SITTING PROUDLY ON the corner of 74th Street and Third Avenue, J.G. Melon is one of those splendid establishments that make living in New York tolerable. It has a distinct 1930's feel to it, despite only dating from the 1970's, which speaks to the taste of its founders. I remember a very jolly gathering there in the winter of our last year in high school; Will, Caro, Scott, Emma, her mother "Momma Kate", as well as her aunt who still lives in a townhouse nearby (and, as is typical of New York, is currently entrenched in a legal battle with neighbors over an obtrusive wall). It was a splendid evening, boisterous, lively, and full of good conversation, and a window was even broken, though thankfully not by our merry band.

Then there was that one Saturday during the summer when a young lady and I went to the Metropolitan to see the Byzantium exhibit which had received much praise. We duly made our entrance donation, obtained our little 'M' tags, and then asked a guard, "Could you point us to the Byzantium exhibit?" "No can do, boss. Closed yesterday." Brilliant. We had a trawl through the Greek and Roman galleries anyhow (the old Greek and Roman galleries, that is, not the new Greek and Roman galleries that everyone raves about), had a quick (overpriced) drink on the rooftop sculpture garden, and dropped in on the Astor Chinese Court in recompense for missing the glories of Byzantium. Anyhow, leaving the Metropolitan we immediately decided to escape the sun to J.G. Melon's for a stiff drink and a late lunch and it was the most delicious and satisfying repast you could've dreamed of at that precise moment.

I could go on and on, but suffice to say that J.G. Melon's is a place of happy memories, as is the Upper East Side in general. That neck of the woods was our particular stomping ground towards the end of high school and the first years of college during the breaks, until the gradual dissolution and dispersal of the East 86th Street Conspiracy. I don't see much of the East Side anymore. Since I began working in the city I have generally avoided staying within its bounds any longer than necessary before skipping back to the lush green quietude of Westchester. Nonetheless, one has to be social from time to time, and its not as if the company of friends is a loathsome burden.

Still, when I suggested to a friend that, it having been over a year since our graduation, perhaps a drink was in order, and she agreed and asked where we should enjoy our cold beverage of choice, I thought "Why not J.G. Melon?" Miss Breed had never been, and so I had the added privilege of introducing someone to one of our favorite little institutions. As I said, I don't see this neck of the woods as often as I probably should and, inadvertently arriving at Melon's with time to spare, I decided to head over to Second Avenue to revisit some other old haunts.

During high school we spent hours and hours at Taja, a Moroccan lounge/bar, sipping cocktails, conversing, and getting to know the immigrant waiters from the Maghreb, who were all very happy to be in New York and not Fez or Marrakech, and learning about the utterly different world from which they sprang. There was also Sultan, the Turkish restaurant right next door to Taja, which was always pronounced SULL-tan, not sultin, probably because our circle was mostly composed of diplobrats, the sons and daughters of the New York diplomatic corps. "Mehmet" and "Omar" (names changed for security's sake) were brothers and the sons of Egyptian diplomats. I remember them bringing a Californian friend to Sultan once, who instantly fell in love with one of the belly dancers who danced there three nights a week. So far as we know, nothing ever came of it. I also remember dining at Sultan with seven or eight of the Bronxville/Fordham Prep circle and for some reason we all decided to order apple martinis to accompany our food (which, by the way, was superb).

Having, as I said, time to spare, I strolled over to Second Avenue to revisit these haunts of my youth and turned at the corner where Baroanda (where they never let us drink) sits. Heading down, I expected to see Sultan and then Taja its happy neighbor, but no. Gone, all gone. Not just closed, but demolished, half the bloody block. These sites of happiness and drink, of conversation and argument were completely destroyed, without a trace of the joy they once provided us. In their place, an empty hole for now, but soon an ugly glass-plated skyscraper full of three-bedroom apartments (for vulgar financiers no doubt). I must take a note of when that shiny edifice will be topped out, so I can go and spit on its foundations.

I HAVE ALWAYS loved the rain, but even higher than rain ranks its offspring, the thunderstorm. From the gentle rolling in the distance to the quite-close strikes, there are few meteorological occurences more dramatic and enjoyable than the clash of thunder and the flash of lightning. This morning I was wakened by the clap and patter of the storm outside, and by the sudden presence of my dog. The poor beast has no appreciation for such weather, and was attempting to gain admittance to the underside of my bed. He was thwarted by the presence of the Encyclopedia of New York State, Tintin: The Complete Companion (by Michael Farr, leading Tintinologist of the English-speaking world), a coffee table book of a Dutch master, and a few discarded copies of the Irish Times with the crosswords half-completed. Sobbing and crying, he gave up and left to find shelter elsewhere.

