From the Globe and Mail:
When [the hostage takers] were finally convinced that Mr. Budzanowski was not an American in disguise, he said, they started treating him more politely, and handling him less roughly. “When they were certain I was Canadian, they were very disappointed. Then, they told me, ‘We love Canada.’ That’s wonderful to hear when you have guns pointed at you…”
I expect the number of tiny Canadian flags sewn onto American backpacks to spike tomorrow.
Our friend in Halifax has created a blog to recount stories of her pregnancy. I’ve added it to the blogroll on the right.
Isaac Hayes quits South Park because the show made fun of Scientology. Chef, it turns out, is a hypocritical dick.
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It’s amazing, the different lenses that people look through. That hundreds of people could line the streets of Belgrade, weeping for the death of Slobodan Milosevic, seems very odd to me and, I suspect, to the rest of the world as well.
We got home around 10:00 last night. My Blackberry’s battery died early yesterday morning, and I couldn’t be arsed to post last night. Yesterday’s highlights:
All in all, a very good trip. We got to see a Daily Show filming, MoMA, the Museum of Natural History and great views of the skyline from the harbour and the 70th floor of the Rockefeller Center. We enjoyed the freakishly good weather. We had two amazing meals. We slept in plush surroundings. We walked through Times Square and rode the subway and sat in Bryant Park and did all those touristy things that you should do in New York. We came to love New York even more than we did from our last visit three years ago. Not a bad way to spend 48 hours, really.
We just had our second amazing meal in as many nights. Triomphe, a newish restaurant next door to our hotel, was reaaallllllly good. Check out what I had:
We made it home just in time to watch the Daily Show, which is surreal. 5 hours ago we were watching this live. Weird.
We just left the Daily Show taping and we’re kinda hoarse from the laughing and yelling. It was really cool to watch, but very short. Like the host. Hoo ha!!
Anyway, very cool. Now we can relax for a bit before dinner which is, conveniently, right next door.
We’re waiting to get into the Daily Show. Being uber-prepared we’re 90 minutes early, but we’re about 20th in line. Doors open at 5 and we didn’t think to bring our books, so I’ve got some time to kill.
We started off the morning with some fast, greasy, diner food just down the street from the hotel before walking up 6th Avenue to MoMA. We blasted through that, taking in all the Picasso and Pollock and Warhol and Matisse and Rothko and Magritte (the last two being my favourites) we could absorb in a short amount of time.
Next up was Rockefeller Center, where we paid to go up to the 70th floor. There’s an open-air observation deck up there that gave us great views of the entire city. Since our last trip here only gave us the chance to go up the Empire State Building at night, this was a good daytime substitute. Too bad it was hazy.
But really, the reason it was hazy is that it’s been so warm. It’s been in the low 60s, which to the rest of the world is in the mid to high teens, I think. We’ve been enjoying the sunshine and lack of jacket.
Anyway, after a quick trip back to the hotel, a long stroll through Hell’s Kitchen to the Comedy Central studios and a quick bite to eat, here we are.
And now we wait.
Our flight was delayed by about an hour, so we got to Newark airport around 8:00. Our cab driver, a very friendly Egyptian guy, got us through Jersey and the Lincoln tunnel in 15 minutes and we were checked into our midtown hotel 5 minutes later. Our hotel — The Sofitel — is very nice; clean, nice, friendly staff, good location, comfy bed. I can see why it’s rated #1 on TripAdvisor.
Our speedy cab ride also made it possible to keep our 9:00 reservation at Smith + Wollensky. We were so full of steak, cheesecake and Zinfandel at the end that it was painful to move. Why, I could barely finish my scotch in the hotel bar…
Our flight was delayed by an hour. We should really know better than to make reservations assuming our flight will arrive on time. Oh well, it’s not like we had big plans. And Smith + Wollensky stays open ’til midnight, so might have some options. Delicious options.
We watched Omagh (imdb | rotten tomatoes) last night. I love Paul Greengrass’ films; he didn’t direct this one, but he did help write it. And Pete Travis’ style was so similar to Bloody Sunday that it might as well have been the same man. Interestingly enough, it arrived via Zip the day before it was released to theatres here in Canada.
The film is about the 1998 IRA bombing in the town of Omagh, primarily the aftermath and the families of the victims looking to bureaucrats for answers and finding none. It didn’t have the same gutwrenching build that Bloody Sunday did; it was meant to show the long, lasting desperation of the families, the juxtaposition of raw emotion against calculated politics. Highly recommended.
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Off to New York in a couple of hours. We’ll be in the Daily Show audience tomorrow night; not that they show the audience, but maybe you’ll hear him pick on us out-of-towners.
Skirl | Dan Dickinson 