Airduct Administration

Welcome!

Welcome to Airduct Administration. In this course we will be discussing Airduct neutrality; airduct hygiene, health and safety; airducts and spam; and spam spam airducts and spam.

Obviously, airduct administration is metaphorical, and actually this is a page about all forms of ventilation. First for some definitions. Someone who speaks through an airduct and you can't see their lips move is known as a Ventiloquist.

An Airduct must never EVER be confused with an Air Duck. Though this is a common mistake (particularly use of 'Duct tape' and 'Duck tape') an Air Duck is in fact a flying duck. This must not be confused with a flying fuck. What this page is not about, is flying fucks. Back to ventilation...

That's enough of a cover I think. On to the real reason we're here <_< >_>

Operation Airduct: New York New York

Let's twalk about nu Yawk...

Signing off, Agent Air Duck

Mission Brief: Intelligence have just informed us that there are some air-ducts in New York which require, well.... administering; thus necessitating a trip. Several good ducks have died to bring us this information....

Looking inconspicuous in New York City

To Do

	Not Get visas, cause we don't need to, honest!
	Book flights
	Arrange transport to/from airport
	Book time off work
	Try but fail to book tickets for 'The Daily Show'
	Make CD entitled 'New York city beats' with songs containing the words 'New York', 'America', and 'Holiday', ('holiday' of course being the codename for 'air-duct repairs') for on the way to the airport
	Book accommodation
	Get travel insurance
	Get some USD
	Complete detailed itinerary
	Create a 'To take' list
	ETI Analysis INC. Decision Making

Who's going anyway?

Volunteers with the appropriate qualifications are:

- Matt

- Elin

When to go

Possible times to go are:

- Early September (just before Elin goes back to uni)

- Elin would prefer not to be in New Yawk for her bday

Elin goes back to uni: Monday 1st October.

Therefore good dates would be (and remember there is a mid-september festival [see below]):

Times between Sat 1st Sept and Fri 21st Sept.

Suggestions:

Fri 7th - > Mon 17th

Mon 10th -> Thurs 20th

Either way, I would have thought 10 days would be enough to do the job.

Where to Stay

Possibilities..

The Gershwin Hotel - a hotel/youth hostel. Obviously the hotel part of it is more expensive than the youth hostel.

The Hotel Belle Claire - Economy Room (shared bath) $109-$189 apparenly very well situated.

Hostels in NYC

Barbara's recommendation: The Edison Hotel (Times Sq.) - is a 'lovely hotel' -sounds expensive I think $230/ room/ night is too 'lovely' for our requirements, we are only airduct administrators after all!

I think we're looking at a youth hostel situation, perhaps around $35 pppn (not including taxes and this room occupancy nonsence of $3.50/room/night) ~ £215pppn

On the Youth Hostel front, this looks like a good one. We could get a 'split double' (private room with twin beds), at $55 per room per night (not incl. taxes). Great location (in East village, close to Broadway). Small rooms, and walls made of cardboard, shared bath/ shower facilities, I think these downsides are OK. A hotel would be too expensive, I'm tempted just to go for this one to be honest.

If we have to go for a hotel, some (relatively) cheapies are: Riverside Tower, Thirty One, and Murray Hill Inn.

We are now booked to stay at the following hotel/ hostel, for the entirity of our stay. Reservation ref. 2164517.

Bowery's Whitehouse Hotel 340 BOWERY NEW YORK, NY 10012 +1 212 477 5623

What to do

Caz's suggestions:

places I'd recommend are Sushi Samba in the West Village - if you like sushi, you simply HAVE to go. Also, if you like cupcakes, check out 'Crumbs' bakery in Manhattan and also the famous Magnolia (as featured on Sex and the City!) bakery (which I didn't have time to go to *sob*)...and there's an amazing milkshake place called Island Burger (great burgers too) I'd recommend. And go to central park to the free open air theatre (you just need to queue for tickets) and the zoo is there and you must see the turtles in the lake! Hmm, there is also the natural history museum near there...lots of information, do any of these things sound good? Where abouts will you be staying? let me know if you want further details on addresses on any of the places I've mentioned!

