Report back from New York

[ZoWie]

I'm pleased to note that NYC has not changed that much. At least in our part of town, it's about the same as it ever was. Bars and restaurants had a rough time, but the city allowed them to block portions of sidewalks and streets for outdoor seating. Many of them have even erected socially distant sheds with cubicles to keep tables isolated from one another. Now it's common to eat in the street, watching the wonderful bustle of New York go by.

There's a lot of talk about crime, but it was a lot scarier back in the bad old days when Times Square was the porno district and Central Park was a no-go and the lights in the subway trains blinked on and off. I wasn't scared even once. The New York Post will tell you that people are selling weed freely in the streets. I did not see one pot transaction. Smoke/vape shops are a Thing, but bfd.

Everything's open, at least for now. Museums require masks and strongly encourage social distancing. Go in off-peak hours and it's fine. Theaters are open and Broadway plays have full houses. I think they require masks. I'm told that the more offbeat stuff that makes New York such a stimulating place is having more trouble getting butts into seats.

I'd go again in a second, and probably will, though if covid gets much worse flying will be a bit too scary for me. Right now, it's OK, but it verges on marginal. For a start, masks on the plane are a settled issue. The anti-maskers won. Even the flight attendants won't wear them. No one cares if you wear one, but you'll stand out like a freak. I stood out like a freak. Being a political radical, I'm used to the experience.

LAX and JFK terminals both require masks. At JFK the compliance is quite good. At LAX, it approaches zero. Large families with seemingly hundreds of kids run around shouting in 30 different languages and not a mask in sight. LAX is also under endless construction. Has been for years, and apparently will be until whenever yet another Olympics happens. Passengers are herded into dark, musty, virus-y, claustrophobic black holes of Calcutta instead of real terminals, and in general it's unfit for human use. You can't get a cab at the terminal. That's another bus, maskless of course, to another long line of potentially diseased people in a holding lot miles away.

All this makes Ellis Island look like paradise on Earth. I won't be back until they finish some of this stuff they've got half of the airport closed off to make. If push comes to shove, I'll use Burbank or Long Beach. Even Ontario and a 40 mile drive into town would be preferable.

[Libertas]

LAX nobody wearing masks?

Fuck

How in the HELL is that braindead ruling about planes and masks still the law? Why has it not been appealed?

I would love to be able to have a home in NYC...

[bradman]

Sounds like ya had fun which is always worth a second trip.

[Glennfs]

I'm pleased to note that NYC has not changed that much. At least in our part of town, it's about the same as it ever was. Bars and restaurants had a rough time, but the city allowed them to block portions of sidewalks and streets for outdoor seating. Many of them have even erected socially distant sheds with cubicles to keep tables isolated from one another. Now it's common to eat in the street, watching the wonderful bustle of New York go by.

There's a lot of talk about crime, but it was a lot scarier back in the bad old days when Times Square was the porno district and Central Park was a no-go and the lights in the subway trains blinked on and off. I wasn't scared even once. The New York Post will tell you that people are selling weed freely in the streets. I did not see one pot transaction. Smoke/vape shops are a Thing, but bfd.

Everything's open, at least for now. Museums require masks and strongly encourage social distancing. Go in off-peak hours and it's fine. Theaters are open and Broadway plays have full houses. I think they require masks. I'm told that the more offbeat stuff that makes New York such a stimulating place is having more trouble getting butts into seats.

I'd go again in a second, and probably will, though if covid gets much worse flying will be a bit too scary for me. Right now, it's OK, but it verges on marginal. For a start, masks on the plane are a settled issue. The anti-maskers won. Even the flight attendants won't wear them. No one cares if you wear one, but you'll stand out like a freak. I stood out like a freak. Being a political radical, I'm used to the experience.

LAX and JFK terminals both require masks. At JFK the compliance is quite good. At LAX, it approaches zero. Large families with seemingly hundreds of kids run around shouting in 30 different languages and not a mask in sight. LAX is also under endless construction. Has been for years, and apparently will be until whenever yet another Olympics happens. Passengers are herded into dark, musty, virus-y, claustrophobic black holes of Calcutta instead of real terminals, and in general it's unfit for human use. You can't get a cab at the terminal. That's another bus, maskless of course, to another long line of potentially diseased people in a holding lot miles away.

