NYC SciBlings MeetUp - Sunday and Monday

During our trip to NYC we stayed at the Millennium UN Plaza Hotel (see the reviews here and here):

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The hotel was built specifically to aid the business of the United Nations next door:

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The hotel was actually very nice - big room with a big comfy bed. Great location as well (on Friday we took a looooong walk from there all the way to the tip of the island; and it was just a few blocks away from the location of the Saturday night party) - an easy walk to Grand Central Station (and from there to the American Museum of Natural History - a subject for an entirely new post tomorrow), etc. - here are some pics from the Grand Central - the ceiling, the old clock, and the people moving around (nobody looked frozen):

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Also on the way south along the 2nd avenue (on the corner with 9th street) is the second NYC location of the Max Brenner chocolate restaurant. The other one is on Union Square (there are also several in Israel, a couple in Australia, Phillipines and Singapore, but no more in the USA and none in Europe). After having breakfast there on Friday (and swinging by the Union Square location to buy some goodies as presents), we also just happened to be passing by it when a thunderstorm started, so we jumped in and had hot chocolate milk - the kind you make yourself: a candle heats up the cup to which one adds as much milk and chocolate chips one wants, until the color is THE perfect brown:

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While at the Union Square, we saw this bus - I guess one can call this a double-decker:

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After the previous night's party, with most Sciblings in various stages of hangover, and the loss of Internet at the hotel impeding communication, we abandoned our Plan A - to go with several SciBlings to Bronx Zoo, and later to go see 'Hair' in Central Park. Next time. So, on Sunday morning, we had breakfast with Orac, said Good Byes to various SciBlings as they were coming out through the lobby on their way home, and generally spent a low-key day, just a little walking around Central Park and shopping.

On Monday morning, knowing that the entire NE corridor is borked, we were in no rush to go to the airport (good decision), so we took a cab to Ryder Alley (this will be a subject of a separate post) and had to teach a brand new cabbie how to get there. On the way back, we had lunch at Katz's Deli, where I took a picture of the place with the owner right in the middle of it, as well as the picture of the famous pastrami sandwich for my friends the food-bloggers:

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...which is NOT what she was having (but he was):

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