Hell's Belles - NYC is wild and wooly!

Hard to believe, but we sent the file for the Jul/Aug issue of The Essential Herbal to the printer, and headed back to NYC to see our dear friend Laura Daniel in a staged reading of Hell's Belles about 300 feet off Broadway. Here is a review of the play when it was performed earlier in another venue...Review with pictures.Two trips to NYC in 2 weeks.... I'm ready for some slow time!
It was a lot of fun, though! To begin with, we hadn't seen Laura on-stage for an embarrassingly long period of time, and it is just so cool to see someone come to life and be so... HUGE! She played Salome, Janis Joplin, Judy Garland, and Joan Crawford - and slipped into each character seamlessly. It was breathtaking! The others in the cast were exceptional performers too, and I expect to see them all in other parts - coming soon, to a movie near you ;-).
First we wandered around the city for a little bit, and stopped in at Rosie O'Grady's for a delicious lunch. There was a restaurant across the street with kilted waiters, but since it was early in the day... that just seemed like it might have required alcohol. On either side of the Irish Pub there were restaurants - one Italian, another Chinese. I love NY!
Being from an area that can smell chocolate from 4 nearby towns on a good day, with Hershey being one of them, I was a little shocked at this - an entire block of Hershey. If you've ever been to the town of Hershey, you'll know what I mean. Hershey is a quaint little town, with nothing like this!
So it was Fleet Week, and the Navy was in town! It was very reminiscent of a 50's movie to me, and we sat at a small table in the middle of Times Square for 45 minutes or so listening to a band playing pop music.
Maryanne and Rob took to the stage after the reading was over. Don't they look natural? Honestly, the two of them should never be left alone for any length of time...I'd worry about the fate of the world.


Traffic was really something in the city. The holiday weekend and whatever else was going on had Maryanne a little... concerned. Those taxis. I'm pretty sure they were the inspiration behind the bus in Harry Potter, the way they seem to get very, very skinny to slide between lanes, and then fluff back out to fly down any opening! Laura is still fresh as a daisy after her performance.
We went up to the roof to relax for a few hours before heading home. It's such fun to talk about old times and dish about old acquaintances. The four of us have never once been at a loss for words in the nearly 20 years we've been friends. Years pass, and it just continues to get warmer and easier.
I love to look at the vistas from the rooftop garden on Rob and Laura's building. Just standing there and imagining all of the people, all of the life going on in all those buildings and apartments! The sounds and energy from the streets rises to the roof, but it is muffled to something that is more bearable.
Penn Station in NY was crazy. We forgot about the upcoming holiday weekend and it looked like a lot of people were taking 4 days. There were some long delays and a LOT of very visible security - dogs, soldiers, police, and rifles. Not at all like last week, when although I'm sure there was plenty of security, it was not stationed every few feet.
The proof of the magazine was waiting when we got home. I love my printer. They got the go-ahead this morning, and it's almost like we never left.