All this makes Ellis Island look like paradise on Earth. I won't be back until they finish some of this stuff they've got half of the airport closed off to make. If push comes to shove, I'll use Burbank or Long Beach. Even Ontario and a 40 mile drive into town would be preferable.

That is odd about LAX and masks.
Around the truck stops and in the trucking world in general. Foriegn folks wear masks far more than any other group.
Second are African Americans and in dead last is us whites.
As for me I always have one handy but if it isn't required I don't wear it
With very few exceptions

[ZoWie]

I was surprised about LAX too. The departure level when we left was about 50-50 but in only a few weeks' time when we got back the arrival level was for all practical purposes completely unmasked. It didn't help, as I noted, that since all the terminals are being remodeled the space available for things like baggage claim is about 1/5 what it used to be, then you can barely get rides at the terminals. They really like it when you get on a bus and go somewhere else to pick up a ride. The buses are of course standing room only, and needless to say they are mask-free zones. I wouldn't get on them. We ended up having a friend pick us up. That may be the best way at LAX until after they have yet another goddamn Olympics in fcking ungovernable LA. When is that, 2024? 2028? Who the hell remembers? Will we still be in covid protocols? Will we need a concentration camp to hide the homeless until everyone leaves, the way Putin did in Sochi? At least then the airport will be usable for another 20 years before they tear it all up again.

[ZoWie]

LAX nobody wearing masks?

Fuck

How in the HELL is that braindead ruling about planes and masks still the law? Why has it not been appealed?

I would love to be able to have a home in NYC...

My understanding is that an appeal has either been put into motion, or is in work. They're keeping it hush hush so faux will have other dire threats to civilization to get the faithful into a frenzy. My guess is that by the time it gets through the courts, masks will be a dead issue. So will about 200,000 more Americans.

NYC is still a great city. After how bad it got in 2020, most people take covid seriously. There's still lots to do, plenty going on, vibrant street action, and less crap about how you're a librul comminist hippy freak if you mask up in crowded spaces. That's more than I can say for everywhere else I've been in the past two years.

[carmenjonze]

Second are African Americans

We don't want any more of your conservative diseases.

Some of you guys are willing to kidnap and kill to keep your snotnose brats unmasked and carrying preventable disease into schools.

But then, you're also for child separation, and it's perpetually too soon to ever talk about all these men shooting up and mass-murdering the schools with their killing machines.

So, that's weird.

[Glennfs]

We don't want any more of your conservative diseases.

Some of you guys are willing to kidnap and kill to keep your snotnose brats unmasked and carrying preventable disease into schools.

But then, you're also for child separation, and it's perpetually too soon to ever talk about all these men shooting up and mass-murdering the schools with their killing machines.

So, that's weird.

I wish my parents were still alive so I could thank them for raising me to not be filled with hatred.

[gounion]

I wish my parents were still alive so I could thank them for raising me to not be filled with hatred.

Oh and ours did?

[bird]

I was surprised about LAX too. The departure level when we left was about 50-50 but in only a few weeks' time when we got back the arrival level was for all practical purposes completely unmasked. It didn't help, as I noted, that since all the terminals are being remodeled the space available for things like baggage claim is about 1/5 what it used to be, then you can barely get rides at the terminals. They really like it when you get on a bus and go somewhere else to pick up a ride. The buses are of course standing room only, and needless to say they are mask-free zones. I wouldn't get on them. We ended up having a friend pick us up. That may be the best way at LAX until after they have yet another goddamn Olympics in fcking ungovernable LA. When is that, 2024? 2028? Who the hell remembers? Will we still be in covid protocols? Will we need a concentration camp to hide the homeless until everyone leaves, the way Putin did in Sochi? At least then the airport will be usable for another 20 years before they tear it all up again.

I was in LAX a couple months ago. I will be back in 2 weeks for training for a new product line. It was cheaper to fly into LAX rather than the other airports.

Regarding construction LaGuardia was a joke while they were doing the rebuild.

[carmenjonze]

I wish my parents were still alive so I could thank them for raising me to not be filled with hatred.

Did your parents raise you to vote in hate-based public policies and white supremacist politicians?

Rhetorical question.

