Ran over the Williamsburg Bridge and back today.  Saw seven (7) ironic mustaches, two (2) non-ironic pairs of legwarmers and one (1) Scottie dog.

A gang of teenage boys stood in a clump around the subway stairs. As I forced a path through them, one of them said, ‘Look out, Miss!’ and I stopped short instinctively. ‘Watch out for that dried water there!’ he said, pointing at a wet patch of sidewalk, and they all giggled.

At the 5th Ave. station, a woman handed out fliers at the top of the escalator. ‘Breakfast sandwich, only $3.99. Breakfast sandwich, only– Excuse me, Miss! Are you gonna pick that up!?!’ Every woman under 40 (including me) stopped short and wheeled around to see what they had dropped, and the entire throng of commuters staggered back a step.

Today, I had to rise at the ungodly hour of 7:30am, and commute with swarms of anachronistic non-freelancers during rush hour.  And I remembered something:  NYC is hell.  I had forgotten it, so rarely do I have to fight my way into or out of a business district during prime commuting time.

Yesterday, as I waited for the train, a young boy ran in circles around me and the pillar I was leaning on.  He was using a pencil as a pretend gun (and holding it ridiculously, I might add), and making explosion noises, and trotting up and down the narrow strip of platform between my knees and the tracks.  One nudge, and that would have been it for him.  It’s amazing children ever reach adulthood.

Last night, there were nearly two dozen cop cars zooming around Greenpoint where McGuinness passes under the BQE.  Every pedestrian out was trying to figure out what was up.  I passed a nest of stopped cop cars, but didn’t want to rubberneck too long.  When I got to class, a guy said he’d been on his way when he saw a guy run by, and then a fleet of cops with their guns drawn charged toward him, screaming at him to get out of the way.  I wonder what the fleeing man had done.

A guy with a body like a spaghetti noodle and Warhol hair trotted alongside a lovely, stylish, and utterly fed up-looking Asian woman in boots and tights. ‘It’s not that I don’t trust you,’ he whined. ‘It’s just that you always threaten me, so I caaaan’t trust you!’

On the train, a very young guy with acne scars and unfocused eyes danced wildly holding the hands of a baby in a carriage propped between his knees. He giggled and tossed his head back and forth, and pushed his face down close to the baby. The baby had the exact look you have when dealing with a temporarily amusing drunk person who you fear could blow any minute.

A bald man sat on a subway bench, and a very short woman stood in front of him, rubbing her hands in circles on both sides of his head, and cooing.

Today in the laundry mat, I opened a washer, only to find it full of clothes. Thinking it was finished laundry, I pushed the door to and started loading up another machine. A pretty young blond Polish lady came over, shut the door I had opened firmly, turned around and shot me an extended glare as if I had just straight up pissed in her cereal. She then put her laundry detergent back behind the counter, and barked at the Korean teenage girl on staff, ‘This here mine. Don’t let nobody take.’

‘Yours?’ repeated the girl, confused.

‘Yes. This. Mine. Don’t let nobody take,’ the woman repeated, and left.

After that, I went to the grocery store, and I was rounding the end of the dairy aisle, I heard some major carrying on behind a swinging door. A woman in a white butcher’s apron was prancing back and forth, texting, and jubilantly singing something mocking in Spanish, and totally cracking herself up. She was totally cracking up another butcher, as well, who had his back to her and was using a cleaver to hack at hunks of red meat strewn all over a table.

‘Spanish spanish spanish spaaaaanish,’ sang the woman. ‘Ha, ha, ha, HA!’

‘Woo, ai, ai,’ agreed the man, swinging his cleaver.

‘Spaaaaanish, spaanish, duh-duh-dum, Spanish, heee hee hee heee,’ sang the woman.

‘Mwah, huh, huh, huh, HUH!’ shouted the man, hacking away.

I really wanted to work there, suddenly.

One of the many annoyances of living in NYC is that a production shoot will frequently interrupt your daily routine. Today was a freezing cold, windy and rainy day, but for some reason, everybody was shooting in Greenpoint. Some project had trailers parked all up and down Driggs Ave., but I didn’t see anyone out in the weather, other than a few workers taping down wires. Then, there was a commercial shooting at the track. A little tent had been erected next to the track, and about ten people and all their equipment huddled under it. A guy dressed like a referee stood out on the track opposite four muscular dudes in summer running gear, who posed squatted down as if about to race. They must have been freezing. An aide with a showy sense of urgency stopped me and requested I run around behind the tent, so as not to mess up their shot, so I had to squelch through the mud, dodging trees and benches, every time I did a lap.

Exiting the food court adjacent to the Lex & 53rd subway station, an Indian guy in some sort of food industry uniform chased two Hispanic guys who both wore a different restaurant’s uniform. ‘Mexico, Mexico, everybody from Mexico!’ the Indian guy was saying, while the two other guys rolled their eyes at each other, and clearly tried to out-walk him. ‘I love tacos! But I am just not [unintelligible]. Seriously, Mexico is a beautiful country, a gorgeous country.’

On Park Avenue, a car failed to go promptly at a green light, causing several cars to lay on their horns for a good long while, which in turn interrupted the phone conversation of a thin blond woman whose tweed pencil skirt met her black leather boots in a perfect horizontal line across her kneecaps. ‘It’s just so loud here,’ she screamed into the phone. ‘It is just too loud, I mean. This whole city, I don’t – this city is so…loud, and I really, I feel sorry for people who have to…’

Blowsy tourist lady on Madison Ave. screaming into her cell phone:

‘So, then where are you, where do you wanna meet? Oh, and Amelia said something about, uh, Ranger, so I told her Ranger got sick and died.’

A very thin young Hassid arrived at the exercise area next to the running track, and shed his black coat and cap. In his vest, shirtsleeves, slacks and tendrils, he spent some time in a standing position, swinging his thin legs in nearly complete circles, dancers’ arcs, with much enthusiasm. People on nearby benches stared.

On my next revolution, he was bent over backwards walking his hands down the spindly trunk of a tiny yellow-flowered tree, attempting to get into a full backbend (I guess). He got about halfway.

On my next revolution, he was hanging by his knees from the overhead bars, with his tendrils hanging straight down, and also his thin thighs and arms, and also the four long strings of his special penile guard (which was also hanging upside down, abandoning its post). He appeared to be a collection of strands and ribbons, and his limbs were like ribbons he was pitching in all directions.

On my next revolution, he was sitting in half-lotus on the grass, holding a cigarette in a fancy way – with his hand extended palm up.