Another ritual is where the game is watched, if not at the preferred stadium. A friends house? A sportsbar? Circuit City on the best TV on the house? In Brooklyn, where I live, it is possible to find a bar catering to the randomest sports team imaginable, and hosting the intensely-attentive fans of that random sport (think: Curling). One problem I’ve found is when you go out in public in the colors or logo of the team playing against a New York team that day. Yes, let’s file that under “ill-advised”, shall we?

It doesn’t matter if a New York fan is fairly newly relocated from Podunk, KS or Whipporwhill, MI, they square off on New York teams as soon as they sign that lease. Giants or Jets? Much bonding with other fans shall soon ensue.

Because I am resolutely a fan of a non-New York team and totally obnoxious in my football watching, I stay home and order in some wings. Maybe I’ll search for other Brooklynite fans of my team, we could sneak around and cheer on our team together! Surely my team has an outpost bar in the City somewhere. Well, that’s a research assignment for me, but if you find yourself sitting alone and watching NFL Today, wondering “One of these things is not like the others..”, rest assured someone across town silently answers, “Joe Buck”.

Football! Chicken Wings! Beer! Yes, I’m a girl!

Last Sunday, September 10, the boyfriend and I sat, resplendent in our flashy Hawaiian gear, in ridiculous Battery Tunnel traffic for over an hour while the President’s motorcade did its thing downtown. Once freed from the honking, swearing madness, we made our way uptown to the Town Hall (123 W. 43rd) to see Hawaii’s most popular recording artist, Kealii Reichel. The music was beautiful, the hula dancing extraordinary, the crowd, ecstatic.

Still plenty of chances for you to get into the Aloha spirit, such as this Saturday night’s concert: Makaha Sons Hawaiian Celebration, featuring the Aloha Boys, at Hunter College (Kaye Playhouse, 695 Park Avenue, Tickets $30), which is sure to be rousing good time.

Dust off those puka shell necklaces, silk flower leis, Aloha shirts, and slippahs, Cuz. We gonna hula like it going outta style

I’m only kidding. I made all that up! It’s a horrible place to live. Really terrible. Don’t bother entertaining a single thought of moving here, because it’s not worth it. We’re all scum and we’lll cut you. I’m being serious.

Thank you and Have a Nice Day.

Born November 4, 1949 to rawther wealthy parents who travelled constantly, Eloise grew up under the care of long-suffering Nanny, her british governess. The staff of the grand Plaza Hotel were accustomed to seeing Eloise, at six years old; rollerskating through the hallways and shouting through a bullhorn, attending fancy private soirees dressed as Sherlock Holmes, and placing her pets Weenie the dog and Skipperdee the turtle in unusual places. However, Eloise did not limit her adventures to the Plaza, she also wreaked havoc in Paris and instigated mayhem in Moscow while on holiday.

So dear is Eloise to the Plaza Hotel her portrait, painted by Hilary Knight, still is grandly displayed. Eloise would have rawther liked that, I imagine.

Other Fictional New Yorkers in this series

Born and raised in predominately Italian and working-class Bay Ridge, Brooklyn, Tony grew up in a close-knit though tumultuous family held together by his parents, Flo and Frank. Frank Jr., Tony’s older brother, was the star of the family, having made his parents proud by joining the priesthood. Nothing Tony, a mere clerk at a local paint store, ever did seemed to please his family–even when he got promoted and received a raise.

One area in which the young man excelled was dance–he was the undisputed king of disco at the 2001 Odyssey nightclub: all heads turned when he arrived with his friends and the crowd parted like Red Sea when he hit the dance floor. A dance contest seemed Tony’s big chance to get the girl he’d had his eye on, Stephanie. Tony wooed her through dance, while dreaming of crossing the Brooklyn Bridge and into a better life. This contest was no contest–once the crowd got a load of Tony Manero in his white suit, shimmying and spinning for all he was worth, the money, trophy, and women piled into his hands.

Unfortunately, this victory was short-lived. Tony’s friends were a bunch of hot-heads and involved him in all manner of disreputable behavior; rumbling with black and Puerto Rican gangs they felt encroached on their turf and tormenting a girl he used to date, Annette. It took the accidental death of his friend Bobby C. and his brother’s scandalous rejection of the preisthood to spur Tony into action, however misguided.

Tony eventually did escape Bay Ridge and six years later became a big time Broadway star in the show “Satan’s Alley”. He retained his magnificent hairdo and bridge-and-tunnel accent throughout his life.

Other fictional New Yorkers in this series.

Name: Mame Dennis Burnside
Address: 23 Beekman Place, New York City
Occupation: Center of Known Universe, Bon Vivant
Memorable Quote: “Life is a banquet and most poor suckers are starving to death!”

On a “bright blue October day” in 1928, young orphan Patrick Dennis arrived with his caretaker Nora Muldoon to the glorious New York City apartment of his only living relative, “Auntie” Mame Dennis. Rather bad timing it was, seeing a jazzy party was underway, complete with bootleg gin and certain counterculture elements mixing with high society types. Nevertheless, Mame scooped Patrick up, declared him her “little love”, and promised to show him the world. With the help of “Uncle” Lindsey Woolsey, the noted publisher, first lady of the American theatre Vera Charles, Japanese houseboy Ito, and the long-suffering Nora, Mame accomplished just that. Only the meddling of Patrick’s Trustee, Dwight Babcock of the Knickerbocker Bank, stood in the way of madcap adventure and enthusiastically free-spirited hijinks; Mame would, as she always did, slyly get her way in the end.

