A New York Story

I have been feeling rather nostalgic for good old NYC of late. I think it is largely the fault of R2B2s uncharacteristically satisfied post about NYC as spring flowers. NYC may be gentrifying into an indistinguishable Big Box store-spooted yuppie wasteland, but it still has - and hopefully still will always have - it's unique weirdos who cause uniquely weird situations (ref. Spanish Harlem guy below). What follows is one of my favorite NYC stories.

The scene: Meatpacking District, late summer, 1995. I had just returned from a summer abroad in Prague (ie, drinking 25 cent beer til I puked for 3 months) and had been reunited that very night with my semi-beau at the time (a man who looked so much like Gary Oldman that people would ask him for his autograph; a man who is now in jail). We had gone to some bar/club with my roommate, who had hooked up Kid from Kid n' Play (no, he did not hold one leg and jump over it with the other one, nor did he have the "Yo, Eraserhead" hairdo anymore - both much to my chagrin). She was all absorbed in his ugly ass so we decided to take a stroll and smoke a joint. So we're walking around, baked, and this stretch limo pulls over. The driver puts down the window and starts this whole story about how he had credit card fares all day, has no cash, and needed $5 for the toll back to Jersey. He said he would drive us around in the limo for 20 minutes, wherever we wanted to go, for $5. Needless to say, in we got. So he starts driving REAL SLOW. We ask him to speed up, he kind of does, then gets REAL SLOW again. He kept telling us to relax and enjoy ourselves. We really wanted to drive thru that tunnel where Park Ave South hits 42nd street (the old Met Life Building that Claes Oldenburg wanted to design to look like someone had dropped their giant eskimo pie in the street - wish they had gone for that). I don't know why - wait, I do - we were baked. Anyway, the slow driving thing is getting worse, and the suggestions as to how we should enjoy ourselves are getting more explicit. Finally the dude just pulls over and pops open a glove compartment FULL OF SEX TOYS. So....we excused ourselves and got out and headed back to the club (fortunately we had barely gotten any distance at all).

Here's the kicker: about one year later, I'm on another date, this time with this guy who had just got of jail (just to switch it up a little), and THE SAME LIMO PULLS OVER WITH THE SAME GUY TELLING THE SAME STORY ABOUT THE TOLLS!!!! So I flipped and was like "I know you!! Open you glove compartment!" and he peeled off!!!!!

Only in NY, folks, only in NY.