Disappointing queue. Loose scheduling on the parts of Luke and I resulted in being three people short of the Chuck Close lecture. Last standing room gobbled up scant minutes before we sauntered up to the box office. From what articles and interviews I have read in art mags, plus the joy I've had in front of his paintings, Chuck Close seems like he's got a brain worth picking.

Luke convinced me that a rare experience underground should be undertaken to carry us towards uptown. Sinful personal avoidance of the subway, ever since that late summer shitstorm day. Being up close to dozens of commuter's halitosis also an overwhelming claustrophobic factor. A cab ride would most likely assured standing room.

One positive of the train. My lecherous nature reigns. Constant chubby snug in cotton. Always a few shorty honies reading their fashion tips, dangling from a metal bar for what seems my visual amusement. Impossible to stop the thoughts of pulling their hair, smacking their ass, and grunting hot breath down the back of their neck.

So, the 6 train didn't boogie quickly enough for Chuck Close lecture standing room.

Fortunately, we wuz in da Met. This is never a bad situation. If eternal cosmic forces were on my side, I would command them to fuse the Met and the New York Public Library together for the making of my palatial home. Sleeping under the bronze of Rodin. Chillin with a bottle of frosty Orangina in the periodical archive racks. Having my dinner in front of a collosal work of David, instead of an infernal boob tube. Leaning against the shelves, lustfully sucking in the aroma of paper aging in old books. Would be fine and good.

Spaced the Chuck Close prints, which we audibly stated sincere interest in. Wonderful wandering labyrinth though. Delightfully easy to lose yourself from gallery to gallery. We spaced the Chuck Close prints.

Hadn't rummaged around Medieval the last few visits. Approached the darkly lit towering wrought altar gate with a smile. Remnants of houses of worship scattered about. Only galleries where artists could present their work those days. Always fascinates me these adorning survivors of time, war and want. Wish I could run my fingertips over the wormholes burrowed in an ancient pine pieta. Respect enough to not infest them with my dirty monkey oils.

Had tons of storytime gears running commentary up in my skull. The surplanted rooms of the European decorative arts warps me into past planes. Wouldn't even know how to form the equation determining the number of visits I have taken to the Met. More than a German tourist, less than a curator of Egyptian artifacts. In all my visits, never before had I viewed the rooms of the European decorative arts. Shame and incredibly dope. It was like opening a letter from a gradeschool penpal that got lost behind the radiator and discovered decades later while sweeping up the dust.

Before the whole fine art feeding, we had to satisfy calorie hungers first. Luke was under orders from older sis to snap the apartment into shape for the new subletter. I might have been waiting in Thailand Cafe for a half hour before he showed. This is in no way upsetting to me. Hardly ever upsets me. Unless I am late for a scheduled whatever, my mind calmly entertains me in any waiting room situation. Plenty of animated knocking around in the skull to do, not gonna get perturbed by that.

I mention this waiting period because I was gifted with observing a silly person. If I am allowed to dip in someone else's comical life, I will always do so. I spotted him as I walked in, highlighted by the fact he was the only other customer in the joint. Sitting at my table, long trance stare out the window, reeling through Saturday morning cartoon footage projected on walls of my eyes, his cell rings. Oh joy.

Immediately, his deliberate misplaced emphasis of syllables and prethought punching intonation, signalled that I should bend an ear. Spoke like a natural born tool. He was extremely thankful that the person called. He wanted to know the exit code for his job termination. "Both YOU-OO and I KNO-oo-OW there are CO-oo-ODES for these things. I am not NAI-ie-EVE enough to beLIE-ie-EVE that SUCH work CO-oo-ODES do NOT exist." Apparently his branch of the Olive Garden, or "O.G." as he constantly referred to it as, shut it's doors here in Manhattan. Also apparently, this tragic end of paste food business was a shock to him as well as the entire global O.G. syndicate. How could an O.G. not prosper wherever it's khaki tastebud roots take hold? Someone should slap the board of O.G. trustees in the face with a brick oven. Can get a better baked ziti at a Famous Ray's knock off here, in sweet sweet Gotham, than any ketchup sauced noodle travesity of an Olive Garden. So they didn't believe he wasn't just fired instead of a victim of New Yorkers cruelty towards McPasta.

Throughout the course of his conversation, he told too much of himself. Too much, and too loud, around a chronic deducer like myself. He mentioned how he has lived in Chelsea for five years now. As if to suggest he was more metro salty than the person on the other end was giving him credit for. The person on the other end was right to do so.

He also offered that he was a grad student. That sealed the deal for me. He was living a pseudo fabulous life. Pretending to lead a life in general. Taking two classes, spreading his daddy's padded wallet through extended years of reality escaping post graduate college foolery. Must have been an overbearing headache producing waiter. I would have told him to relax with the theatrics if I was a customer. Luckily, I'm not a tank of asshole, and wouldn't find myself in a pleather covered booth at the Olive Garden. Praise linguini.