If you want bacon on your sandwich at the Carnegie Deli, it'll cost you $4.50...

... and other observations from a week in New York City.

I hate 5am. It's either way too late or way, way too early. This week it was the latter.

I was curiously excited to spot two black albinos during the week.

The first morning I woke up to saxophone "music." You know how if you don't play the sax correctly, it can make an annoying honking sound? Well, this particular song featured many intentional honking saxophone blasts. Almost like Hendrix's
"Star-Spangled Banner" only 1,000 times more annoying. At 5AM, no less.

Class dragged on from 7:30am to 5:30pm. That's all I got to say about that.

One day, I came back to the hotel and collapsed on my bed for about 4 hours. I woke up and went to McDonald's and Starbucks for dinner. I'm pretty sure this made Che Guevara roll over in his grave.

The NY Subway has a Metro Card offer where if you buy six rides, you get a seventh free. I love the pointlessness of this offer because no one's ever going to need an odd number of subway rides.

By the way, the clerk at McDonald's was named Enchantment. I love New York.

I went to a Chinese place for lunch, and within the first minute of having my menu I was asked four times if I was ready to order. This is an extreme example, but it is still indicative of the service in NY. Waiters are always very quick to take your order and bring your food, but after that you're on your own. Refills are non-existent and I always found myself staring into space waiting for my check to come.

I saw on ESPN that the Devil Rays drafted a guy named Evan Longoria, which humored me to no end.

At the Virgin Megastore in Times Square, I was able to finally get my hands on Remy Zero's "The Golden Hum" CD, for which I had searched long and far.

Now, my last class was scheduled for Saturday, but I decided not to go. I was sick of getting up at 5am (have I mentioned I did that quite often?), and with my flight home being the next morning, I really wanted to spend the day touring the city. So, I got up at a much more reasonable 10am and started exploring. First stop was Ground Zero. It was a very emotional experience. Upon arrival I really had to hold back the tears. With so many fences and construction equipment around (breaking ground for the Freedom Tower), it was hard to get a good view of the actual pit. But that wasn't as important as simply looking up at the enormous emptiness of where the twin towers once stood.

Next, I headed to Rockefeller Center with one mission: get into Conan's studio. Luckily, NBC had tours available with stops at the studios for Conan, SNL and Dateline. What surprised me the most about Conan's set was the size. It is much smaller than it appears on TV. Everything is crammed in. Max's drum set is right next to where Conan stands for his monologue, which is right next to the guest couches. The tour guide took a picture of me there, but it didn't turn out at all. Would someone please explain to me why a flash will turn your picture completely black?

Last tourist stop: Empire State Building. The line takes forever, but the view from the observation deck is worth it. My only regret is that I didn't go at night, when the view of the Manhattan skyline must truly be awe-inspiring. But then, I wouldn't have gotten any good pictures. So it worked out.

I wasn't able to get to the Statue of Liberty, but I had been there before and my feet were killing me. So, I grabbed a final dinner in Times Square (my 20th straight meal by myself), made the short walk back to my hotel, packed, and turned in.

My classes in Charlotte start today. They're from 6pm-10pm on Monday, Tuesday and Thursday. I like that I don't have to get up early anymore, but I really don't like how all of my traditional dinner times are completely blocked out. Yeesh.

The rumor is that one of these days I'll be taking law classes that actually count for something.