It's been a pretty eventful week or two, what with the holidays, working on my documentary, getting a super surprising late holiday bonus, having someone steal my identity and purchase an $1100 plane ticket and all...but nothing compared to the sight, one hour ago, of my NYC driver's license being unceremoniously plunged into a shredder at the local DC DMV. Before my very eyes! Jesus, can't they build a private room for that, or give me a warning at the very least, so I could take a moment to shield my eyes? And how about one last visit with my NYC license? Oh, the humanity. I'll never impress an overzealous DC doorman again.
Why would I do something as outlandish as trade in my NYC license for its desultory DC cousin? Because DC is the kind of over-bureaucratic pseudo city that makes you jump through about 5 gazillion hoops to park a car on the street while meanwhile the murder rate skyrockets and half the city burns. Why can't I just park my car in front of my house with NJ plates and a NY license? Who the hell knows. Probably for the same reason you can't find anything to eat after 10pm. Ugh. Don't get me started.
Anyway, without further ado, a few observations from my attempts to score a DC driver's license:
1. I'm honestly not sure what's worse: the seriously misplaced over-popularity/snarling traffic en route to the Georgetown DMV branch (honestly, what the hell is so desirable about Georgetown? The Banana Republic?) or the what-country-am-I-in/better lock the doors/snarling traffic en route to the Brentwood DMV. A friend once remarked that DC is either white and boring or black and scary, and I think he makes a fine point - though, truth be told, the Brentwood DMV isn't at all scary.
2. The Brentwood DMV is, however, located in a strip mall.
3. I had to pay $6 to park at the Georgetown DMV, which proved way too busy to actually enter. Thus, I paid six bucks to duck my head into the DMV and take a quick look around. Unreal.
4. Several people were actually sleeping on the floor of the Georgetown DMV.
5. While in line (outside) at Brentwood, I was privy to a fascinating debate regarding whether teens are crueler to their elders in Mississippi or North Carolina. It seems Mississippi takes the cake. In fact, NC was met with derisive chuckles, as "that ain't even the South."
6. The supremely hefty security guard in Brentwood invited the line to try and get past him, claiming he could take us all on at once (no doubt).
7. The license itself is so garish, I first thought they'd actually handed me a glow stick. I haven't seen anything this over-wrought since the last time I strolled through the "new" Columbia Heights. Wait, I think I see a cranny where they could still fit another piece of calligraphy.
8. If I knew checking "donor" would result in an outlandish red heart straight out of 1980s-era Clip Art appearing on my drivers license, I wouldn't have bothered.
9. I swear to God, one of life's great pleasures is sitting next to an elderly black gentleman, trading shitty stories about the DMV, then getting to shake my head and utter the phrase, "It's always something." I haven't connected with the black community like that since the last time I pretended not to be Jewish.
10. While in line, the woman behind me remarked that she "liked this place a hell of a lot better when it sold ribs." Yes, in DC the DMV was once a bbq rib takeout joint.
Friday, December 28, 2007
Monday, December 17, 2007
Thursday, December 13, 2007
The Sound and the Fury
First of all, who reads Faulkner for fun? I figured if I managed to miss The Sound and the Fury during middle school, high school, and 4 years of a pseudo-English minor in college, then I was totally in the clear. The book certainly had a way of lurking out there, taunting me from its place on my theoretical Books I Should Probably Read shelf, nestled between Ulysses and Moby Dick. And I was pretty much happy to let it sit there forever, beckoning, but not too loudly.
Then my book club read The Road (no, not Oprah's book club, just a coincidence), which I found to be utterly devastating and brilliant in a way too emotional to pick apart/analyze at book club (and in fact, our meeting was oddly combative). The Road left me feeling stunned, in a "you know, that was probably one of the greatest artistic achievements I'll ever encounter" sort of way, which of course lead directly into "so where do I go from here?"
Enter Faulkner, who happened to get quite a bit of play during our meeting, some of the more intellectual members of the group depicting McCarthy's style as a perfect combination of high and low art, the former of which they felt was most evocative of Faulkner. I sat there sipping my wine, nodding learnedly, searching my brain for any leftover insights from As I Lay Dying. Nada.
I got back to DC looking for my next read and was coincidentally directed to the copy of Sound and Fury on my girlfriend's bookshelf. Alright, why not? Cut to two days later and I'm slogging through the first section like your average Washingtonian attempting to find a decent restaurant. This was easily one of the most challenging things I've attempted to read in a really, really, really long time. I could barely figure out who was who, what they were talking about, or why I was supposed to care. But I hung in there, reminding myself "it's the Great American novel, it's the Great American novel, it's the Great American novel." I tried reading at my desk, in bed, on the couch, on the bus, at Baja Fresh, on the train...nothing helped. And still, old Bill wouldn't throw me a bone. Who's white? Who's black? What year is this? What the hell is going on? Why are there 2 Quentins? Why is there Caddy the sister and Caddies who work on the golf course? Is this all just a case of showing off or...well, what?
I confess, dear reader, that during one particular dark moment, I sunk so low as to Google "sound and fury characters." It was not my proudest hour.
(What was my proudest hour, you ask? I'd say attending the NPR holiday party, being asked what I was currently reading, and fishing The Sound and the Fury out of my coat pocket. Now who's the intellectual, sucka?)
But I stuck with it, finally completing the opening Benjy section in a wide-eyed stupor of determination. At which point I put the book down, half expecting someone to wrap me in tin foil and hand me a Gatorade. Instead there was only my girlfriend, asking me why I was making so much noise. Somewhere along the line it dawned on me that, though very tough to read, this section is an outlandishly brilliant depiction of how the mind of a mentally-challenged person might function. The way that inanimate objects are perceived to move to and fro, just like people, and the way one's self is perceived in a sort of third-person way, as if lacking a sense of self...I mean, this is stuff is a real insight, on another level really, I think.