The Great Stock Market Crash and subsequent Great Depression wiped out Mame and all her terribly chic friends, but nothing ever dampened the wildly eccentric spirit of Miss Dennis. At the very end of her luck, Mame met and was wooed by one Beauregard Pickett Jackson Burnside, extraordinarily wealthy Southern oilman. After a remarkable engagement, Mr. and Mrs. Burnside embarked on a world-wide, life-long (for Mr. Burnside) honeymoon. After a period of mourning for her dear departed husband, Mrs. Burnside wrote her devastating memoir with the aid of a secretary/sponge, Agnes Gooch and an editor, poet-at-large Bryan O’Bannion. Mame’s charge, young Patrick Dennis, graduated from St. Boniface Academy and was briefly engaged to Gloria Upson, daughter of Mr. and Mrs. Claude Upson of Mountebank, CT before marrying Pegeen Ryan.

After an appropriate mourning period, Mame Dennis Burnside married her long-time friend, Lindsey Woolsey. The newlyweds resided at Beekman Place and in India for the remainder of their lives.

A walk down 5th Avenue in Bay Ridge feels like a walk down Main Street U.S.A: people from all corners of the world trying to make a new start in America and trying to fit in. Sure, the famously Italian neighborhood now shares its brownstones and storefronts with a United Nations of different ethnicities and you’ll hear a Babel of Spanish, Creole, Farsi, Arabic, Chinese, and Turkish while walking over to Century 21 on 86th Street; still, people are generally open, helpful and friendly. Can you imagine? The guy at the pizza place, the guys at the bagel place, the girl at Rite Aid, and the clerks at NYSC all know me and are super friendly, every time I go.

How can this be? We’re still in New York City, after all, where tourists are mowed over for gawking too long on the sidewalk. Where everyone is on the take and only the strong survive. Where good manners are seen as a weakness in character and ambition trumps the Golden Rule. Everyone’s a critic, a cynic, a therapy-dependent depressive. All treatable afflictions, helped immeasurably by putting someone else ahead of oneself, even if it’s so small you don’t even break your stride.

Brooklyn is hardly alone in retaining small-town values; I’ve seen similar acts of blatant kindness and goodwill in all five boroughs, and yes–that includes Manhattan. Little things like giving up cabs in the rain to the elderly or infirm; holding the door for a harried mama with kids and shopping bags in tow; or helping a lost tourist find 42nd Street. These are small things that literally anyone can (and should) do to make our fair city a livable place.

So you can’t afford monetary contributions to charity, and you don’t have time to volunteer somewhere; you can still foster a sense of community all by yourself by supporting local businesses. Easy choices like local movie stores instead of Netflix, corner coffee shops instead of Starbucks, mom and pop bookstores instead of huge chains like Borders and Barnes & Noble, and intriguing choices like the Turkish deli or Mexican taqueria instead of the usual pizza or Chinese take-out. All of those choices are opportunities to get to know people in your community and even if someone ends up being unreceptive to your efforts, they’ll remember you the next time and probably afford you a second chance. You can always strike up a conversation with someone in your apartment building at the mailboxes–you’ll both wonder if the other is an axe-murderer, but that idea can be quickly overcome.

Many times in Brooklyn and Manhattan, I have been absolutely shocked by ill-mannered people: I’m not talking as Miss Manners here, I’m talking about a lack of basic manners, i.e. Don’t bulldoze a five-year old child out of your way to get to the public restroom, or Don’t carry on excruciatingly intimate conversations at top volume on your cell phone in a crowded public place. I’m not sure who thinks this kind of behavior is cute and/or acceptable, but ye gods. These particular instances point to deeper issues within those people’s families, not with the greater populace of New York City. Not that I buy the idea poverty, race, or ethnicity excuses a person from acting right. However, politely asking someone to reconsider their behavior in any way will likely get you pummeled, or, at the very least, screamed at. Probably too late for many in the City, but not you: whether you have current or future children, you are and will be the Manners Role Model. They watch everything you do and say, and make mental notes about your behavior. If you “please” and “thank you” and are generally gracious and kind, you’ll turn out polite kids. If you drop the f-bomb every third word or so, share your personal life and your every thought with the world at large at the top of your cell phone volume, and generally feel you are entitled to all the world has to offer without having to bother with “nice”, well, you get what you pay for.

In Lancaster, people who act like this are called “tourists”; in Bay Ridge, they are called, “neighbors”. I find they are tolerated in either place, and everyone else just goes about their merry way, working and pursuing their dreams, raising their families, and having fun. There’s room for everybody in New York City, even a polite kid from Lancaster, PA (No, I am not Amish). What will preserve the small-town feel of Bay Ridge will probably improve the quality of life for everyone in New York City: Community. Oh, and some improved manners wouldn’t hurt, either.