TO THE FIVE BOROUGHS

Parking in New York is about as likely as a Labour government taking Britain to war. After a short discussion and little thought, we ignored all advice and popular attitude and did it anyway.

We parked in Jersey City, New Jersey, which is ironic as we both needed new jerseys. Getting on the subway in Hoboken I didn’t get to see any of the city until we popped up right in the midst of it at Broadway and 33rd. Times Square brought out the child in me… Every billboard moved, every sign flashed, bright graphics lit up the sides of every building… NYPD cops wandered passed, yellow taxi cabs honked at me as (not paying attention) I stepped into the road, steam vented from the subways and a man with a pneumatic drill fixed the middle of the road, shouting. I think everyone in New York is called Shorty as that’s what everyone yells: “Hey Shorty!”

Natalie had a photo taken with the object of her nightmare sexual fantasy - Cookie Monster; she dreams of his crumb-covered blue furry fist inside her almost every night. I suggested we roleplay and I dress up as him but she declined.

Opposite the Hershey’s store, inside the M&M’s store, hundreds of people queued at ceiling-high dispensers, collecting their favourite coloured rabbit droppings in bags and paying by the half-pound when they could walk into any gas station or visit any news-stand for exactly the same thing. There were cuddly toys, mugs, even Mars leather jackets. We had to evacuate as this brand confused the crap out of me. When I say confused I really mean I have just one question… Who the fuck buys this shit?

Maybe they’re the confused ones, breast-fed confectionary consumerism by a cathode-ray nipple.

I mean I like nice things, I want but will never afford an Aston Martin DB7 Vantage, and despite the recent scrimping, saving and stealing I like Diesel jeans, but c’mon who needs a $4000, diamond encrusted M&M leather jacket?

Wankers. That’s who.

Fat American wankers.

We walked around one edge of Central Park and sat on a rock where Natalie asked yet again if I was in love with her… So we discussed whether we were in love. A little bit we concluded. More importantly though, we had a 7oz burger at Jackson’s Hole in a secret subterranean burrow for meat-lovers on 64th and 2nd and ambled back to get a few £4..50 bottles of Corona. We took some pictures in Grand Central Station, but being night time there was no famous shaft of light penetrating the magnificent windows so turned into photo-magicians playing with time and space under the star-speckled ceiling. We also saw a couple of black fellas in suits though, which was nice, but bizarrely they didn’t show up on any pictures.

Anything else of note? Oh, we kinda got engaged… in H&M.

With a ring purchased there, well four rings for $4.90.

Of course we’re not really engaged… well, just "a little bit"

Walking out of the Irish pub, enshrouded in winter mist and fine rain, the Empire State Building loomed high above us. It was something straight out of Gotham City and I hoped to see the Caped Crusader swoop down to batarang me home to my bed as my feet were aching like a motherfucker.

The next day was a cold and wet Sunday; we didn’t do much so on Monday we went downtown. Getting off at Ground Zero was a strange feeling, but I wasn’t saddened as I expected to be. Like the massive construction site, I just felt a bit empty but I did buy a 9/11 hat and World Trade Center salt and pepper shakers. Not really, I was glad to see no-one trying to capitalise on the worst event of recent times, but thinking about it there were those parachutes in case it ever happened again… I imagine some fat-cat businessman hoping for more hijacked planes to line his pockets.

We took the ferry to Liberty Island to see the Statue of Liberty. There were signs informing stupid people that she was not painted but in fact that oxidization had coloured her green. It was bloody freezing and blowing a gale so we were not allowed up her. I didn’t really want to go up her as that would mean cheating on my new fiancé so I just took a couple of up-skirt shots instead. I’m pleased to be the first to inform you that The Statue of Liberty, vision of beauty and shining beacon of freedom throughout the world, has copper-coloured pubes. Proper wiry, ginger, short and curlies like a cross between a Scottish “jimmy” football wig and a pan scourer.

She doesn’t shave her armpits either… well she is French.

Wandering passed the Brooklyn Bridge I remember from the opening titles of Cagney and Lacey we took some really great snaps of a moon-walking seagull and I got some of Natty looking simply amazing. Sometimes it does feel like I’m in love, you know when the lighting is good but we’re more like best friends. We both love each other, sometimes lots, sometimes not so much… everything else is there but just the romance is missing. My undying love for her… died. I think it’s still in there somewhere, deep down, hidden, lurking… Perhaps it will come back one day. I don’t know what will come of us when our little adventure is over but it will be difficult to leave each other. We’re all each other have.

That said, I’m not sure how long my game of hide and seek with reality can go on...

Someone we know in L.A. (and his writing partner) have just been given a pilot on Comedy Central… and $100,000 each to write it. That’s what I want, and I know I have the ability to do it, just lack the application… and a comedy partner (come baaaaaccckkkk John, I miss you!)

We ate in Chinatown, what we both felt was our first real meal in this country. An idiotic thing to say I know, but it was like the real food that we used to share, the real food we’re used to eating, the real food we crave from Thailand. Cheap, simple, clean and fresh; making me realise every other Chinese dish is for fat white people. Despite having been there, Nat asked if there is a Chinatown in China. “Yes” I enthusiastically told her… “It’s so big that people get lost in it, and you can only find your way out by finding an airport”

Following the self-same route that she and her ex-boyfriend had taken, (I know - weird) seeing the same sites in the same day, we strolled to the Lower East Side that Nat had been telling me all about… only she couldn’t find it. So we sat in a bar called Lolita’s in Noho. Happy Hour fed us a few beers and then a guy informed us there was a comedy night downstairs. Amazingly Nat has never been to a comedy-night before (I know, I know, what am I doing with her? She’s cute alright) and somehow we had just stumbled upon a tiny, quaint, typical New York venue, almost as if it were planned… I considered getting on stage but decided against it, though I do have some new material. The comics were okay, highs and lows as ever but it was good to not be there to scout talent, to analyse - also good to not have to talk to or be pestered by the comedians.

The last act featured a girl out of Flight of the Conchords. Their act was the worst of the lot, less ad lobbing; more unprepared and rambling - possibly a bit too much red wine love. I said I wasn’t going to analyse. Anyway Natalie was really excited to meet her and had a photo taken whilst wearing her Brettesque Canada Goose jumper. I don’t think she’s met anyone famous before.

I had expected to fall in love with New York. I didn’t. It was cool and all, but it just felt a bit like London. Not how people say that it’s the loneliest city in the world, I just didn’t fall in love with it.

Got engaged though.