Then it was on to section 2, Quentin, whose non-retarded narration hit me like a foot massage after 4 hours of holiday shopping. There wasn't an italic for pages, and it finally, slowly, all started to come together. By the end of this section, I was riveted. (Off topic aside: this is the second difficult book that came together in my brain due in large part to sections being set in Boston, whose geography I know well from college. The first was Infinite Jest. If I were smarter, I could write something interesting on this phenomenon. No doubt.). Within a matter of pages, I went from not being able to even remotely tell the characters apart, to being actually interested in what was happening to them. That's no small feat. Give it a try some time. (Off topic aside #2: this also happens to represent the trump card of my In Defense of Sly Stallone argument. Go home and try writing Rocky in three days. Seriously, give it a go. You want Stallone and Faulkner? Only at Thirty is the New Sixty.).
It occurs to me suddenly that this post would have been much more satisfying had I waited until finishing the book. As it stands, I've just begun the 4th and final section, but I can tell you it's riveting and worth the initial effort. After the Road, I doubt I'd have been impressed by much. It's sort of like living in NYC, then moving to DC. Everything just feels unspectacular. But Faulkner's hanging in there. I'm really, really looking forward to picking up the book a little later, and think I might even forgo disc 3 of The Wire (season 4) in favor of reading, if you can believe such a thing. I'm really excited to get back to it...and, to paraphrase and old classic saying, "Those who can't write, read."
(Oh, might as well end with a little Woody Allen. Why not? "Those who can't do, teach. And those who can't teach, teach gym." Man, that's rich.)
Then my book club read The Road (no, not Oprah's book club, just a coincidence), which I found to be utterly devastating and brilliant in a way too emotional to pick apart/analyze at book club (and in fact, our meeting was oddly combative). The Road left me feeling stunned, in a "you know, that was probably one of the greatest artistic achievements I'll ever encounter" sort of way, which of course lead directly into "so where do I go from here?"
Enter Faulkner, who happened to get quite a bit of play during our meeting, some of the more intellectual members of the group depicting McCarthy's style as a perfect combination of high and low art, the former of which they felt was most evocative of Faulkner. I sat there sipping my wine, nodding learnedly, searching my brain for any leftover insights from As I Lay Dying. Nada.
I got back to DC looking for my next read and was coincidentally directed to the copy of Sound and Fury on my girlfriend's bookshelf. Alright, why not? Cut to two days later and I'm slogging through the first section like your average Washingtonian attempting to find a decent restaurant. This was easily one of the most challenging things I've attempted to read in a really, really, really long time. I could barely figure out who was who, what they were talking about, or why I was supposed to care. But I hung in there, reminding myself "it's the Great American novel, it's the Great American novel, it's the Great American novel." I tried reading at my desk, in bed, on the couch, on the bus, at Baja Fresh, on the train...nothing helped. And still, old Bill wouldn't throw me a bone. Who's white? Who's black? What year is this? What the hell is going on? Why are there 2 Quentins? Why is there Caddy the sister and Caddies who work on the golf course? Is this all just a case of showing off or...well, what?
I confess, dear reader, that during one particular dark moment, I sunk so low as to Google "sound and fury characters." It was not my proudest hour.
(What was my proudest hour, you ask? I'd say attending the NPR holiday party, being asked what I was currently reading, and fishing The Sound and the Fury out of my coat pocket. Now who's the intellectual, sucka?)
But I stuck with it, finally completing the opening Benjy section in a wide-eyed stupor of determination. At which point I put the book down, half expecting someone to wrap me in tin foil and hand me a Gatorade. Instead there was only my girlfriend, asking me why I was making so much noise. Somewhere along the line it dawned on me that, though very tough to read, this section is an outlandishly brilliant depiction of how the mind of a mentally-challenged person might function. The way that inanimate objects are perceived to move to and fro, just like people, and the way one's self is perceived in a sort of third-person way, as if lacking a sense of self...I mean, this is stuff is a real insight, on another level really, I think.
Then it was on to section 2, Quentin, whose non-retarded narration hit me like a foot massage after 4 hours of holiday shopping. There wasn't an italic for pages, and it finally, slowly, all started to come together. By the end of this section, I was riveted. (Off topic aside: this is the second difficult book that came together in my brain due in large part to sections being set in Boston, whose geography I know well from college. The first was Infinite Jest. If I were smarter, I could write something interesting on this phenomenon. No doubt.). Within a matter of pages, I went from not being able to even remotely tell the characters apart, to being actually interested in what was happening to them. That's no small feat. Give it a try some time. (Off topic aside #2: this also happens to represent the trump card of my In Defense of Sly Stallone argument. Go home and try writing Rocky in three days. Seriously, give it a go. You want Stallone and Faulkner? Only at Thirty is the New Sixty.).
It occurs to me suddenly that this post would have been much more satisfying had I waited until finishing the book. As it stands, I've just begun the 4th and final section, but I can tell you it's riveting and worth the initial effort. After the Road, I doubt I'd have been impressed by much. It's sort of like living in NYC, then moving to DC. Everything just feels unspectacular. But Faulkner's hanging in there. I'm really, really looking forward to picking up the book a little later, and think I might even forgo disc 3 of The Wire (season 4) in favor of reading, if you can believe such a thing. I'm really excited to get back to it...and, to paraphrase and old classic saying, "Those who can't write, read."
(Oh, might as well end with a little Woody Allen. Why not? "Those who can't do, teach. And those who can't teach, teach gym." Man, that's rich.)
Tuesday, December 11, 2007
Friday Night Lights
Where has this show been all my life?
Heading into the last disc of Friday Night Lights, Season 1, I've been rendered speechless
by how good this show is. Why is nobody watching this? Is it all the football? All the Texas? All the preposterously attractive young peeps in tight outfits and occasional slow motion? (No, it can't be that). I don't know what the story is, but I'm here to tell you that this show is so good, (not sure if I can actually bring myself to type this)...that I actually felt a little disappointed when season 4 of The Wire (aka, Best Show on TV) hit the streets before I'd had a chance to finish with FNL. Obviously, the Wire takes precedence, but still I find myself jonesing for a little FNL. This show is really, really, really good. Like one tiny notch below HBO good. If not better. Friday Night Lights certainly kicks Carnivale's ass. Ditto John from Cincinnati, Deadwood, Extras, and (shudder) Def Poetry Slam.