It was quite a storm, however, and there was no rail service into Grand Central for much of the morning because of flooding along the line. When the MTA finally announced that service had been restored, I went down to the station in town and caught the 9:45 to the city. As one might expect, it was exceptionally crowded and I was forced to stand, leaning uncomfortably against the wall at the back of the train car while I tried to read Rodolfo Fogwill's Malvinas Requiem (o en castellano, Los Pychyciegos, 1983).

It took forty-five minutes to reach Grand Central instead of the usual thirty-one and the relief upon entering that cool marble temple was dissipated (as it always is, but particularly this morning) by descending into the depths of the subway. I made my way, as per usual, towards the 4/5/6 but found the steps down blocked and an MTA employee standing in front. "No trains?" "No trains." Blast. Well, I'll just have to take the shuttle over to Times Square and then the N/R/Q/W down to Union Square. Then the harsh crackle of the station loudspeaker "There is no Times Square shuttle service. No shuttle to Times Square." Very well, I'll take the 7 to Times Square instead, and descended myriad other stairways to the platform of the No. 7 train. The 7 must be the deepest line in all Manhattan! It was like falling down into Wonderland to get to it. Anyhow, hopping off the 7 at Times Square, and heading towards the N/R/Q/W platforms, there was a sight of much disappoinment. It's not the fact that the N/R/Q/W platform was crowded per se but that there was a crowd waiting to even get down to the N/R/Q/W platform. I quit! I decided to ascend to street level, summon a taxi, and get to work the easy way.

Ascending the escalator out of the Times Square subway station, I remembered a time six years previous. Elena Fichtel and I had gone to one of the giant multiplexes on 42nd Street to see "The Others", a psychological suspense film. There was one very quiet and tense point in the movie where Nicole Kidman holds a glass lamp and look towards the staircase of the grand, dark country house her character inhabits in the film. She believes she has just heard the sound of running feet on the floorboards above when she knows no one could possibly be there. She just glances at the staircase and nothing happens. However there was a very quick change of perspective, and even though nothing happened in the film, the suddenness made Elena elicit an almighty shriek of horror. Her's was the only one, and the entire jam-packed cinema erupted in laughter at her. It was a truly classic moment.

After the film we ran to the subway, hoping to get to Grand Central in time to catch an advantageous train back to Westchester and make it home for dinner, and it was the very entrance we entered then that I today egressed and made my way to Broadway. A whole mob of people had the same idea as me and were waiting at the side of the Great White Way, forlornly hoping that an empty cab. Weighing my chances, I figured I'd just walk down Broadway from 42nd Street to Herald Square on 34th and pick up the N/R/Q/W there. I should mention at this point that the morning storm had gone completely and had done nothing to lessen the extraordinary temperature, which was certainly in the 90s. Very uncivil of Mother Nature.

I walked down the shady side of Broadway. A Vietnamese woman rested on a crate at a street corner and fanned herself with a nonchalance indicative of her ancestry. A young boy strode determinedly up the boulevard, finger in one ear and cell phone to the other, disputating with (one presumes) a parental figure on the line. A Belgian-looking man bedecked in Venetian red trousers walked fastidiously in the same direction as I. Finally, through Herald Square (which, by the way, has been done up very nicely with those little Parisian chairs and tables akin to Bryant Park) and to the subway entrance. Flooded. Just a few inches, but I was wearing sandals. (Sandals? In the metrop.? It's summer! And they are sandals of substance, I assure you.) A clever girl in wellies was undeterred. Luckily, another entrance around the corner provided the necessary access.

Then, of course, minutes waiting on a stiflingly hot subway platform. I processed up and down the platform very slowly, feeling that if I stood still I might not budge again. Office-types in suits held their jackets over their shoulders and wiped the sweat from their brows with hankies while a fat black woman sat silently on a bench, shaking her head with dismay at the temperature. After what seemed like eons, the Broadway Express rolled into the station and I was swept away to Union Square in a fine, cool, air-conditioned seat. Exiting the subway into the farmer's market in the square, I passed the Belgian-looking man in red trousers. We had made it there in the same amount of time, but I had a comfortable air-conditioned seat much of the way. (Or so I rationalized).

