New York City And Its Ego

New York is the city with the biggest ego in the world. No seriously, it is. Get on the subway and there are advertisements confirming that ‘since you live in the greatest city in the world, you should have the greatest health insurance’ and other similar sentiments. Apparently this isn’t just limited to New York City, but expands to New York being the greatest state in our cozy little Union, at least according to a commercial encouraging investment in the state. New York is a testament to the idea that if you just keep repeating something people will start to believe it, and not just the people that live there, but people all over the world. This translates over into TV and movies as well, which means in order to really enjoy NYC a lot of sterotypes need to be let go of.

The most fashionable city in the world? I expected there to be some noticeable difference in the percentage of people looking really good in their clothes, this didn’t happen. There were a lot of crocs and a surprising shortage of Chanel. NYC is just a regular ol’ city like any other. That doesn’t mean it isn’t interesting and fun, but this whole ‘greatest city in the world’ thing is a bit presumptuous. You won’t find any Carrie Bradshaws, or Joey Tribbianis, or Blair Waldorfs. Mostly just regular people living in a regular city, the only difference being a monstrous ego. Once you get over the fact that New York City is not what it’s on TV, and the movies, and the advertisements (because how could it be?) then there’s some kinda cool stuff to see, but not ‘the greatest’ and certainly not greater than London, or Paris, or any other city, in my opinion.

Now that that’s out of the way, let’s talk some weather because, after all, this blog is entitled gloriously dismal.

When we arrived it was 103 degrees and our hostel wouldn’t let us check in until 3. Ouch. We plopped down in Central Park and did not move until we could be assured some air conditioning. Later we decided to hit up the Whole Foods just down the block from us for some dinner. Big mistake. We got caught in severe storms and lightning in the 0.3 miles down to the store. There was a nice sense of camaraderie as the streets quickly emptied and everyone stood along the walls and under overhangs. Everyone was so totally drenched that they gave up on their umbrellas and subway stations started to look like that scene in Titanic where where the water is rising quickly on the lower levels. The rest of the trip was indeed gloriously dismal, but all I cared about was that the triple digit heat wasn’t coming back.