Usually when I like a show this much, it's all about the writing, the characters and the acting. I could care less what the show is actually about, and FNL is no different. High school football is just a backdrop, FNL's version of the mortuary industry (Six Feet Under), Mormonism (Big Love), or Hollywood (Entourage). Two things are paramount: that the characters are richly drawn, fascinating, three-dimensional "people", and that their world is presented in such a way that the experience takes on something of an anthropological flavor. I'm telling you, regardless of how you consider the sport of football, it's fascinating to become immersed in a culture wherein a town full of grown, otherwise upstanding citizens spend their lives obsessing over a group of children playing a game. Remember your earliest days of having a driver's license, cruising around in your beat-up junker, going nowhere in particular for the fun of it? Well, imagine every radio station on the dial playing talk radio call-in shows devoted to your performance at last week's game. Imagine the mayor giving you a hard time about your hustle. Imagine having a billboard erected in your front yard, trumpeting your name, number and position. Imagine living in a town spilling over with fat, pathetic assholes still basking in the glory of their bygone trip to "State", shoving blocky Championship rings in your face.
Now imagine being the new, young head football coach in a town like this. A football coach whose job, most feel, is owed solely to having served as longtime mentor to the town golden boy, quarterback Jason Street, who promptly gets paralyzed during the first game of the season, leaving the new coach with an untested, meek JV quarterback at the helm and the burdens of small town Texas football on his shoulders. Kyle Chandler is absolutely brilliant in this role. Each episode seems to bring a new layer to his performance as a man living his life in the eye of the storm. I'm going to go all out and say Chandler is treading hallowed TV drama ground here. He's one of the best I've seen, his performance practically Kristen Bell-ian (whose lights out work as Veronica Mars almost wore out my remote control's Rewind button. Chandler's like that, too, full of small asides, gestures, nuanced movements you need to see again, immediately).
And then there's Connie Britton, as Coach's sexy, wise, guidance counselor wife. Britton pretty much matches Chandler beat for beat, and the way they carry themselves is fascinating to watch, great parents struggling to figure everything out, the perfect symmetry of their relationship a testament to both who they are and were, the high school quarterback and the gorgeous Texan blond (cheerleader?) made good. It can often feel like they are the entire town's parents.
One more shout-out: Brad Leland as local businessman, former UT player, head of the Dillon Panthers booster club, all-around sleazy guy, and above all else football OBSESSED Buddy Garrity is just...unspeakably brilliant. Right down to his physicality, fat necked squeezed into tight shirt collar, skin just this side of red and sweaty, that Texas drawl, the perpetual big boy grown up look of him, all snake-oil salesman and defacto spiritual leader to Dillon's football-worshiping zealots. Leland's is one of those delicious supporting performances that makes a show so textured and great.
Friday Night Lights in in no way without its faults. As with any show featuring this many characters, some are more intriguing than others, some plot lines more compelling, some less. A few lowlights:
1. Jason Street, erstwhile football God, now stuck in a wheelchair, is quite possibly the most whiny, annoying character on network TV. I have been known to audibly grown whenever the show cuts back to his plotline. Scott Porter is terribly cast. In a town full of shockingly attractive young people, even his good looks are the most bland. Ugh. I can't stand this guy, especially now that he's gotten into quad rugby and does stuff like get "Peace" tattooed on his wrist in Sandscrit. What is this, the BU dorms circa 1994?
2. Every game, and I mean every game, somehow culminates in the Panthers being down with three minutes to go, only to either a) stage a highly emotional, even more highly improbable comeback, or b) lose in a thoroughly heartbreaking, only on TV manner. For a show about football, the football is the least interesting part.
3. God, I hate Jason Street. Seriously, he's the worst. Man, I wish the injury could have affected his whine bone.
But seriously, this show is amazing. I don't watch a lot of TV, and when I do I almost invariably think everything is dramatically overrated (30 Rock? The Office? Average, at best). But this is good stuff. Now I just need to fly through the Wire and get back to it.
Heading into the last disc of Friday Night Lights, Season 1, I've been rendered speechless
by how good this show is. Why is nobody watching this? Is it all the football? All the Texas? All the preposterously attractive young peeps in tight outfits and occasional slow motion? (No, it can't be that). I don't know what the story is, but I'm here to tell you that this show is so good, (not sure if I can actually bring myself to type this)...that I actually felt a little disappointed when season 4 of The Wire (aka, Best Show on TV) hit the streets before I'd had a chance to finish with FNL. Obviously, the Wire takes precedence, but still I find myself jonesing for a little FNL. This show is really, really, really good. Like one tiny notch below HBO good. If not better. Friday Night Lights certainly kicks Carnivale's ass. Ditto John from Cincinnati, Deadwood, Extras, and (shudder) Def Poetry Slam.
Usually when I like a show this much, it's all about the writing, the characters and the acting. I could care less what the show is actually about, and FNL is no different. High school football is just a backdrop, FNL's version of the mortuary industry (Six Feet Under), Mormonism (Big Love), or Hollywood (Entourage). Two things are paramount: that the characters are richly drawn, fascinating, three-dimensional "people", and that their world is presented in such a way that the experience takes on something of an anthropological flavor. I'm telling you, regardless of how you consider the sport of football, it's fascinating to become immersed in a culture wherein a town full of grown, otherwise upstanding citizens spend their lives obsessing over a group of children playing a game. Remember your earliest days of having a driver's license, cruising around in your beat-up junker, going nowhere in particular for the fun of it? Well, imagine every radio station on the dial playing talk radio call-in shows devoted to your performance at last week's game. Imagine the mayor giving you a hard time about your hustle. Imagine having a billboard erected in your front yard, trumpeting your name, number and position. Imagine living in a town spilling over with fat, pathetic assholes still basking in the glory of their bygone trip to "State", shoving blocky Championship rings in your face.
Now imagine being the new, young head football coach in a town like this. A football coach whose job, most feel, is owed solely to having served as longtime mentor to the town golden boy, quarterback Jason Street, who promptly gets paralyzed during the first game of the season, leaving the new coach with an untested, meek JV quarterback at the helm and the burdens of small town Texas football on his shoulders. Kyle Chandler is absolutely brilliant in this role. Each episode seems to bring a new layer to his performance as a man living his life in the eye of the storm. I'm going to go all out and say Chandler is treading hallowed TV drama ground here. He's one of the best I've seen, his performance practically Kristen Bell-ian (whose lights out work as Veronica Mars almost wore out my remote control's Rewind button. Chandler's like that, too, full of small asides, gestures, nuanced movements you need to see again, immediately).
