New York adventures, part 3: AKA Lady Liberty's guts

This was a great day. A very cold, very windy great day. I have not been so cold in a long time, but it was definitely worth the cold temperatures and wind to get to climb all 352 steps to the top of the State of Liberty.

Our tickets to Lady Liberty were for 2:00pm, so we decided to spend the morning at the Met again. We hadn't even seen the Ancient Egypt exhibit the day before, and we knew we had to get back to see at least that. We ended up spending another 3 hours at the museum, and then busting our butts to get all the way down Manhattan to catch the ferry to Liberty Island at 2:00.

We loved this giant sarcophagus of some guy (can't remember his name) who really thought he was important. He had the slaves build him a 50'x50'x50' limestone chamber, which was entirely then filled with sand, and his sarcophagus was placed exactly in the center of this sand. No wonder he was so well preserved and protected from the elements.

We loved seeing real-live canopic jars. We also got our favorite joke of the trip from this museum visit, "What's wrong with you? Did you leave your brain in a canopic jar?"

Did you know that the Book of the Dead is actually---a book? A real thing? The full thing is on display at the Met. It was interesting to read (no, I can't read ancient Egyptian--just trusting the translation) about the customs and religious rites of the Egyptians straight out of their book.

We ran out of the museum at 1:00pm knowing that we would be pushing it to get to South Ferry in time for our tickets. It's quite a brisk walk to get to the subway from the Met, and then a loooooong ride down to the tip of Manhattan.

If you ever want to go to Liberty's crown, you must get tickets months in advance. Months and months in advance. I bought ours last November as soon as I knew we were going to be in New York. The crown tickets are gone through the rest of the summer from what I hear. A big plus of Crown tickets is that when you get to the super long line to go through security and get onto the ferry boat, they totally let you cut in at the front of the line. Just like a movie star.

You see in this picture that Lady Liberty is off to the right in the background. Why wasn't I looking at her? Well, it's because there's a pretty dang good view of Manhattan from the boat. Every seat and standing place was taken on the lower decks of the boat, and it was freezing on the top. But we had the best view, even though we were frozen.Some people had trouble finding their land legs again.

I love the view of the statue and Manhattan in the background.

And now for an anatomy lesson. The statue itself is only about 3/8" thick. Made in the repussee technique from hammered copper sheets riveted together. This thin shell of copper has turned green on the outside, but the inside is still a beautiful golden/copper/brown color. The inside of the statue is supported by an Eiffel Tower-like structure (designed by none other than Monsieur Gustav Eiffel) along with hundreds and hundreds of stainless steel ribs that are riveted to the staute.

The original spiral staircase to the crown had been replaced by a new tiny spiral staircase, a double helix with separate up and down stairs twisting perfectly around each other. It was a long climb, and a miracle that Mark was able to climb stairs by this day, only 4 days after the marathon. He ended up coming down backward to save his quads, but he did it!

This is the back of her head, from the inside. Lots of cameras everywhere.I was so happy to be in the crown room, I couldn't stop smiling. The two park rangers up there that day were not so happy that we were happy to be there. We were the last ones up that day, and they wanted to go home. Boo on them. We had climbed 352 steps and we were going to relish the experience of being on top of the world.

Jacob in the crown.Looking out at NY Harbor.Abram the happy boy loved being in the crown.Just enough room for four of us up there.The Statue of Liberty Enlightening the World. That's the official title of the statue. Lady Liberty, The Copper Lady, the New Colossus, whatever you call her, she is magnificent. And yes, Nancy, I found the plaque this time--right at the end of the museum exhibit.

