Exactly one year ago today, when my little daughter, Charlotte, turned 5, I thought it would be a fun idea to fill the apartment with balloons for when her little friends came over to celebrate. So, that morning, I strolled on over to Village Paper on Greenwich Avenue and ordered a couple dozen pink balloons. The guy behind the counter immediately went to work with the helium tank and within moments, I was walking back up 9th street with a massive bunch of balloons. Charlotte's big brown eyes sparkled with excitement when I walked in the door with them and she spent the rest of the afternoon hopping with joy. Mission accomplished.
Sadly, the Village Paper store burned down in a freakish fire last month. It's a tragic story. The place was the pride and joy of one Sun Wong, a father of three who literally watched his dreams go up in smoke with the demise of the store. The corner shop is now just a boarded-up, gutted shell. In the last couple of weeks, my wife and I started making plans for Charlotte's sixth birthday. I suddenly wondered how I was going to get hold of more balloons.
A tip from sweaty goth at the frankly ludicrous Gothic Renaissance costume outlet on 4th Avenue pointed me in the direction of the promisingly named "Party City" on West 14th street. Yesterday afternoon, I popped in and sure enough, they sold a vast array of colorful helium balloons. I figured I'd just pop in this morning when they opened, buy a bunch and that would be that.
So today, while my wife iced a few cupcakes and the kids ran around maniacally, I walked back over to Party City. Once inside, I was dispassionately informed by a dead-eyed Puerto Rican girl with rainbow-colored fingernails that they weren't taking any new balloon orders today and that all the balloons on display were already spoken for and sold. I started to panic. "When will you have more available?" I asked, even though she'd already turned away. Another girl behind the counter told me to "try 17th Street between 7th & 8th."
Unsurprisingly, I left in a huff, but it was really my own fault. I shouldn't have assumed that it was going to be that easy. Not knowing what else to do, I started to hotfoot it over to 17th Street, although I wasn't exactly sure what I was looking for. Another Party City outlet? Whatever, I had to land this plane. The notion of disappointed Charlotte quickened my pace.
Glancing down at my watch, I noticed that the morning was getting away from me, and I still had other errands to accomplish before the festivities were planned. I hurried across 7th Avenue, looking up and down 17th street for an awning or a clown or something that said "get your balloons here." Sure enough, peaking out of the basement level of an grotty-looking brownstone, I spotted a slightly beat-up sign that read "Balloons to Go." I darted down the stairs and into an office festooned with balloons and pictures of rather pre-Raphaelite-looking bellydancers. I then breathlessly asked a woman behind the desk if she could see her way clear to selling me a dozen pink balloons. "No problem," she said and went right to work. "You're timing is perfect," she continued, "we normally do this by appointment only." It turns out this place also supplies gorilla suits, singing strippers and the afore-cited bellydancers, but none of them really seemed appropriate for Charlotte's party. I paid up and hit the bricks.
Eighteen dollars later, I was braving the surprisingly balloon-hostile streets once again, clutching onto my prized bunch for dear life in the face of sudden gusts of wind and the odd, piercing tree branch. Incidentally, it's damn tough to look all cool and punk rock when you're strolling through the West Village with a dozen pink balloons, but I didn't give a damn. I turned east on Greenwhich Avenue and ended up walking right past the former facade of Village Paper (where I stopped for the pic at the top of this post and a moment of respectful reflection). When I walked in my front door with the spoils of my efforts, Charlotte & Oliver burst into little cheers as if on cue. Once again, mission accomplished.
If you live downtown and are planning a party, tell Party City to get stuffed and go to Balloons to Go! Tell'em Flaming Pablum sent'cha.
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