The Garden Inn raised its rates by 50% for our last
night, so we'd moved on to the Doubletree a block away,
which had been more expensive but had conveniently
dropped its price - I wonder why hotels do this, I mean
they are different brands of the same chain, and why
rates change so rapidly and in different directions, who
knows. It could be worse, they could be in cahoots and
raise their rates together. This at least temporarily
lets people like me get the occasional bargain without
having to hike out to New Jersey.

The Frick Museum is one of the monster treasures of the
western world. It's amazing what you can do when you're
one of the great robber barons of all time. As with
several others in his circle, Henry Clay Frick channeled
his energies into art collecting, and he did a mighty good
job of it. You'll see a number of works that you recognize
from the art books - three Vermeers, Holbein's Cromwell,
a Rembrandt self-portrait, Goya's Forge, and numerous
others their equal. Worth an afternoon or two or three,
depending on your devotion to old dead white people's work,
but we spent only from 11 something to alonst 3, ODing on
greatness and needing to get a breath of fresh air, so we
spent the rest of the afternoon strolling through Central
Park, something Bonnie had never done, and found ourselves
a bit hungry and on Central Park South, so straight to dinner
it was. Bonnie had the urge for a great burger, and I knew
just where to go. As I'd missed my annual visit to Commander
Catcop at La Bonne Soupe, I took her there.

Usually, I and my friends are under the watchful eye of the
Cat, who is thick with the proprietor, and we are treated like
reflected royalty. This time, in the late afternoon, the B or
perhaps C team was on, so no amount of namedropping did any
good, and we were treated like the nobodies we are. Not that
that's altogether a bad thing - anonymity has its virtues.

At my urging Bonnie ordered the ground sirloin with bordelaise,
which comes with shoestring frites. It's probably 12 oz of
exceedingly good beef, I think from Pat Lafrieda, cooked
perfectly medium-rare, with an average salty brown sauce that
would have been better on the side. The frites, as expected,
were enough for three and also very good.

The house Cotes du Rhone was average but drinkable.

I got the prix fixe with onion soup ($1 supplement) - steak
frites rare, hold the frites, and chocolate mousse. I also
got my own glass of Cotes du Rhone, as as I recalled it came
with. The hanger steak was very tasty but on the tough side,
which was okay except that the knife was dull, and the mousse
was sugary but as expected. Sad to say, I got charged for the
wine; on inquiry, I discovered that the wine isn't free any
more, but when the Cat comes in, it's still free. Pooh. The
guy had a small deduction off his tip, but to be fair, it
wasn't really his fault (if indeed he was telling the truth).
Oh, the onion soup was exceedingly salty but made with
distinctly Gruyere cheese and distinctly real stock.

The MTA trains were running on a weird construction-based
schedule, and we ended up on a car that didn't go where we
wanted to, so we had to change and then walk from Herald
Square to Penn Station (not difficult, even with luggage),
but it was an irritation to see one's chosen stop closed
owing to maintenance and to have to figure out alternate
pathways on the fly.

2V 168 NYP BOS 1900 2333

We got to our track with five minutes to spare and discovered
that there was some mishugas going on, so we were held milling
around for an extra third of an hour, not bad considering it
was Amtrak and New York.

This time we sped right along, making up all our time and then
a bit; we came in quite early, and getting the subway was a
piece of cake.
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