songbird's crazy world

There are some kinds of excitement that make me happy. And there are some kinds of excitement I can live without. NYC had the latter kind yesterday. You have to understand that the Fulton Street Station, in lower Manhattan, is a transit hub.  Three different subway lines intersect at Fulton Street -- the 8th Avenue line ("A" and "C"  trains), the Lexington Avenue line ("4" and "5" trains), and the 7th Avenue line (the "2" and "3" trains). Yesterday,  around 7:30 in the morning, two suspicious packages  were discovered in the Fulton Street station, one on the mezzanine near the "2" and the "3", the other on the platform for the "2" and the "3". Police investigated, and saw what appeared to be two pressure-cooker bombs.  They evacuated the station and rerouted the "2" and "3" subway trains..  The other two lines skipped the Fulton Street station.  There were a...

As I mentioned earlier, last week we got together with a group of friends for our annual dinner cruise to Fire Island. Fire Island is a barrier island parallel to Long Island's South Shore, separated by the Great South Bay. It is 31 miles long, but only about a  quarter of a mile at its widest point.  Robert Moses State Park (the western end of Fire Island) and Smith Point County Park (eastern end) are accessible by vehicle, but the summer communities that occupy the rest of the island are only accessible by boat. So every summer, a group of us take a dinner cruise to one of the summer communities. We meet up at Captree State Park, (which, incidentally, is NOT on Captree Island, but rather, is on the east end of Jones Island, 11 miles east of the famed Jones Beach State Park).  Captree is essentially a marina for small fishing craft, but is also the home of The Moon Chaser , a party boat that can accommodate up to 200 people. There's a cash bar on the lower level, b...

In a quiet plaza at  55 Water Street, you'll come upon this sight: This unassuming green glass wall is The New York City Vietnam Veterans Memorial .  Dedicated in 1985 (with a ticker tape parade down Broadway, the Canyon of Heroes), the plaza was refurbished in 2000-2001. What's so special about the green glass wall? Come, let me show you. Those are the words of the men and women who served in Vietnam, taken from letters home to family and friends. There are honor plaques as well It's a quiet, dignified memorial.  Worth a visit if you're in lower Manhattan.

This week Terri i s focused on world War II. NATIONAL V-J DAY – August 14 – 15 – Unofficial Observances NATIONAL V-J DAY  ( Victory over Japan Day) National V-J Day on August 14th commemorates the day in 1945 when news broke around the world the Imperial Government of Japan would surrender ending a long a grueling world war. In Europe, the date was August 15 due to the time zone, but regardless, the celebrations that broke out were no less zealous. Since 1939, the entire world had been enduring the strife of war. The first rumblings began in 1937 but by the end of 1941, the United States would join the war they had vowed remain out of. After the bombing of Pearl Harbor by Japan on December 7th, 1941, the United States declared war and fully supported all fronts. Throughout the war effort, military personnel and civilians stood together to make the next 4 years a united front. Victory in Japan and the rest of the globe was a final goal. HOW TO OBSERVE #VJDay ...

So the other night I was on a home-bound train, and I had a window seat.  There was a young, attractive  woman in the middle seat, and another woman in the aisle seat.  We reached a major station, and  the woman in the aisle seat got off the train.  A young man boarded the train and took the aisle seat.  He turned to the woman in the middle seat and began asking her personal (and I thought impertinent) questions.  Clearly he was trying to pick her up.  Eventually she told him she was a lesbian, and no she didn't "turn" because of a bad experience with men, she was born that way...conversation ceased after that.... In my quest to avoid the nightmare that is Penn Station, I've been catching my Long Island Railroad train in Brooklyn.  Atlantic avenue is a mega station, with four different subway lines as well as the railroad.  there's a long tunnel that connects the various subway lines with the railroad.  In the past I've seen sever...

Another free choice week. I'm going to mellow out this week with singer songwriters. I was 15 years old the first time I saw Harry Chapin perform.  He came to my Long Island high school, just a short distance from his home in Huntington, NY.  And I was in Eisenhower Park on July 16, 1981, the night he died on the Long Island  Expressway en route to the concert.  Instead of one of his top 40 hits, let me play "All My Life's a Circle", which I think is one of his best: Jim Croce...I was just starting to really like him when he died in that plane crash.  Which makes this song even more poignant. Gordon Lightfoot, another favorite: So before we get completely depressed here, let's play some feel-good John Denver: And we will close it out with some Jimmy Buffett:

So Friday's mishap reminded me of another incident in the NYC subway, something that happened back in the 90's. I rather famously took a fall in the lobby of a hotel while on a  business trip to Philadelphia.  Really killed my right foot and ankle, and wound up in a walking cast for about two weeks.  No crutches or anything to help me walk or balance, just the cast itself, which covered my foot and ankle. I may have mentioned recently how frustrating it was to wear a cast and not be able to drive. But I did manage to get on the subway every day and go to work. So one afternoon I left my office and limped to the subway.  A train pulled in, another woman and I got on.  The train was fairly full, only one seat available in that car, and I got there first. You could see the frustration on the other woman's face.  She decided to stand directly in front of me, and when I looked down at her feet, I could see that she was wearing stilettos. Of course s...