Monday, April 20, 2009

A Few Thoughts About My New York Trip...

Just returned back from a FANTASTIC weekend in New York with my wife. A few thoughts:

Rarely have I encountered a more overrated pizza joint than Lombardi's on Spring St in New York's SoHo. If one were to rank tri-state pizza joints, the first six would easily reside in the New Haven area. Even the pizza place along Arden Ave. in Staten Island is better.

Sadly, Ground Zero today resembles an orderly construction site. Interestingly, pamphleteers around the site demanding a re-investigation of the 9/11 Commission. Far-fetched but interesting.

Here's the golden rule regarding souveniers: Two of shit is shit. If a vendor really wanted to screw you, he'd give you the third one for free. How many NYC emblazoned Statues of Liberty does one truly need?

If you have the means, I highly recommend taking in an opera at Lincoln Center. A grand hall built in the 1950s, the Metropolitan Opera House is the Yankee Stadium of opera halls. All the great ones played here...

The famed Waldorf-Astoria hotel was actually the merging of two New York hotels built by the dynastic Astors. Hence the hyphen.

Waiting for a seat at any crowded restaurant, I have two words: What Recession?

If you're taking the train into NYC from Connecticut, avoid doing it the day of a Yankee day game.

I don't know what it is but there's something about a well-played saxophone in the Subway that really gets to me.

How star-crossed are hockey's Rangers? Before Saturday's victory, it had been almost 70 years before the Rangers won a playoff game 1-0.

Rangers Getting Routed

Have you ever walked up to a roulette table and witnessed a sick run of reds or blacks? So you put your money and instantly the run ends? That's the case with tonight's Rangers game. It's 3-0 Washington in the third period. What happened? Playing on the road in Washington, the Rangers rode brilliant goaltending and clutch scoring to take a 2-0 lead in the playoff series...So what changed playing at the Garden? The answer is simple: I tuned in. Either that or they began running around in their own end and taking too many penalties against Ovechkin & Co. Without support,even King Henrik can seem like a jester. I guess it was too much to ask to take a 3-0 lead.