Wi-fi and weirdos

We don’t take the subway very often. It’s not because it’s inconvenient – there is a station right around the corner, just past the medley of weirdos on the old bank’s stone steps – or because it’s expensive – public transport in NYC is incredibly cheap, and efficient – or even because 14th Street station is filthy dirty and home to even more weirdos. No, all these things aside, it comes down to the bubonic plague.

You may think I am getting my cities confused. Or my centuries. This is not London in the fourteenth century. Or Paris in the seventeenth. But there are rats. They can be spotted poking and sniffing around along the tracks as soon as a train pulls out of the station, brazen as you like. Thank goodness New Yorkers like to chuck their trash on to the rails with gay abandon. Say the rats.

Yet it’s not even the rats. They are subterranean entertainment while you wait for the next train to arrive and try not to make eye contact with any weirdos. No, it all comes down to the fact that He Who Knows Best read somewhere (source to be confirmed) that some scientist investigating on some part of the subway system found traces of the plague. So now we walk everywhere we can, and at a push we take a bus, where a whole new species of weirdo can be found.

Today, however, we struck out for the E train because #6 was having dinner with a friend in Queens and we didn’t want her coming back alone after dark. She, of course, scoffed at this because she is 14 years old and knows best, and also because she foresaw the agony of accompanying ageing parents who try to get from A to B (or Manhattan to Queens) without touching anything.

I was delighted when the E train arrived, not just because we didn’t have to linger on the platform in the sweltering heat but because it was a Subway Library Train. I had read about the train just this morning, so was excited to encounter it on the very first attempt. The train is part of an initiative by the city library and various other interested parties. Basically, the free wi-fi allows you to explore all sorts of literary gems online, if for no other purpose than to give you an excuse to avoid eye contact with the weirdos. As an added bonus, if you upload a photo of the train, you can win a prize. I do love a good prize.

I was explaining all this to He Who Knows Best as he sat with his hands firmly folded between his legs, having got thus far without making physical contact with anything not directly related to himself. I could see that he was itching to whip out his phone and see what was on offer, but that would have entailed releasing his hands, so he tried to peer over my shoulder instead. Enjoying his discomfort, I kept my screen just out of reach, so that he was wriggling and squirming in his seat, hands still hidden from sight. I looked up just in time to spot the other passengers glancing away quickly, obviously not wanting to make eye contact with the weirdo sitting next to me.

Inspiration struck today at ... Jack’s Wife Freda, Carmine Street

The website for this little eaterie describes it as ‘an immigrants’ love story’. Which makes me wonder why He Who Knows Best hasn’t opened a trendy little restaurant named after me.

Pros: Good simple food, reasonable prices, coffee topped up before you have time to finish the last gulp.

Cons: Acoustics are terrible – the crowd at lunchtime were twenty-somethings without volume control, which made conversation a bit of a pain, especially for those of us whose hearing is declining with each advancing year.