Alright, thanks for the responses and reassurance, Yoshi212 and Blumie.
We're normally very much "go with the flow" travelers, and wouldn't mind joining a peaceful protest. I know my way around Manhattan fairly well, too, but this will be my girlfriends first visit. Ironically, we've been to 20 or so major cities around the world together, and some of them in tumultuous times, but not yet NYC.
As I said earlier, this is a major celebration that we've been planning for months; For anyone remotely interested, I just paid off the mortgage on the building my business is housed in, after 20 years. I have had a plan to take one last mortgage "payment" and blow it frivolously on a weekend in The Big Apple. Why there, I'm not even sure myself, being a Bostonian. Something about one of the biggest celebrations of my life being on the biggest stage in the world, tho, I guess! I really want it to be seamless.