And then there's Connie Britton, as Coach's sexy, wise, guidance counselor wife. Britton pretty much matches Chandler beat for beat, and the way they carry themselves is fascinating to watch, great parents struggling to figure everything out, the perfect symmetry of their relationship a testament to both who they are and were, the high school quarterback and the gorgeous Texan blond (cheerleader?) made good. It can often feel like they are the entire town's parents.
One more shout-out: Brad Leland as local businessman, former UT player, head of the Dillon Panthers booster club, all-around sleazy guy, and above all else football OBSESSED Buddy Garrity is just...unspeakably brilliant. Right down to his physicality, fat necked squeezed into tight shirt collar, skin just this side of red and sweaty, that Texas drawl, the perpetual big boy grown up look of him, all snake-oil salesman and defacto spiritual leader to Dillon's football-worshiping zealots. Leland's is one of those delicious supporting performances that makes a show so textured and great.
Friday Night Lights in in no way without its faults. As with any show featuring this many characters, some are more intriguing than others, some plot lines more compelling, some less. A few lowlights:
1. Jason Street, erstwhile football God, now stuck in a wheelchair, is quite possibly the most whiny, annoying character on network TV. I have been known to audibly grown whenever the show cuts back to his plotline. Scott Porter is terribly cast. In a town full of shockingly attractive young people, even his good looks are the most bland. Ugh. I can't stand this guy, especially now that he's gotten into quad rugby and does stuff like get "Peace" tattooed on his wrist in Sandscrit. What is this, the BU dorms circa 1994?
2. Every game, and I mean every game, somehow culminates in the Panthers being down with three minutes to go, only to either a) stage a highly emotional, even more highly improbable comeback, or b) lose in a thoroughly heartbreaking, only on TV manner. For a show about football, the football is the least interesting part.
3. God, I hate Jason Street. Seriously, he's the worst. Man, I wish the injury could have affected his whine bone.
But seriously, this show is amazing. I don't watch a lot of TV, and when I do I almost invariably think everything is dramatically overrated (30 Rock? The Office? Average, at best). But this is good stuff. Now I just need to fly through the Wire and get back to it.
Tuesday, November 27, 2007
Uptown
I lived in NYC for just short of 8 years, and in that time I think I ventured uptown perhaps four times. Furthermore, I'm a hardcore East Side kind of guy, and so the Upper West Side is like a complete and utter mystery. I have absolutely no idea what goes on up there. No idea.
Until now. I've spent the past 3 days up on 105th and West End. Some quickie first impressions:
1. Homeless people up here are either strangely well dressed or absolutely out of their fucking minds. I just walked by a group of the latter and felt like I'd wandered onto the set of Panic In Needle Park.
2. It seems that wifi has yet to be invented, much less free wifi. This includes the supposedly amazing, borderline legendary Hungarian Pastry Shop, or whatever it's called. When I politely asked the barista whether there was wifi, she looked at me like I'd just stumbled in from Hungary.
3. So that's where the Seinfeld diner is.
4. Lo and behold the 1 train. Where have you been all my life? This has got to be the best subway line in Manhattan. Wow. I'm meeting a friend at the Ear Inn tonight and can't believe I'm not dreading the schlep over there. It's a Brave New World on the West Side, let me tell you.
5. Cats are absolutely disgusting (ok, perhaps that transcends the Upper West Side. not sure). Seriously, though, are they supposed to go days without eating? Is this normal?
6. If you happen to be a racist, there's a wonderful Avenue by Avenue segregation thing going on up here. Whitey, stick to Broadway. Blacks, you take Amsterdam. Repeat.
7. Tired of crowded cafes? Try the ghost town-like Upper West Side!
8. I haven't witnessed many things as pretty and romantic as Morningside Park in a light rain. Wow. By the way, there's a place in NYC called Morningside Park. News to me.
9. Waking up to NY1 again is like coming out of a thirty year coma and being greeted by your wife Cate Blanchett who tells you you've just hit the Powerball jackpot. My God, how I've missed In The Papers.
10. I'm literally half a block from Riverside Park, which I hear is quite awesome. Of course, I've been too lazy to check it out. Oh, well. Maybe next time.
Until now. I've spent the past 3 days up on 105th and West End. Some quickie first impressions:
1. Homeless people up here are either strangely well dressed or absolutely out of their fucking minds. I just walked by a group of the latter and felt like I'd wandered onto the set of Panic In Needle Park.
2. It seems that wifi has yet to be invented, much less free wifi. This includes the supposedly amazing, borderline legendary Hungarian Pastry Shop, or whatever it's called. When I politely asked the barista whether there was wifi, she looked at me like I'd just stumbled in from Hungary.
3. So that's where the Seinfeld diner is.
4. Lo and behold the 1 train. Where have you been all my life? This has got to be the best subway line in Manhattan. Wow. I'm meeting a friend at the Ear Inn tonight and can't believe I'm not dreading the schlep over there. It's a Brave New World on the West Side, let me tell you.
5. Cats are absolutely disgusting (ok, perhaps that transcends the Upper West Side. not sure). Seriously, though, are they supposed to go days without eating? Is this normal?
6. If you happen to be a racist, there's a wonderful Avenue by Avenue segregation thing going on up here. Whitey, stick to Broadway. Blacks, you take Amsterdam. Repeat.
7. Tired of crowded cafes? Try the ghost town-like Upper West Side!
8. I haven't witnessed many things as pretty and romantic as Morningside Park in a light rain. Wow. By the way, there's a place in NYC called Morningside Park. News to me.
9. Waking up to NY1 again is like coming out of a thirty year coma and being greeted by your wife Cate Blanchett who tells you you've just hit the Powerball jackpot. My God, how I've missed In The Papers.
10. I'm literally half a block from Riverside Park, which I hear is quite awesome. Of course, I've been too lazy to check it out. Oh, well. Maybe next time.
Monday, November 26, 2007
I'm Not There
First of all, I'm back in NYC for the week, doing a little cat-sitting for a friend on the Upper West Side. The cat is stand-offish, which is absolutely perfect for me, as I'm not doing this to make friends. I figure if the cat is still alive when its owner gets back, then I've done a good job. Can I go 7 days w/o petting the cat? We shall see...
