But all that gets trumped by this story.
One day after a long exciting drive through the city down from the Bronx Zoo, I get home to where I’m staying, the Hotel QT, near Times Sqaure. I have a chat to the bar tender for suggestions on where to eat that night, since the QT doesn’t have a kitchen (this is Andre Balazs’ idea of a $200 a night “budget” hotel in NYC). I can’t get reception from the depths of bar, so I go outside to make the reservation.
And while I’m outside on the pavement, I see a Lincoln Town Car pull up with a smoking bonnet, right opposite where I’m standing. The driver steps out and after a couple of minutes of jawing and pacing, he decides that he’s had enough and walks off! All the while the car continues to emit lots of menacing smoke.
By now I’ve forgotten all about making the reservation as my focus has now shifted to the small balls of flames that are starting to drip from under the engine. And it’s at this moment I go from ‘concerned citizen’ to ‘blog content hungry whore’. I bust out my camera phone and start taping. This image is a frame near the end when the front of the car bursts into a flames in front of my eyes.
Unfortunately the car doesn’t do anything very dramatic, like jump into the air like so many Jerry Bruckheimer/Michael Bay movies, but it does freak everyone out for a good fifteen minutes.
The transcript from the clip is below. I’m sorry, but I can’t stop swearing or stuttering it seems. My apologies.
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George: “There’s actually fire dripping out the bottom. D’you see that shit? WTF?”
Citizen 1: “It’s the oil I bet”
G: “Yeah. I mean, this is really bad. I mean, this is, this is, this is… going to be fucking rediculous.”
C1: “Do they know who’s car it is?”
G: “Um, some guy basically, was ah… some guy basically came out of his car, as far as I can tell. It wasn’t smoking anywhere near this badly, and now it’s smoking like a mo fo… and it’s basically going to blow up!”
C1: “Yeah”
G: “And what do I do?”
C1: “You stand there and take pictures!”
G: “I’m, I’m recording it. Can you ring… I mean, obviously the police are here, but WTF? Ooooh shit.”
C1:”Wow.”
Citizen 2: “We should get out of here before it blows…”
For the full audio visual experience, download the movie here. It’s an *.mp4 file so I hope you have the latest Quicktime. Get that here if you like.
