So close yet so far

After the postponement of the Brooklyn Nets basketball first ever home regular season game during the week the rescheduled game went ahead on Saturday.

One of Heather's friends was coming into Brooklyn from New Jersey to see her and we went out for dinner. Her husband is French and his parents and cousin just happened to be visiting from France and they all had tickets for this game which was cheaper as it was against poorer opposition and would initially have been game two of the season so they got real lucky with that!
So we met her outside the stadium and in a funny situation I got to travel on a subway and stand outside while all the fans piled into the arena for the game.... while we met and went for a burger.

Then I got to stand outside the arena and watch the last minute of the game on the giant scoreboard which you can see from outside due the the sunken design of the court and see all the fans exit while we waited for her family to come out.

They all had their "I was there for opening night" t-shirts on and I got to see the issue No.1 Marvel comic style programme before handing it back :-(

Pretty cool but kinda disappointing to be so close to this (I'm guessing) historic action but yet to be standing literally watching from the outside!

The Aftermath

A couple of days after Hurricane Sandy, they restored power to parts of the subway. For us, this meant we could get to downtown Brooklyn by subway and then catch a shuttle bus into Manhattan. For once, I was glad I wasn't working yet and Heather's work had no power so at least we didn't have to join the rush hour(s) commute as apparently the long lines for buses and time spent in congested traffic meant some people were saying allow up to FOUR hours to get into Manhattan from Brooklyn.

©Brownstoner

©Brownstoner

We waited until Friday mi-morning and ventured into Manhattan to visit the New York Marathon Expo. Apart from the buses being packed to capacity there was no real wait and they had separated bus lanes across the bridges purely for these buses so we moved reasonably quick.

The Expo was massive and rammed with runners from all over the world and although neither if us were taking part it was still good to wander the stands and sample the giveaways!

To get home we decided to catch a regular bus further downtown and then we got off and ran down the west side a little and along Canal Street through Chinatown. This was all in the area of Manhattan still without power and as this particular street is normally one of the most congested at all times of the day and night it was spooky to see it eerily quiet. There were only a couple of tourist gift shops  using the available daylight to open.

We ran over the Manhattan Bridge and then once back in Brooklyn hopped on the subway home.
Something else I'm not used to is being in an apartment where you have no control over the heat in the building. We can't really complain considering the situation of so many people in NY & NJ, but our heating is not on yet so it is freezing inside our apartment, I've never worn so much clothing to bed before!

As the MTA carried on with their cleanup they posted some photos and this one taken around the South Street Seaport area shows how high the water level reached.

©MTA

And then there were the photos of all the garage forecourts and the stories of people waiting hours for gas both in cars and with gas cans.

Even after the buildup of people commenting (negatively) on the fact that the New York Marathon was still going ahead it was still a shock to hear it was cancelled especially after we just came back from the Expo that day and with the vast majority of runners already here or on their way.

In the end, the amount of negative publicity (mainly online) that the Marathon organisers and runners themselves were receiving forced them (Mayor Bloomberg) into cancelling the race at that very very late stage. I'm not going to comment on some of the frankly stupid comments some people (obviously non-runners) were making but in the end nearly 1000 runners turned up at the Staten Island ferry to go over and help out there on race day. While A few thousand also turned up at Central Park and did various distances in the park also raising money for the Red Cross and no doubt their own charities.

©Saucony

Hurricane Sandy

Well, that passed through then! Luckily where we are situated, at just about the tallest point in Brooklyn, we were never going to be at risk from any flooding. Although we just had to wait and see as regards power and water and INTERNET. Oh my god, the internet!

Heather has been through a couple of real bad storms while living on Hawaii but I had no clue what to expect. I ventured out on Sunday to grab a couple of extra things like some matches and bread and water, etc. I would have got more but the lines in the local stores put me off!

It started off with the wind just building later on during the day but already people were posting pictures of trees downed in the neighbourhood.

This was about ten hours before the hurricane was even scheduled to hit land!
But it was Monday that it was supposed to get a lot worse. Luckily we have a new couch to "hunker down" on, that seemed to be the phrase of the day everywhere I looked.

But apart from a few flickering lights and our four storey building swaying a little when the wind picked up, we were very lucky. Some of Heather's friends all over the city didn't have it so good. A couple had their homes flooded and others lost power.

We followed the news on television, and Twitter was really good for getting instant updates especially around Brooklyn. We watched the video and seen the pictures of the power transformer thing blowing up in midtown Manhattan.

