Longtime family friend from Glen Ellyn, IL visits in NYC

Mark Strayer, a family friend from way back when he was born, now lives and works in New York City and stopped by after work to see us at our marina. For dinner, we just grazed on the things Kathy and I found in New York markets today. Mark is currently working as a legal secretary at a downtown law firm. He's looking good, and feeling well and says he never needs a car in New York. He had been to see Spamalot here when Jay and Kay came to visit and he enjoyed it too. What a coincidence how cultured we all are to pick the same Monty Python play. There just wasn't anything as good at the opera, ya' know.

Today, Kathy and I went to the Metropolitan Museum and the Guggenheim Museum. Getting there was fun because it was first a ferry ride across the Hudson River, then a subway ride up to Central Park and then a walk along 5th Avenue and inside Central Park to the museums. This is a picture down Park Avenue. I had to stop in the crosswalk in the middle of the street to take this picture while a turning NYC cab waited for me to pass. Maybe not a smart place to take a tourist picture.

Here's one of the classic bridges in Central Park. I think I've seen this one in several movies too. I think every blog about New York City has to have one of these pictures in it. It's some kind of unwritten blog-law.

The Metropolitan Museum is simply too huge to see in a day. They should have tickets good for 7 days like the Sculpture Gardens. We really only saw the Egyptology wing and the American wing today, and my feet are still tired, but it was fun.

The Met does have a truely incredible collection of art and artifacts from Egypt, including this almost 5,000 year old carved granite lion (2500-2800 BC) and this falcon god. There are also entire large stone buildings and tombs moved here from Egypt, stone by stone, and reassembled in the museum.

The American wing is equally impressive. Many of the displays are done in room settings where the art and furniture from a single period are set up as a room in a home from that period. There are many other displays of excellent American antique furniture, which I wandered through while Kathy spent more time in the paintings. This spectacular buffet in flame-grain mahagony had spectacular color and workmanship.

Then, one of the parts I liked the best was the "stacks" in the American wing. This is the museum's "back stock" of great pieces that is cataloged in computers availiable to look up what you're interested in and then go see the real thing displayed in glass cases. Just row after row of glass cases with similar objects stored and coded for research and enjoyment. Here is a couple hundred feet of antique desks stacked 2 high, and another whole long double aisle of chairs. Wow! It's just way too much to take in all at once. For example, here's one of the cases of American antique clocks. That one second from the left in the back is a genuine 1825 Aaron Willard banjo clock from 1825.... just like the one John and Susan have hanging on their wall. Their clock is in the Metropolitan Museum!

On the way home, we stopped by Grand Central Station..... not so much to see the station as to see the "marketplace" which operated in one of the wings of the station. It's like a high quality farmers market for fresh vegetables, fruit, seafood, meat, pastries, baked goods and cheeses. That's where we got all the interesting food items we had for dinner tonight with Mark. A delightful way to eat dinner.