Day 7, in which I almost vomit in the cinema and Paul takes to his bed

It is apparently minus 12 degrees celsius today, once you take the wind chill factor into account. We prepared for frozen misery by putting on our black thermal tops and leggings, and for one brief moment it looked like two particularly unskilled ninjas had broken into the room. I wore four more layers on top, plus gloves and a hat, and still the ice cold wind blew right through to our bones.

As today is our last full day in New York, we decided to get a proper American breakfast and - after some google research - ended up at Norma's at Le Meridien on 57th Street. Everything was big at Norma's, including the prices and the queue to get in. However, once seated and served with hot coffee and unlimited freshly squeezed orange juice we soon cheered up. Norma's spin on eggs benedict was somewhat unexpected - sweet pancakes topped with poached egg, hollandaise and asparagus and served with deep fried new potatoes - but it gave us sufficient fuel to brave the cold again.

We strolled up through Central Park and scoped out the Tavern on the Green, the principal joy of which was the wacky topiary out back. To the right: a shrub pruned like an elephant with its trunk held triumphant, its tail elevated and a trail of little poo sized bushes down below; to the left: a leaping horse, its shrub-based mane streaming behind it; and in the middle: a bit shaggy gorilla with its arms raised in the air, its fur made with fir fronds in a realistic - if green - simulcrum of an ape's pelt.

We bore left to the cinema at Lincoln Square, and tried to enjoy Avatar. Unfortunately, James Cameron has not made this easy, not least as the entire plot is a series of tribal cliches ripped off from every Boy's Own jungle adventure show anyone has ever seen. It is also an uncomfortably racist film: giant blue aliens living a feral jungle existence on a completely alien planet for some reason speak in a range of black accents (not one accent in particular, you understand, but any of the range of black accents, from the Caribbean to Harlem to generic Africa). Cameron's theory seems to be - as Doctor Who might put it - "Lots of planets have a tribal underclass".

Cameron also demonstrated that he now struggles to follow Syd Field's screenwriting maxim "show, don't tell". Awkwardly presented exposition was dripping off the screen, and at the start of the film characters were to be seen regularly explaining the key features of the plot to other characters who were either (a) already fully aware of the facts or (b) themselves in no need of knowing it. "Are you forgetting why we're here?" the villain said to a hard-nosed Sigourney Weaver (who had spent the past five years on the alien planet leading a major division of the project the villain was referring to), "It's for the unobtanium, which is a rare mineral worth millions per ounce back on Earth. You've not probably heard me mention it previously, although we've been mining it exclusively for the past five years and you lead my core research team." If people talked like this in real life, you'd punch them in the throat. Given the concept was trite at best, an element of slow reveal might have served the story better.

I doubt we would have walked out of Avatar on the strength of these criticisms alone, but they were certainly contributing factors once I discovered that the new 3D technology causes me to experience incredibly unpleasant motion sickness. Nauseous and dry retching, Paul escorted me from the cinema 45 minutes in and so we never found out which of the two most obvious endings Cameron chose in the end - the hackneyed option or the derivative one. I don't much care.

Today was going to be the day we caught up with all of the different people we know in New York. Alas, Paul was by this stage feeling very ill, as his cold reached the headache and acheing bones stage, and so he called off meetings with two of his friends in the afternoon in favour of walking back to the hotel, eating some chicken salad and napping.

In the evening, then, I travelled down to SoHo on my own (leaving an ailing Paul in bed with nothing more than a Six Feet Under marathon and the promise of RuPaul's Drag Race for company) and met up with some friends at 'Salt' on Macdougal Street. An obscure friend of Paul had recommended the place on the basis that "it doesn't look like much, but does the best Italian food". In actual fact, it looked amazing and did traditional English bistro food. We had some dates wrapped in bacon to whet our appetites, and then shared plates of lamb shank, steak and pork belly. The food was all terrific, the atmosphere was warm and the waiting staff very friendly.

It was great to catch up with my friends who - we realised - I have only met up with a few times previously, although they're the sort of people you feel immediately comfortable with and conversation and laughter came quickly.

I sloped off back into the night, ready to pack for England.