Not like the brazen giant of Greek fame,
With conquering limbs astride from land to land;
Here at our sea-washed, sunset gates shall stand
A mighty woman with a torch, whose flame
Is the imprisoned lightning, and her name
Mother of Exiles. From her beacon-hand
Glows world-wide welcome; her mild eyes command
The air-bridged harbor that twin cities frame.
"Keep, ancient lands, your storied pomp!" cries she
With silent lips. "Give me your tired, your poor,
Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,
The wretched refuse of your teeming shore.
Send these, the homeless, tempest-tost to me,
I lift my lamp beside the golden door!"
Emma Lazarus, "The New Colossus"

New York adventures, part 2

How do you begin to describe the Metropolitan Museum of Art? We decided to go here and take our chances, even though the Museum of Natural History had been so crowded we could hardly see a thing the day before. We were pleasantly surprised with the lack of crowds at the Met, though. It was amazing that either many fewer people were there in the first place, or that the museum was so huge and open that it absorbed everyone much better. Whatever the reason, it was a heavenly place to spend the day. We were there for about 7 hours, and barely saw a fraction of what the museum had to offer. It was incredible. We also discovered the secret lower entrance to the right of the main steps--no lines for admission, plus a restroom right there as well.

I loved this picture of the buildings across from the Met. There were several spots in Manhattan where someone had held out and didn't sell their building out to high rise development on either side. This is one of many such holdouts we saw.

We were so delighted to find this Joseph-Siffrede Duplessis orignal painting of Benjamin Franklin, dated 1778.We were stunned to see Van Gogh's self portrait just sitting there in the middle of a gallery where anybody could walk up and touch it. Not that we did. It is just such a priceless work of art to be hanging out in the middle of the floor.
I love Monet. That Claude was a genius.

This is the Van Gogh we would buy if we could.

Jacob and Abram liked this "manly" painting.

We accidentally wandered into the "Modern Art" wing, because it was the closest way to get to a restroom. But we found some really, really cool stuff there.

The piece behind us on the wall is made up of several thousand hexagonal mirrors, all somehow attached to each other at just the right angle to give some very excellent reflections when you look into it from any angle.

Mark took this one of the four of us looking into the mirrors. Each tiny individual mirror has its own unique reflection, and if you zoom in on the picture, it is very cool. Looking into it made me sick, though. My brain couldn't figure out if it should focus on the whole reflection or the individual ones, and it sort of messed with my head. Well worth it, though.

We never quite figured out how somebody came up with this idea to paint rectangular pieces of canvas each a solid shade. Looks like a paint chip sample from Home Depot to me.

Not sure what this was, either.
Or this.

After so many hours at the Met, we decided to call it a day and go back the next morning. We headed down to the Plaza Hotel to meet up with my friend Emilee as she finished her gig. We walked through Central Park. Emilee and I had some honey roasted nuts as we talked about things old and new.

Jacob was just along for the ride.

Abram had wanted to eat a pretzel in Central Park while sitting on the grass the whole time we were there. This was finally the day that it was warm enough to do that.

Next up, Lady Liberty's guts.

A few more marathon pics

Before I get to posting the rest of the New York adventure, I realized there were some marathon pictures that I forgot to post.

First of all, I forgot to post a picture of Joan Benoit-Sameulson, who is pictured above. She is truly a hero, and a most remarkable person. Who is she, you ask? Well, only the first woman to win the gold medal in the marathon in the Olympics. You see, for a long time, the Olympics makers felt that women were too delicate and wimpy to run marathons. And then in 1984, they decided to give women a shot at the marathon. A beautiful lady named Joan Benoit ran a scorching 2:24:52 and showed those Olympics makers a thing or two. She won the gold medal, and became a legend. She also held the women's marathon world record for a couple of years around the same time. She is now almost 54, and she can still run circles around almost everyone.

For instance, if you are Lance Armstrong, and you decide to run a marathon in under 3 hours, and need a pacer to get you through, who do you call? You call Joan. She helped pace Lance Armstrong to a sub-3-hour marathon in 2006.

I was so happy when we saw a TV motorcycle just ahead of Joan coming down Boylston Street in Boston on her way to a 2:51:29 marathon. She is an inspiration. And just look at that smile on her face. Mark was able to say hello to her at the finish line, and that really made his life. Almost as much as meeting Meb Keflezighi last summer at the Seattle marathon.

Here are a few photos of something else that brought tears to my eyes at the marathon. A huge group of soldiers carrying 40-pound backpacks came running through the finish line. First there was a bunch, and then there were some stragglers over the next 30 minutes. But it was amazing to see them finish the race.We caught up with them on our walk back to the hotel. They said that they had actually started as bandits about 5 hours before the race began.

