I had a wonderful trip to New York. The book-related reasons to go were to sign copies at the Columbia Alumni Book Fair and to give a speech at the Jack Kerouac Literary Group, both of which went very well.

Outside of the scheduled events, it was great to spend some time in New York City, where I lived for six years before moving back to the UK in 2006. I managed to catch up with friends from my various incarnations:  a corporate banker at Citigroup, a student at Columbia and then a journalist at the Wall Street Journal. And then I spent time just wandering down memory lane. Of course things have changed, but most of the old favourites are still there. As I list them, it’s interesting how many of them are food-related! Anyway, in my old neighbourhood on the Upper East Side: hot pastrami on a poppyseed bagel from Tal Bagel (I used to live in a little apartment upstairs), breakfast at the old-fashioned Mansion Diner, and little choux pastries filled with custard from the Choux Factory. Further downtown, brunch at Danal’s was a must. Then there was Eastern Parkway in Brooklyn, Van Cortlandt Park in the Bronx, Brooklyn Heights Promenade, the various riverside walks in Manhattan, and of course a lazy, sunny afternoon lying on the Great Lawn in Central Park reading a book and trying not to get hit by frisbees. And visiting friends in New Jersey gave me an excuse to rent a Corvette for a day and hit the gargantuan American highways.

I realise that holiday snapshots are usually more interesting for the person who went on the holiday than for everyone else, but I’m posting a few of them anyway 🙂