2006_09

One day, they're OUTSIDE the lanai, next day they are INSIDE

Well, if you look closely, you will see that his little tail is OUTSIDE, poking through the screen. That's how tiny the inside model is.

Cripes, I wonder where they go at night? Will I step on him in the dark? Sit on him? Feel his little leathery self skitter across my foot?

The only reason his ass isn't captured and ejected is that I know he will eat bugs, and this is a good thing. I just don't want to have to trade a heart attack for a bugless existence.

He is still out there. He hangs out on the lanai screen door supports on the south side of the house. The screen door on that side has a thin sliver of a gap on the bottom, which is how I suppose he got in. He's a thin sliver, himself. He has not taken it upon himself to let himself out again.

I have this rule about my home. Nothing with wings, scales, fur, feathers, or more than two legs may enter. If something of that description enters despite this rule, a seek and destroy mission will ensue, and the offender will exit my home in a state of deadness. However, Georgia convinced me last night in chat not to take a baseball bat to his wee head. She told me about having a tree frog in her shower for months - not sure how you all bathed without being totally skeeved....

I'm going to NY this afternoon, not coming back until Thursday a.m., so let's see how his survival skills are. My guess is that unless it rains cats and dogs sideways into the lanai, he's going to go in search of water at some point. He may do well eating whatever bugs he finds (hopefully, he finds all those ugly earwig water bugs with the prehistoric pincers). So maybe when I get home, he will have grown. Or else, I shall come home to a dead lizard.

The flight was uneventful. JFK luggage carousels were the usual circus. Found my driver by means of our company logo on the sign with my name on it. So far, so good.

We get downtown, and there's construction everywhere. Everything in NYC is a one-way street to begin with, so this does not bode well. I then figure out that my driver doesn't know downtown, so I have to coach him. He's on the West Side Highway, and I'm like, "Dude, you have to be on the OTHER side of The World's Most Famous Gaping Hole In The Ground to get to the hotel.

Finally get to the hotel, and the check in guy regrets to inform me that they are fresh out of smoking rooms. Fine, whatever, just get me into my room.

Get to the room, and the curtains are open. Not a shabby view... until you look down and realize what side of the hotel they put you on.

Yeah, it's The World's Most Famous Gaping Hole In The Ground.

God, when are they going to stop fighting about it and JUST DO SOMETHING with it, already?

Here come the pics....

The reason I took my camera with me on a business trip is that I lived here in NY all my life, worked Downtown for 15 years, and never took any photos! Here are some pictures of things on the walking route between the hotel and the office.

After a long day of meetings, a van arrives to take us down to the Ritz Carlton. There's a bar on the 14th floor with an outdoor patio overlooking New York Harbor. We arrived and realized it was sunset; I grabbed the camera and raced out to the patio.