NYC feels like a warm, comfy blanket. Yesterday morning, I got coffee and plopped down on a bench in the median smack in the middle of Broadway, just watched the cars and people going by, remembering, oh yeah, this is what it feels like to be not dead. DC has sort of started to grow on me in a way, but it still feels like a place where dreams (and social lives) go to die. But maybe it's best to live somewhere else and spend one week per month in NYC. It's like rediscovering the city over and over again. Kind of nice, at least for now.
I saw I'm Not There at Film Forum and really, really liked it. I'm not a big Dylan fan. I'm not a big Todd Haynes fan, either (in fact, Safe is on my 10 Most Overrated Films of All Time List. It's no Children of Men, but it's close), though his latter day work has really impressed me. I spoke with a few people who felt you needed to know a ton about Dylan to get the film, but I disagree with that. I'm a casual fan at best. I know the broad strokes, but not much else. I probably got maybe 30-40% of the references...but I didn't feel this took away from the experience at all. In fact, I didn't think the success of the movie hinged on getting/catching all the details. It was a surreal, trippy couple of hours. If it's Dylan minutia you're after, that's easily attainable (I saw a Rough Guide to Dylan in a used bookshop after the movie). This was more like a dream of Dylan. For a performer who's mythological persona might be even more relevant than his music at this point, I'm Not There is a perfect approach to his "story", especially when you consider the alternative: another paint by numbers musical biopic ala Ray or Walk the Line or countless others. I feel i know Dylan better, in a deeper way, than I would have after sitting through 2 hours of conventional rock star behind the music cliches. And if nothing else, I'm Not There feels totally new, which is a feat unto itself. Is it uneven? For sure. But excitingly so.
And Cate Blanchett can do nothing wrong. Wow.
NYC feels like a warm, comfy blanket. Yesterday morning, I got coffee and plopped down on a bench in the median smack in the middle of Broadway, just watched the cars and people going by, remembering, oh yeah, this is what it feels like to be not dead. DC has sort of started to grow on me in a way, but it still feels like a place where dreams (and social lives) go to die. But maybe it's best to live somewhere else and spend one week per month in NYC. It's like rediscovering the city over and over again. Kind of nice, at least for now.
I saw I'm Not There at Film Forum and really, really liked it. I'm not a big Dylan fan. I'm not a big Todd Haynes fan, either (in fact, Safe is on my 10 Most Overrated Films of All Time List. It's no Children of Men, but it's close), though his latter day work has really impressed me. I spoke with a few people who felt you needed to know a ton about Dylan to get the film, but I disagree with that. I'm a casual fan at best. I know the broad strokes, but not much else. I probably got maybe 30-40% of the references...but I didn't feel this took away from the experience at all. In fact, I didn't think the success of the movie hinged on getting/catching all the details. It was a surreal, trippy couple of hours. If it's Dylan minutia you're after, that's easily attainable (I saw a Rough Guide to Dylan in a used bookshop after the movie). This was more like a dream of Dylan. For a performer who's mythological persona might be even more relevant than his music at this point, I'm Not There is a perfect approach to his "story", especially when you consider the alternative: another paint by numbers musical biopic ala Ray or Walk the Line or countless others. I feel i know Dylan better, in a deeper way, than I would have after sitting through 2 hours of conventional rock star behind the music cliches. And if nothing else, I'm Not There feels totally new, which is a feat unto itself. Is it uneven? For sure. But excitingly so.
And Cate Blanchett can do nothing wrong. Wow.
Tuesday, November 20, 2007
DC, My New Home
Overheard this afternoon on the 14th Street Bus:
"I think from now on, before I have a child with a guy, I'm gonna find out a little bit about his background."
"I think from now on, before I have a child with a guy, I'm gonna find out a little bit about his background."
Monday, November 19, 2007
I Am An Old Man
Once upon a time, I really enjoyed the game of tennis. Right around 7th Grade, it became kind of cool to spend summer evenings playing under the lights at the local municipal courts. Cool kids got there via moped. I rode my bike. I read Tennis magazine and attended the US Open every September, but mostly I just liked hitting the ball around. There was something strangely satisfying about hitting a perfect shot, or chasing down a lob, or tending the net. And I always felt kind of cool being the only kid to play left-handed, as if this slight (and probably mostly psychological) advantage made up for what was, at the end of the day, a totally average set of skills. Also, since most lefties seem to be at least a little ambidextrous, I felt extra cool running down particularly tough shots to my right side, switching hands, and returning them right-handed. I doubt anyone even noticed, but to me this was the absolute height of 7th Grade
Tennis Cool.
At some point during high school, I realized that my playground game wasn't going to cut it if I actually wanted to play in any official capacity. So I started taking lessons once a week, and progressed to the point where I was able to break into the Varsity squad my senior year. Our school had a good team by south Jersey standards (meaning we won our division, but got slaughtered at county or state tournaments or any occasion which pitted us against opponents from the more populous northern portions of the state), and while the rest of the team was pretty polished (though still quirky), my doubles partner Jon and I probably clashed a bit with the others, at least in terms of playing ability. We were Second Doubles, the lowest members of the Varsity team, and were periodically challenged by JV players, who could have taken our spots by beating us at practice (they didn't). Point being: the rest of the team didn't have to deal with this crap, since they were actually good at tennis. We were only marginally good. But that's what was fun about it. While Brian, at First Singles (the best player), had to pretty much play like a machine to compete against each school's best player (even schools w/ incredibly shitty teams had one good guy Brian had to face), Jon and I were free to be our scrappy, marginally good selves. I could hit forehands from both sides, throw my racket after bad shots, and dive around the court like an idiot. Jon, even worse, would smoke in between games, eat McDonalds cheeseburgers during court changes, and once climbed up the high chain link fence surrounding the court and started screaming for someone to let him out of his cage. I think we were losing at the time. On more than one occasion, we were reprimanded by the other team's coach, which really takes some doing. But man, this was fun!
[Jon later got arrested for grand larceny and extradited to West Virginia. True story.]
