4 min read
Today I woke up earlier than normal to meet up with a couple friends from back home to tour Google. It was quite the speed tour as the office is too huge to thoroughly explore and experience in a single day. Seeing as it's the weekend, there was only the food in the dozens of micro-kitchens we passed by.
At "Drive In" -- giant TV not pictured here
After speeding through the dimly lit main building, we went over to the Chelsea Market office to look around and tour the YouTube office. We were greeted by a Googler upon arriving at the 6th floor who offered to give us a real tour in an hour since my badge doesn't grant me full access to the whole YouTube space.
Someone else's photo of the vacant reception area
We agreed and went to get lunch at Chelsea Market in the meantime downstairs. I ordered a BLT with egg, thinking it would be good. It was, but the runny yolk went all over the place as soon as I took a bite and made my hands disgusting. We had to relocate to a micro-kitchen so I could was my hands in the sink.
Eventually it was time for the tour and we got to see more of the YouTube space than on either of my visits. We got to see the makeup room in use, the audio room, a completely sound proof room (which is really bizarre being in the middle of a noisy city), the audio room, and a freshly painted green screen. We were even shown a wall of fame of some famous singers and celebrities who have visited the office or performed there.
After the grand tour we got some swag by request and were on our merry way to the newly finished Google office space in a third building right next door. We didn't look around much so I'll have to check it out more thoroughly some other time.
We ended up taking the subway to go to the Guggenheim Museum. The packed subway brought us part of the way, then we walked across Central Park from west to east to get to the museum. That was my first time being to Central Park and I was surprised by how different the air felt there. It felt healthier and much less polluted than over by the office.
Looking across the giant reservoir in the center of the park
Eventually we made it to the other side and the Guggenheim wasn't much further. The current theme title is "Storylines" (supposedly it changes regularly as new art is put up on display and other stuff taken down).
After getting our bags checked, buying our tickets, and stowing away our stuff in the coat room, we started to look around. The first thing we saw: Pinocchio face down in fake water, making it look like a successful suicide attempt. After that we spiraled up the museum checking out equally twisted stuff among actual famous paintings by artists such as Vincent van Gogh, Pablo Picasso, and even one by Claude Monet.
Le Moulin de la Galette by Pablo Picasso
There were lots of sculptures to look at on the 7 levels of the museum. Oddly, we went through it all in 45 minutes and that wasn't just running by everything quickly. After reaching the top, we looked down at the now tiny Pinocchio lifeless in the water. I didn't feel comfortable looking over the edge as the floor was sloped, the viewing area hung out further than the rest of the floors in that section, and the railing was kind of low.
Click the picture if you can't really see Pinocchio well
Afterwards, we walked back down and checked out our favorite displays again, but that didn't take terribly long. A lot of the side rooms were closed off probably since it was the end of the day so we didn't see everything.
This museum is incredibly wheelchair friendly,
the floors spiral up along the edge of the building
Seeing as it was getting late, my friends and I parted ways and I took the subway to get back to Google. Why go back to the office? It beats the crap out of sitting in my apartment. The massage chairs were super convenient since my feet were aching from walking around all day. Instead of buying food I just ate a few of the bananas and apples left over in some of the micro-kitchens. Someone's got to eat the leftover fruit around here.
I messed with this thing too -- it's basically a giant Lite-Brite,
which pretty much was right up there with Legos back in my childhood
Where am I going tomorrow? Who knows. Most likely back to the office, but not to work -- really.