Autumn in the Big Apple

Those Wholefoods organic turkeys are fattening up nicely on their all-natural diet of locally-grown pretentiousness. Which means it's nearly time to run the holiday gauntlet in the Big Apple. There's barely time to rush down to the West Village Halloween parade and separate the real goths from the down-and-out stockbrokers before it's time to rip down the ghouls and raise the Thanksgiving kitsch. And all that is before the big tree even goes up at The Rock.

What follows is a random pictorial tribute to what by J00ster's reckoning is the best season in the Big Apple. Assuming of course the Yankees can get it done against the cheesesteakers.

Rock pigging out in Hell's Kitchen.

Rock pigging out in the East Village.

Mei pigging out in the East Village.

Rock pigging out in the Upper West Side.

Was someone trying to claim there's something random about these shots? Maybe it's just me here, but I'm detecting a bit of a theme. A Non-Random Walk Down Main Street?

I bet the Mayflower didn't have any dark chocolate semifreddos with a touch of bitter orange. On the upside, the pilgrims didn't have to wait for an hour in the Wholefoods line just to get a couple of bags of cornmeal.

Central Park in autumn is a stunning cacophony of reds, yellows, oranges... and hot babes in spandex training for next week's New York marathon. Hang tight, any second one is going to race into frame.

Amazing that the founding fathers had the foresight to preserve such a slice of prime real estate. Or perhaps they lived in the penthouse of the tower over yonder.

That's quite a backyard. Unfortunately if you're lucky enough to live up there, you're also so famous that you can't even venture out without being mobbed by either the paparazzi, or more recently the FBI looking to drag you off to jail by your freshly starched white collar. Ponzi schemes just don't pay like they used to.

Hmph, I thought tourist season was over? No wonder pumpkin lattes are back at Starbucks.




With such idyllic scenes, it's hard to believe that it was only a few decades ago that the only one enjoying the view was your friendly local crack dealer.

The Central Park Reservoir no longer pumps water to the city, since some bright spark realized all it would take is one disgruntled Phillies fan to wipe out New York's water supply.

But it still makes a great backdrop. Especially for those who can afford Upper East Side lux.

The Ramble is a great place for... uhm... what's a synonym for rambling?

Belvedere Castle enjoys a stunning view over the park. Rock especially likes it because it's his kind of cheap, i.e. free. Especially compared to Top of the Rock. Although on the downside, he doesn't get to use the crude Mei on Top of the Rock joke that he's been saving up for ages.

Enjoy it while it lasts. A few short months and the only thing those glasses will be good for will be avoiding snow blindness.

Rock surveys the vast swathes of real estate that he can't afford. Don't give up dude, if you look really, really hard, you can almost see a shoebox in Queens over there.

Leaves are fun, until you have to rake them up. But it still beats shovelling snow.


Lights, camera, action! Gossip Girl season 3 filming is in full swing. Now where's the html tag for annoying voice over?



Columbus Circle is a dizzying blaze of lights on a foggy autumn evening.




Getting into the holiday spirit on the Upper West Side. In this melting pot of a city, even the Jack O' Lanterns hail from far away lands. Wuhan by the looks of it?

A New York minute on Broadway, Upper West Side.

The recently refurbished Lincoln Center gleams. Thank goodness the Dow is back above 10,000 - they might have a chance of actually selling some tickets for the upcoming ballet season.

Apparently this computer-controlled fountain can be programmed to perform in-sync with whatever is on stage in the Center. In other words, there's an app for that.