I @%$&#! N.Y.

Part 2: Livin’ Just Enough

originally published January 10, 2007

Last summer, former Flagpole Executive Editor Brad Aaron and his wife Jennifer left Athens for New York City. This is the second installment in a series chronicling the experience.

It is often said that it takes seven years to become a true New Yorker - or roughly the amount of time it takes to get cable TV service here. While we wait, let us continue to bask in all that city life has to teach.

Movin' Out

If you enlist a “professional” moving company to assist you with relocating to New York, be advised that the contract you will be asked to sign confers upon the movers two crucial responsibilities: (1) increasing your previously agreed upon “estimate” by as much as they see fit once your property is in their possession, and (2) charging your credit card for said amount post haste.

Expect your movers to declare every item you own to be “badly worn,” “hopelessly soiled” or “burned beyond recognition” before the move, so as to assign responsibility to you in case of any unplanned disasters while your worldly belongings are en route to your new home.

Suppress the urge to call your movers with niggling questions, such as “You picked up my things two weeks ago - where are they?” They won’t know. And whatever you do, be sure to take photographs of your most precious items, as there will be times when you will be certain the memories are all you have.

Locked In

Due to skyrocketing crime rates incurred when mollycoddling Democrats ran the city, most New York residences are equipped with a series of interconnected special super-strong locks. Therefore, it may take you several days - or, if you are native to the American South, five months and counting - to figure out how to enter and exit your front door while maintaining any semblance of dignity. In our home, this game is called “Escape from My New York Apartment,” also known as “Goddamn Brad, are you really that thick?”

Even if the need or opportunity arises, there is no use in trying to duplicate your New York keys outside the city. Locksmiths elsewhere have never seen keys like yours, much less do they have the ability to make copies.

Finally, do not expect the number of keys you are issued to match the number of people who are legally responsible for meeting the rent. Instead, count your blessings if you receive one complete set, and prepare to be shaken down by your building superintendent for additional keys - which, conveniently, only he can provide.

Let It Ride

Though 32 million cars clog its streets every day, there are very few occasions which require the use of a private motor vehicle in New York City proper. However, if you absolutely must drive, there are a few simple but important rules to remember.

For example, turning right on red is a no-no. Should you choose to obey this law, there are motorists who will honk at you for your intransigence. These people are called “tourists” or “New Jerseyans.”

When parallel parking, it is perfectly acceptable to use other cars to establish the parameters of your parking space. If you feel resistance due to contact with another vehicle, simply nudge your car in the opposite direction. Once you detect similar resistance that way, inch your vehicle forward or backward ever so slightly. There. You have parked successfully.

People who are familiar with New York often knowingly refer to the five boroughs as “The City.” But when asking, or when asked, for directions, keep in mind that the closer you get to The City the more geographically exclusive The City becomes. Residents of the lesser boroughs, for instance, refer to Manhattan as The City. Uptowners generally restrict the descriptor to that part of the island below, say, 90th Street. Downtowners consider The City to be a fire hydrant in the Village.

Watch Your Step

While crime is down and New York is generally relatively safe for the most part, this city can kill you a dozen ways before you hit the ground. This is why, especially in “up and coming” neighborhoods, bank tellers, postal workers and dental receptionists greet customers from behind thick sheets of bulletproof glass. Convenience store clerks, meanwhile, tend to wing everyone who walks in the door with a round of buckshot, Cheney-style, just to even the odds. Not that you need to engage in hand-to-hand commerce to catch a bullet; there are plenty of strays whizzing around, often nestling in the gut or skull of innocent passersby. Then there are those not fired by cops.

Car crashes are big in New York. Huge. Bigger than bullets, even. When they’re not busy smashing into each other, cars and trucks are plowing into trees, fences, utility poles, bridges, buildings, houses - you name it: a car has either flattened it or been flattened by it. But what New York drivers like to run into most is people. People on bikes, people crossing the street, people on the sidewalk. Old people, young people, in-between people, smacked by motor vehicles on an hourly basis. Who needs semi-automatic Tecs when we have automatic transmissions?

And as if gravity weren’t menace enough - hurling parade balloons and chunks of buildings toward unsuspecting Gothamites with abandon - death can also come from below. Every so often, when melting snow and ice leaves New York’s streets and sidewalks saturated, a phenomenon known as “stray voltage” (a local euphemism for “criminal negligence”) actually electrifies a manhole cover or section of pavement, electrocuting some person’s poor dog - or some dog’s poor person. Other times, utility covers simply shoot out of the ground, resulting in deaths, injuries and unfortunate headlines such as “Manhole explosions leave Queens powerless.”

Sweet Charity

Even after former mayor Giuliani disappeared many of the city’s panhandlers, there remains an impressive array of means by which the average New Yorker can be relieved of pesky excess cash at any given moment. Some of these methods are legitimate, like the tip jar at the DMV, or the subway breakdancer who earns his dollar by kicking you in the face, rather than the groin. Then there’s the traditional New York mugging - always keep at least $20 on hand for just such an occasion. Other tactics are more suspect, but no less admirable, like “suggested” museum donations (ahem), and the gentleman who cuts to the chase by posting himself outside my bank with upturned hat in hand and a long, hard stare for every exiting customer. Viva Angry Bank Guy!

On the upside, what New York taketh away, New York giveth away. Since New Yorkers do not have yards, New Yorkers do not have yard sales. Ergo, with a little persistence and a strong back, you can outfit your entire apartment with abandoned street furniture. Sofas, coffee tables, dressers, all there for the taking. Other New York freebies include Central Park, the Staten Island Ferry, and the bedbugs living in the furniture you bogarted from the sidewalk.

Sleep tight.

Brad Aaron