We went to the Christmas show in Radio City

[Paul B]

My wife had this bright Idea to take out Grand Daughter Greta to the Christmas Show in Radio City Music Hall.

Of course living in New York we have seen the show quite a few times and I figured I was done with that. Of course not.

So $500.00 later we got tickets and went this weekend. I forgot it was the same day they lit the Rockefeller Tree across the street and a couple of blocks away is Trump Tower which has hundreds of police protecting and the street is half closed.

I worked in Manhattan for 40 years and hate crowds. If you hate crowds, that is the one place in the world you don't want to be. Even in July you don't want to be there because of the crowds but for some reason people need to flock there to see all this.





So we took the Long Island RailRoad to Penn Station (which is how I got there every day to work) and naturally almost all those people going to Radio City are on the same train. Most of them were in the same car.

My wife has MS and doesn't do stairs well and I didn't remember where the elevator was to get to the "E" train so we decided to take a cab.

Big mistake. The line for the taxi's had about as many people on it as Yankee Stadium on opening night. We got on the line and called an Uber cab.

The Uber cab app came up with a message that basically said, "Yeah Right, Are you kidding?"





So we waited on the Taxi line which would have gotten us to Radio City for the Grand Finale if we were lucky.

Cars kept stopping offering rides to Radio City. I asked the first guy the price and then I told him that I don't think he understood me, I said I just want to ride in his car for the 15 blocks and I didn't want to buy the car.



After 10 or 15 cars came by looking for ridiculous prices, a guy came by and told me he would take us there for $25.00. I offered him $23.00 and he took it.

We got there and you could not get near the main entrance so we went in to the handicap entrance which was great. Of course my wife had to go to the Ladies room which was by the main entrance. The place where we didn't want to go because the Yankee Stadium crowd was all there, including the players, bat boy, mascot etc. As a matter of fact everyone in New York City and nost of the people from Europe were in Radio City and they were all in our way to get to the Ladies Room. All nine million of them except for the fifty Rockettes who were on stage.

Remember my wife can hardly walk "and I am walking a four year old" which I can't pick up due to a recent shoulder operation. Greta wants cotton candy. $8.00

I want a drink. A big drink, but that line was longer than the Ladies room so that didn't happen.





WE start making our way to the seat on the other side of the theater and I am wishing they let me bring torpedoes with me.

Greta wants pop corn. $9.00

We finally get to the theater and at the start of the show, Santa Claus tells us to put on our 3 D glasses. We follow Santa as he flies over Manhattan, then the show starts with the Rockettes. 50 Supermodels, what could be bad?

Greta says, "I want to go home". No, that didn't happen. We saw the entire show with the camels, donkeys, goats etc. (In my working career I sometimes worked under the stage in Radio City and it stinks of wet camel down there. I wonder why!.)





My wife wants to go to the Ladies room again, so we ask where it is. It is one floor up and the mens room is two floors up. Great. The elevator is again on the opposite end of the theater. I think when they built this place they purposely designed everything on the opposite end of the place from where you are at any given time, I am not quite sure how they did that.

We get on the elevator and go downstairs and are told, oh No, the Ladies room is upstairs on the opposite end of the theater.





Greta wants a light up dancing, twirling Rockette on a stick. $30.00





We go back up the elevator and they tell us "Oh no this floor is rented out for a party and you have to back downstairs.

I finally convinced my wife to go where the camels go.

We try to get a Taxi. Yeah right. So we walk to the Subway and of course that subway doesn't have an elevator. The Cop told us there was an elevator two blocks away. It takes my wife an hour to walk two blocks so we started down the stairs.

Greta is tired. 17 or 18 people jumped over us as we slowly got down the stairs.

We couldn't get to the E Train and had to take an F train which leaves you on 6th Ave. Penn Station is on 7th Ave so we had to walk. 45 minutes later we get to Penn Station where the Cop tells us the escalator was not working.

Neither was the elevator. Of course not. Why would any of those things work?

I remember it working in the 80s and once on the 90s.

We finally get on the train where two young girls loved Greta's Christmas dress and kept her occupied.

All in all it was a great day and like all days when I go to Manhattan I wanted to blow my head off.

 

[DaveK]

This sounds like a really bad time for all. Not only that, but it cost you $500.

I suspect this is the sort of thing that will only happen once. There are a lot of other things to do that do not involve crowds, long lines and so on.

I hope for all this trouble your granddaughter had a good time.

 

[nanoreefing4fun]

Always enjoy the read Paul !

Living in a relatively rule state where everyone has a car and a crowed sidewalk is 10 people on a city block, in the capitol city downtown, and having never rode in a bus, taxi, subway or train... your post reads like another country that is barley imaginable. Your outing seems as wild as an African safari adventure !

