I got home from work last night to find all this going on just a couple blocks round the corner from our apartment. Cop cars everywhere, TV news crews everywhere, people being interviewed - it was all happening! All the surrounding intersections were cordoned off and everything seemed to be centred on this NYPD car in the middle of the road. Apparently the cop had hit a pedestrian shortly beforehand, a lady who had walked right out in front of him while on a red signal (the cop had a green light).

By all accounts the cop wasn't speeding or doing anything he shouldn't have been. Her and some other guy just walked right out, except he looked for traffic and she didn't. Witnesses heard a big thump and saw her flying through the air, landing where her white scarf is on the road there. As there are several hospitals in the area, an ambulance happened to be right there and immediately whisked her off, though she didn't make it. And therein lays the problem with New York pedestrians in particular. That big red hand there may as well not be there at all. Jaywalking pedestrians are a constant bloody hazard to me on the bike because they simply don't look and/or don't care. They're immersed in their phones, completely unaware of what's around them. Once one person starts to cross, the whole lot of them do - they're the closest thing to a herd of sheep you'll find in New York City. Every day the news is full of people being hit and killed at intersections, with most witnesses claiming they were simply jaywalking. I mean hey, we all do it from time to time, let's be honest. The difference is those of us with half a brain are paying constant attention, or just simply wait. And while we're being honest, and as unfortunate as events like this are, I have to say I have no sympathy for these people. One day one of them is going to do me a major injury on the bike; I don't have a windshield to protect me.

Kristina's office on Madison Avenue in Midtown Manhattan apparently used to be a bank. As such, there's a huge bank vault down in the basement. During the week it's used as a meeting room. During the weekend however, Kristina parks her bike in there when she's working hahaha awesome!

I've never seen a bank vault, and this thing is legit! I have no idea how much the door weighs - easily some number of tonnes, but just moving it is a huge effort!

Anyway, back to the running topic of the month: Banksy. Regardless of what was up with his "police activity" posting on Wednesday, he was back at it the following day and this is his installation for the weekend in the Lower East Side. The Grim Reaper riding around in a dodgem car, complete with some dude playing an accordion in the background, a lighting system, sound system, and smoke machines hahaha! As always, it sure drew a crowd.

In between pieces from the accordion player, the two guys in the background there played DJ (mostly Blue Oyster Cult's big hit from 1978, Don't Fear The Reaper). Is one of these guys Banksy? Not likely :)

The Lower East Side and the East Village further north have some of the best bars in the city, most of them all themed up for Halloween at the moment. This one was right next door the Banksy's installation, and no doubt enjoying some extra business because of it.

'Twas a chilly autumn day in the big smoke today, as evidenced by the lady in the middle. This here is Prospect Park - Brooklyn's answer to Manhattan's infamous Central Park. In fact, Prospect Park was designed by the same two guys that designed Central Park, around in the middle of the 19th century. And like Central Park it's full of fields and meadows, sports facilities, a zoo, and of course no shortage of joggers and cyclists.

You can even ride your horse around in here, assuming you have a horse. In fact I'm not even sure where you'd keep a horse in this city? It not like there's ample room to just stick him out back. I didn't think to ask. "Excuse me, where do you keep that thing at night?"

The park is also home to Brooklyn's only lake, and as usual is surrounded by Asians fishing on it.

I love autumn (or fall as it's called here) as much as the next guy, and in the northeast of the country it's especially pretty. I never look forward to it though - I don't like what comes next!

After I'd had enough of the park I ventured south and just followed my nose through some pretty bloody nice Brooklyn suburbs.

Everyone's getting geared up for the big day on Thursday. I'm thinking about getting a huge pumpkin this week and attempting to carve my first ever jack-o'-lantern. Stayed tuned for that dismal effort!

Some houses are scary-looking enough as it is.

I was surprised to find there's no shortage of what I've started calling "Kristina houses" down there - these big things with a porch or two out front. She really wants a porch hahaha, or even better a wrap-around porch. One day maybe. I wouldn't mind a rocker.

Eventually I made it as far south as I could go - all the way out to Coney Island, or perhaps more appropriately, Little Russia. Kristina and I checked this place out earlier in the summer, which was an interesting experience.

From there I turned around, and followed my nose home again. Lovely.

This little green card right here (known as a Green Card) that arrived in the mail today has been a long time in the making for me. Back in 2009 when I was living in London, I signed up for something called the Green Card Lottery. The lottery is an annual offering of 55,000 United States permanent resident visas to natives of countries deemed to have low rates of immigration to the United States, including us New Zealanders. The odds of being pulled from the hat are 1 in bugger all, but it was worth a shot. At that stage, I was trying to make plans for my departure from the UK two years later when my British ancestory visa was due to expire. Canada was an obvious and easy choice in terms of acquiring a work visa and continuing my travels. But the US of A would have been even better given the travel opportunities for globetrotters like me, although near impossible given the difficulty of attaining any kind of long-term entry visa.

