MANHATTAN 4

What a great last day in Manhattan. This morning we took the subway to Southport Village, west of Wall Street on the coast. It's a fish market as well as a seaport shopping area. Just a really quaint part of the city that takes you away from the hustle and bustle of NYC.

From there, we went back to the hustle and bustle by heading to Times Square and taking the NBC tour in Rockefeller Center which featured the set of "The NBC Nightly News with Brian Williams" as well as the set of "Saturday Night Live."

Joelene's sister and her husband happened to be in Manhattan this week for their 25th anniversary, so we had a chance to grab a bite to eat with them - just ironic that they were here the same time as we. Joelene's sister saw a rat as big as a small dog in the subway today.

We trekked up to the Central Park area to hit the Metropolitan Museum of Art (pictured above). The place is huge and filled with requisite modern art paintings of people who get famous by drawing noses on the right sides of faces and ears underneath chins and stuff like that. But it was still interesting.

In the evening, we saw "West Side Story" on Broadway. It's a classic and was terrific. During intermission, I heard there was some pretty bad weather back home - tornado sirens and all - so I called my next door neighbor to make sure my house wasn't doing the "Wizard of Oz" thing or the "Noah" thing and he said so far so good. On my way back to my seat after intermission, I was sharing the turn of events weather-wise with Joelene just as Part Two of the show was starting. I really wanted to let her know what was going on since it was pretty important and the lady behind me at the show 'shushed' me twice. The nerve.

One of the things so unique about visiting Manhattan is that when you come out of the Broadway show at 11 p.m., the streets are absolutely packed with people around Times Square. The lights are as bright as noon day and there are hundreds of cars whizzing by. We sat in a cafe and had dessert until 12:30 pm (EST) and as we walked to our hotel 7 blocks away, the streets were still crowded and some clothing shops and stores and eateries were still open and going strong.

Sure love to visit -- wouldn't want to live here. Can't wait to get home to the relative peace of Wisconsin.

And be blessed.