Going back in Time... (square)

Tonight was my first proper organised like evening. Going to see a friend's play followed by a horrendously expensive drink in Time Square. Splendid. Gave myself about an hour and a half to get there on the old underground, meaning I'd have time to grab some pizza etc before the show began at 7:30. Being here a week nearly I don't really get fazed by the subway anymore-its actually a really simple, easy to work out system that you can't really get wrong.

I somehow emerged from the subway at 7:54.
I was confused, frightened and more than a bit angry at what I will put to you as the space time continuum. Who knows what happened during those two hours? I certainly don't. Obviously a number of glaring errors were made, and sadly, they were undeniably all made by me. I'm just not completely sure what they actually were. And I don't think I should try and concentrate on what happened ever again. Oh well. Wandering about in New York on my own it was. Its not like I've done much of that recently.

'Boo!', I hear you say, Time Square? 'We've done it, its over, there was that funny bit with the Russian guy and thats about it. Go sign up for horse riding lessons and leave us alone until you've got somthing new to say!'

All very valid points, and you're right, the Russian story was hilarious. But you know what, this is my blog and if I want to harp on about Time Square, I bloody well will. Except I don't actually. Time Square is about 17 times more (insert previous description of Time Square) at night, and frankly, my eyes, my ears and my very skin just couldn't deal with it. So I decided to hide in a music shop until I'd figured out my next move.

Now this is where things start to kick off.
You know in America, and in England too only perhaps less so, there is the idea of 'try before you buy'? You're with me? Excellent. Now this is a good system, suited to things such as moisturiser or perhaps slippers. A lovely jacket, also. However, there are some items in this world that this idea does not work for. I'd go so far as to say that there are some items in this world that should never be attempted to be inserted into this system, as they will never ever work for. A violin is one of those items.

Imagine, if you will, a large, balding, alarmingly freckly (and I'm no stranger to the freckled) man, holding a violin in his hand, a bow in the other, scraping away with the look in his eyes of one who has just discovered his calling. Beside him is a salesman, with a look in his eyes of one that spends his time introducing the large and freckled to violins, and has become dead inside because of it. It was a bad noise. I mean really though. God it was bad. It was like the violin was dying, and wanted everyone to know how unfair that was by screaming as loud as possible.

I have personal issues with the violin anyway, as I was forced to play it between the ages of 8 and 10. They were not good years. The problem with the violin as an instrument is that there is no middle ground between good and bad. Its a bit like waiting to eat a pear (stay with me). When you're waiting to eat a pear, there is either rock-hard impenetrable toughness, or a gooey mush suitable only for the toothless and half-dead. With the violin, there is either the horrible 'eeeek-uuuurrrgg-AAARRK-MEEEEAAA' let it stop please god let is stop type noise, or wonderful swooshy hair Loreal advert time crisp Chinese brilliance. No one is 'quite good' at the violin.

The years I was forced to practice the violin in my room every other night, in terms of the emotional state of myself and my parents, are the years I might as well have just walked up the stairs and self-harmed loudly with the door open. I'm serious. My family is less strong because I played the violin. But its never mentioned now, so you know.. thats some comfort.

Anyway, the point is, this was happening, and it wasn't doing great things for me. Then a child started hitting me and I had a feeling this evening wasn't going to turn out the way I'd hoped. This was a young child, very young, the kind that can't quite say proper words yet, just mumble jibberish as they punch you in the thigh. At least, thats what I thought it was, until I realised his mother was speaking to him in Russian. I did the smile of a person who is very aware that there are far too many people around to strike an annoying child, and walked away. He followed me. Apparently he'd gotten a taste for blood now, and there was something innately brilliant about hitting me repeatedly. I disagreed, but wasn't really in the mood to argue. 'Heimlich! (oh whatever) schneeeuz miz sshhhaluuttzz muuiiz' said his mother comfortingly. I smiled at her. She smiled back at me. Heimlich smiled at both of us and hit me really hard on the knee. I decided it was time to leave. I pointed Heimlich towards some relatively unsafe looking cables and stormed out of the door, only to nearly fall over a tramp settling into the doorframe. He was grasping a sign that read, in scrawled writing 'GET ME A BEER, MAN'. We locked eyes, and he slowly, not taking his eyes away, revealed a smaller sign he had hidden behind the first one and placed it next to the first. I looked at it. It read- 'YEAH AND GET ME ONE TOO'. I blinked. He grinned a grin that would make a worm look toothy, and began laughing, loudly. I, as tends to be my special move these days, ranny mc ran away, back into the welcoming arms of the relentless Time Square mania flash. Jeebus. I am literally in a world of mad.