Photo from Wikipages.com

I had a very musical evening last night. It all began in the Grand Central subway, where I met up with a friend who was playing trombone in the terminal. Her band, called the Dramatics band, includes 2 trombones, a trumpet, a saxophone, and some awesome drums. They play jazz/ African fusion tunes in various subway terminals nearly every day of the week.

We went with her to Le Poisson Rouge, a relatively young venue in the West Village. There was a $10 cover for an evening of 2 shows, something I won’t normally pay. When you walk into the establishment, you’re greeted by a hanging fish tank and a dark room. The performances occur downstairs, through a red lobby with interesting throne chairs, in a large dark room with a spacious stage and ample seating. The space lacked the dinginess many other musical venues in the area possess.

The show last night began with Ethan Iverson, an inventive pianist. He played innovative renditions of a variety of jazz standards. My favorite was Smoke Gets in Your Eyes, which he played with melancholic intensity. Some of his other playing was a bit too much for me, a non-musician, but he clearly has a lot of talent. Next up was Gabriel Kahane and his band, a singer-songwriter group.  The band’s charming leader had me cracking up with his humorous anecdotes that punctuated their songs. I was most impressed with their violin player, Rob Moose, whose fast fiddling stole the show. We left as they continued their set, but had thoroughly enjoyed a melodic evening.

Having just flown back from a trip to CA, I was not in the mood for a trip to the DMV. But I had the rest of the day off and I forced my jetlagged self to the License Express. I’ve been living in NYC for 5 years now and still had a Jersey driver’s license with my parents’ address. Now that it was expiring, it really was time to make my NY residency official.

Located on 34th between 8th and 9th, the License Express is an easy commute for most subway lines. When I arrived shortly before 4 (when it closes!), I found the office busy, but not packed. There’s a station for everything. Station 1: you go to the Information booth, get a form, and get a ticket. Station 2: you get your vision checked, your forms checked, and get a number. Station 3: Here’s where it gets fancy. A digital board displays which counter is serving which number and a computerized female voice announces “Now serving number —- at counter —-.”

The lines (which are unavoidable) move fast and the multiple stations make the process seem speedier. The workers were oddly pleasant, something I don’t recall from prior DMV experiences.  The woman at station 2 actually told me “Good job!” when I’d successfully completed my vision test.  I’d say the full experience took maybe a half hour.  It probably differs with days or times, but if you come prepared you might find the License Express to be a pretty smooth ride.

Where were you in 1973? Were you even born yet? I was watching “All in the Family” on TV, Nixon was President, gas was well under $1 a gallon, and we listened to Cat Stevens, the Moody Blues, and Led Zeppelin on 8-track tape players. Many of us still had rotary phones, my dad’s car had big-ass fins, and some of my neighbors had been drafted to Vietnam. And “the city” was a dangerous place — 42nd St west of Broadway was one porn-show or peep-show palace after another, with streetwalkers [prostitutes] lining the streets in broad daylight. SoHo, TriBeCa, and NoLiTa were barely ideas, and the Bronx was burning! The World Trade Center was in its infancy.

If you want to go back to NYC nostalgia, or want to appreciate how far we’ve come. Or even if you are like me — secretly longing for a little of the grittiness again [oh that colorful subway graffiti!], catch tonight’s second episode of “Life on Mars” [ABC, 10pm]. If nothing else, the hairstyles are a hoot, and last week I caught a Gremlin [car] on the street. They really are dead-on with the details! Oh, and the political-incorrectness! Every young girl should note the disrespect to women, and appreciate what we burned our bras for!

WaMu or Washington Mutual or the bank of choice for all my friends in NYC, Queens - whether business or personal accounts - is rumored to fall next.

I got a worried voicemail instructing me to move all my funds out of the bank while riding the subway. There’s mass confusion for us that are not financially savvy.

Can someone from WaMu please let us know what’s going on and what we can expect? I know that the FDIC insures up to $100,000 and after that, you’re sort of on your own.

So any help would be great. And what I’m doing now is re-visiting other banks and figuring out how to manage this plan. NYC is getting to be more of a hazard for businesses and individuals.

The once popular banks employed well-paid bankers. Businesses thrived, real-estate prices sky-rocketed, night spots grew, coffee shops expanded, but with the fall of major banks, where will our city be in 5 years?

I’m worried.

One of my biggest issues with the subways are that you never really know when they run. When taking a bus, there is always a schedule at the stop which gives you an estimate as of when a bus might come, but I did not see something like that on the subway - maybe yet.

