Snapshots from Saturday Sightseeing

Saturday was a very busy day, we did a lot of sight-seeing and walking around. Here in no particular order (the order the pictures uploaded, actually) are a few snaps of our activities.

Here's me & Krista outside the Golden Theater where we saw Avenue Q. Again, Krista is doing the one-handed self portrait shot; no sunglasses to see the reflection in this time. Avenue Q is a great play, very very funny (for those who haven't seen it, think 'Sesame Street' meets 'Rent'). Muppet sex!, 'nuff said:
Here's the lovely Krista in Times Square 'round midnight, after our Avenue Q show (she's got the program in her hand, as you can see).
We took the 75-minute harbor tour from 42nd street, out around the Statue of Liberty & back again. Here we are on the boat: The day was intermittently hazy & clear, and on the warm side (low 80's) but in the shade still very nice. Here's a view of Manhattan from the south end, kayakers & all (from now on Krista can be an expert on the geography of Manhattan Island):
Here's the boat passing the statue; for once Krista isn't taking the picture herself -- the couple behind us on the tour boat were willing to take a badly composed & exposed picture for us. Thanks!
Here's the statue herself:

"Give me your tired, your poor,

Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,

The wretched refuse of your teeming shore.

Send these, the homeless, tempest-tossed, to me:

I lift my lamp beside the golden door."

Of course, that moving poem only applies to people whose ancestors were immigrants. If you're an immigrant now, well apparently we have no need for you and you can ignore that sentiment. Oops...social commentary. Okay I'll stop.

Here's Krista at the west entrance to Grand Central Station. We had a nice late afternoon meal at the restaurant inside, although Krista seemed to like my risotto with asparagus better than her ravioli...
We started the morning at the south end of Manhattan, in Battery Park (where we decided NOT to stand in line for two hours to catch a ferry to the Statue of Liberty). One of the recent additions to the park is the World Trade Center Sphere, which stood in World Trade Center Plaza until 9/11. Its wreckage has been placed down the street:
Please do NOT get me started about an administration that has hijacked the righteous anger our nation, allowing the perpetrator of the greatest crime of the twenty-first century off scott free while we instead used our greatest national tragedy as an opportunistic excuse to launch an ill-advised, poorly planned, unnecessary military agenda in an unrelated part of the world while Osama Bin Laden snickers at us from his cave six years later. Yeah, don't get me started on that...sorry but every time I'm at ground zero I get more and more pissed. Can't help it.

(deep breath)

We wandered up from Battery Park past Ground Zero, where the new plaza is under construction, to Wall Street (here's Krista and a bull):
And here's Krista in front of the New York Stock Exchange, that bastion of capitalism. Street security in that area now is insane; there are roadblocks & security cops everywhere...
Trinity Church is at the end of Wall Street, at Broadway. Here's a nice picture of the spire without all the huge buildings around it:
Saturday was a pretty long, eventful day; the weather was pretty good for the most part (I got a little sunburned) and we had a lot of fun. More tomorrow...