New Yorkers can be rude, pushy and indifferent, but they are also warm, funny and caring.  I was once caught in a downpour on the upper East side and waited for a bus, with dripping hair and running mascara.  One finally showed up and everyone on the bus took one look at me, quipped "is it raining?" and burst out laughing.  Then they all started rummaging around in their bags to see if they could find napkins to help me dry off.

Another time, I was walking down the street on a nice fall afternoon when this guy pulled me aside and said, "Hey, look!  Isn't that the biggest cockroach you ever seen?"  And when I went to look, it was indeed an enormous cockroach.  I agreed.  He said, "it must be one of them palmeeto bugs or somethin!" 

Another time, I was dressed in business attire and on my way to an appointment when a guy walked up to me and said, "that's a really nice suit!"  I thanked him and he kept walking. 

I can't remember the number of times I had really great conversations with people on subways, standing at bus stops, reading in the park, or just standing in line for one thing or another.  People can just be super nice or they can be jerks.

Vegas is an odd place.  I was last there in the late 1970's before it became family friendly.  It was a place for gamblers.  It was notable for high cancer rates (thanks to the experimental nuclear explosions), a zoo, boating on Lake Mead, the Hoover Dam, and especially populated by lots of people trying to dull their senses with drugs and alcohol.  There were legal brothels on the outskirts of town.  The surrounding desert was beautiful, though.

I hope your son has a good trip and comes home with happy memories of the place.  Lord knows we need intercessors with the goon in the White House doing all he can to burn down our reputations globally.

My daughter does CBT today (motorbike Compulsory Basic Training) which I was dead set against as I wanted her to use 4 wheels when she gets on the road. She argues that it's my fault for putting on the back of a Superbike at the age of 5 or 6 and I suppose she's right.

TNG is currently Stateside and in New York until Wednesday. He has found New Yorkers a bit rude. I advised him before he left (from my limited time in the States) that New Yorkers are a different breed and to expect some indifference toward him.

He then goes to Vegas to meet his boss for a few days and then off to sunny LA for a couple of days and then flies home.

Sounds like fun.

Last night I used less than ¼ of the meat to make a tomato based sauce with basil and diced chicken.   It was nice over pasta and made enough for 3 meals for the two of us.  We'll probably heat some more chicken meat tonight and have with a salad or vegetable on the side.  It's reasonably moist and tender so given how many meals we'll get out of it, it wasn't hideously expensive, all things considered.  I thought of making curried chicken salad for lunch but I'd like to make it with mango chutney and we don't have any in the pantry so I made egg fried rice for lunch with the vegs that were getting older in the fridge.  Stir fry with eggs and rice.  It wasn't magical but it was economical.

When the tub chickens didn't sell we turned them into chicken salad.

I'm tired from traveling so I went to the grocer's to pick up a rotisserie chicken.  I nabbed one of the two packages in the hot chicken area.  I get home and see that I've managed to get a large rotisserie chicken breast for twice the price of a whole chicken.  They had changed the packaging so I was confused and purchased the wrong item.   And we don't really even like white meat on the bird so I'm trying to figure out what to do with this slab of bird meat.  Maybe curried chicken salad?  Soup?  White meat chicken basil sauce?  The idea was to come home and do nothing more than heat it up.  Now I have a project.  I guess I shouldn't grumble since there's plenty of people who have to do without, but I could use some more energy to deal with it.