It’s beginning to look a lot like Christmas

Here is a compilation of photos I’ve taken around the city this month. Happy Holidays, my friends.

Bullets over Broadway

In a post a couple months ago I talked about places in the city where I go to find peace, and I mentioned one of my favorite spots is a Broadway gift shop adjacent to the Times Square Marriott.

It looks like I’ll be looking for an alternative haven for repose …

NY Post: Gunman fatally shot by cops in Times Square panic

As the NY Post details in the article linked above, a street vendor and a police sergeant exchanged gunfire yesterday in the pass-through from 45th to 46th streets, right in front of the Marriott and a certain beloved gift shop.

From the story:

“The shootout occurred in the theater district. Bullets shattered windows at the Broadway Baby souvenir store and a box office … The slug sliced down the center of a book about the show Wicked, struck a souvenir baseball and lodged in a shelf holding ‘I Love New York’ T-shirts.”

It is a blessing and a miracle that no one other than the vendor was shot. That area is bustling with holiday tourists this time of year.

In spite of this incident, I want to say that I feel very safe in this city, and this event certain is an anomaly.

Please don’t buy me a bullet-proof vest for Christmas.

A cashmere sweater-vest would be just fine, though.

It’s beginning to look a lot like Christmas

Yesterday was quite a “Christmas in New York” day. I saw the Rockettes perform in the Radio City Christmas show, spent some time wandering through the holiday shops at Bryant Park and then made my way to Rockefeller Center to take my first gander at the tree since the lighting ceremony last week. It was, of course, utter chaos, but I still managed to get some good photos.

I especially like this shot of one of the iconic wire-sculpted angel figures with the snowflakes on the Saks Fifth Avenue building behind.

The photo seems serene to me, which is remarkable since it was taken amid a crush of camera-wielding, Christmas-crazed tourists. Oh, and at least one camera-wielding, Christmas-crazed New Yorker. Happy to fill the role, thank you very much.

The next stop on this train will be Rationalization

Who needs leather seats with butt warmers when you have these amazing plastic orange ones?

I’m heading to Colorado in a couple weeks for Christmas. I am so looking forward to it and am counting the days until I spot the teepee-inspired spires of Denver International Airport from my plane window.

(I am NOT looking forward to seeing that creepy, demonic-looking horse statue near the airport. Seriously, Colorado, is that really the “art” with which you want to greet visitors?)

There are so many things which I’m looking forward to while I visit my old stomping ground.

While it doesn’t top my list of things I’m excited to do while in the Centennial State, driving a car certainly makes the list.

The open road. My tunes turned up loud. No one else in the vehicle.

Glorious.

I sold my car when I moved to New York City. It is a tad bizarre to think about the fact that I have been behind the wheel of a car fewer than five times in 2009.

At least the roads – and sidewalks – of Northern Colorado are safer now.

But I must say that as much as I miss the idea of a personal vehicle, there are aspects of traveling via the New York City subway system that I really cherish.

I give you the top three reasons that subway travel is not too shabby:

1. Train of thought: I am 100 pages away from finishing a 900-page work of historical fiction that I started reading fewer than two weeks ago. And 90 percent of my page turning on “New York: The Novel” – gotta love the pretentious title – has been while riding the subway. Train travel is great because it affords me the opportunity to do a lot of reading while getting to and from work. Literary commutes aren’t so successful when you’re behind the wheel of a car. Just look at my driving record.

2. Oh the weather outside is frightful: I’m not a morning person. (And in other breaking news, scientists have discovered the world is round.) And what can make the prospect of an early morning even worse than the thought of facing it sans coffee? Having to stand outside in the frigid air and scraping my car windows. It was a winter-in-Colorado ritual I hated. And now I never have to do it. I also don’t have to drive on icy roads anymore. An underground transportation system means travel is rarely hampered by Mother Nature.

3. Do you hear what I hear? I love eavesdropping on strangers’ conversations. I think it’s a bit like attending a one-act play. And there’s no better place to do it than on NYC public transportation. I have heard subway chatter that is more provocative, poignant, pithy and peculiar than anything contained in the tomes with which I occupy myself on the train.

In truth, perhaps I’m rationalizing and have compiled this list so that when I return to the city from my Colorado visit, I won’t grieve the loss of a car.

Nevertheless, riding the subway is a uniquely New York experience and one in which I hope you all have the chance to partake one day.

If you do, look out for a blonde gal with her nose in a big book and her hands on an even larger cup of coffee trying unsuccessfully to look like she is not listening to every word being exchanged by the passengers sitting next to her.

O Christmas Tree, O Christmas Tree

Here a couple photos from the big tree lighting in NYC last night. The one in my apartment, that is. The other one I watched on TV from the comfort of my couch. Of course, MY tree lighting did not include Rod Stewart singing “Love Train” … and that’s why mine was so much better.