[Totally Skippable Tennis Note, for anyone interested: the way a team tennis match works is this: there are 7 Varsity Players. The top 3 play singles, the next 4 doubles. So, each match is actually comprised of 5 matches (3 singles, 2 doubles). Whichever team wins the best of 5, wins the match. So screwups like me and Jon actually figure in evenly with the real players.)
ANYWAY, then I got to college and sports weren't cool anymore. What was cool? Let's see: hair dye, nose rings, apathy, flannel, thrift shops, Seattle, coffee, and etc. I put down my racket and didn't play tennis again for another 16 years. Which brings us to this past Monday.
Holy unbelievable crap, I am an old, slow, and easily-winded semblance of my former self. I am an embarresment to terrestrial creatures of all shapes and sizes. I am a lumbering oaf with the soft touch of a rhino. I am a sack of bones and soft shapes where once were muscles. I am very, very bad at tennis. When I say I was sore after playing a single set, what I mean is that two days later I was begging my girlfriend to please rub my right buttock, which throbbed with an intensity of pain normally associated with makeshift Civil War field hospitals (like any right-minded person, by the way, she demurred). Four days of absolute misery. Here's what I couldn't do without yelping in pain after playing one set of tennis: put my pants on, brush my teeth, walk down a flight of stairs, drive, tie my shoes. I mean, this was a serious wakeup call. I am no longer young.
But damn, I don't wanna go out like this. I played again on Friday, and this time was able to last a set and a half. I was sore all weekend, but nothing like the first time (now my soreness was of a more reasonable variety: feet, ankles, that sort of thing). Thing is, while plodding around the court the second time, I was struck over the head by the knowledge of what getting old, and I mean really old, will feel like. As I shuffled about, hitting balls into the net, way past the baseline, or not at all, I experienced a dramatic disconnect between brain and body. In my head, I was still the same me as ever. My "I" — whatever it is that makes me feel like me — hadn't changed at all. The brain was still in perfect shape. I knew exactly what shots I wanted to hit, where I wanted to place them, what spin I wanted to put on them. The whole game came flooding back to me almost immediately, as if my last match were 16 hours ago, not 16 years. But actually doing it? Totally different story. I just can't. It just doesn't happen. My body knows the truth, whether or not my brain can relate. I think this is what getting old must feel like, a series of surprises, the gradual incremental knowledge that, in fact, you aren't really you anymore, regardless of what you think.
Tennis Cool.
At some point during high school, I realized that my playground game wasn't going to cut it if I actually wanted to play in any official capacity. So I started taking lessons once a week, and progressed to the point where I was able to break into the Varsity squad my senior year. Our school had a good team by south Jersey standards (meaning we won our division, but got slaughtered at county or state tournaments or any occasion which pitted us against opponents from the more populous northern portions of the state), and while the rest of the team was pretty polished (though still quirky), my doubles partner Jon and I probably clashed a bit with the others, at least in terms of playing ability. We were Second Doubles, the lowest members of the Varsity team, and were periodically challenged by JV players, who could have taken our spots by beating us at practice (they didn't). Point being: the rest of the team didn't have to deal with this crap, since they were actually good at tennis. We were only marginally good. But that's what was fun about it. While Brian, at First Singles (the best player), had to pretty much play like a machine to compete against each school's best player (even schools w/ incredibly shitty teams had one good guy Brian had to face), Jon and I were free to be our scrappy, marginally good selves. I could hit forehands from both sides, throw my racket after bad shots, and dive around the court like an idiot. Jon, even worse, would smoke in between games, eat McDonalds cheeseburgers during court changes, and once climbed up the high chain link fence surrounding the court and started screaming for someone to let him out of his cage. I think we were losing at the time. On more than one occasion, we were reprimanded by the other team's coach, which really takes some doing. But man, this was fun!
[Jon later got arrested for grand larceny and extradited to West Virginia. True story.]
[Totally Skippable Tennis Note, for anyone interested: the way a team tennis match works is this: there are 7 Varsity Players. The top 3 play singles, the next 4 doubles. So, each match is actually comprised of 5 matches (3 singles, 2 doubles). Whichever team wins the best of 5, wins the match. So screwups like me and Jon actually figure in evenly with the real players.)
ANYWAY, then I got to college and sports weren't cool anymore. What was cool? Let's see: hair dye, nose rings, apathy, flannel, thrift shops, Seattle, coffee, and etc. I put down my racket and didn't play tennis again for another 16 years. Which brings us to this past Monday.
Holy unbelievable crap, I am an old, slow, and easily-winded semblance of my former self. I am an embarresment to terrestrial creatures of all shapes and sizes. I am a lumbering oaf with the soft touch of a rhino. I am a sack of bones and soft shapes where once were muscles. I am very, very bad at tennis. When I say I was sore after playing a single set, what I mean is that two days later I was begging my girlfriend to please rub my right buttock, which throbbed with an intensity of pain normally associated with makeshift Civil War field hospitals (like any right-minded person, by the way, she demurred). Four days of absolute misery. Here's what I couldn't do without yelping in pain after playing one set of tennis: put my pants on, brush my teeth, walk down a flight of stairs, drive, tie my shoes. I mean, this was a serious wakeup call. I am no longer young.
But damn, I don't wanna go out like this. I played again on Friday, and this time was able to last a set and a half. I was sore all weekend, but nothing like the first time (now my soreness was of a more reasonable variety: feet, ankles, that sort of thing). Thing is, while plodding around the court the second time, I was struck over the head by the knowledge of what getting old, and I mean really old, will feel like. As I shuffled about, hitting balls into the net, way past the baseline, or not at all, I experienced a dramatic disconnect between brain and body. In my head, I was still the same me as ever. My "I" — whatever it is that makes me feel like me — hadn't changed at all. The brain was still in perfect shape. I knew exactly what shots I wanted to hit, where I wanted to place them, what spin I wanted to put on them. The whole game came flooding back to me almost immediately, as if my last match were 16 hours ago, not 16 years. But actually doing it? Totally different story. I just can't. It just doesn't happen. My body knows the truth, whether or not my brain can relate. I think this is what getting old must feel like, a series of surprises, the gradual incremental knowledge that, in fact, you aren't really you anymore, regardless of what you think.