As it happens, I was to meet my future wife that same year and, coincidentally, she happened to be an American hehe. American girlfriends don't count for much as far as the US immigration department is concerned however, but temporary work assignments do. So, also as it happens, my same employer in London later offered me a role in New York under their US brand because, also coincidentally, one of their projects for a London-based client necessitated it and I just happened to be in the right place at the right time (that is, returning to Texas after travelling the globe with Kristina before likely heading up to Canada). That meant I was eligible for a long-term US work visa. Nice one! Kristina moved up to New York with me, I liked it, and so I put a ring on it. Beyoncé would be proud. That in turn meant I was eligible for this highly sought-after green piece of plastic :) Ironically, my wife isn't here to celebrate with me; she's across the ditch in New Jersey for a couple days with work.

Anyway, the fantastic plastic here entitles me to live and work in the US indefinitely. Notice it expires in a couple years though. Because it was attained through marriage, we need to prove to the immigration department we're still legit come that time. This is to prevent (or deter) someone from paying an American citizen a ton of money to marry them, getting a Green Card, and then going their separate ways. Like I said, it's a highly sought-after visa and a path to eventual US citizenship through naturalization, which I intend to go through with when I become eligible for it in three years. I'll then have dual-citizenship in New Zealand and the USA. So yup, this will be my end-game. After almost nine years now of travelling the world, and never knowing what to tell people who asked me where I would eventually settle down, it's nice to finally have an answer - most likely Austin, Texas :)

By the way, my name obviously hasn't been pulled from the Green Card Lottery hat so far. I signed up and paid for ten years or something, so I'll keep checking every year out of interest anyway.

The whole city and indeed the whole country is all kitted out for Halloween tomorrow hehe.

Ghosts, zombies, and scary monsters are out in force.

This lot don't even have heads! Aarrgghh!

There are also plenty of jack-o'-lanterns out in force too, and tonight we carved our own. Don't wanna be the neighbourhood kill-joys who do nothing ;)

He did have another front tooth but the pumpkin tooth fairy will be coming for that.

Happy Halloween y'all!

Well so much for Halloween this year. Kristina and I were going to see an annual Halloween parade but it's pouring rain out there, as it is over much of the eastern half of the country. Oh well, we'll try again next year maybe (if we're still here).

Meanwhile, I've been talking about it all month, and today was the final day of Banksy's month-long 'residency' in New York City. His final piece was an inflated balloon of his own pseudonym in Queens, a play on most graffiti being done in balloon lettering. Someone working across the street said he saw this being put up at 6:30am this morning by three people driving a rental truck. Obviously there's no real way of knowing if one of them was Banksy himself, or if he was even there. He did have a large team of helpers here for the month. The UK's Daily Mail tabloid newspaper is convinced they already know who Banksy is. Anyway, not long after it was revealed where this was, two idiots climbed up there to steal the balloon but were arrested after onlookers called the police hehe. The police then took the balloon down anyway. As a parting gift, from his website you can download this logo to get printed on a t-shirt if you're so inclined. The heart is from a piece he did earlier in the month in Brooklyn.

The Batmobile has evolved a lot since the 1960s, but this replica is bloody impressive nonetheless. Kristina and I were out on the bikes today and happened to pass by while it was parked up along Second Avenue. Even a fire crew had stopped to check it out.

Gadgets! I love gadgets :)

They don't make 'em like they used to.

Anyway, I led Kristina on some of my recent cruises through Brooklyn. This here is the stunning Brooklyn Heights neighbourhood which I first checked out a couple months ago. A townhouse in the next neighbourhood over was listed at $16 million a couple weeks ago, beating the previous Brooklyn record of $12 million. Crazy.

You may park here for 10 of the 168 hours in a week. How generous.

Like husband, like wife. She's not exactly at the point of racing cars and intimidating jaywalking pedestrians yet, but she's coming along :)

The New York City Marathon is an annual marathon that courses through all five boroughs of the city. It's been run every year since 1970 except for last year when it was cancelled at the last minute due to Hurricane Sandy. In Manhattan the route heads north along First Avenue, right at the end of my street which is the 17-mile mark. I plonked myself on the corner and waited for the action.

The wheelchair runners were all flying past when I arrived. I have no idea how much some of these things are worth, but they don't look cheap.

I'd been watching the marathon on TV, and arrived in time to see the leaders of the women's race.

Ethiopian-born Bizunesh Deba actually lives in New York and was therefore a local favourite. She was leading the race at this point with nine miles to go, but ended up finishing second.

