What seems like a good idea at the time...

...predictably turns out to be just another excuse for a bath.

(Please forgive the fuzzy pictures. I was too busy trying to avoid becoming the next canvas...and trying to keep Lilli from eating the paint...)

Start spreading the news

Gavin is making me a Manhattan - we've been home for three days now. The four of you who read this blog are probably wondering when you can tune in to Jeopardy! to see him in action.

The truth is, they won't tell us if he's been shortlisted. After being put through a kind of short version of everything that goes on during the television show (the public 'get to know you' segment, a simulated game play in groups of three with buzzers while the competition waited and watched) and then being tested again with another 50-question quiz, Gavin's audition group was told "don't wait by the phone." At some point over the next eighteen months we may get a call and an invitation to travel to Los Angeles on our own dime...or we may not. Don't worry, we'll keep you posted. Or I will, at least. Gavin is still very secretive about the whole thing.

But wasn't that a great excuse to travel to New York?

It was a surprisingly familiar place - around every corner there was another building or skyscape that I had seen in a movie, or heard referenced in a song, or had sung about myself when I was much younger. And while we did manage to spend a lot of money in the city, I'm happy to say we also found a lot of things that were "real good, for free." We also caught up with some old friends from my musicology days, who happened to have connections at a truly lovely restaurant. The company and food were some of the best I've enjoyed in a long time.

And yes, everytime I saw a mom with her kids doing any number of the fabulous things for families that can be done in that city, I either teared up, or just went ahead and cried.

Most of the time though, New York confronted us with marvel after marvel. I know real life is never that simple - I won't try to tackle the darker side of Gotham in this post. For a tourist, it is a great city.

Here are just a few of my favourite New York things.

Indulging my geeky side at the Museum of Natural History.

What is "Gavin's favourite dinosaur, Alex?"

I love this kind of art. Bas-relief? Walls that aren't just walls.

I also love seeing this side of Gavin. Without the kids, he gets even sillier.

Random words of wisdom from the decor of a seventeenth-century virginal in the instrument collection of the Met.