Did see this in a movie once, thought there were kidding...

 

[Paul B]

Dave, in New York City there is no such thing as getting away from crowds or spending a small fortune. The tickets were $500.00 but the entire day was closer to $800.00 with the trains, dinner, bootleg taxi's, popcorn, parking and especially stress management pills. I don't know how I worked there all those years.

Nanoreefing, that scene in Crocodile Dundee where he is in the subway and he is walking on top of everyone is a normal rush hour Friday. That was not staged although I am sure for the scene they were actors but you could actually walk on top of people (if they let you)
I have seen people fall on the tracks but luckily someone always pulled them up before the train came.
It boggles my mind that people come to Manhattan on "purpose" just because they want to. Like, what are they thinking?
In that picture you posted of Dundee climbing up on a light pole to find someone, I did that all the time.
But at this time of the year, you can't even walk on the sidewalk as the first lane of traffic closest to the sidewalk is all people because they don't fit on the sidewalk.
It is a horrible place stay home.

Greta had a good time.

 

[DaveK]

Yea, I've been to NYC more than a few times. I really don't enjoy it too much, but never tell that to a native New Yorker. They think it's the greatest place on earth.

Next year, take that $800 and take a weekend trip to visit Pacific East Aquaculture. You can stop as see some of the other sights along the way. You'll spend a lot less money, and see some really nice corals and stuff. (grin)

 

[nanoreefing4fun]

Great pic of Greta ! She a real cutie !

 

[Paul B]

Dave, maybe I will just add another $6,000.00 and go back to Tahiti so I can see corals in their home.

Thanks nano

 

[Paul B]

Our Daughter got us tickets for a Broadway show last night called Something Comet. I can't remember the exact name but it had Comet in it. Josh Groban stared in it and it was about the French Revolution, I think. Anyway, we were seated right on the stage. It was an old theater built in 1925 like most of those theaters. The stage is composed of about 5 small areas where they put a tiny table with 3 people around them. Brass rails surround the tiny table area and some of those areas are lower and some slightly higher than the stage which was a walkway that surrounded these tiny seating areas so the play happens all around you and right at your table. My wife was in a different one from me because my Daughter couldn't get 2 seats next to each other.

Of course as a musical there was a lot of dancing around and singing with a scattering of Supermodels in the show.
At one point all the lights went dark and they turned on one spot light. It was turned on me. I had on this bright red Christmas tie that was drawn by an 8 year old. One of the main characters comes over to me and whispers in my ear to please stand up. I thought she wanted to show off my tie, So I am standing in this very bright spot light and I am sure the shine off my bald head was blinding everyone and this girl who is holding my hand starts singing to me like I am her boy friend. I wasn't sure if I was supposed to sing or dance with her and if I did, would I do the tango, twist or the mashed potatoes?
I didn't know weather to pass gas or go blind until I looked at my wife. The old guy in the play who was supposed to be this girl's Father, has my wife, and the spot light is on her and this Geezer is singing to her.
What are the chances out of the hundreds of people in this theater that the two of us would be singled out. At times through the show, one of the cast members would sit next to you, or on your lap, which was interesting.
OK, that was my 0ne minute of Broadway fame.

The play ends and we go outside with the 800,000 other people on Broadway because most of the theaters on Broadway get out about the same time. My wife doesn't walk to well so we can't get down to the subway. We call an UBER. UBER says it will be at our location in 4 minutes. Then as we were looking at the phone it goes up to 7 minutes, then 11 minutes and I am watching him drive off on the screen. It was hard to look at the tiny phone screen because I was shivering so much I couldn't see straight. It was cold. About 16 of those silly bicycle Pedi cabs (Rickshaws) come by to take us but they charge $5.00 a "minute" and it would have taken an hour just to get off 46th street and we had to go to 4th street which meant I would still be in that thing calling a bank to sell my home to pay for the ride.
The UBER driver calls us to say, he can't get us because there is too much traffic. This is after 15 minutes of freezing.
OK we call another UBER cab. He will get us in 2 minutes. Then 6 minutes, then 10 minutes. He calls us to say, for get about it, he can't get us. Too much traffic.
At that point I was thinking of laying in the street in front of one of those pedi cabs, then when he runs me over I could then call an ambulance and see if they would take us to a hospital down town near 4th street and I would then run out the back door and meet our Daughter at the restaurant. Just as I started to lay in the street a regular TAXI dropped someone off right in front of us and before they got out, I did a swan dive into the car. My wife got in and we made it to the restaurant.