That caused practically the whole of lower Manhattan to go dark. From about 34th street downwards. So I jumped off the couch and looked out our window to see, it was a bit freaky to see as normally there are obviously so many lights from the buildings in the distance.

Not our photo, but gives you an idea of what it looked like from even closer.
The stories on the news about the water levels were weird because we could see that it wasn't exactly pouring rain outside so it's freaky to think of the hurricane winds combined with a full moon/high tide pushing the water in from so far off the coast.

To see pictures of places I know so well gave me an instant picture of how far in the water was coming. This was the carousel I've pictured before, down by Brooklyn Bridge Park.

Just before bed we looked out the side window to see the sky lit up similar to the video of the transformer blowing up, it looked like sheet lightning that was permanently on for a minute. There is a power station of some kind a few blocks away so I don't know what that powers?

This morning we seen the news pictures of the houses destroyed by fire and the tunnels filled with water and felt extremely fortunate to escape so relatively untouched.

See the height sign!

We went out this morning for a walk and there were a lot of businesses open. I guess unlike for Manhattan stores, a lot of people here live locally. It did have a slight feel of Christmas or New Year about it, with people happy to get out of the house for a walk and some fresh air. Plus like us people obviously wanted to see the damage done!
Apart from a lot of bits of trees on the pavement and some shops missing their awnings it seemed okay. There were a couple of downed trees on cars and up at Prospect Park there was a big clean up operation going on.

Then of course, the subways are closed. Because of that, like a lot of people Heather is off work and the MTA aren't sure yet when things are likely to reopen. The New York City Marathon is this coming weekend and I wanted to go to the Marathon Expo this week, partly out of interest and partly I was trying to get some work there. At least I'm not one of the thousands of runners attempting to travel to the city to take part.

Washington DC / Army Ten Miler

Last Friday morning we took the BoltBus (approx 4½ hours) from New York to Washington DC in order to run the Army Ten Miler.

I've visited DC once before for a weekend and if you didn't know, DC itself is actually quite small in size. This means it's easy to get around using the Metro but because it's quite expensive in "the city" most ordinary people live just outside which happens to be different states, Maryland and Virginia. So we actually stayed across the Potomac River in Virginia.

On the Friday we visited.... a shopping mall. One of the main cultural landmarks of Washington, NOT.

But we went back to the same store we went to in 2009 on my very first trip with Heather and they had the same cardboard Obama they had back then when he was running for President. This time I did get a photo with him though.

He's much flatter in real life

And this dick

Then it was on to the Armory where the race expo and packet pickup was. As well as the exhibitors inside, the Army also had a few stands outside and some equipment such as this helicopter! It made for a great photo as the sun was just setting.

Then on the way back we got off the train on a random part of the city that sounded like it was central-ish and used the iPhone to google "pizza" and found this great place a couple of blocks away that served pizza pies, with pie being the operative word.

Not sure if I like the tomato on top of everything. I like to see the toppings so I can look forward to eating them! Rather than it being a surprise when I get a bit of sausage or whatever.
We found we were actually round the corner from Fords Theatre where Lincoln was shot. Then we grabbed some self serve frozen yoghurt and endured the walk up the tallest, slowest escalator in the world at our Metro stop.

On Saturday we decided to take a look at the Capitol Bikeshare system they have here. There was a dock right across the road from the hotel and it was only $7 for a 24hr membership.

There are over 175 stations across the area and after downloading the phone app it was easy to see where they were and how many spaces/bikes were available. We started on the middle left (11) and headed across the bridge into the Georgetown area.

The trips were free for up to 30mins and then $2 up to 60mins and so on. So in true Aberdonian style we made sure we got those bikes docked within the 30min timeframe. A couple of times we walked about a bit but one time we literally docked the bike then took it straight back out again in order to make a longer journey with a fresh 30mins, ha ha.

The Georgetown area is so nice. Like a couple of the other American cities (not New York) I've visited, the streets and buildings seem so clean, the brickwork on most buildings makes it look like it was just built. Maybe I'm just used to the grey granite of Aberdeen and the other much older buildings around the UK. Although I just read that that the oldest unchanged building in DC, a stonehouse in Georgetown, was built 270 years after Aberdeen university was founded!

Look, we cycled along the canal path for a bit, just like Inverness!

It is obviously heavily university orientated as the busy Saturday shopping streets we landed in consisted of Abercrombie & Fitch, Hollister, Jack Wills, All Saints and preppy bars called things like "Rugby".
So we quickly exited onto a side street and I got to see some of the local houses. They looked expensive and the streets looked so good in the Fall with the colour of the trees.

