Move over Tenement Museum - here comes American Girl

While visiting the American Girl store for the first time, the history buff in me was happily surprised to meet a doll named Rebecca among their "Historical Figures." Rebecca is a girl of about 12, living on the Lower East Side in 1914. To illustrate her world, they've built a charming diorama of a room in Rebecca's home - replete with egg cream, seltzer bottle and  bagel.

Music in the Times Square subway station

Ancient Professor Eduardo Alvarado has been performing his tinkly music in the subway as long as I can remember.

This time his audience includes both live passersby and the silent crowd in the mural behind him.

Flying Rhine Maidens at Lincoln Center

Part of a photo shoot about the Met's new Ring Cycle.

Kudos to the designer of this beauty

How to see a pink elephant without taking a drink

Antique store promotional truck spotted on Broadway

Aforementioned elephant

Serenading Eleanor Roosevelt

Ben Arthur was out this morning serenading passersby with a song about the history of the UN. It was  commissioned by the on-line University of Phoenix as part of some kind of promotion. Ben did a fine job - even finding a rhyme for Boutros Boutros-Ghali (Somali), not an easy task. I'm sure Eleanor loved it.

Only in New York

There's a fellow who has been panhandling on and off at a nearby corner for at least fifteen years. He has a sweet face, which has been distorted by a stroke he had a few years ago, and a gentle, soft-spoken manner. Over the years I have learned a lot about his life, his wife, and his world view.

Yesterday, after I made my traditional donation of a buck, he surprised me by saying: "Would you like to be part of a survey?" I agreed to become part of his focus group and he said: "What's your greatest fear?"

I won't get into my response, which is only between me and my panhandler, but I asked him what other people had been saying. "One fellow was afraid of being hit by a car at 92nd Street and Broadway," he replied. "Do you want to know what my fear is?" Sure, I replied.

"I'm afraid of two things- lightning, because when I was a kid in the South I stood right near a tree that was blasted in half, and losing my wife, because I need some one to comfort me when the lightning comes."

I swear there's a blues song in there somewhere.

How would you have answered? Think about it.