penn station

There is a sign in penn station. on on that sign a smaller sign is scotched-taped in the middle of it. the smaller sign says about the larger sign, "sign out of service."
Maybe I'm the only guy walking through Penn Station today who caught the irony.

Every morning on my way to work, I walk by a 6-foot rotating lobster suspended above the sidewalk. Tourists take pictures in front of it.

The Lobster is merely 1 block before the guy who every day asks me while tring to hand me a small sheet of paper if I've ever been to a comedy show. He's standing next to a guy with a portable credit-card processing machine who wants to sell me a ticket to ride on the double-decker bus, but who by now knows better than to waste his breath asking me.

Another half-block and I am safe in the refuge of my building, where the security guards who know my name refer to me as Mr. Tursi (not that I am special, they would refer to the receptionist by Mr. Lastname if the receptionist wasn't himself a security guard,) and where I can get a nice freshly-prepared egg sandwich on the 16th floor cafeteria which doesn't take cash - they swipe my security badge as payment - the machine that adds money to my security badge account takes cash - and which has it's own web site, and if you were to visit this web site you'd see a dizzying array of promotions such as submit a recipe and win $50 to your security badge account, which are probably paid attention to only by HR execs. They have coffee, but I seldom see anyone buying coffee from the cafeteria because each floor has a pantry, and in that pantry, next to the vending machine, the fridge/freezer, and the microwave there is a 4-foot tall stack of paper cups and a Flavia coffee machine which takes no payment.

Hey, did I mention the sign in penn station that was posted on a larger sign and said "Sign out of service?" That was pretty funny.