Priscah Jeptoo from Kenya was a ways back when she passed me, but went on to eventually pass Deba and win the race comfortably.

Shortly thereafter at 1:23 into the men's race, da boyz came flying past. The seven front runners in this shot ended up taking the top eight places, all except for seventh. Specifically, Lusapho April from South Africa obscured at the back of the pack in yellow took third, Tsegaye Kebede from Ethipoia in blue at the front took second, and Geoffrey Mutai from Kenya in orange beat 'em all.

Mr Mutai here along with his Kenyan counterpart above who won the women's race are each $500,000 richer for their effort.

And off they went. For those who don't know, I ran the Paris Marathon while Kristina and I were living there in 2011. The New York Marathon is much harder to get into, but there is a lottery option available which I've decided I'm going to enter next year.

A few hours later I went back out to see the rest of the crowd punishing themselves hehe. Shortly after this point in the Paris Marathon I was forced to start walking when my legs just couldn't do it anymore. I hadn't done any training for that one, but if I'm able to do this next year I'll put some proper effort in.

I guess Katie didn't do so good.

Tonight is Guy Fawkes Night, probably not well known to Americans if my wife is anything to go by. It's an annual commemoration observed on November 5th, primarily in Great Britain. Its history begins with the events of November 5th, 1605, when Guy Fawkes and his crew failed miserably to blow up the House of Lords (the upper house of the Parliament of the UK). The Brits continue to celebrate his failure to this day, usually at large organised events centred on a bonfire and extravagant firework displays. Anyway, my Social Security card arrived today; I'm getting more legit by the day ;) In the US, Social Security encompasses several social welfare and social insurance programs, particularly retirement benefits. More than that though, since everybody's social security number is unique, it has become the de facto US national identification number and is a requirement for many other unrelated things such as applying for a credit card (which I also did today).

While it usually sports flags from the around the world, the Rockefeller Center is looking very American at the moment for some reason.

In the middle of the complex, this year's infamous Christmas tree was being hoisted up this afternoon after its overnight trip from somewhere in Connecticut (it's comes from a different place every year). Now it's being rigged with around 50,000 LED lights on five miles of wiring.

Early next month, those 50,000 LED lights will be switched on during a two-hour holiday celebration. Hundreds of thousands of people pack the streets surrounding the plaza for the tree lighting each year, with millions more watching on TV. Won't that be fun.

I mentioned on Friday the Rockefeller Center Christmas tree is going up, and here at Bryant Park the ice skating rink was also recently opened for the season.

Kristina has been in Chicago all weekend catching up with friends, so I took the opportunity last night to catch up on some work. While slaving away I was listening in on the NYPD via an online police scanner. Around 11pm all hell broke loose on the ice rink when gun fire rang out leaving two people wounded. Being a Saturday night the ice rink was packed and people took off in all directions upon hearing the gun shots, some still wearing their skates. A 16-year-old from the Bronx was arrested this morning, and his motive... he wanted the jacket of one of his victims, a 20-year-old just minding his own business. The other person wounded was a 14-year-old bystander, hit in the back by a stray bullet and now paralyzed from the waist down. The scumbag was caught thanks to an anonymous tip off after bragging about it on Facebook. Unreal.

After snapping the shot of Bryant Park I headed to Columbus Circle this afternoon intending to set out on a ride. The weather was looking alright before and was forecast to stay that way, but in the short time it took me to get here all that seemed to change.

This is Broadway, best known as the heart of the American theatre industry, particularly for the portion that runs through the Times Square area. Broadway actually runs the full length of Manhattan and beyond to several towns further north of New York City that I wanted to start exploring. Well, good weather forecast or not I thought better of it, and sure it enough it started raining shortly afterwards. So much for that. Incidentally, notice the punk on the bike blowing the red light. They're delivery guys (courier and food) and they're a hazard. I've rammed a few of them over time after they've blatantly cut me up, but worse still they cause traffic to swerve to avoid them which has created a few near misses for me. Life in the Big Apple.

Miss Universe finished up in Moscow on Saturday, and this here was the costume competition which took place a few days earlier. Here we have Miss Great Britain, looking good.

Miss Haiti, rocking it.

Miss Switzerland, hell yeah.

And... Miss USA. Yeah. She didn't win.

Halloween was two weeks ago already, and this was our little jack-o'-lantern for the occasion.

Two weeks later, he's still sitting in the window but he ain't looking too good hahaha! He also has a baseball lodged in his head that I found in the Bronx earlier this year. As his lid started shrinking it fell inside, so I gave him the baseball to rest it on. Now the rest of his head has shrivelled up tightly around the baseball and I can't get it out.

We'll see how he's looking in another couple weeks.