Day 1 (Christmas Day): I have officially discovered the single best day of the year to fly. I think there were three people in the security line with me, and we didn't even have to take our shoes off. Needless to say, between that and the fact that I indulged in the luxury of a flight that left at 11:30 AM (as opposed to, say, 6 AM), the whole experience was extremely mellow and pleasant (even if I did have a complete brain wrinkle and forget that I needed to get to the airport an hour early until sometime the morning of...). I even managed to navigate from JFK to the Financial District via the AirTrain and the subway, all by myself! (This is way more of an accomplishment than it sounds. Every time I descend into the subway solo, I have this vision of inadvertently boarding a train speeding mercilessly in the wrong direction, vanishing into the outer reaches of Staten Island, or some such wilderness, never to be heard from again. It's hard, people.)
Anyway, Andrew and Katie arrived ahead of me, so once I'd dropped my bags at our super-cool (wink, wink) hotel located smack next to the World Trade Center construction site, I set off to find them so we could embark upon our first eating adventure. It was just the three of us, this first night; my brother Dan and his wife Emily were scheduled to arrive the next morning. We decided to hit this Asian noodle place in the East Village that Andrew (who spent a few weeks in the city taking a culinary class a couple of summers ago, lending him a certain amount of street cred) had been raving about. Now, to be honest, I am a noodle-lover (yes to all of that carby goodness) but not an Asian-cuisine lover. The best response I can generally muster to a white styrofoam box full of General Tso's Chicken from Hong Yip or Fu King is a tepid shrug. I'll eat it, but don't expect much by way of passion. That being said, I can say without qualification that my bowl of Spicy Lamb Noodles (please do not expect me to remember, let alone pronounce, the linguistically correct name) and accompanying Spicy Tiger Salad was the most delicious Asian food I have ever eaten in my entire life. I even include sushi in that statement, and I like sushi pretty well. Long story short, those fantastically chewy, hand-torn noodles, redolent with warm spices and rich lamb flavor, counterbalanced by the cool, herbal crunch of the salad, were really, really, really good. Totally, totally worth braving the claustrophobic interior of the place. Besides, there is something that feels so authentically...New York about sitting, back propped against the curb (it did occur to me to wonder how much dog pee I was sitting in), chopsticks in hand, slurping noodles from plastic to-go containers. I liked it.
We had to burn a few calories so we could justify dessert, so we walked uptown, intending to climb to the top of the Empire State Building for the nighttime view, which was totally not worth fifty bucks and a two-hour wait, so we skipped it. We did, however, venture onto Times Square, which I don't care if I ever set foot in again. What a gross monument to everything that is disgusting about American consumerism. I also had a chance to walk into Grand Central Station, which is positively stunning in its grandeur. Even the bathroom signs are carved in marble. But enough of all of that; the real reason for the season was dessert, which we found at ChikaLicious Dessert Club, where I picked up a slice of Vanilla Mille Crepe cake (literally a pile of crepes layered with vanilla pastry creme). Katie and Andrew collaborated on a Meyer Lemon Dough'Ssant (a riff on the Cronut, which is actually Dominique Ansel's trademark, and whose out-of-control popularity is demonstrated by a knockoff for sale at Dunkin Donuts, of all places), a tasty banana custard pie, and something else, which I can't tell you anything about, because Andrew doesn't believe in food-sharing, which is totally ridiculous if you ask me. That, coupled with some brown water from the hotel's espresso machine, savored in the splendor of the luxurious lobby, made for a real pleasant nightcap. 
Christmas Day, Times Square, at like 10 PM. Unspeakably awful.
Adds so much romance to the daily commute.
Bro! *Pumps fist*
I saw shops like this all over the city, selling anything and everything you can imagine. I'll post a picture tomorrow of the ones in Chinatown, selling stuff I'd never heard of. So incredibly cool.
I have no idea why the streets were lined with Christmas trees, but they smelled heavenly.
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