NYC Hates Babies (Part 2)

The girls at Bryant Park.

Not having learned my lesson the first time, the girls and I ventured back into New York City, this time with Erin and her almost two-year-old son, Patrick. We were headed to Bryant Park because they were having a Broadway concert series that day. We secured a small table and pulled up four chairs for me, Erin, Harper and Patrick. Violet would eat her lunch sitting in the stroller next to us.

Not two minutes after we sat down someone walked up and asked if we needed all four chairs.
"Yep, we'll be using all our chairs," I said with a smile and went back to digging through my purse. A couple minutes later someone asked again. And then someone else. And every time they seemed truly confused, and somewhat annoyed, that only two adults would need four chairs.

"Can I take one of these?" Someone else asked with his hand already on the chair.

"No. Move on," I said. My patience was at a low.

"Really? Jeez," he said.

"There are four humans here!"

It might have been a bit much. But the lady two tables over with a shitzu sitting next to her wasn't bothered once, from what I saw.

The funny thing is, kids hate sitting. They are allergic to sitting. So the whole time I'm fighting the good fight, contemplating making "Kids are People Too" shirts, at least one of the kids was not in their highly coveted chairs. I perhaps picked the wrong cause.

After lunch we went sight seeing. Here's Harper at the Empire State Building and Madison Square Garden. She was riveted.

In Macy's at Herald Square we decided it'd be a good time for a bathroom break. We walked up to a man folding shirts and asked where the closest bathroom was.

"The men's bathroom is right over there," he said.

I looked at myself (a girl), Erin (a girl), Harper (a girl), Violet (a girl) and Patrick (not a girl).

"You're in the men's department," he said for clarification.

Apparently if you work in the men's department at Macy's, the location of all other non-men bathrooms are kept top secret. I've been trying to teach Harper to only get the urge to use the restroom in gender appropriate areas, but apparently she isn't getting it.

After finding the restroom on our own, we headed out. The kind doorman saw us coming with our strollers and happily opened the door for us.

"Here ya go," he said and handed Erin Patrick's shoe that had dropped on the ground.

"Oh thanks! I didn't even know he took them off," she said.

"Eh, small brains," he replied.

I thought I heard him wrong, but Erin agreed she heard "small brains" too.  I'm not sure if he was insulting kids or women, though. I'd probably be able to figure it out, if only my brain weren't so annoyingly small...

The rest of the day went just fine. We got a lot of "Wow, you have your hands full" comments, which aren't exactly insults, but seem a little misplaced considering the parent to kid ratio was 2:3. The guy in the pizza shop told me to stop yelling at him when I ordered our pizza. Not sure what that was about. And Erin got her picture taken by someone who she thinks writes for a what not to wear blog. Here's Erin reenacting the photo:

But none of this matters because I had a blast those few days visiting New York. And I'd go back in a heartbeat. I could explore a paper bag with Erin and still have an awesome time. But since open letters seem to be popular on social media, here's mine:

An Open Letter to New York City

Dear NYC,

Go to hell.

Sincerely,

Laura