The Chambers

Our visit to NYC has not started as well as it could have – no major dramas, just not right on track.

Our flight over was fantastic – the morning went well, the cab arrived right on time, we got to LAX in good time and used curbside check-in. I LOVE curbside check-in – you basically get out of the cab, a guy gets your bags out of the boot of the car and checks you in for your flight, giving you your boarding passes. sweet – all checked-in, no carrying bags through a long line and no lining up at all! We passed through security, which was pretty heavy and then had some breakfast.

The flight over was about 5 hours something and Jackson had a great sleep – I watched heroes episodes 1 to 4 before the ipod ran out of batteries and Kylie watched the movie, which was License to Wed with Robin Williams (a good one for you andrew sinclair).

When we got into NYC, at about 540pm, the walk from the gate we arrived at to the luggage collection point was very long – 20 minutes or so. There was a very impressive “billboard” on one of the sections which microsoft had taken, it was both sides of the walkway and ad very large and very clear plasm screens for about 100 meters which was running one show along the whole length – very nice… where else would look good there.

Got to the luggage carousel no probs… turned on my mobile to have 2 messages from the guy we rented the apartment we’re staying in. Thankfully the order of the messages on my phone played them in this order;

1/ forget my last message, no problems.
2/ ah chris, can you please call me. i know you are probably in the air already, but…. we have a problem with the apartment…

one of the things i was worried about on this trip was the apartment and where it was and what it would be like and would we be scammed…. i shouldnt have worried – everything on the internet is true!

The driver of the car we’d organised hadn’t shown up. I called three times and the operator said, sure – the driver is there…. he was at the wrong terminal. I was told ALL qantas flights arrive at terminal something ( i dont remember what number he said), yet here we were having flown into NYC on QF3095 and we were at a different terminal – then the driver wouldnt come IN to the terminal. Anyway, we were delayed maybe 45 minutes. All sorted and on our way.

The apartment is great! up on the 32nd floor, it’s a few blocks from times square and there’s nice night time views.

We went for a walk at about 8 tonight for dinner. We had New York pizza, at a place on the corner of our block – very tasty. There’s lots of nice looking restaurants around here.

We went for a walk through times square. Tonight is halloween – we saw some well atired folk. Darth Vader, Stormtroopers, Brittney Spears, a Steve Irwin (poor taste award), witches, goblins, motorcycle bikeriders wearing masks of ex-USA presidents, and much more…

Jackson was pretty amazed by the bright lights at Times Square and wanted to be picked up and carried – i think this was half him being tired and half being a bit over-awed by the lights and the number of people…

It’s now 240am…. Kylie and I have not been able to sleep – so I’ve taken the time for an update and kylie’s been planning tomorrow. We’re of to SoHo tomorrow, which is apparently a very nice shopping spot (aren’t they all?)

Running tally of kylie’s clothing purchases:

tops = 4
pairs of jeans = 2
jackets = 2
dresses = 1
pairs of shoes = 0

(and kylie wanted me to point out that she hasnt started in NY yet…. )

i’ve been reading a lot about the conference i am going to next week. Apparently there are a total of 10,000 people registered to attend! and there is apparently going to be a big facebook announcement at ad:tech, which will be interesting.

Kim and Ian arrive Friday – looking forward to that.

tootles for now.

cc, kc and jacko