Not So Happy Halloween
As I mentioned in yesterday's post I am not a fan of Halloween but since everyone was all abuzz about it, I decided to to attend the Halloween parade in NYC last night. The parade starts in the Village and goes up to 23rd Street so we decided to catch it near the end since our office is on 30th. So it was me and some co-workers, Karin, Christina, and Michele and then we met up with Andy and a bunch of his co-worker people to have drinks before the parade. Karin, Christina, and Michele left the bar a little earlier than we did and staked out what looked to be an awesome spot on 19th Street. They weren't on the Avenue but the street was going to be blocked off so we could still see everything really well. No one would be standing in front of us.So we meet up with them and the parade still doesn't start for another hour. There was a little bit of shoving going on but nothing too bad...and the streets were PACKED! Wayyyy more people than were at the Thanksgiving Day parade. It was really cool just to watch all the people walking by in their costumes...my favorite were the oompa loompas and the guy dressed as a vagina.
Anyway..so the parade starts and it was really cool...there were people on stilts dancing and some really cool costumes but the best was all of the papier-mache puppets...very cool. I think Karin got some good pictures and I'll post those later. So about ten minutes into the parade the police for some inexplicable reason start letting people through the street again even though the parade is still going on. So all of the people that had good views before, including us now can't see anything. Pushing and shoving ensues. The whole time we were there Andy had his arm braced on the scaffolding and I thought he was just propping himself up but the whole time people were pushing and shoving in the back and he was shielding Michele and Christina from getting crushed. Then a huge guy behind Andy starts throwing punches so there's a big fight breaking out behind him. Then people start jumping over the barricades and into the street. At this point I started to panic because the fight is going on right behind us and if people really started pushing I knew I was going down so I tell everyone I'm bailing and I jump over the barricade. After that I look back and there's a flood of people pushing over the barricade. The cops had absolutely no control over what was going on. It was ridiculous.
So everyone else that was with me then tries to make it over the barricade. Andy tries to get over and the cop grabs the front of his shirt and pushes him back over the barricade and won't let him through even though he just let the guy that was throwing the punches over...it was a huge mess. Andy, Karin, Christina, and Michele finally made it out of the huge mass of people and met up with me. At that point I was just like, all right, we're getting the hell out of here. Andy and I headed home but the three of them tried to catch more of the parade and ended up getting caught between two more fights again....it was just crazy. I've always worried about getting crushed or stampeded in crowds but last night was the first time that I ever felt like it really might happen. Scary stuff.
One more Halloween note...I was walking up to the office at 7 this morning and I see a girl walking towards me with her hair disheveled and her Halloween costume on and her shoes in her hand. This must be the worst morning ever for the walk of shame. Not only is it obvious that you've just hooked up with some random guy and are making your way home but you're dressed up like a birthday cake while you're doing this. very funny.
Labels: Halloween, NYC sights
posted by carolyn @ 7:25 AM
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