I stand corrected. Every once in a while, midtown does give back something more than a paycheck.

You see, New York is one of the few places I know where you can cut work early, see Tom Cruise, find a nice rock climbing bolder and finish the New Yorker all in time to see Sleater Kinney play at Roseland. All of this, conveniently enough, is within short walking distance of my work. I would have rather seen Katie, but alas, us gawkers take what comes.

Tom was headed out of Letterman, probably doing a promo War of the Worlds, that remake-of-a-movie-that-was-actually-a-remake-of-a-radio-program. (Come on now Spielberg, now you have run out of ideas? The man who defined what an aliens should look like? Do I need to take you to the Brooklyn Superhero store?). Tom, for what it is worth, looks like a pretty normal guy when you see him. A bit flamboyant perhaps, but not that much to write home about.

And so we move on.

There is a great bouldering boulder in the southern tip of Central park. PICTURE. This is a nice little jewel to stumble into. I think that I may head out there and do some climbing during my lunch break if I can talk someone into to spotting me. Funny, I worked at a camping store for months, and I never scoped out Central park for climbing spots. Now that I know the rumors are true, I think some city climbing is in order. I would love to climb in Brooklyn, but Long Island is essentially detritus left over from two glaciers— no nicely exposed bedrock there. Damn.

And that leaves Sleater Kinney to wrap up this post. Not bad. Not bad at all. If they are in your town and you have the time and money, you should drop the change to go see them.

Summer. Stars, rocks and rock stars. I love this time of year.