Current mood:	satisfied
Entry tags:	american museum of natural history, pen, reading, shoes, writing

Museum of Natural History and PEN Literary Awards

Tuesday, May 20, 2008

Waning Moon

Pluto Retrograde

Jupiter Retrograde

Rainy and mild

My head is so stuffed full of information, it’s ready to burst.  It was a good day, but a long one.

Train ride in was mediocre, as usual.  I couldn’t stand the thought of being underground, so I decided to take the bus up Madison Avenue and then across 79^th St. to the west side.  The bus ride up Madison was excruciatingly slow, because there was a water main break at 57^th St.  The ride across the park was fine, except for the bratty, spoiled little rich kids with their nannies on the bus.  One, in particular, a little girl of about six, was exceptionally horrid.  Tantrums, screaming, whining, hitting other kids, trying to hit adults.  She didn’t try it with me – like most bullies, she’s a coward at heart.  I glared at her once and she hid behind the nanny.   I’m not one for hitting a kid very often, but this one needed a good smack.  Actually, maybe if they started by telling her “no” occasionally – and meaning it – it would make a difference.  If she’s like this at six, what will she be like as a teenager, or as an adult?  It’s a shame, because she’s very pretty.  Too bad the inside doesn’t match the outside.

The Museum of Natural History was full of kids.  I forgot that this is the time of year for school trips.  You can tell the city kids from the suburban kids.  The city kids are loud and rambunctious, but, living in the city, they’re very aware of personal space.  They invade their friends’ space, but they’re careful not to invade that of strangers.  The suburban kids have the same unwarranted sense of entitlement that their parents do, and just don’t care. 

There was a really cute little boy of about eight with his dad, who thought EVERYTHING was AMAZING.  There was a little girl of about eight or nine making sure her younger brothers and sisters didn’t wander off – there were about five in that group.  The youngest could barely walk, but liked all the animals.  She’d read a bunch of books before coming to the museum and was telling them stories about everything – it was great.  A teacher-in-the-making (and most of it was even right).  There was a girl of about eleven or twelve sketching, photographing, taking lots of notes in the Northwest Coastal Indians exhibit.  Either she had a paper to write, or she’s an archaeologist-in-the-making.  One little kid fell asleep in a corner of the Hall of Gems – it’s dark and only the cases with the gems are lit.  There was a group of teenaged boys wandering through North American Mammals, singing Pat Benatar lyrics.  I told them I was impressed that they knew the lyrics to her songs, and they all blushed.

The Museum has a lot of stuff for kids, and several of the shops are geared specifically towards kids, filled with learning toys and books – really, they have one of the best shops I’ve ever seen.  Low on the kitschy souvenirs, high on the education-presented-engagingly.

I wandered through the special floor of the main store dedicated to books.  I could have easily dropped nine or ten THOUSAND dollars just in that bookstore.  Fabulous stuff.

I visited some of my favorites – the Blue Whale, the African elephants, the owls, the biodiversity exhibit.  I spent more time in the Human Evolution exhibit than I planned, because they were explaining archaeological and anthropological methods and evaluations, and I figured that would be good for the Gwen/Justin books.