Big Apple Christmas

I have never been in New York City this close to Christmas, so when my sister invited me to tag along with her and some friends who wanted to see the tree at Rockafeller Center, I thought 'cool'! My sister, brave soul that she is, thinks nothing of driving into the city as opposed to a bus trip or other means of transport. While it definitely allows you more freedom to come and go as you please, as someone who absolutely hates to drive anywhere, I say better her than me. (I say this with thanks and admiration) After rising at 5:30am (which somehow seems sacrilegious on  Saturday morning) we were on the road bright and early (although realistically it was dark and cloudy and felt more like early evening than early morning) and walking around the city sidewalks, busy sidewalks dressed in holiday style by 10:30am or so. The crowds weren't so bad when we first arrived, but as they day went on, the momenteum picked up until it became a real challenge to navigate the streets. Finding an eatery that didn't have a line stretching around the next block also became a challenge, but we finally found a warm and toasty Irish pub where we had tasty, if simple fare, and just enjoyed sitting down and being out of the wind for a while. We took the subway (with only one snafu of getting on the wrong train) down to Canal Street seeking bargains, and my sister's friend really was the negotiator extraordinaire! The scene reminded me a little bit of Rome in that there were licensed vendors as well as those whose wares were displayed from the depths of large trash bags or laid out on a cloth tarp, ready to grab and run when the police came along. As my experience of big cities is limited, it may be that this is a common practice, but I couldn't help thinking it must be a tough way to make a buck. Walking around the city, we couldn't help noticing the roving packs of Santas and other assorted Christmas characters everywhere we went. I initially thought that it must mean that NYC had more Christmas spirit than anywhere else on Earth! I later learned that they were participants in a city wide bar crawl. I guess that explains the banana with a Santa hat on his jingle bells and the skinny Santa in the corkscrew Who-ville hat being held up in a standing position on the subway by his elf girlfriend.