Talking Times Square

There are few better cures for depression than taking a stroll down Times Square, especially during the daytime. The sights and sounds of the place soon divert the mind to thoughts unlike any that are likely to pop up anywhere else.

Like exactly how many cups of noodles one would have to sell to bankroll the twenty square foot billboard that advertises Cup Noodles brand cups of noodles at [above] that famous juncture where 7th and Broadway merge or diverge, depending on how you look at it. It is the largest billboard in a sea of billboards.

Or the extent to which the Times Square 2004 reflects or fails to reflect the spirit that produced Simon & Garfunkel's Sounds of Silence, which is being played by an appropriately registered street quartet three blocks up from the MTV studios. Bleecker Street is another issue entirely, though related.

For a moment one marvels at the speed and determination with which a man in a wheelchair cuts through the bidirectional foot traffic for which this area is so famous and so frustrating. Then one looks down and sees two feet attached to this infirm person eschewing his chair's slightly askew chrome footrests and paddling madly in tandem on the pavement.

And finally, one can contemplate, hopefully without bitterness, the sheer marketing brilliance of the federal government establishing a multi-floor DEA museum only blocks away from Madame Tussaud's. And this when Clinton took flak in this city for using his office in Harlem as a positive public relations vehicle. At least it was a relatively inexpensive public relations vehicle.