A Ball drops ... and a Pilgrimage of sorts

Times Square during New Years celebration .. I didnt want to do it, in fact I particularly didnt want to, but for lack of options tagged along with my friends and ened up standing for six and a half hours in Freezing cold to see a Ball drop and some feeble attempt at Fireworks light up the city at 12 mid night to usher in the new year.
Local bands and musicians played on and "New York New York" was rendered a dozen times and requests to "sing along" became really irritating after the gazzilionth time.
Cold, Lack of Food, Sleep Deprivation and standing in one place for soo long does little to cheer you up, atleast cheer me up. Guess with such a big turnout (estimated forecast of more than a million people at Times Square before the event), this event is important for some people.
I was left gnashing my teeth at the lost oppurtunity for visiting other places of interest in NY.
It did have one fleeting moment for me, when just before the Midnight countdown, they played Imagine by John Lennon. It felt good that in between all the glitz and marketing and made forTV celebrations, where even the New Year countdown screen had a big Budweiser ad, the organisers thought it right to play that particular song.
But the high point of my trip to NY was the plan to Visit the House where Einstein stayed in Princeton after he moved to US.
I was looking forward to it, and it almost did not happen as we were too tired and slept till late
but we finally decided to just go there. It took us almost two and a half hours to drive from Stony Brook, NY to Princeton. I knew that the house was a private property now and someone actually lived there and that its not permissible to visit the house as such. But still I was curious and it was almost like a pilgrimage that I wanted to do.
By the time we reached the Princeton, it was dark and chilly and we reached 112, Mercer Street in the quaint little university town of Princeton. We could just take some pics from outside and had tp be content with that. Later on we walked around a bit and came across a Bust of Einstein made of Bronze. Another Photo Session :-)
Felt good to have done it .. got a feel that the entire weekend was not wasted :-)
Anyways, its a new year now, a new beginning, and as I write this, I realised that I have made no resolutions this year !!
Happy New Year !