 

 
It's definitely an area I'd go back and visit. We hadn't really planned out anything in particular before coming down. What with it being the day before the race, I was worried a day of cycling and walking and all that  fresh air would tire me out, what with me being a super highly tuned athlete and all that.
Then back on the bikes, down the hill onto the waterfront.

We were going to head back over the river to the hotel but once we realised the bridge was basically behind the Lincoln Monument, it really is a small city, we raced along Constitution Avenue, where we did a u-turn in order to see this really cool statue of Einstein.

After an early dinner we took the Metro back to our hotel area but upon exiting, walked the opposite way, crossing main roads in the near dark didn't feel that safe but we wanted to see the famous Iwo Jima monument. It was brightly lit up on one side and looked amazing under the darkening skies. The monument was massive too, much larger than I'd expected.

Sunday morning was race day. The race started at 8am so I was up at 6am. I was worried I wouldn't get my regular race day porridge & bagel/toast as the hotel didn't serve food until 6.30am.
Heather had been ill in the run up to the race and got a bit worse again a few days before so decided not to run. She has done the event a few times before but that didn't make her feel any better about it, probably worse. Luckily there was a Starbucks outside the hotel that opened at 6am so while I showered and prepared my good wife made a porridge run for me!

The location of the hotel was excellent, the Metro stop was a 5min walk and only two stops to the Pentagon where the race started. It was funny to go down the stairs onto the platform to see hundreds of runners lined up waiting for the train and obviously the train full of runners that arrived on the platform.

It's the third largest 10 mile race in the world and there were just under 22,000 finishers. Minus the 1-150 "elite" runners, I was in the first coral of numbers 1-4000. I desperately needed to pee but when I seen the lines for the portaloos and the fact I had to be in my coral in 10mins time I just made my way through the other corals to get to mine.

this amount of loos ÷ 22,000 people = ?

With 15mins to go, they had a high ranking Army guy reading something on the sound system about the troops and the amount of wounded warriors taking part. Nearly everyone stopped and there was near silence. I was still making my way to the start but stopped with everyone else but after a minute I noticed there were still people using the loos and the sound of the doors continually banging closed so I pressed on towards my coral, trying hard to forget how much better I'd feel if I could only pee.

Once the gun cannon went, the start was the worst part for being crowded while running, the half dozen guys who ran off into the bushes to pee didn't make it any quieter. You are kind of stuck running on whatever part/side of the road you decided to start. Once we got up onto the bridge it widened out. I was glad I was that far up though, I can't imagine how bad it is further down the field, although you would get to see more of the wounded warrior guys taking part. I only passed one on the course and it was good to see some other runners clapping them and shouting encouragement and thanks.

Heather had taken my gear and was going back on the Metro to around mile 6 where the runners loop around and come back past again, so she could see me out on course. Can you tell in these pics that I spotted her?

All this unemployment has enabled me to do some consistent training and I was aiming ideally for 7minute mile pace for a 1hour 10 finish but was prepared to accept up to 7minute 30secs in the event it was warm or I didn't feel at good at the uncommon time of 6am, etc.
In the end, I don't think I've felt as good in a race for ages. The weather was perfect, around 11 or 12 degrees and a very light cool breeze. I kind of just ran how I felt and this meant around 7.05 pace and then I picked it up for the last 4 miles. So I ran faster for the second half and did around 6mins 36secs for the last mile. I felt strong at the finish and it makes me wonder how much harder I could've pushed from further out?

Straight through the finish area, grabbed my finishers "coin"

 
and to the toilet for that much needed pee. Then got some water, a bagel, a muffin, a cereal bar, a cookie and, oh that's it.

The only downside was I couldn't find Heather afterwards so I just made my way back on the Metro to the hotel and we met up there. Then I gorged on a Quiznos steak sandwich and on the 10min rest stop on the bus I had a tasty greasy pizza stromboli (a first for me but I'll be on the look out for those now).

Nice, but not at $30

Then to finish off a good weekend, when we got home my work permit card was in the mailbox!
So apart from the last few days where I have been moving stuff around the apartment and then taking delivery and assembling an Ikea sofa I shall be getting on the job scene asap.

MORE gigs?!

The past 10 days we redeemed the last of the concert tickets we'd purchased way back in the day, when I actually thought I had money to buy things like this.