[Libertas]

Did your parents raise you to vote in hate-based public policies and white supremacist politicians?

Rhetorical question.

Trumpers went to the capitol on January 6th to kill Mike Pence and Nancy Pelosi and stop the certification of the election and board con still says it was just a riot, when/if they come for us, board con will be looking the other way, guaranteed.

[carmenjonze]

Trumpers went to the capitol on January 6th to kill Mike Pence and Nancy Pelosi and stop the certification of the election and board con still says it was just a riot, when/if they come for us, board con will be looking the other way, guaranteed.

This is how Holocausts and Pol Pots and Opeation Condors and Jim Crows happen.

This guy is already part of the latter.

F. him, that whole way of life is based in xenophobia that stems from deep self-hatred.

Miserable bigots.

[ap215]

Glad you had a good time here Z.

[ZoWie]

I love New York. I've by now spent a total of several years of my life there, and it's my place.

LaGuardia is still under construction, and from what I can see from the highway, the new terminals look pretty impressive. JFK depends on when you're there. During the day before everyone gets off work and leaves town, it's fine.

LAX was fine three years ago, but then they decided to completely redo it for the Olympics just to impress visitors and world leaders for a three week period sometime in the future. This is despite the fact that VIPs and some of the more sensitive teams have their own separate remote terminals and a separate back gate out near the beach.

In particular, the American Airlines terminals at LAX are vast, and have all manner of tunnels to other places, but right now everything in the arrival section is closed for a remodel that will cost us money and was not needed except to impress the Olympic visitors. The baggage claim in particular is reminiscent of a concentration camp. The whole airport in general is torn up, everything's a long bus ride in hellacious traffic to various lots cobbled together out in the boonies, and everything's temporary and tacky except for the showy international terminal that always seems to get the big bucks first.

This will change, of course, and the new facilities will be nice, but the global pandemic was not well timed for those of us who have to endure the current mess, especially when the existing mask requirement is not enforced.

[carmenjonze]

I love New York. I've by now spent a total of several years of my life there, and it's my place.

LaGuardia is still under construction, and from what I can see from the highway, the new terminals look pretty impressive. JFK depends on when you're there. During the day before everyone gets off work and leaves town, it's fine.

LAX was fine three years ago, but then they decided to completely redo it for the Olympics just to impress visitors and world leaders for a three week period sometime in the future. This is despite the fact that VIPs and some of the more sensitive teams have their own separate remote terminals and a separate back gate out near the beach.

In particular, the American Airlines terminals at LAX are vast, and have all manner of tunnels to other places, but right now everything in the arrival section is closed for a remodel that will cost us money and was not needed except to impress the Olympic visitors. The baggage claim in particular is reminiscent of a concentration camp. The whole airport in general is torn up, everything's a long bus ride in hellacious traffic to various lots cobbled together out in the boonies, and everything's temporary and tacky except for the showy international terminal that always seems to get the big bucks first.

This will change, of course, and the new facilities will be nice, but the global pandemic was not well timed for those of us who have to endure the current mess, especially when the existing mask requirement is not enforced.

Yes it must be really crazy-making. I was at NAMM last weekend and a ton of people who went have tested positive. About 50% of the people were masked, not to mention that it was in Anaheim. People behind the counters were masked. Regular shoppers weren't. Most "brown" people I saw were masked. Going to DTLA for my own purposes, most people on the street were not masked- same for going through South LA, probably 70?% of people were masked.

I stayed in OC with a friend who teaches down there. Many many Asian Americans (East Asian, South Asian) in their, part of town, so a ton of people were masked, though apparent demographics are not an indicator of much of anything.

I do know that in the Chinatowns and other Asian-American parts of town in SF, people have been masking since SARS. It's one reason imo that San Francisco had been doing so well with COVID up until this point. There are surges here, now, affecting people I know. This is not over, yet, though this country on the whole is pretending like it is...or, people simply just DGAF anymore.

[carmenjonze]

Oh and ours did?

Glennfs and the rest of the neonazi-friendly GOP voters do not see anti-masking, plotting to kill and kidnap a pro-masking governor, child separation policies, or these mass-murders as being filled with hate.

Discussing these current events is being hate-filled, though.

It's not allowed. Well, at least not when African Americans do so. Then it's time for the hemp rope.