 

I love a parade

After watching the television broadcast of the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade each and every year since I can remember, I finally saw the big event in person. It was pretty great. One of my good friends works at an ad agency right in Herald Square, so she invited me to watch the parade from the comfort of a cushy corner office with large windows and a killer view of the parade.

View my photos from the 83rd Annual Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade.

It’s beginning to look a lot like Christmas

I snapped these photos last night during a quick stop into Macy’s Department Store at Herald Square. The annual Thanksgiving Day parade it sponsors and the classic “Miracle on 34th Street” flick make Macy’s synonymous with the holidays. Here are photos of ornaments adorning the entryway, a lighted tree on the side of the building and one of the festive window displays.

Don’t leave home without it

American Express may have been talking about its credit card with this catchy slogan, but since becoming a New York City gal nearly a year ago, I have my own list of “don’t leave home without it” objects.

At the top of that list is my iPhone. It’s key to my survival in the city.

That may sound a tab hyperbolic, but I rely on my iPhone so much as I’m out and about in New York City. There are a few iPhone apps that I think it would behoove all New Yorkers to download ASAP, including the following:

CityTransit – This handy app contains all of the subway and bus maps.

Google Maps – This awesome app will locate you via GPS and also provide walking directions from Point A to Point B.

Twitteriffic – This Twitter app makes my “necessary for New York City” list because you can follow NYCTrains, which provides real-time updates on train delays, construction work and other pertinent information about how your public transit travel may be interrupted. Now when I’m standing on the platform cursing because the subway is delayed indefinitely, my obscenities are well-thought-out since I know ahead of time that there’s trouble on the tracks.

urbanspoon – This snazzy app allows you to browse the city’s restaurants via neighborhood, type of cuisine, or price range. And if you are really in the mood for a spontaneous culinary adventure, urbanspoon will randomly select an eatery for you.

ShakeItPhoto – I recently discovered this app and have been using it to document the holiday splendor that is blanketing Manhattan. ShakeItPhoto allows you to take a photo with your iPhone. Then you shake your phone (yes, literally shake it) and watch the photo develop like a Polaroid pic of yesteryear.

Fake-a-Call – If you plan to date in New York City, you’re bound to meet some, um, “interesting” people. And by interesting I mean scary, awkward or mind-numbingly boring. And if you’re among the truly blessed, you might find a date who is all three. The trifecta. That’s where Fake-a-Call becomes a lifesaver. This ingenious app allows you to pre-program the time at which you want to receive a “phone call.” You even can choose what you want the Caller ID to say. Let’s say you’re headed out to meet a date at 8 p.m. You can pre-set your iPhone to “call” you at 8:20 p.m. If the date is going well, you ignore the call. If it’s not, you answer “the call” – no one is really there, of course – and you put your acting chops to work and explain there’s an emergency and you’re so sorry but you have to leave. Immediately.

Now if only the iPhone had an app that would alert me when I tried to leave my apartment without my Metro Card …

It’s beginning to look a lot like Christmas

With the help of my snazzy new Polaroid iPhone app, I am capturing the sights that signal that Christmas in New York is near.

Here is the first installment in my ‘It’s beginning to look a lot like Christmas’ series: the charming Target billboards – or ‘spectaculars’ as they’re called in the ad biz – in Times Square.

The billboards depict the 12 Day of Christmas in uniquely New York ways. For example, the nine ladies dancing (pictured here) are the Rockettes. The five golden rings are bagels. The 11 pipers piping are radiator pipes. Very clever.

Jack Frost nipping at your nose

It’s beginning to look a lot like Christmas.

This year’s Rockefeller Christmas tree arrived a couple days ago and is being decorated in preparation for its official lighting on Dec. 2.

Many moons ago when I was but a little girl in love with Christmas, in awe of the city and apparently brainwashed from viewing too many romantic comedies, I announced that one day I would get engaged in front of the Rockefeller Christmas tree.

Whether that particular dream will materialize remains to be seen. But even if it does not turn out to be the place where the love of my life (or the man I settle for at age 40) gets down on one knee and pops the question, Rockefeller Plaza at Christmas always will seem a little magical to me.

I fell in love with this city at Christmastime. It’s truly a winter wonderland – and not just aesthetically. Indeed, New York is absolutely beautiful during the holidays with its window displays, dusting of snow, and tens of thousands of twinkling lights. But Christmastime also is remarkable because I think it might just be the one time of the year when tourists and New Yorkers are not warring factions.

True, most tourists don’t understand they’re the enemy, but enemies they are.

Call me a romantic, but I have this idea that come Christmastime, the Grinches (aka New Yorkers) and Whos (the tourists) will finally happily co-exist. No more wanting to yell at tourists or kick them in the ass or “accidentally” trip them when they stop in the middle of the bustling sidewalk to gawk at something. Because won’t we all be pausing to take in the new visual delights that the holiday seasons has brought?

The fanny packs and the Fendis at peace at last. What a beautiful wish for this blessed season.