Things I see/feel/hear/smell while commuting around NYC

• ALWAYS an ambulance, fire engine or police car with their sirens on (it doesn't help that I live near both a fire hall and a hospital)
• Buskers - some showing their wares of creativity, others simply just showing off their wares, and ones who shameless just ask for spare change (aka beggars but I'm trying to be PC here)
• The glorious smell of puke (like I did this morning while walking to school) somewhere on the sidewalk, where you constantly look around while waiting to cross the road, to see where the disgusting smell is emanating.
• The dripperty drip of an air conditioner - note: this is a regular experience, you've never truly experienced New York until you experience a semi-cold drip of some liquid
• and you're not quite sure if it was air-con condensation or someone's spit or bird crap.
• The bumps and sidewalk stepping while trying to get anywhere. I'm not quite sure why but everyone here seems to walk faster which in turn makes you walk faster, when really you don't have any reason to. I feel compelled to rush everywhere I go, on the bus, the street and in the subway.
• Dogs - lots of dogs. And dog poo too. It seems in the big city of New York, people are so hurried and busy that they barely have time to social relationships of any genuine kind. The result? Fuzzy, loyal, four-legged companions, by the dozens, all over every single park, tree and green space you can imagine. I miss Digby...
• Men in suits after 5pm, walking around with their pressed, crisp shirts in clear laundry bags.
• Women in suits before 9am, walking around in flip flops with their heels in their work bags.
• High school kids at 3pm, swarming all over the bus stops, subways - screaming, yelling, simply being a nuisance.
• Coffee/tea/pastry vendors all over the city in the morning - I know one I always go to outside my school who cheerfully wishes me "Good morning", calls me "Gorgeous" and serves me my tea or coffee and my jelly doughnut every Tuesday morning. Nothing makes your morning, when someone calls you "Gorgeous" even when you're wearing yesterday's stinky tee and no makeup. Hee!