The Times landed a sitdown with Caroline Kennedy at a New York diner, a site chosen to suggest that Kennedy has a populist streak.

After weeks of criticism that she had not opened up to the public or the press, Kennedy has embarked on a series of print and television interviews. But in an extensive sit-down discussion yesterday morning with The New York Times, she still seemed less like a candidate than an idea of one: eloquent but vague, largely undefined and seemingly determined to remain that way.

In the interview, Caroline comes across pretty much as I remember her: Intelligent, wary, slightly skeptical of the whole process, a little edgier than you’d expect given her rather anodyne public persona, and ultimately controlling.

Ms. Kennedy came to the interview with two aides, who had reserved the back room of the Lenox Hill Diner, on Lexington Avenue near 78th Street, for several interviews scheduled on Saturday.

[Blogger: a nice detail by the Times reporter there, the reserving bit, to suggest that this gesture is not authentically populist.]

As things wrapped up, a reporter tried to pose another question, but she interrupted him.

“I think we’re done,” she said.

Gawker has a little fun with the audio the Times posted, noting that in one snippet, Kennedy uttered the phrase “you know” 12 times in 49 seconds.

(Funnily enough, John used to do the same thing—a verbal tic the two siblings shared.)