And this guy was all smiles about what he had experienced that day.

Another tear-jerker was seeing this one below.

You see a runner who is being helped by two other runners. I don't know how far down the street the middle runner's legs stopped working, but they were seriously cramping, and he couldn't put any weight on them. These two other runners gave up what may have been a PR, or at least their goal time in order to stop and help this poor guy get to the finish line. It was amazing to see.

That's it for tonight. I'll get going on some more New York pictures tomorrow.

New York adventures, part 1

I love New York City. I have been dying to go back there ever since I left it last October after my 40-hour visit. The day after the marathon, we boarded a Greyhound bus and took a 4-hour ride to New York for the rest of the week. It was a great week, and because we were spending 5 days there, I actually made time to sleep this time. Last visit was too short, and I didn't want to waste any time sleeping when there was so much to do and see.
Our first day, we found this great cafe called Fluffy's. It was around the corner from our hotel, and we loved to sit in the window and watch NY go by as we ate breakfast.
Jacob spotted this sweet sign for Jacobs. Whatever that is. It was a cool sign, nonetheless. We wandered through Times Square, went to Toys R Us and other interesting stores along the way. Then we found a great spot for dinner, and after dinner spent the evening at the Waldorf listening to my friend Emilee play the piano and sing in Peacock Alley. Emilee is dazzling, and I love listening to her. She is also a party in a package, and life is always better when Emilee is around. My entire high school career was made better and memorable because of Emilee. I am so glad that we have stayed friends for 24 years.


We were all amazed at the number of taxis and people all over NY, but especially Times Square. I had been here once before, so I wasn't as stunned as the boys and Mark were. But it is fun to be a part of such an immense crowd.

Day 2 in New York brought some pretty exciting things. First, it was a run through Central Park. I made Abram and Jacob come with me, and we were so excited to find Bethesda Fountain, which we have seen in so many movies. As soon as we came upon a long pathway with benches on each side, I started singing. Up to this point of our trip I had pretty much been singing strictly Schoolhouse Rock songs about the American Revolution. But at that moment when we recognized a scene from Enchanted, my singing turned to "How does she know you love her?....." The boys were totally embarrassed, but that didn't stop me. Then we got to the fountain, and I went crazy singing. It was awesome. I have always wanted to see the fountain and the stairs that lead down to it in real life.
We had some good times on the subways. Amazingly, this trip, we never had to wait more than a few minutes for a train.




We decided to check out the American Natural History Museum. It was a bust. It was so insanely crowded that it was hard to move around and see anything. We started out cranky because of the cashier who didn't appreciate our "suggested donation" of $10 each for admission. We told her if the museum was great and not too crowded, we would pay the rest on the way out. She told us they did not accept donations on the way out, only on the way in. Yeah, right . She was very upset that we had questioned the sign that says "Suggested Donation $20." Technically you don't have to pay anything, and it was so crowded that we knew we weren't even going to get our $10 worth this day. Turns out when it is east coast spring break, Easter weekend and also Passover, there are a lot of people who come to New York City.


Jacob has always loved monkeys, so he wanted his picture taken with this guy.
Who loves the Olmecs?
We were on the lookout throughout NY for other Boston Marathon runners. Mark found a buddy at the museum. They were complete strangers, but their Boston Marathon apparel turned them into instant friends.Then we took a walk down Central Park West and through the park where we showed Mark the fountain. He took some sweet pictures of us, and we marveled at the crowds who were out enjoying the first warm spring day New York had seen.



Then it was back through times square for dinner and a show. We saw Memphis. Not my favorite story ever, but I loved the music and we all agreed it was an excellent display of talented singers and dancers. It was enjoyable. We couldn't get tickets to see Anything Goes, sadly. Maybe next time I go to NY and it isn't a brand-new show I will be able to see it.We ended the night back at the Waldorf to catch the end of Emilee's gig, and to meet some of her friends. It was so fun, and we ended up at the Midtown Cafe for a midnight meal. Best waffle of my life. Then we went to bed around 3AM, because we needed a few hours of sleep for our adventures the next day.