Under the Broadway lights

MB's Lincoln swooped out of Columbus in the early afternoon, a bit later than expected. WE provided our only stumble mere minutes after the Pogues NYC crew grabbed me at the airport. We didn't stop until construction a few miles from the Holland Tunnel shut us down for a full hour. But I imagine there's no true good time to close lanes on that busy road.

[To protect the identities of the innocent and those less so, I'm omitting names from this post: Aside from me, we'll leave it at MB, WE, and RH).

Tearing across midtown (as much anyone can), we checked in, and around midnight, our first pint went down at P.J. Moran's. After we toasted, a strangely familiar face entered with a small drinking crew - Dan Didio, the editor if DC Comics. I discovered RH was a comic fan as well, and he also saw the resemblance. While we worked on our first pint, this crew had been imbibing for a while, so I didn't approach with any snarky comments about DC's recent quality. This morning I checked to see how far away DC's office were - it was a matter of blocks, which clinches it for me.

We left Didio and crew behind for a spin down to Time Square, where night ceases, even at 1 a.m. The swarms were dwindling at this hour. As Shott would confirm the next day, the Disney and theme-restaurant look of the square has forced its unsavory elements into the corners and crevices, but has not wiped it out. We saw this when after a parade of police cruisers idled through, some guy passed us offering to sell crack.

Then we made haste for the Scottish bar down the street, where I had my only deviation from Irish beer all weekend, a Belhaven Twisted Thistle IPA (definitely a different spin on the style, almost worth the $8 tab for a pint). Very quickly, it became apparent that every Irish and Scottish bar in midtown staffs its taps with people from across the broad Atlantic. After a few plates of wings and more more pints, we spilled back onto the almost deserted street.

The revelry stretched into the wee hours, but I woke early for a coffee and long stroll through Central Park. After a leisurely pace through the Mall, a promenade with statues of prominent artists and authors, I hastened my pace up toward the Central Park Reservoir, swept up by the endless stream of runners passing me. By the time I returned to 5th Avenue, I'd gone almost 50 blocks from the hotel. Catching up with the rest of our crew at Connolly's (one of two I passed in a span of 10 blocks), we turned back to the park, hitting the John Lennon memorial (Strawberry Fields), drifting through the park until the gang decided to hit Tiffany's.

With no one to break up with me for not returning New York with a blue box, I split to catch up with Christ Shott, my old compatriot from my early SNP days. Meeting up at the Press Box (his appropriate pick), it was a bright reconnection, not missing a step from the last time we ran into each other, fish & chips at Worthington's Old Bag of Nails in April 1994). Those old times from 8-9 years ago flashed back with ease, and we never stepped too deeply into nostaglia. Good friends can always share a moment, if even it takes a while for another to arrive.

[See the Pogues post for this chunk of the story]

Fleeing the scene with the prize RH pried from the mob, we decided to continue our bar-hopping, landing at the Channel 4 Pub. With soccer/football highlights flashing on the HD screens, our Irish bartender bought us a round for talking Pogues and giving him pints to pour as tourist traffic dwindled on Saturday night. The gang went to late-night eats, I stumbled back to crash, which I would finally do just short of 4 a.m. again.

With a flash, we were gone on Sunday, crawling through Manhattan, then roaring through our 9-hour journey. A fog native only to Sunday mornings cut off the entire skyline around the 40th floor, so there were no panoramic views from the rear window.

After barely leaving street level for those glorious 36 hours, we weren't complaining.