Let the sunshine in!

Today is a sunny day in New York City.

When I say sunny, I mean so sunny that I didn't recognise my apartment door when I came home earlier, thinking I was still one flight below my own. That's because for some strange reason, my benevolent landlord hasn't installed a lightbulb in the hallway on my floor, but on the floor below. So my apartment door is perpetually shrouded by darkness. Today when I trekked up the usual four flights, the skylight was streaming sunshine directly onto my door - and, yeah, I struggled. So that's how pretty it is today.

Now spring springs (tee hee) differently here in NYC than it does back down under. In Melbourne, I remember those few days of sunshine and blossoms in September, but I don't think anything major starts happening until spring racing in October. Then the pretty dresses and fascinators start proliferating every Chapel Street and Chadstone boutique; the horsies, B-list celebs and marquee gossip are all over the Herald Sun news; and we gear up for our first "hot day", when after the first half hour of sunshine, everyone starts whingeing about the heat.

Over here, the hot days haven't begun, but the sunshine does something that changes the city completely, like some sort of colour autoenhance on Photoshop, or changing a sepia photograph to bright technicolour. Everyone is frolicking - literally frolicking - down the streets, the kids are out and about, the birds are singing, the sun is shining - yeah, it's all because THE SUN IS SERIOUSLY SHINING, Y'ALL.

Now here comes my question as a first year New Yorker and all: Back in November, after my fourteenth fight (out of about sixty three this year, and counting) with the landlord regarding the temperature of my frigid home, he introduced me to the concept of plastic on the window panes to keep the chill out. Which has been all nice and lovely this winter, as I've shivered away, because it's meant that my fourth-floor-walkup-front-facing-windows on a rather busy street have remained curtain-less while I kid myself that the cloudy plastic shields my goings-on from the neighbourhood. Now the sun is shining, so what happens with the plastic? If I take it down, what happens if it gets cold again?

In the meantime, though, Imma make some sangria. And LET THE SUNSHINE IN!