Overheard at the Grocery Store

Girl #1:  Why you have all that paper?

Girl #2:  Why?  Because her dumb ass didn't do void.

Overheard at the Diner

Old Man #1:  I called your wife yesterday.  She said you were fine.

Old Man #2:  Fine?  Aw, that's bullshit.  She always says that.  My leg's been killing me for two weeks, I have a scratch in my throat, a headache.......

"Our Miles Go in Circles"

Another fabulous conversation with an eighth-grader on the Downtown R.

ROBERT:  The city blocks are the shorter blocks, and there are twenty blocks in a mile.

EIGHTH GRADER:  What?!

ROBERT:  Twenty blocks make up one mile.

EIGHTH GRADER:  If you walk in a straight line?

ROBERT:  Um, right.

EIGHTH GRADER:  Our miles go in circles.

ROBERT:  What do you mean?

EIGHTH GRADER:  Like one mile where we're from is four times around the track.

Little Bytes Recommends: The Silk Road at the American Museum of Natural History

Until August 15th, you can travel the historic Silk Road in an interactive exhibit at the American Museum of Natural History.  Here are just a few little bytes of trivia I found interesting on my last trip on the museum's Silk Road:

--The Silk Road stretched between Xi'an and Baghdad, ran 4600 miles and took a traveller about six months.  The temperatures along the journey could dip down to -50 degrees Farenheit and rise to 122.

--1000 years ago, Xian was the capital of China and the largest city in the world.  1 million lived inside the walls and 1 million lived outside.  It was a grid system with 108 walled neighborhoods.  The largest street was Heng Street and was as wide as a 120-lane highway.

--The secrets of silk were guarded for centuries.  5000 years ago, a small cocoon dropped into an empress's tea cup.  When it was removed, it unwound into a glistening strand. The empress dropped multiple cocoons into hot water and the silk industry was born.  A single cocoon can unwind into a silk filament about 3000' long (or, in modern-day measurements, 10 football fields).  2500 silk worms are needed for one robe.  Other animals that spin silk are spiders, some bees, ants and wasps.

--Paper was another guarded secret.  The Chinese were using paper as early as 50 BCE.  At some point in 794, the secret was smuggled west and Baghdad built a paper mill in 795AD.  The oldest existing paper book dates to 868 A.D.

"This Doesn't Look Good, Kids"

A driver bringing students from D.C. to New York was shocked to find no traffic as he approached the Lincoln Tunnel.  As far as he was concerned, this could mean only one thing. 

DRIVER:  This doesn't look good, kids.  This doesn't look good.  Start calling your parents and find out if anything's wrong.  Go online and see if there's anything about a bomb or terror attack.

(Still no traffic.  The bus is moving at a clip.)

DRIVER:  This isn't good.  Something happened.  Not good at all.

Gormley and Gaudens

Since March, the Madison Square Park Conservancy has presented Antony Gormley's EVENT HORIZON, wherein thirty-one life-size sculptural self-portraits stand throughout the park and on the tops of local buildings, including the Flatiron and the New York Life Insurance Company.  One of my groups couldn't get past the fact that "you can see the man's doo-dah."

That reminded me that this isn't the first time visitors to Madison Square have craned their necks to gaze upon a human figure floating above the park.  New York City made national headlines in the 1890's when a sensational and scandalous nude by Augustus Saint Gaudens was unveiled as a weather vane for Stanford White's Madison Square Garden. 

What was the name of that statue?

The Logic of an Ambivalent Eighth Grader

ROBERT:  (speaking to eighth grader who bought a bat--with his name engraved--at Yankees stadium):  Do you play baseball?

KID:  No.

ROBERT:  Do you like the Yankees?

KID:  Not really.

ROBERT:  Then why'd you buy the bat?

KID:  My mom said she was gonna take back any change I bring home, so I thought, Might as well buy a bat.

The Bethesda Angel is Back!

Not only was my latest group the very first to enter Liberty Island's snazzy new gift shop on Wednesday morning, they were my first group of the season to see the restored Bethesda Angel floating above her fountain in Central Park.  For weeks (maybe months), the sculptural centerpiece of the park, The Angel of the Waters has been completely surrounded by boxy scaffolding.  On Thursday, I almost took my group on a detour to purposefully avoid the work-in-progress, but was pleasantly surprised to find her exposed and all aglow.

 

The Net Worth of the American Presidents...from Washington to Obama

Who was our richest president?  (He didn't actually inherit the money, but his family shared a fortune in excess of $1 billion.)

Which of our presidents made most of his earnings from book sales?   

Which Roosevelt was richer?

Which Bush?

How poor was the populist, Andrew Jackson?  (He wasn't--he had $119 million.)

Which quarter century did our poorest presidents serve?  (There was a streak of paupers who had less than $1 million.)

Peruse the fascinating list, calculated and compiled by the people at 247wallst.com.

The Garden of Eden

After a visit to the Conservatory Gardens in Central Park, a middle schooler, who loves to walk up in the front and talk, begins to ramble.

MIDDLE SCHOOLER:  Those are nice.  I'd like to go to the real Italy and see if it looks like that garden..

ROBERT:  Well...

MIDDLE SCHOOLER:  ...and the real France and the real England.

ROBERT:  That would be a nice trip.

MIDDLE SCHOOLER:  Where's the Garden of Eden?

ROBERT:  Um.

MIDDLE SCHOOLER:  Because that would be real nice to see.

ROBERT:  Mm.

MIDDLE SCHOOLER:  What happened to it?  Did they tear it down?  That's sad.  I wish they didn't tear it down, because I would've seen it some day.  Would you want to see the Garden of Eden?  What do you think is nicer?  The Central Park garden or the Garden of Eden?

ROBERT:  I like Central Park.

MIDDLE SCHOOLER:  Why?

ROBERT:  Because it exists.

A Subway Subscriber

MIDDLE SCHOOLER FROM CENTRALIA, MO:  How much does a subway ride cost?

ROBERT:  Two twenty-five.

MIDDLE SCHOOLER:  Each time?  But you ride it a lot, so you probably have a membership.

From a Recent Stroll in Central Park

It's the season for baby geese...or goslings...or merde machines.

Trivia from Doug Nervik

There is a roadway in New York which has three different names. Each of the three names contains an 'X'. What is this road?

Visual: The Landfill of Lower Manhattan

In several of the Layers Trivia--especially #21--I referred to the amount of landfill added to Manhattan. 

Here's a fantastic interactive map that shows you the evolution of the coastline of Lower Manhattan from 1660-2004:  400 Years of Coastline at RaconTours.

An Eighth-Grader Meets Luis Vuitton

8th Grader:  Ooo, that's a pretty key chain.  How much does it cost?

Salesman:  Three twenty-five.

8th Grader:  Oh, okay.  (Takes out wallet)  One, two...

Salesman:  Three hundred twenty-five.

8th Grader:  Oh.  (Returns wallet.  Exits store.)