By the time I arrived at my office it had been a full two hours since I had left the comfort of my home! Nonetheless, I enjoyed the morning's storm as I lay comfortably under the covers in my room. The pitter-pat on glass, the sudden flash, and the anticipation finally quenched by the rolling boom. When we were children, we always counted the seconds between the flash and the boom and multiplied it by some magical number to discover how far away the lightning struck. When we were younger than that, we believed that thunderstorms were when the angels and demons were bowling. And whenever a storm cleared, I thought to myself "Oh good, the angels won again".

EARLY YESTERDAY EVENING I found myself on the West Side and with a bit of free time, so I sauntered down Broadway to Columbus Circle to finally investigate in the flesh this great public place after its complete rehabilitation some two years ago. I am happy to report that the Circle's refurbishment is quite a successful one. My only reservations were minor details, but as these were all done in an extremely simple and smooth modern style, they are much less objectional, and perhaps serve to focus attention on the sculptor Gaetano Russo's splendid monumental column from which Cristóbal Colón, Admiral of the Ocean Sea, Viceroy and Governor of the New World presides over the grand plaza consecrated to his memory.

Colón's name is rendered on the monument as 'Cristoforo Colombo', which seems appropriate since the monument was paid for by public subscription raised by Italian-Americans, and it is commonly assumed that Columbus was Italian. He may have been Genoese, Catalan, Portuguese, or Corsican, but he described himself as being from lands under the rule of Genoa, which lends significant credence to the Genoese and Corsican theories. In Spain, however, he is apparently Spanish, or so one daughter of Iberia, the wife of a frequent reader of this little corner of the web, informs us. The happy couple were strolling through Columbus Circle recently and the good lady was shocked to discover the purported Italian origin of the man who brought Christianity to the New World. After all, Spain's national day — the Día de la Hispanidad — is October 12, the day in 1492 that Columbus first set foot in the New World. (In woebegone Venezuela, the vulgar socialist dictator has proclaimed October 12 as the Día de la Resistencia Indígena, or Day of Indigenous Resistance, and the Columbus Column in their capital city of Caracas was toppled on that day in 2004).

Anyhow, not only was the good lady was shocked at our monument's proclamation of the Discoverer's Italian-ness but the combination of that with the presence in Columbus Circle of the beautiful U.S.S. Maine Monument led the observer to conclude that the public plaza should be instead be named "Anti-Spain Square". It was the disastrous sinking of the Maine, after all, which led to the Spanish-American War, the result of which was America's most unfortunate and regretful act of taking Spain's empire off her hands. (Contrary to Mr. Kipling's idealistic urging of America to take up the imperial mantle in his poem 'White Man's Burden', this turned out to be a fairly good deal for the Spaniards, and a very poor deal for the peoples of the United States).

Politics aside, I enjoyed the few minutes during which I ruminated in the square (or circle, if ye be pedants). I recall many years ago the debate surrounding how to improve Columbus Circle that there was a near-universal desire for there to be more trees but that the very shallow depth between the street surface and the subway below presented difficulties in this regard. The redesigners have solved this problem by encircling the center of the circle with a raised ridge, on which are planted a number of trees which, we trust, will be even more appreciated as they mature. The raised ridge, which features jets of flowing water around the inner circle, also serves to innoculate the center from the noise of the traffic which, the Circle being situated at the confluence of Broadway, Central Park West, Central Park South, and Eigth Avenue, is considerable.

And so, I judge the new Columbus Circle a success, and I am happy to the report that the American Society of Landscape Architects concur, having awarded it their General Design Award of Honor. Another random fact which surprisingly few people know is that Columbus Circle is the spot from which distances to New York are numerated, akin to Moscow's Red Square and London's Trafalgar Square (if I recall correctly).

LEAVING COLUMBUS CIRCLE, I sauntered back up Broadway to another of Manhattan's engaging places, Lincoln Center. Critics accused the architects of the performing arts complex of cribbing off of Rome's E.U.R., but one wishes the three halls facing Lincoln Center's plaza had the same crispness of those modern Roman structures. The thirty years between the E.U.R. of 1930s Italy and the Lincoln Center of 1960s New York were years in which the quality of modernism declined just as greatly as its supremacy increased. Despite this, the plaza of Lincoln Center is one of the most successful public places in Manhattan. I have often lamented the absence from New York of the open piazza so common on the Continent. This plaza competes with Central Park's Bethesda Terrace as the best example of the type in Manhattan.

