Running in Central Park: No Races!

Finally! Today, I ran in Central Park and there were NO RACES.  None.  No one was in my way, and I got a glorious 4 miles out of my system.  A-maz-ing!  During my warm up walk to 72nd (on the east side), I saw my man the bagpiper who is practicing every Sunday.  I like to think that he plays in the southeast corner of the Park because he can't play in his apartment building because he's too loud for the neighbors.  He's up on a small hill and away from the main pathway.  There's no bag or hat for money.  I seriously think he's just there to practice.

During my cool down walk from 72nd (on the west side), I saw a man walking his parakeet.  Seriously, folks.  The very normal looking middle-aged man in a polo shirt brought his little blue bird with him to the Park so he could walk in the tall grass (supervised).

 I also ran right past an artifact that's been in the NY news lately -- Cleopatra's Needle.  I've seen it a few times now, and it's surprisingly not in my book!  

 According to the Central Park website:

The Obelisk, nicknamed Cleopatra’s Needle, is the oldest man-made object in Central Park.  A pair of obelisks was commissioned for Heliopolis on the banks of the Nile in 1500 BC by an Egyptian pharaoh who wished to celebrate his 30 years of reign. The monuments were then moved to Alexandria in 18AD. They remained there until one obelisk was moved to London in 1879. The New York one was erected in the Park two years later and was offered by the Egyptian Khedive to America in exchange for funds to modernize his country.

However, lately, Egypt has been questioning how its gift is being treated.  According to the Village Voice blog:

The minister of Egypt's Supreme Council of Antiquities, Zahi Hawass, claimed that the obelisk was being slowly destroyed by life in New York (much like the rest of us) and that if we couldn't treat it properly, well, perhaps they would have to bring it back to Egypt. New York City mostly denied that the obelisk had suffered more than the usual growing pains -- after all, it was built back in 1500 B.C. and has been living outside in New York City since the 1880s -- what does one expect? This is no spring obelisk!

Egypt may not be the best place for a historic monument at the moment though (excerpt from NYTimes blog):

But Egypt is not necessarily the safest place for precious artifacts these days. Not long after Dr. Hawass put New York City on notice, looters ransacked the Egyptian Museum in Cairo during the upheaval that toppled the government. 

We'll just have to see where this goes.