Bloomingdales offers us a "personal shopper"

As the tramway/cable car deposited us at the back of Bloomingdales, Bloomingdales is where we went. To go into this department store was magic for me. When I worked in Selfridges, Oxford Street, I sometimes had to despatch things to Bloomingdales, New York and then later in the garment and fashion trade, we exported articles to Bloomingdales. I never imagined I would actually go in the store. It is in typical Art Deco New York style and even some of the merchandise follows this. We were very struck by some coffee makers which, although modern, would fit very nicely into a 1920s-style kitchen. We had coffees in Bloomingdales and very nice they were too. We looked round on every floor and as is my habit in big department stores, I spent a fortune... with my eyes. Unfortunately I did not get a signal on my phone in the store and therefore did not get a message from my son to ask me to look for a pair of "7 for all mankind" jeans. I was looking for a Birthday present for him, but since I failed to get the message, although I was looking in the right department and looked at the endless rails of jeans there, I would not have known which style/size to pick. And Bloomingdales is listed as a stockist. Department stores were not really to everyone in our party's taste and therefore we split up, two of us to take the subway to Macey's and the other to take the subway to the Metropolitan Museum. Helen Hanff grumbles a little about the Metropolitan Museum, since planners allowed a large chunk of Central Park, where she used to walk a neighbour's dog, to be snatched to construct it. Amongst the impressive collections in the Metropolitan Museum is the largest number of statues portraying the female pharaoh Hatshepsut. We agreed to meet back in Bloomingdales near Prada and Jimmy Choo. Macy's is palatial, covers an entire block and attracts masses of shoppers. as with Bloomingdales, I never imagined I would actually go to Macy's. Also, as with Bloomingdales, I was in contact with Macy's years ago. I was able to find a special 'New York' present for my son. A sweatshirt printed with the New York skyline in a series of rows in rainbow colours. We also spent a bit in the children's department, where there was one of the three McDonalds we saw in New York. Our lunch was on the eighth floor in Au Bon Pain, a snack chain we had already tried and tested on Staten Island. It was very busy, but we were able to squeeze into a table in the corner after choosing and buying coffees and snacks. There were coats left on chairs near us where there were five vacant seats at two tables and a single woman seated. We were there for about twenty minutes when the tables and chairs remained vacant. We came to the conclusion the party would eventually meet up, but in the mean-time there were many would-be diners who came near our corner and looked hopefully at the vacant chairs and tables. Our seats were swooped on as soon as we left them to continue our shopping and then make our way back to Bloomingdales with our Macy's bags. There we were greeted by the tall doorman, who asked if we remembered him, we did. As we were early we had another look round. The perfume department near the lifts was a cacophony of sales girls in neat black dresses, calling out to us and other potential customers... "hey, hey, you gotta try this... come on, come on, try, try... you gotta love it, when you try it." We didn't try, but were unable to avoid the smart suited man who persuaded us to try the latest Chanel perfume. We obliged. "Remember its in the black package" he called our after us as we left. We were about to take the escalator to the first floor when "Dorcas" introduced herself to us. What were we looking for and where were we from? She had been an actress, she just loved the English actors she had met. She directed us to the right sort of fashions for our age group and I must admit I did spend quite a few dollars... with my eyes. There were certainly styles I liked, but it was a colour and a size thing, which prevented me trying them on, or considering buying them. We were a little late for our rendezvous at Prada/Jimmy Choo and were greeted once again by the friendly doorman. We took the subway to Grand Central Station.