Merry Christmas

This picture is a few years old, but it's one of my favorite things in New York at Christmas—standing in Rockefeller Center near the tree, looking across Fifth Avenue at Saks.

I'm sorry, where was I?

Almost done. But not quite.

Saturday, after teaching my two classes, I gave my Capstone presentation, which was my last big assignment. I left school later than usual and ended up walking all the way home because there were no cabs and traffic was ridiculous anyway.

I was too tired to eat, and ended up having my celebratory piece of cake for breakfast on Sunday. And that's about all I did. My biggest accomplishment of the day was changing from my pajamas into my sweats (when bedtime rolled around again, I couldn't be bothered changing back and slept in the sweats.)

I finally made myself put on real clothes and go outside yesterday—my brother in Minnesota had asked for pictures of the Christmas tree in Rockefeller Center, and the sun was actually out so I walked over there.

It was the first time I'd been there at Christmas since the world blew up, and though I'm still uncomfortable in crowds, it made me emotional to see all the familiar decorations again.

Saturday reflections

One of the buildings in Rockefeller Center lost power a few weeks ago, and this is the spooky lobby in the underground concourse.

Saturday reflections

This is Atlas again, in a much more whimsical mood, with those mighty legs topping a jaunty straw hat.

Saturday reflections

I've done this one before, but it's irresistible: reflections of the statue of Atlas and St Patrick's on Fifth Avenue.

Bonus Saturday reflections

Because it's only 20 degrees outside and even after two cups of coffee and reading more news than is good for me I still don't feel like getting dressed and going out in it, here's another picture: the Atlas statue in front of a triptych of cathedral reflections.

Wikipedia tells me that when this statue was first unveiled in 1937, people protested because it looked too much like Mussolini. “Later, painter James Montgomery Flagg said that Atlas looks too much as Mussolini thinks he looks.”

March of the Wooden Soldiers

And coming back home to New York, here's Rockefeller Center, where they change the flags to gold and silver for the season and life-size soldiers stand guard.

Saturday reflections

I took this picture with my phone Thursday when I was running errands at  lunchtime -- a clear autumn sky over the towers and flags of Rockefeller Plaza, reflected in a temporary glass enclosure.

But what's all that red behind the glass, you might wonder. Since it's only a few weeks until Thanksgiving, the answer should be obvious -- it's cranberries.

Our friends at Ocean Spray had built a temporary cranberry bog outside 30 Rock where passersby could have all of their burning questions about cranberry harvesting answered once and for all. Since my only question was Why is there a cranberry bog in Rockefeller Center? I accepted my free pack of Craisins and went on my way.

Saturday reflections

I am endlessly entertained by the spectacle of generic city office towers reflected in the windows of other generic city office towers, turning them into something Gaudi might have dreamed up.

These two examples are in Rockefeller Center.

Saturday reflections

An abstract of red, white-ish, and the deep blue of an August sky, in Midtown.

Saturday reflections

Wintry colors here, which feel appropriate on a day when the air is rushing around enthusiastically, shoving the trees outside my window back and forth and sharpening the bitter cold temperatures.

It was 12 degrees when I got up, and eventually I had to give up on the idea that I wasn't going to go outside until it hit a minimum of 20, since that may not happen until April.

Skater's waltz

It's been coming down all day, but the furrow-browed, deeply concerned TV reporters reminding us every ten minutes to STAY INSIDE (while standing for no particular reason on various street corners and highway overpasses being snowed on) insist that the big blizzard hasn't actually started yet, and we won't be getting the real snow until later tonight, when the entire Eastern Seaboard will turn into the ice planet Hoth (tauntauns sold separately.)

In the meantime, here are a few more pictures from Friday, since it was apparently the last sunny day we'll have until well into February. There are always a few showoffs spinning and jumping at the Rockefeller Center ice rink, but I love to watch the novices, clinging desperately to the railings or their friends, and how delighted they look when they start to get the hang of it.

Sun dance

Here's another relief, part of the two sets on opposite sides of 30 Rock called, for some not very obvious reason, Radio and Television.

It was unexpectedly sunny Friday, and a relatively toasty 35 degrees, so these dancers seemed less interested in acting out cryptic metaphors about modern communications than in just soaking up some rays while they can.

Saturday reflections

The NBC building in Rockefeller Center.

There were originally a lot more windows in this picture, but I ended up cropping it down to get a better look at the Art Deco bas relief. There are many similar reliefs around Rockefeller Plaza, some allegorical, some less so. Like this one, which seems to suggest that not only was television widely known in the Classical world, but that ancient Greek cameramen did their jobs naked.

Saturday reflections

A twofer.

Rockefeller Center reflected in automobile hoods. Same, but different.

Urban poetry

Tomorrow I'm going to Oregon, for the 2014 World Domination Summit in Portland, followed by a few days at the coast.

So before I start getting too mellow, here's a very New York piece of public art: a closeup of the 1938 Noguchi relief, called News, on the old AP building in Rockefeller Center.

Saturday reflections

I haven't posted an ordinary window reflection in a while, so here's a closeup of windows in what I still call the RCA building, aka the other side of 30 Rock.