We went to Carnegie Hall last week to see Ben Harper play an acoustic set. It was my first time at this famous venue and it's much more like an old theatre back home. We were in the second tier of about five, sitting on moveable thickly padded comfy red chairs with only three rows (deep) of people and with our own little door to get into our section which the red jacketed staff opened for us.
This was the sight that greeted us on stage.

I think he just about used them all although at times it seemed he was deciding there and then which one he was going to play. 

Then on Tuesday we went to see Fiona Apple, as this crappy iPhone photo shows.

Really good, really loud compared to the albums and just the right amount of crazy as she rolled about on stage.

As we had to be there early to get a good view it means missing out on food at a regular dinner time so I enjoyed my first experience of being able to go to a diner and to be sitting having an omelette, fries and toast at midnight. The forty minute journey home gives you time to digest before bed!

I made a little error this week too. I was asked to walk our neighbours three dogs at 10pm but once out, I realised I had accidentally left the key on their worktop so was now locked out of their flat. They were at the cinema so didn't get back until just after midnight. As we have two cats, Heather kept them in the other room as I sat watching the laptop and keeping them out of mischief for a couple of hours. After a while the two little ones settled down on my lap to keep me warm.

Chris, Newt, Tubbs

In work permit news, it is now "In Production" according to the government website. So hopefully in the next couple of weeks I will have it in hand and be able to leave behind my life as a house husband and get out of bed before 9am... assuming I can get a job of course.

We are off to Washington DC this weekend to take part in the Army 10 miler. I am set for a PB... as I've never raced a 10 mile distance before! I'll try not to sight see too much, both before the race and during.

Brooklyn's finest

In my pursuit of my work permit I was told by the USCIS that I could get back in touch 75 days after the application was received in order for them to chase it up, so to speak.
Of course, the average processing time according to their website is currently around 90 days and when I called earlier this week they gave me another code/number and said they'd look into it and to please allow up to 15 days for them to do this. Thus taking it up to the 90 days anyway!

Last night we went to one of the eight sold out Jay-Z concerts taking place at the brand new Barclays Centre. The novelty factor was for once it's under 2.5miles from us and I love sports arenas anyway!

There has been the usual controversy about the arena being built in the first place and what it has done, or was supposed to have done for the area. Lots of stories involving the developer, the Russian billionaire owner of the Brooklyn Nets basketball team that have moved from New Jersey and some good publicity from co-owner and local boy Jay-Z.

It marks the return of major league sports to Brooklyn, which has been absent since the departure of the Brooklyn Dodgers baseball team to Los Angeles in 1957. Their old Ebbet's Field Stadium used to be in the same neighbourhood and the Jay-Z intro was pretty cool with a massive projection onto the stage of this and all the people that came from Brooklyn.



All the food concessions come from local Brooklyn restaurants so we shared a pulled pork sandwich from the Fatty Cue stand. I think I've said before, but that's one thing that is definitely better than back home, I don't know why they don't make a bigger deal of the food on offer at UK stadiums.
They even had a little Brooklyn Farmacy (the soda fountain place we went to a few weeks ago) cart in case you fancied a coke float!

The tickets only cost $30 and we were seated about three rows from the very very top. Plus it has those real steeply banked stands so you don't want to sit there if you suffer from vertigo!
Like flying above the clouds, we were so high we were above the lights, ha ha:

I didn't know all the songs he played, unlike probably 90% of the crowd but it was still really good. Still find it funny to see people sparking up a joint at a show like this. Heather did comment that it was probably the most mixed types and ages of people at a gig ever.

More walking & eating

On Saturday night we met up with some friends in Chinatown for tea. The restaurant was on a cool little one way street that looked like a movie set.

After sampling some soup dumplings and other shared plates we walked a couple of blocks into Little Italy where the annual San Gennaro festival is on.
It was a thought to brave the crowds but after switching my wallet and phone into my front pockets we went for it.

It was kinda like a street fairground. As well as food stalls there were games to win cuddly toys and even a couple of freakshow things, like the amazing snake boy!
We resisted that and had some canolis and I tried a fried Oreo cookie. Much like anything sweet that is fried, it is tasty but as usual, one is more than enough.

The next day we were up early and burned it all off by doing the same upstate hike we did before but this time leading different friends. Apart from a missed turn and a slight double back it all went good and the lack of humidity compared to in the middle of summer made a massive difference in how we felt during and afterwards. The hike photos were obviously the same as before, but the one below from the car park at the end of our hike was a nice surprise!

Then on Sunday night during the American Football due to an injury to the regular San Diego Chargers player, Heather's cousin got more game time and only ended up scoring three touchdowns!!!