there aren't too many people who would believe that i could be lost for words, but in my effort to communicate my experience of my first visit to new york city, words like "sublime" and "ineffable" keep coming to mind. i wrote a summary of each of the five days that i spent there in a journal, with the expectation that i would transcribe them to my blog, and thereby, communicate my feelings about this city to the interweb. but i've found that those musings and sentiments ring hollow without the context of that great city to inform them. i think that the best that i can do is to tell you to go and see it for yourself.

i've gone on and on in my blog about how i'm a "simple boy from the prairies" and how i wonder at the many achievements of mankind, but nothing in my life prepared me for the humbling experience of emerging from penn station in the middle of manhattan and seeing new york city for the first time. i took over 500 photos, and that was a far lot fewer than i would have because i would have loved to photograph every single building, street corner, and person i saw. i had to consciously refrain from taking a photo of every step from the moment i arrived to keep myself from having 500,000 photos and i would have had no time to see anything with my own eyes. ooo... i've never been so enthralled with anything in my life.

it's been over two weeks since i've returned from new york, to very relieved cats and the biggest city in canada that suddenly felt a lot like the wide open spaces of mill woods in south edmonton where i used to go to feel alone and like i was the only person in the world. i don't know why i so suddenly fell in love with a city that is so incredibly busy and impossible as new york - but love at first sight (well, with a city anyway) never seemed more plausible. all i can say is that if i could choose to live anywhere in the world, be anything i wanted, do whatever was possible - i would live in new york. i wonder if there's some way that i can make that happen?

- g

song of the day for loving new york city: "a new york city night", paul van dyck (featuring ashley tomberlin)

wow - i've been busy. i had all these great intentions of telling you all about my trip to new york day by day, but my new project in calgary has taken way more out of me than i had expected.  the work is very exciting and new and challenging and it's forcing me to look at programming and development for the internet in an entirely new and more abstract fashion than my experience has preapred me for and all of that has taken a lot of getting used to.  on top of it, i worry about leaving my cats alone for extended periods of time, and so in my off time, i've been doing more with them, playing more, doing more for them, and making the time that i have with them count more by being with them.  after all, they've given me so much and helped me so much through some hard times, the least that i can do take great care of them when i'm in town and around.

anyway - i'll get around to that as soon as i can. in the meantime, here's my latest timelapse video, demonstrating the challenges of blogging with two needy cats.

- g

song of the day for blogging with two furry interruptions: "wouldn't change a thing", jose amnesia with jennifer rene

as everyone else in the world other than me already knows, new york city has become a really marvellous place to be. from the 80s and 90s, new york had a terrible reputation for crime and smut and scum and nastiness that may or may not have been deserved - i can't say because i had never been there.  all of my life, i'd seen movies shot there, had seen familiar sights there, and generally felt that i had some kind of a grasp on what it was like that rather sublimated any strong urge to go there. i mean - i live in a big metropolis now, right?  a centre of culture and industry and fashion and style for an entire nation - i was certainly not going to be impressed with new york, was i? i couldn't have been more wrong.  the new york that i saw and the new yorkers who i met were unquestionably of the highest calibre imaginable.

the city, dirt and garbage included, was a magical world bejewelled with what i am now completely certain is the most awe-inspiring collection of buildings in the world - so very many skyscrapers as far as the eye can see - all of them fascinating and detailed and beautiful - so many with beautiful art deco adornments and rich, enduring materials - such a far cry from the glass and steel of modern buildings.  the nights in quiet parts of the city had a deep, profound silence and presence, saturated in history and context and the sense that for 400 years, life's adventures have been laughed and cried and bled out onto them.

the new yorkers who i had the chance to meet - in fact all of the americans who i had the chance to meet - whether they were attached to the conference or not - were such a far cry from the perception that canadians have.  the new yorkers who i had the chance to meet were open, friendly, helpful, cooperative, intellectual without pretence, and universally very very funny.  i don't think that i've laughed so much as i have with these people ... ever.  every group activity i did at my conference, every time i went out for a meal or to starbucks, and even every time i had to ask for directions or for help, even in the cases where there was that inimitable new york crappy customer service attitude, every interaction was a little challenge and a surprise that made every encounter an adventure.