The plaza is raised above the neighboring Lincoln Square (one of the many triangular squares created by Broadway's healthy disregard for the grid) and is reached by a gentle rise of stairs. Viewed from the square it appropriately seems like a stage upon which all our great dramas are played. The dance of the New York City Ballet in the State Theatre on the left, the music of the New York Philharmonic in Avery Fisher Hall on the left, and in the center, the Metropolitan Opera in the Metropolitan Opera House; the greatest opera company in the Americas, not to mention one of the best in the entire world. And from the hour of seven or so on the evening of performances, the three arts mix and mingle in the plaza as attendées wait to meet their companions and enter whichever of the respective halls they are to spend the evening. Some jealously preserve a seat of honor on the rim of the central fountain, while others hide from the elements (the beating sun, the heaving rain) in the shelter of the arcades, while still more meander slowly to and fro around this piazza dell'arte.

It's unfortunate, then, that the elders of Lincoln Center insist on erecting temporary stage structures in the middle of the plaza, partially obstructing the fountain, during the warmer months when, above all other times, it should be open for all to enjoy. The creators of Lincoln Center conceived of the obvious desire for outdoor performances during the summer, and so they built the bandshell in Damrosch Park in between the Opera House and Avery Fisher Hall, just diagonally adjacent to the plaza. Surely the plaza is meant to be an open space where all the events can mix, blend, interact, influence, before finally separating into their appropriate places. If there are to be outdoor performances, hold them where they were meant to be, and if that place suffers from some malfunction of design, then redesign that place rather than rudely interjecting a particular event into what was meant to be the public square for all.

THIS PARTICULAR EVENING it was into Avery Fisher Hall for a performance of the New York Philharmonic, now in its 165th year. The program was Rossini's overture to Semiramide and Schubert's Symphony No. 3 in D major (D.500), with Dvořák's Symphony No. 5 in F major (Op. 76). Riccardo Muti wielded the conductor's baton and the result was definitely less than was expected. I had only heard Muti's conducting on the radio in passing and, while admittedly not devoting much thought to it, he seemed a fairly capable conductor. In person, however, he left much to be desired. Rossini's overture was merely lackluster but Schubert's symphony was actually surprisingly poor. Perhaps the worst thing was observing Muti in action, for the man looked like an utter fool. His conducting seemed unnatural, choreographed, even foppish. And those ridiculous jestures towards the first violins! I wanted to slap the man, and I shouldn't be surprised if the violins wanted to themselves. Towards the middle of the Schubert symphony, I began to think of the man as a proper ass, the tails of his evening jacket acting the part of hind legs. My only solution to the St. Vitus's dance on the conductor's dais was to shut my eyes and imagine that I was there in the Austrian capital in that autumn of 1815, after the chancellors and ministers of the crowned heads of Europe had departed the Congress of Vienna when peace and order were plotted, in the home of Otto Hatwig where (scholars posit) the work was premiered.

The friend I accompanied that evening actually knows about the inner workings of music (I am actually an ignoramus on the subject, and simply like what sounds good to me) and agreed completely with me on the subject during the intermission. Luckily, the Dvořák fared better, but one had the niggling suspicion that this was the Philharmonic working its magic in spite of Mr. Muti, rather than at the command of his baton. My knowledge and appreciation of Dvořák has slowly grown, from that first passing fondness we all have for his Symphony No. 9 "From the New World". My appreciation for the Philharmonic grows, when I see they have printed in the program that Mr. Dvořák was born in Mühlhausen, Bohemia, rather than the more modish style of "Nelahozeves, Czech Republic" that would find favor elsewhere.

Perhaps I am too hard on Mr. Muti. Perhaps he and the Philharmonic were simply not a good fit for eachother. At any rate, I shouldn't complain as one doesn't often get box seats to a sold-out performance with every seat in the hall occupied (though, to be honest, the sound is better down in the orchestra seats). But how I wish I could have seen von Karajan while he was alive!

After the baton had finally fallen for the night, my friend and I had the same stroke of genius at exactly the same moment and decided to head up to good old Café Lalo, but unfortunately everyone else had the same idea (Saturday night? Lalo's? What did we expect?) so we comforted ourselves with a pint or two at the Parlour instead.

THE RECENT UTTERANCE of most grievous blasphemies against the Holy Spirit and the Blessed Virgin by a member of Senator John Edwards' presidential campaign team sparked great scandal, much compounded by the Senator standing by the offending party after the affair erupted. While she has since resigned, one wonders in what jurisdiction her comments, posted electronically on the internet, were made. Blasphemy remains a common law offense in New York, while one suspects it is almost as rarely enforced as those as-yet-unrepealed Plantagenet-era laws requiring all free-born Englishmen to practice archery weekly.

