New York, New York...

I hate that song. It's almost as bad as "My Way" and "Maggie May", but not quite.
And just today when Sam said that about a different song, I gave her a speech about how it's more spiritually harmonious and less judgmental to just say something like
"I have never cared for that song. I'm sure some like it, but it's never done much for me."
I mean, hating a song seems like such a waste of energy, doesn't it?

But anyway, I hate that song. I find it annoying and stupid and unpleasant to listen to.

Because even tho I'd never been there in my life, I always sort of hated New York.
Big cities always seemed scary to me. As a young person I was painfully shy -- being in a room with 3 strangers was difficult, much less 8 million of them.
Also, I've always really enjoyed post-apocalypse fiction, and it's a well-known fact that cities are a bad place to be after an apocalypse. So that's another strike against NY.
I hated the Yankees because they had so many celebrity fans, and so much money, and won so much.
Then there's the rude people, with their unpleasant accent.
And the fact that NYers are often so proud about where they come from, and wax rhapsodic about The Bronx, Queens, Staten Island, Soho, the Upper West Side, or whatever -- places I'd never seen and had been getting along just fine without -- and some even give the impression they think everyone wishes they could live in New York, too.
Plus, lots of people are enamoured and terribly impressed with New York. And if you want me to dislike something, just tell me everyone else loves it -- I have an immature and perverse personality flaw that makes me hate whatever it is that everyone else loves.

So because of all the above, I wanted to hate New York itself, as well as the song. But I didn't.

I spent two days in NYC on my way to my client gig in New Jersey. It was great. The people seemed fairly directed and in a bit of a hurry sometimes, but the ones I interacted with were all charming. They hardly said the F-word at all. And once I got over my fear that WWIII (or a big meteor) was going to hit while I was there, leaving me to survive in a post-apocalyptic urban jungle, I had a great time.

Central Park is beautiful; the architecture is interesting; the subway is navigable, even for out-of-towners, and the mix of languages and cultures is fascinating.

All in all, had a wonderful time. Stayed across the street from Ground Zero, where the World Trade Center was. Saw a musical. Ate good food. Walked miles around Manhattan. Came away with a whole different attitude about New York. But I still hate that song...