and then there's the attractions of the city itself.  i've already written a little about the buildings which, when i first emerged from penn station nearly made my head explode with delight.  but what was in them... amazing. the museum of modern art, the metropolitan museum of art, the cathedrals, the world-class unique shops, the streets and streets of million dollar apartments, the streets and streets of corporate headquarters, the centres of media and entertainment, the broadway theatres, the overpriced but incomparably stylish restaurants, the elite clubs, the posh hotels.  or what's not in buildings - the wide streets of taxi cabs, the budding trees on the boulevards with their cheery cherry blossoms, and of course, the crown jewel of manhattan - the park in the centre. i went to central park just about every day during my trip and still didn't get enough - it was utterly sublime.  armies of joggers, tourists, revellers and wanderers all rejoicing in the beautiful, unusually warm springtime weather.

in fairness, it was probably the very best possible time of year, with the possible exception of autumn, to visit new york and take in the sights - and it was the best possible circumstance, being on vacation and attending a conference on good user/customer experience where everyone was positive and open and bright. but even so, i've never been to a city where as soon as i got there, and every day after that, my whole being cried out to move there!

more on the adventure in upcoming entries. for now, just look at how many photos i have to go through!

- g

ps.  as an aside, everything from the moment i got to newark international airport to the time i left it went like clockwork.  the border security was friendly and helpful, i was able to navigate, figure out methods of transportation, tell where i was going and how to get around, and i was never late and i never got lost even once. when i got back to toronto, i had to unpack all of my luggage and i learned that there was a transit strike so i had to take a cab back home that took almost an hour to go 9km because congestion on the roads was so bad.

song of the day for loving new york: i love new york, madonna

ok - i couldn't leave without making one more timelapse video.

i'm excited because this afternoon, i was able to pick up a fanny-pack thing that has the perfect compartment for my camera, which MEANS... i should be able to take a timelapse video of my run around central park!!!  i so can't wait!!!

happy vacation everyone!!

- g

song of the day for saying goodbye to your cats for five days: hold on to me, armin van buuren with audrey gallagher

for the past year and a half, i've been working on a client site doing some really great and interesting work, as well at times as doing some less exciting and rather frustrating work. yesterday was my last day at that site, and now, i am moving on to a new client to once again resume doing great and exciting work in a completely different vein - work that is really interesting to me and also happens to be interesting to my company. it's a great opportunity and i couldn't be more thrilled about it. and best of all, the client is back in my home province of alberta, in calgary.

when i decided to stay here in toronto a year and half ago or whenever it was, i never expected to have the opportunity to have the best of both worlds - to be able to do leading-edge work that i rarely rarely saw out west, but to be able to do it for my beloved toronto-based company in a place that was so very close to home and my old friends. i've never lived in calgary before, but i can't wait to take advantage of being so close - closer even than when i lived in edmonton - to my beloved rocky mountains, to drumheller, and even on a larger scale, to vancouver and victoria! all of this is during the best time of the year to be in alberta! there are so many great ways that i can take advantage of this opportunity outside of the great work that make this gig even more precious and wonderful to me. it's like a dream come true.

there are many many logistical obstacles to be overcome first. i need to find a place to stay for three to four months. i need to get my cats to calgary so that i can be free to take care of them over the week and leave them alone for just a few days while i reconnect to the west. i will probably need to drive my car across the country so that i can get the cats there, and to have my car available for the many many roadtrips that will be involved in seeing everyone i know in the west. i need to find some time to fly back to toronto once in a while to maintain the bonds of friendship that i've made here and make sure that no one ransacks my apartment in my absence. and i need to figure out all of these things more or less the day after i get back from new york next week.

one of the biggest problems that i have in achieving all of this coordination is that i won't have a computer next week. normally, that would be a pretty good thing - to not have to be tethered to the internet at the hip. but i gave up my imason workstation when i got my client laptop, and i gave up my client laptop when i left the client yesterday. my new laptop is still on order and won't be available to me over the trip, and all of the other imason floaters are accounted for. so i will be relying upon internet cafes and hotel shared pc's for connectivity - so no VPN access to work and limited access to file storage to my home PC and its production tools. accordingly, during one of the most exciting weeks of my life, i will probably not have a chance to blog and i don't see how i will have time to catch up once i start my new project in calgary.

sigh.

these are pretty minor problems for someone who has received such amazing gifts from work like the chance to go to new york for a great conference, to go to work so close to his far away home, and to do some work that i've been itching to try for a very long time. but it's a problem, nonetheless. if you don't hear from me for a couple of weeks - please promise that you'll come back later. this is only a temporary black-out. i promise.

- g

song of the day for leaving the matrix: session, mr. han of linkin park

ps. i totally missed a great timelapse opportunity today and i'm kicking myself hard. maybe in a month or two, my new hair stylist will let me film a timelapse haircut. i would have loved that even though there wouldn't have been any cats in it.