New York, New York - January 8-9, 2007

My first ever trip to New York! The hotel where I stayed, Millennium Hotel, overlooks Time Square. It was amazing to drive through Time Square at 12:30 a.m. and it was as bright as day. To be honest it was smaller than I imagined but still amazing. My room overlooked other buildings but if I craned my neck to the left and pressed my face to the class I could see a bit of Time Square. I started my first day with news of a "strange odor" penetrating the city. OK, strange odors I can handle but when office buildings are being evacuated and you are in the city impacted by 9/11 it is not anything to take too lightly. I stayed in my room, watching the news until I felt it was safe to leave. I took a cab to Soho and met R.H. for lunch at a yummy French restaurant. My back was to the door so he watched for stars...we had a false alarm with a Paris Hilton look alike. The food was delicious and R.H. and I talked about the event that night with SRC and he told me about New York. At the conclusion of lunch I stayed in Soho for about another hour to do some shopping. Great shopping! I braved the subway to get back to the hotel. It reminded me of Chicago.

SRC had been invited to speak at a YEO event in New York which is why I was there. The venue was an old Broadway Theater attached to the Millennium Hotel. It was amazing! R.H. told me that during a recent renovation they uncovered Tiffany glass that had been painted over. There are beautiful greens, blues, golds, and reds. Spectacular! In total there were about 250 people attending the event and SRC did a fantastic job. Take a close look at this photo and you will notice the marquee above our heads. The event organizer had 2-3 artists in Central Park draw SRC and the one you see here was the best. I rather like it. You will also notice that I am in jeans. I was not quite through with my Audio Visual rehearsal when I got the word that SRC was arriving. I raced outside and met him at the curb. He just smiled and laughed. I did change into a business suit and looked appropriate for the event.




On my next trip to New York I do not want to go alone...it would have been far more fun to see everything and more with someone else.