Thursday, November 1, 2007
I Have A Fever
I'm in bed and I'm freezing, then I'm sweating, then I'm freezing again. It's not fun. Not fun at all.
Tuesday, October 30, 2007
DC en Fuego
Two nights ago, I happened to fall asleep at a decent hour only to be quickly jolted out of bed by what sounded like a car accident. I stumbled about trying to find my glasses, then managed to open the shades after only the briefest of struggles. Now, I'm always convinced I hear something, like an intruder, a ghost, a knife fight in the street (hey, this is DC, after all). And it's always nothing, just the wind or the chronic ringing in my ears or (where have you gone?) my imagination. So imagine my surprise at the sight of a gigantic fireball 3 doors down, with a pickup truck in the middle. That's right: a truck blew up on my street. The truck was totally engulfed, like it was protesting the war in Vietnam. You could sort of make out the truck in there, but it was really just a giant ball of fire. Obviously, I felt pretty great that my own car was parked 4 spots behind the fireball.
Like the rest of my new neighbors, I stumbled out into the frigid night, wearing only my jammies and a look that suggested, "where the hell have I just moved to?" Amy stayed inside and watched from the windows, missing all the neighborly chitchat. Soon, we were herded aside by the incomparable DC police force (none of whom, unfortunately, brought their Segways), while the fire department got things under control in a matter of moments. The most excitement came when a stretcher was wheeled toward the truck, bringing gasps from all assembled. Was there actually somebody in there?
Fortunately, there was not. But maybe if there had been, I'd actually be able to dig up a shred of news concerning this event. A truck BLOWS UP on my street, two white males are observed fleeing the scene, and, well: NOTHING. You can't imagine how disconcerting this is. Where's the media? Where's like the police department Press Release, or something on the website, or, I don't know, a tiny item in the next morning's paper. Has DC slid so far down the drain that a vehicle being bombed doesn't warrant any follow-up? I mean, I can't even find anything about it on my neighborhood's crime blog...which, by the way, is even more disconcerting. My neighborhood has a crime blog. And the posts don't read like "Got a parking ticket on 15th Street". Oh no, these posts are more along the lines of "Girl raped in broad daylight outside convenience store" and "My boyfriend was jumped by 3 black guys in an alley off Mt. Pleasant." This is not good.
Neil Diamond's "I Am...I Said" just came on the shuffle: "LA's fine, but it ain't home. New York's home but it ain't mine no more."
I need a drink.
Like the rest of my new neighbors, I stumbled out into the frigid night, wearing only my jammies and a look that suggested, "where the hell have I just moved to?" Amy stayed inside and watched from the windows, missing all the neighborly chitchat. Soon, we were herded aside by the incomparable DC police force (none of whom, unfortunately, brought their Segways), while the fire department got things under control in a matter of moments. The most excitement came when a stretcher was wheeled toward the truck, bringing gasps from all assembled. Was there actually somebody in there?
Fortunately, there was not. But maybe if there had been, I'd actually be able to dig up a shred of news concerning this event. A truck BLOWS UP on my street, two white males are observed fleeing the scene, and, well: NOTHING. You can't imagine how disconcerting this is. Where's the media? Where's like the police department Press Release, or something on the website, or, I don't know, a tiny item in the next morning's paper. Has DC slid so far down the drain that a vehicle being bombed doesn't warrant any follow-up? I mean, I can't even find anything about it on my neighborhood's crime blog...which, by the way, is even more disconcerting. My neighborhood has a crime blog. And the posts don't read like "Got a parking ticket on 15th Street". Oh no, these posts are more along the lines of "Girl raped in broad daylight outside convenience store" and "My boyfriend was jumped by 3 black guys in an alley off Mt. Pleasant." This is not good.
Neil Diamond's "I Am...I Said" just came on the shuffle: "LA's fine, but it ain't home. New York's home but it ain't mine no more."
I need a drink.
Tuesday, October 23, 2007
Our Oven
This is what I've been dealing with pretty much full time for the past two weeks:
That is a detail from INSIDE our oven, depicting what remains when you let mice nest in your stove for two years. Apparently, the animals who occupied our house previously had no problem with this state of affairs, nor with the unimaginable odor which emanated forth from the stove as a result. What's worse, our slumlord sees no problem with this. To him, this constitutes a perfectly safe, sanitary, and acceptable living environment. Not only that, but he views me as the problem, a high-maintenance tenant who insists on making his life miserable.
But, aha: here's where attorneys and the DC housing inspector come in, to strike the fear of God and citations into slumlords everywhere. Like the cockroaches no doubt slumbering somewhere inside this oven, the slumlord scurries out into the light of day when said slumlord's ass is held in close proximity to the proverbial fire. And thus, tonight I purchase a new stove, and the slumlord pays.
Just a note for all my readers. Why have I not been writing any amusing entries of late? Because I've been far to busy dealing with this unbelievable bullshit.
That is a detail from INSIDE our oven, depicting what remains when you let mice nest in your stove for two years. Apparently, the animals who occupied our house previously had no problem with this state of affairs, nor with the unimaginable odor which emanated forth from the stove as a result. What's worse, our slumlord sees no problem with this. To him, this constitutes a perfectly safe, sanitary, and acceptable living environment. Not only that, but he views me as the problem, a high-maintenance tenant who insists on making his life miserable.
But, aha: here's where attorneys and the DC housing inspector come in, to strike the fear of God and citations into slumlords everywhere. Like the cockroaches no doubt slumbering somewhere inside this oven, the slumlord scurries out into the light of day when said slumlord's ass is held in close proximity to the proverbial fire. And thus, tonight I purchase a new stove, and the slumlord pays.
Just a note for all my readers. Why have I not been writing any amusing entries of late? Because I've been far to busy dealing with this unbelievable bullshit.
Tuesday, October 16, 2007
Working from Home
Just a little note to cheer the spirits of those of you working in cubicle-land: at 1pm today, an exterminator and I will explore the inner catacombs of my oven, in which appears to be residing a medium-sized community of disgusting rodents. Working from home: it's fantastic!
