in every stage of designer glitz or hopeless disrepair; crowds of people walking on the sidewalks and skating through intersections as if the skidding taxis and cars and trucks and city buses all around them didn't really exist; you smell Sabrett's hot dogs and the steam from subway vents and perfume and gladiolas -- but you don't smell dogshit anymore. Dogshit is so 1990s.

And you don't fry in the subway anymore either, not even in the middle of summer, because all the cars are air conditioned. Even when you're packed in and surrounded by so many people that you have no idea who just pinched one leg and smashed you in the back with their briefcase, you're not hot. You have no idea what a big difference this has made.



True, The Plotniks had to pay way-y-y-y too much for five nights in the Hotel Marrakech, but by what standard? The place was filled with European hostelers, whose Euros seem to go a long way in New York, and they obviously didn't feel they were overpaying. To The Great Plotnik, the room, while substandard, and two flights up with no elevator, and with a bathroom so small it felt like you were showering in a bucket, would have been perfect at half the price. But nothing is half any price in Manhattan, so stop whinin'.

The location, close to Absolute Bagels and Sal and Carmine's Pizza, only fifty feet from the 103rd St. stop on the Broadway local subway and, best of all, only a few blocks from The Great BZWZ's apartment, was perfect. Plot and Duck got to hear BZWZ's band The Matzanya Family MARCHING BAND AND Flea Circus rehearse there. Yes, that's BZ with the banjo.



Two days ago, on Thursday, BZ rented a Zip Car and drove out to Long Island to see Sagamore Hill, the home of President Theodore Roosevelt. What a trip that house is -- if ever a home mirrored the personality of the owner, this is the one. Moose heads, bear skin rugs and stuffed animals fill every room, along with gifts from heads of state and thotchkes Mrs. Roosevelt bought in local yard sales. In those days if you wanted to speak with the President of the United States you phoned OB 67 and T.R. picked it up and said Hello?

BZ took another bridge photo for Plot and Duck, heading over the marsh towards Oyster Bay in back of T.R.'s house. The horseshoe crabs are delicious.