Nick's suggestions:

the street that Nick used to live on - Saint Mark's place, 8th street, 3rd avenue, nr. Washington Square.

There are some suggestions in They Might Be Giants chronicle 'New York City' which outlines places most seriously affected by the Ventilation system meltdown:

"Statue of Liberty, Staten Island Ferry, Co-op City, Katz's and Tiffany's* Central Park, Brooklyn Bridge, The Empire State where Dylan lived** Coney Island and Times Square, Rockefeller Center Wish I was there"

With this in mind, I have determined the most seriously affected areas as follows:

Brooklyn:

• "Take a trip to Brooklyn. Seriously. If you like cheesecake - go to Junior's. You won't be disappointed" -hmm...cheesecake..

• Brooklyn Bridge - Walk across the Brooklyn Bridge, have an ice cream at the Brooklyn Ice Cream Factory at Fulton Ferry Landing – perhaps the best place to take pictures of downtown skyscrapers.

• Coney Island

LOWER Manhattan ("Downtown"):

• The Battery, or 'Battery Park' - trips to see the Statue of Liberty depart from Battery Park so...

• Statue of Liberty - little known fact, The statue of liberty is actually in..New Jersey! But the New Yorkers don't advertise that very loudly...

• "Go downtown at South Street Seaport and get some half-price Broadway tickets. You can't come and NOT see a play."

• Little Italy: Someone suggested the Feast of San Gennaro which is in mid-September and lasts for 11 days.

• Chinatown and SoHo.

• Other places of interest; City Hall, Wall Street, World Trade Center site, and the Woolworth Building.

• Greenwich Village, including Magnolia Bakery - apparently does the "best cupcakes in the world", but we'll be the judge of that.

MIDDLE Manhattan:

No-one steps on a church in (Peter Venkman's) town. (That includes you Mr. Stay Puft!)

• The Shandor Building - Built by Dr. Ivo Shandor, a medical doctor who performed a lot of unnecessary surgery. After the First World War, he decided mankind was too sick to survive. He designed and built the building that stands at 55 Central Park West with a specialized roof cap designed to act as a telemetry tracker for supernatural energy. Its purpose was to focus that energy and create a doorway into another world…the world of Gozer the Traveler!

The ventilation system of this building has never fully recovered since the Marshmallow incident of 1984 - As he approached the Shandor Building, Mr. Stay Puft’s cute demeanor soon changed to that of pure evil. He overcame the problem of the church next to the building and in his way by simply stepping on it, pissing Peter off to no end. Ray finally overcame his shock and fear and led the boys in a charge to start blasting their pastry foe.

• The Library - The largest non-academic library in the United States. It is housed in a beautiful building by Carrer and Hastings, which is seen as the greatest example of Beaux Arts architecture. Business is now booming, despite the paranormal incident (also) of 1984.

It was just another day in the life of Alice the librarian…that is until she met a ghost. Getting wind of it, Dr. Raymond Stantz immediately snatched up his partner, Dr. Peter Venkman, from their University lab and met up with Dr. Egon Spengler at the library to investigate. They soon learned, however, that they bit off more than they could chew as the old lady ghost they were looking for turned into a roaring monster. The experience wasn’t a complete waste, fortunately, as braniac Egon received readings on one of his devices that told him it would be possible to trap and hold ghosts.

• Columbia University - Home to prominent parapsychologists: Egon Spengler, Peter Venkman & Ray Stance before they started their own business

• St. Patrick's Cathedral - The largest Catholic cathedral in the United States.

• Restaurant Row in Hell's Kitchen - In addition to the usual American, Caribbean, Chinese, French, German, Greek, Italian, Irish, Mexican and Thai restaurants, there are multiple Afghan, Argentine, Ethiopian, Peruvian, Turkish, and Vietnamese restaurants.

