Just got back from a week in NYC, and I have a couple of observations.
– I stayed in Brooklyn, in a real blue collar area, and I was simply amazed at how many American flags are prominently displayed. Every house has at least one flag, and most have 2-3. All I could think was that Osama and crew pissed off 8 million people for good, and New Yorkers do not forgive or forget.
– The New York Sun is just great. I don’t know if it is just me, but I did not feel it had a conservative tilt to it- it was just straight up reporting, and most of the coverage was on local news. I guess the absence of a liberal bias makes something conservative. The paper is a little thin, but if I lived there, I would definitely subscribe.
– Every day I was there I read another story about a funeral of a fireman or a cop from the WTC.
– Inside Grand Central Station, there is the most awful memorial/announcement board for those still missing from 9/11. Xeroxed sheets with pictures from weddings, and handwritten descriptives about height, weight, description of wedding band and which hand watches were worn on, all with a little note saying I love you/miss you. After two minutes, I was bawling. Those motherfuckers.
– Egg Creams are delicious.
– You just do not realize how big Ground Zero is until you went there. I did not make a special trip to it, but the express bus I took to Manhattan drove right by it. It is just enormous- for Pittsburgh fans, it looks like you could fit all of Three Rivers Stadium in there.
– The last thing I noticed, which I must have just forgotten on my last trip there (5 years ago), was that New Yorkers wear nothing but black. You can tell the tourists- they look up at the buildings and wear colors.