Of course I could check out the tripplaner website beforehand, but let’s reserve my beef with the tripplanner for another blog post.

So while I am really glad that the subway system runs all around the clock, I have also found myself numerous times standing on a platform in the middle of the night wondering when my dear train comes to bring me home. Just add to the uncertainty of time, the uncertainty about the overall service (”It’s the weekend, does the 2, 3 stop here?”), rats and all kind of weird people to make this experience a lasting one.

Last weekend I went out with some friends in Williamsburg and to get their I took a L-Train from Manhattan to Bedford Avenue and I noticed that the L is the first one of all the lines I’ve used that actually displays the time of when the next train runs right on the platform. At least in Brooklyn.

And while I was waiting for the the train at Spring St, they kept announcing an ETA for the next train every three minutes. Not that you need it so often, but it’s still a nice service.

So this is still pretty rare for NYC and the system is probably a pilot. All the people I talked to about it so far were joking about the MTA raising prices soon to compensate the spending on the panels. ;) Even though I oppose raising the prices (Of course!), I feel like this system is long needed.

Does anyone share my enthusiasm and know more?

There were some chores to be taken care of today. Some mundane tasks, but they happened to be on Central Park East. And any task that’s on CPE is OK by me. The neighborhood is filled with the sort of NYC essence you’d find in a Woody Allen film or a Neil Simon production. Something about the place just exudes classic New York.

I feel it has a lot to do with the preserved buildings. Especially the ones that are open to the public like the Frick Collection. Or just the tree-lined sidewalks that overlook the Central Park Zoo.

So I meandered into the park from 6th avenue and after going over a gazebo, some picnicking folk and taking in the skyline from different angles, I just found a nice boulder to rest my butt on and looked at the Victorian Gardens. It was filled with kids - sounds of laughter, screams, and laser-like noises in the distance from below and sounds of honking, sirens, and horses to the side.

A live unadulterated stereo of New York City. Perfect place to take a nap. It was awesome.

Okay, so it’s no secret anymore: the Transit Authority is about to roll out a new experiment– subway cars with folding seats, which will be locked in the up position during rush hour. In other words, a seatless subway car, or standing room only. For many riders, this is no big deal; they never get a seat anyway. For others, it’s the ultimate insult from a TA that constantly raises fares and doesn’t seem to improve service. The TA says a car without seats will provide more space for more riders. This is the obvious advantage. But what are some other benefits? Following is a list I came up with; see if you can contribute your own:
1] No smelly bums laying out, taking up seats.
2] Less chance of someone falling asleep next to you and falling in your lap.
3] More difficult for the riders who do their personal care on the subway, especially the annoying people who insist on clipping nails on board.
4] Don’t have to worry about giving your seat to the elderly or pregnant
5] Less likely to have someone next to you eating their greasy food.

Photo from sciflicks.com

I needed to get a new social security card. That sadly meant that I needed to go to the Social Security Card Center. I discovered after several phone calls and trips to the official website that, while practically the rest of the country can just mail in their application or show up at their local office (mine is a mere 2 subway stops away), New Yorkers are required to go to a “Social Security Card Center”. There’s two of these in the city - one in Jamaica and one in Brooklyn.

Despite the fact that I live in Queens, the Brooklyn Card Center is considerably closer to me (and more accessible by subway). So I informed my employer that I might be late to work today (expecting the wait to be about 3 hours), filled out all paperwork ahead of time, brought a book, and headed down to Brooklyn. I imagined some sort of bureaucratic hell awaiting me with sour-faced employees, winding lines, and paper mounds like something out of the movie Brazil.

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Photo from Wikipages.com

I met up with friends at a great brunch place yesterday - Central Park. We all brought something different and met up with a blanket at the Sheep Meadow. Inspired by breakfast buffets in Turkey, I brought a couple different cheeses, cucumbers, olives, and bread. One friend broke rules a bit and brought the ingredients for Bellinis. With quite a food spread, we sipped our Bellinis and caught up on with each other. I wondered why I didn’t do this more often, especially since it’s much cheaper than any other Manhattan alternative. We were just packing up when the sky darkened ominously and we made a dash for the subway. I suppose that there our some risks involved in brunching al fresco.

Okay - as promised, here is the second installment of A Commuter’s Manifesto.

Please keep in mind that this was compiled from hours upon hours of research and “man on the street” style reporting - basically, I just asked people what drives them nuts about commuting, and they pretty much gave me these answers*.

PART II: WHEN RIDING THE SUBWAY Read more