• Broadway - Can we see a show, paint the town red, and then Blame it all on the nights on Broadway, Singin' them sweet sounds, To that crazy, crazy town...?

• Rockefeller Center This huge centre needs some attention. Just take a look at this: RC Camera - as you can see, really rather serious. I think it might be a good idea also to check out the top of the centre to get a good overview of the city: Top View

• Empire State Building and the Flatiron Building.

UPPER Manhattan:

• Times Square - (apparently there's a Toys 'R' Us in Times Square that has an indoor ferris wheel among other things. A couple of people have suggested this...how random!)

• Central Park - things to do in Central Park include these 10 things

• Chrysler Building

• "Check out the Museum of Natural History"

• "A Walk Through Harlem. Harlem is worth going to... Sylvia's is the standby, but there's also Sunday Brunch with the Harlem Gospel Choir..."

• Map of Manhattan

• WikiTravel have some great (and numerous) ideas for attractions and whatnot.

Harlem Gospel Brunch

Harlem Gospel Show

Brunch Menu

It costs around £20 for the show and the brunch and is not *actually* in Harlem, but Times Square.

Another option could be going to Harlem and slipping into any random church and then eating at Sylvia's afterwards. Or we could not do it at all if you don't want to. What thinkest thou?

Daily Show

Organisation and Discussion

ETI

Elin's Tentative Itinerary

Transport

Getting around in the Big Apple

Visa

US Embassy Visa info

We might be able to go without the aid of a visa! If our passports are machine readable, or something...

More Visa Info

Particularly useful Visa info about passports

To the airport

This is now booked with BAA Gatwick - £46.80. We'll drive to Gatwick airport for about 10.20am and park up.

Flights

Flights are booked: We're going with 'Zoom' airlines - £262.90pp - both direct flights, approx. 8 hrs each way

Outbound Flight

From	To	Date and Time	Flight No	Class	Carrier
London - LGW (south)	New York - JFK (T4)	Mon 10th Sep 2007 13:00 -> 15:45	UKZ101	Economy Standard	Zoom Airlines Ltd

Return flight

From	To	Date and Time	Flight No	Class	Carrier
New York - JFK (T4)	London - LGW (south)	Thu 20th Sep 2007 17:30 -> 06:00 next day	UKZ102	Economy Standard	Zoom Airlines Ltd

Max luggage allowance pp = 2 pcs of luggage totalling not more than 20 kgs

When we get to JFK, we can take the tube, or a taxi, see wikitravel

Travel Insurance

Might be wise to get travel insurance. The post office is generally the bench-mark place, from whence to try to find a cheaper quote. I think I used Halifax when I went to Mex/ Cuba. - Matt

Post office - £53 pp

Via Money Supermarket.com - Flexi-Cover - £29 for a 'couple' (it just said that meant 2 people)

Let's just go with: Endsleigh 'Essential' at about £30 pp.

To Take

For a list of things to take, go here.

Budget

Budget details are available here.

Recommended food eating

A Big Apple (photo op!), A "Sub", cup a'joe or "kworfee", a chili dog, apple pie, sloppy joe, bagel, runzas/bierocks, Manhattan Clam Chowder, twinkie, sweet potato pie, snow cone, burrito/taco, moon pie, an Italian Hero or "Hoagie", Creole i.e. Jambalaya, cheeseburger, bastrami, a chinese in Chinatown, an Italian in Little Italy and the delights of Restaurant Row.

Recommended film watching

Some of the best films set in New York are as follows:

Miracle on 34th Street, On the Town, Sabrina, Rear Window, Breakfast At Tiffany's, The Manchurian Candidate, Shaft, The Godfather (I, II & III), Taxi Driver, Raging Bull, Ghostbusters, Crocodile Dundee, Highlander, Wall Street, Harlem Nights, When Harry Met Sally, Goodfellas, Die Hard with a Vengeance, Being John Malkovich, Eyes Wide Shut, American Psycho, Gangs of New York, Spiderman