Meet Benny

• You say “the city” and expect everyone to know that this means Manhattan.
• You have never been to the Statue of Liberty or the Empire State Building.
• You can get into a four-hour argument about how to get from Columbus Circle to Battery Park at 3:30 on the Friday before a long weekend, but can’t find Wisconsin on a map.
• Hookers and the homeless are invisible.
• The subway makes sense.
• You believe that being able to swear at people in their own language makes you multi-lingual.
• You’ve considered stabbing someone just for saying “The Big Apple”.
• The most frequently used part of your car is the horn.
• You call an 8′ x 10′ plot of patchy grass a yard.
• You consider Westchester “upstate”.
• You think Central Park is “nature.”
• You see nothing odd about the speed of an auctioneer’s speaking.
• You’re paying $1,200 for a studio the size of a walk-in closet and you think it’s a “steal.”
• You’ve been to New Jersey twice and got hopelessly lost both times.
• You pay more each month to park your car than most people in the U.S. pay in rent.
• You haven’t seen more than twelve stars in the night sky since you went away to camp as a kid.
• You go to dinner at 9 and head out to the clubs when most Americans are heading to bed.
• Your closet is filled with black clothes.
• You haven’t heard the sound of true absolute silence since the 80s, and when you did, it terrified you.
• You pay $5 without blinking for a beer that cost the bar 28 cents.
• You take fashion seriously.
• Being truly alone makes you nervous.
• You have 27 different menus next to your telephone.
• Going to Brooklyn is considered a “road trip.”
• America west of the Hudson is still theoretical to you.
• You’ve gotten jaywalking down to an art form.
• You take a taxi to get to your health club to exercise.
• Your idea of personal space is no one actually standing on your toes.
• $50 worth of groceries fit in one paper bag.
• You have a minimum of five “worst cab ride ever” stories.
• You don’t notice sirens anymore.
• You live in a building with a larger population than most American towns.
• Your doorman is Russian, your grocer is Korean your deli man is Israeli, your building super is Italian, your laundry guy is Chinese, your favorite bartender is Irish, your favorite diner owner is Greek, the watchseller on your corner is Senegalese, your last cabbie was Pakistani, your newsstand guy is Indian and your favorite falafel guy is Egyptian.
• You’re suspicious of strangers who are actually nice to you.
• You secretly envy cabbies for their driving skills.
• You think $7.00 to cross a bridge is a fair price.
• Your door has more than three locks.
• Your favorite movie has DeNiro in it.
• You consider eye contact an act of overt aggression.
• You run when you see a flashing “Do Not Walk” sign at the intersection.
• You’re 35 years old and don’t have a driver’s license.
• You ride in a subway car with no air conditioning just because there are seats available.
• You’re willing to take in strange people as roommates simply to help pay the rent.
• There is no North and South. It’s uptown or downtown.
• When you’re away from home, you miss “real” pizza and “real” bagels.
• You know the differences between all the different Ray’s Pizzas.
• You’re not in the least bit interested in going to Times Square on New Year’s Eve.
• Your internal clock is permanently set to know when Alternate Side of the Street parking regulations are in effect.
• You know what a bodega is.
• You know how to fold the New York Times in half, vertically, so that you can read it on the subway or bus without knocking off other passenger’s hats.
• Someone bumps into you, and you check for your wallet…
• You cringe at hearing people pronounce Houston St. like the city in Texas.
• Film crews on your block annoy you, not excite you.

Funny thing is - most of that list is OH SO TRUE!