Books, records, donuts (16 again in NYC)

Good times spent in the basement of dusty record stores

As advertised, I finally made it out of Brooklyn by myself, guided only by signs that tell me how to do (and not to do) absolutely everything, and survive for several seconds completely on my own in Union Square before I grabbed hold of an old friend and begged directions to the nearest donut shop.

Rebecca and I had broken up. For one day only, but it was necessary, after the weeks spent together packing up the house and flying to the US, to do something apart so that we would have something original to talk about.

Vulnerable tourists, we were both babysat, Rebecca with Ali and me with Shawn. The girls went high-brow and indulgent, hitting the MOMA and then slinking back for massages. Shawn and I went for an altogether more…teenage option.

New York, New York (Looking for Judge Judy)

Rebecca's travel guide tells me that NYC cab-drivers don't speak English and don't know how to get to your destination. I will try the subway.

Stop #1 in my life-changing, life-trembling move to the United States is Newark Liberty International Airport.

Rebecca and I  understand EWR as a necessary evil; a tense and petulant airport, unlike Edinburgh or Nashville which are small and friendly enough to at least pretend they’re happy you want to fly somewhere.

But Newark is where Continental flies to from Edinburgh, it has been our Hub-of-choice for 6 years, and so Newark is where I will begin my life as a permanent resident in the United States.

Stop #2, before we fly on to Nashville, is a 7-day vacation in New York City. This game plan, on the face of it, seems designed mainly to drive my Judge Judy and all right-thinking individuals to distraction.  I had to explain to the Judge my whereabouts for the first week in April 2011, I fear she would give me the same short shrift she gives her arch nemesis; Men Who Do Not Pay Child Support.

Arrive in a new country with no job or home of your own? Living off your savings? Is the first logical move really to relax and spend a week in one of the most expensive cities on Earth? Baloney, Sir!

But let me make the case for the defense.