The blasphemy case which obtained the greatest reknown in these parts took place in December of 1810. A man (we will not call him gentle) by the name of Timothy Ruggles was brought to court in Salem in Charlotte County, New York. (Or, more properly, Washington County, as that particular bailiwick, originally named after the patron of the arts and Queen Consort to King George the Last, had been rechristened after a George of more recent popularity). Ruggles, anyhow, had made grievously blasphemous utterances against Our Lord and the Blessed Virgin which do not bear repeating (but which the inquisitive and hard-stomached scholar can find in the appropriate academic sources).

Ruggles had reckoned himself a "free thinker" and the townsfolk made haste to ensure he would be, at the very least, an imprisoned one. Found guilty in the Court of Oyer and Terminer of Salem, he was jailed for three months and fined $500. The blasphemer appealed the conviction, his lawyer arguing that there was no specific statute against blasphemy in the State of New York. The great James Kent, Chief Justice (and later Chancellor) of New York whose Commentaries on American Law earned him the worthy cognomen of "America's Blackstone", however, upheld the blasphemy conviction, citing blasphemy as a threat to morality and public welfare and "offence against the public peace and safety". Would that such was the case today!

IN THE MIDST of the frigid cold, I found myself (a fortnight ago) having a meander around the old Ward estate in New Rochelle. I was very glad that I had brought my walking stick along, as most of the old paths were covered in frozen snow. Without the aid of it, I most certainly would have slipped and cracked my head. A good few nooks and gullies had filled with frozen snow and water, to the extent that some small trees were eerily half-submerged in white. In a clearing amidst the barren trees, the old house sits, boarded-up and somewhat neglected. Despite being surrounded by sheets of ice, I circumnavigated it, and gave as good an inspection as I could before the cold bade me onwards, and back home.

Just as I reached the edge of the estate by the old forge, I came upon an old man with a giant of a beast that may very well have been the Hound of Cullen. My presence was acknowledge by a great loud bark, one of such ambiguity as to leave me guessing whether it was of welcome or suspicion. The old man promptly leashed the enormous beast. "No good out there today," he said. "Expect it's all frozen over". "Yes, quite," I tersely responded, my mind still arrested by the Hound of Cullen. (The reader will recall that only the week before, my right calf had been the object of a terrier's affections). "Better in a few weeks," the Old Man said in aspiration. "Hope so". Realizing my own terseness, I expressed my wish that the Old Man and the Hound of Cullen enjoy the remainder of the afternoon, and, the wish having been returned in kind, I proceeded home to the warmth of my own abode.

RATHER APPROPRIATELY, the landlord of our pub has been appointed Grand Marshal of the town's St. Patrick's Parade, which will duly be held tommorrow. Monsignor Doyle even appeared before mass last Sunday to solemnly announce the honor to the assembled faithful, citing this public citizen's good works (among them, sending food over from his rather capable kitchens when the rectory cook is away).

I recall, with fondness, Mr. Fogarty's ardent protests (consisting primarily of a shaked fist and some strongly-pronounced verbiage) when the village police, in a fit of overzealousness, erected checkpoints at every neighboring intersection to the pub, stopping every single passing automobile and "breathalyzing" the driver thereof. Needless to say, many a car was left on the village streets that night, including that of yours truly. Irritatingly, it was already winter, and I had to make the uphill walk home in the cold. Also, while traversing the hockey field behind the school, I was forced to climb over a fence in order to evade a skunk. We were not impressed by the village police that night, and heartily concurred with Mr. Fogarty's protests. No doubt he will do a good job of waving to the assembled Gaelry, compulsively bedecked in the Arran jumper and ceremonial sash which are typical of St. Patrick's Day Parade Grand Marshals past and present.

Does this position confer, we wonder, a certain suzerainity over the town's Irish-Americans?

THIS EVENING WAS SPENT, happily, in front of the fire, perusing the Encyclopedia of New York State given to me by Col. & Mrs. Cusack, my aunt and uncle next door. It is a worthy companion to the equally weighty Encyclopedia of New York City (an updated edition of which will appear next year). Between stoking the flames and letting the dog in and out of the house, I learnt about agriculture in Westchester (over 2,000 farms in 1850 but only 91 today), almshouses, art collecting, Austerlitz (pop. 1,453), aviation, bagel production, the Bahá'í faith ("white Protestants remain the principal source of converts"), and Ballston Spa.

PERHAPS I WILL go wander around the old Ward estate again when I return from the city tommorrow. The ice will surely have melted by now, but then tonight's rains might turn it a bit muddy. On the other hand, I've only gotten as far as Ballston Spa in my latest perusal of the Encyclopedia. Very well, I intend to do both (and will likely end up doing neither).