The Big Crispy Apple

I'm sitting at Nora's small square kitchen table in an 11th story flat on 14th Street with gorgeous views, south, of the seemingly endless buildings, all of which scrape, more-or-less, the cloud swept sky.

And it is damn cold; or it was last time I ventured outside. That was about three hours ago, before a delicious nap with Mr. WIlliam on Nora's bed.

For about half an hour after arriving, we weren't sure whether we'd be spending the entire day on the street. We got into JFK about 5:30 this morning. I slept a bit on the plane, W did not. I guess that's the advantage of being able to fit lying down across two seats: this is why Darwinian selection has nearly stopped in homo sapien sapiens: too many variables.

Anyway, we took a taxi to Nora's montrous apartment building and rang her buzzer. No response. Rang it again. No response. At that point a couple of women leave the builing. We sneak in. We go up to Nora's floor. We locate her door (aparment C). We knock, no answer. We ring the little door bell that goes: ding. dong. No answer. We call her. No answer. ding. dong. Nothing. We drop our bags and really bang on the door. No response. I go downstairs to buzz her again. I buzz her three times. Willie can hear it through the door, he says it too loud for anyone to sleep through. We try to remember who deep a sleeper Nora is. I want food, so we decide to venture outside, toting our bags into the cold wind.

But before we leave, we find ourselves in an elevater with a kindly father-ish man who advises us to leave our bags in the hall -- that the building is safe. We're tempted but wary. Then, on our way out, he runs into his rather adorable kindly mother-ish wife; they offer to let us bunker down with them, and stow our bags in their apartment.

Which we do. Amidst the sort of rubble that few people can accumulate in a small apartment in a lifetime. The couple's son is home from college. He is sulking at the kitchen table: he just arrived from Miami for Christmas. He is thin, pale, and has long brown scraggly hair. I wonder, judgmentally, what exactly he did in Miami.

Anyway, by the time we leave and get bagels, Nora calls.

She slept through it all: she even had kept her phone right next to her bed.

Now we know: we're out to purchase one of those new-fangled alarm clocks with a tazer attached

Hope all is well!