NYC without reservations
You’ve always wondered, and I’m here to tell you that yes, filing stories from remote locations is every bit as sexy as it sounds. One of my fondest memories of my days as a computer journalist is writing a column while sitting in a Paris café and then e-mailing it to my editor from the local cyber. Yep, just so long as there’s good food, strong drink, zero chance of bodily harm, and I don’t have to work too hard, I’m your effete traveling correspondent.
I suppose that there could be bodily harm in New York City, but you really have to go looking for it, especially in the Murray Hill/Gramercy Park area of Manhattan. Dangerous pigeons, I’d imagine. Strollers from hell. Aggressive art. I finally talked the company I work for into flying me back east for a week so that I could do little things like meet the man who I report to, not to mention the rest of the editorial team. Details.
But the truly important consequence of this trip is that I get to spend five nights in NYC, eating my little brains out. Fun, no? Lots of advance time with maps and Web sites and telephone calls, right? Perhaps for the ordinary traveler. The desperate truth is that despite my deep and highly valued organizational skills within the modern office milieu, I’m horrible at planning personal outings, trips, events, engagements, sideshows, meetings, and gatherings. True to form, three days before I had to leave, I had made zero reservations. “My god,†I thought. “This show is going to suck.â€
Note to self: hire producer on return to SF.
So. Lemons to lemonade moment. The theme for this adventure is now New York Without Reservations. I’m not going to eat anywhere that I can’t just walk into and sit down. And I’m going to nice places, dammit. Virtue, thy name is necessity.
