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7:48am. I wake up in my 11th-floor room of my hotel. The Four Seasons Hotel boasts being the tallest hotel in New York City, with the largest rooms, and prices starting at US$550 per night (suites up to US$10,000 per night). Despite the impressive specs, the hotel is not good enough to make it in Dorling Kindersley's "New York Travel Guide," a copy of which Autodesk thoughtfully placed in our rooms as a welcome present, together with a box of chocolates, which I save for my wife.

7:59am. I'm from the Pacific time zone; for me, it's now 4:59am. My United flight had arrived an hour late, and I had got to the hotel at around 1:30am. I work really hard at convincing myself to get out of bed. Room service could be bringing my breakfast at anytime now. But it's hard getting up just four hours of sleep.

8:43am. I've checked for email on my Palm III; I have 47 messages waiting. Room service announces itself by ringing the doorbell. The trolley contains its own gas-powered heating unit to keep the American Breakfast (US$43) warm on its trip up from the kitchen.

9:40pm. Breakfast; shower; get dressed; head down to the lobby. I have two hours before I need to show up at the Autodesk event. Stepping out onto East 57th Avenue, I feel it for myself -- New York's sense of urgency. The incessant honking of car horns. The darting jaywalkers. The endless canyons of tall, tall buildings.
SUV (sport utility vehicles) are used as urban assault vehicles. The most single popular car seems to be the black Lincoln Continental. Taking pictures of squirrels is a popular activity in Central Park.

I get into the swing of jaywalking -- walk to the edge of parked cars, then cross when the coast is clear. After a while, I notice that the car honking is less "get out of the way" and more "look out, here I am" -- despite the "Don't Honk - $350 Penalty" signs. I buy gifts for my family back home from a stationary store. I am disappointed that I am missing National Tourism Week (May 7 - 13) by just five days.

11:35am. Time to show up for the Autodesk media event. After finding my name badge, I am asked to sign an NDA (non-disclosure agreement), which means I can't tell you anything specific to two products Autodesk will be previewing this afternoon. There are roughly 50 people in the conference room. I am the only one in a bluejean shirt; everyone else is wearing a dark suit. Oh well, as least I stand out.

12:02pm. The Four Seasons staff silently and quickly place lunch in front of us. The appetizer looks nice, but we are not sure what the grayish-looking cylindrical food mass is made of. I guess it is mashed potato mixed with other things. One person at my table takes a tentative taste. "Some sort of crab dish," he announces.

Recall the analysis several of us did at the Revit Software Launch last month. Geoff Langdon, sitting next to me, figures our pessimistic calculation we came up with doesn't matter. "The real reason for Revit's subscription model," he advises me, "is to draw eyeballs to their Web portal. They could give away the Revit software." Hmmm... everybody wants to be a portal.

12:32pm. Scott Borduin of Autodesk introduces the other Autodesk'ers in the room. They make up nearly half the audience. "We will be showing your products that we think even Mr. Grabowski will find interesting."

"CAD is going to change more in the next 24 months than in the last ten years!" Scott emphasis Autodesk's Web orientation: "Transforming Business by Design." The double-entrendre, he tells us, is deliberate. The next slide in the PowerPoint presentation indicates that the future is a wireless world -- I am not sure how that fits in, but apparently means universal access to information via the Internet.

"Autodesk today," says Scott, "is a design-centric keiretsu" -- the Japanese concept of several companies working together for common good. That is how he answers Brad Holtz's question of how do the semi-confusing collection of Web sites -- Autodesk.Com, Buzzsaw.Com, RedSpark.Com, PointA.Com -- work together (or against each other, as the case may be).

Autodesk, Scott says, is using all these sites to "connect the information supply chain." Geoff Langon, an architect, is disappointed to see that no architect is pictured in that PowerPoint slide.

12:54pm. We get a preview of how Autodesk sees wireless communications working in the design world. Now it makes sense to me.

1:34pm. Product manager Andrew Ramm bounds upfront to talk about [deleted], which will feature [deleted], [deleted], and [deleted]. Scott was right: I find this pretty exciting stuff!

"When will it ship," we demand. "[Deleted]," Andrew replies.

Other questions follow, such as "How much will it cost?" and "How will this affect [deleted]?" That last question comes from me; Andrew has a ready answer, which I cannot share with you.

2:59pm. Running overtime, the next demo jock gets up. During his introductory monologue, I start replying to the email messages I had downloaded earlier on my Palm.

Replying to email with the Palm III and its Portable Keyboard.

My attention is suddenly wrenched away by what's being demo'ed on the two screens. This is fascinating stuff that could revolutionize the way that [deleted] do their work! What I am seeing reminds me of a MicroCADAM poster from the late 1980s that shows [deleted], except now it's no longer an ink sketch on a napkin. I wonder if I still have that poster tucked away under my stairs back home.

3:38pm. The group presentation is over. We split up into groupings of vertical industries. Since I am a CAD generalist, neither the architecture, mechanical, nor GIS sessions are of interest to me. Still, I sit in the architecture session for a while, but leave as the Architectural Desktop demo grinds on.

To make things more interesting, I ask about the Java-based version of Actrix I've heard rumored. The Autodesk pr person purses his lips, pauses a long time, then suggests I speak to someone else. I try to find him, but he is busy with a one-on-one conference. I head back to my room, and download another 40 email messages to my Palm.

5:15pm. Time to meet for the evening's entertainment. Autodesk has hired an Events Coordinator to shepherd us from hotel to dinner to show and back again. They've hired four "specialty automobiles:" a stretch Hummer, a stretch Lexus SUV, a stretch Range Rover, and a stretch Shelby truck. I just know my son's going to be jealous that I get to ride in the Hummer. Each seats about 17, but getting to your seat means shuffling bent-over double.

It costs US$50-60 thousand to stretch a Hummer.

Waiting in the Hummer, we speculate over the meaning of Autodesk's revolutionary software's codename. Brad Holtz notes that it's unlike any other Autodesk codename. I venture that the name is somehow related to 'Lisa,' Apple's revolutionary forerunner to the Mac. I worry that Autodesk might take too long to ship the new product.

5:41pm. We form a convoy, and head down the streets of New York to the restaurant. A brown UPS truck partially blocks on intersection, and the stretch Hummer can't make the corner. Pedestrians crowd around as the driver fruitlessly tries to back up. Finally one ped takes charge and directs the Hummer around the obstacle.

The Maloney & Porcelli restaurant at 37 East 50th.

5:55pm. We arrive at Maloney & Porcelli restaurant. The steak dinner is excellent. The dessert looks like cream puffs, and Mike Edwards, sitting next to me, takes a big bite. "Brain freeze!" he exclaims; it was ice cream. During dinner, Mike and I find out we were both born and raised in the same hometown of Kitimat in northern British Columbia.

7:40pm. Hurry! Hurry! Time to skuttle back into the stretch limos. This time I pick the stretch Lexus. Its alligator decor seems out of place. We pull in front of the Booth Theather, 222 West 44th. The show is Dame Edna.

They said "No flash photography," so I took the photos with flash turned off.

10:16pm. Back to our hotel. I had hoped to walk back to see Times Square in the dark, but no one wants to join me. "Why walk when you've got this?" gestures one person at the stretch Range Rover we are sitting in.

11:04pm. We mill about the front of The Four Seasons hotel. The streets of New York seem as busy at night as they do during the day. The Autodesk people jump back into the stretch limos. I figure they're off to their own party -- sans journalists. Time to return to my hotel room, and write up my day in Gotham City.

Author Ralph Grabowski on the streets of New York City.

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