Monday, October 15, 2007
I Am Still Alive, But Barely
My God, moving blows. Seriously, it's the absolute worst. The last two weeks have been a series of ever-maddening moving related imbroglios. Everything has completely fallen by the wayside. I'm a shell of my former self. I'm essentially still living out of a bag. Everything is weird and upside down. Oh, and I'm in a new city where I don't know anyone or my way around. Uh, I think I'll deal with those facts later, possibly with the help of an accredited psychoanalyst.
Things have been such a blur that I believe only an observational list will do. And so I present, Observations on Moving from NYC to DC on a Whim:
1. An hour at the Chelsea U-Haul outpost will cure any of your I'm-Sad-To-Be-Leaving-NYC bittersweet nostalgia real, real quick. As will driving your U-Haul truck through the streets of Manhattan. Awful.
2. Dropping said truck off in the middle of one of DC's various ghettos will instantly make you pine for the Chelsea branch, and NYC in general.
3. Working from home = awesome. Working from home in bed = super awesome.
4. If you're planning a major lifestyle move, don't also plan to shoot a trailer for your documentary during the same week. Trust me on this.
5. I still haven't processed what went down with the Phillies yet. Attempting to comprehend the past 2 weeks in Phillies' history is about on par with pondering the near-infinite dimensions of physical space. Suffice to say, the Phils were just another layer of my preposterous last two weeks. Overwhelming isn't even the word.
6. That said, I'm not sure I've experienced greater pleasure than watching Mets fans openly weep during the final day of the regular baseball season. Now I know what it feels like to be alive.
7. My girlfriend and I moved into a house previously occupied by the only pair of disgustingly filthy gay men known in the Western hemisphere. These two managed to singlehandedly torpedo every gay stereotype I know of. I wish they'd spent less time maniacally tending to the garden and a little more time addressing the rodents in the stove. Oh, but at least the plants look nice. I was trying to think of a Queer Eye for the Slovenly Gay Guy joke here, but it made my head hurt.
8. I can actually see trees out the window. Lots of them. I forgot about those things.
9. Painting sucks.
10. If you ever wondered what would be the first thing about you life you'd stop doing if you ever got really, really busy, I've got your answer: blogging. You'd stop blogging.
Things have been such a blur that I believe only an observational list will do. And so I present, Observations on Moving from NYC to DC on a Whim:
1. An hour at the Chelsea U-Haul outpost will cure any of your I'm-Sad-To-Be-Leaving-NYC bittersweet nostalgia real, real quick. As will driving your U-Haul truck through the streets of Manhattan. Awful.
2. Dropping said truck off in the middle of one of DC's various ghettos will instantly make you pine for the Chelsea branch, and NYC in general.
3. Working from home = awesome. Working from home in bed = super awesome.
4. If you're planning a major lifestyle move, don't also plan to shoot a trailer for your documentary during the same week. Trust me on this.
5. I still haven't processed what went down with the Phillies yet. Attempting to comprehend the past 2 weeks in Phillies' history is about on par with pondering the near-infinite dimensions of physical space. Suffice to say, the Phils were just another layer of my preposterous last two weeks. Overwhelming isn't even the word.
6. That said, I'm not sure I've experienced greater pleasure than watching Mets fans openly weep during the final day of the regular baseball season. Now I know what it feels like to be alive.
7. My girlfriend and I moved into a house previously occupied by the only pair of disgustingly filthy gay men known in the Western hemisphere. These two managed to singlehandedly torpedo every gay stereotype I know of. I wish they'd spent less time maniacally tending to the garden and a little more time addressing the rodents in the stove. Oh, but at least the plants look nice. I was trying to think of a Queer Eye for the Slovenly Gay Guy joke here, but it made my head hurt.
8. I can actually see trees out the window. Lots of them. I forgot about those things.
9. Painting sucks.
10. If you ever wondered what would be the first thing about you life you'd stop doing if you ever got really, really busy, I've got your answer: blogging. You'd stop blogging.
Thursday, September 27, 2007
Last Day of Work!
The last week has been completely overwhelming, and the next is going to be even worse. I'm worn down and in no mood to blog. Too bad, though, cause there's been some awesome material of late, including me belting out Love Hurts at a karaoke bar on Ave A last night. There's a lot going on, much of it really exciting. About to make a big move, shoot my first commercial, and get started on a new documentary. All at once. My head hurts.
But in lieu of a real post, I just couldn't let this day go by without commemorating it. This is my very last day in an office, hopefully forever!!! I can't overstate the magnificence of knowing I don't have to go to work anymore. When I decided to tip my toe in the advertising waters two years ago, part of my agenda was to get to a point where I could work from home, but actually not starve to death (as I was about to do writing novelty books). It was a slog, but it totally paid off. Freedom, here I come.
But in lieu of a real post, I just couldn't let this day go by without commemorating it. This is my very last day in an office, hopefully forever!!! I can't overstate the magnificence of knowing I don't have to go to work anymore. When I decided to tip my toe in the advertising waters two years ago, part of my agenda was to get to a point where I could work from home, but actually not starve to death (as I was about to do writing novelty books). It was a slog, but it totally paid off. Freedom, here I come.
Monday, September 17, 2007
A Helpful Creative Tip for Dan Deacon
I hit the Girl Talk show at Webster Hall Saturday night (or, rather, Saturday evening, as doors opened at 5:30pm!). GT was amazing. Brother right-clicked the muthafuckin' doors off that place. And by the way, if you ever find yourself at a laptop rock show, it's incredibly, brilliantly fun to scream things like "F12!" from the crowd. Especially if you've just come from The Continental, where 5 shots of anything cost $10. Wow.
Anyhow, this is really just a short post for the benefit of Dan Deacon, who opened for the main act. Dan, you know that raised platform at the front of the dance floor? It's called a stage, dude. And when you're playing a show in public, you should sort of get up on top of that thing instead of sitting at your computer down on the floor for no reason. Not that there's much to see at these types of shows anyway, but if I wanted to stand there and just listen to a bunch of ho-hum electronica in the dark, I could have stayed home and punched in a couple of pre-sets from my mid-1980s era Casio keyboard. At least try to put on a show or something. Come on. These tickets aren't cheap. And that flashing skull from the Halloween shop in the mall doesn't count.
Girl Talk, on the other hand, while also just a dude w/ a Mac, rocked the house, y'all. Now THAT is how you put on a show. ON STAGE. With some video going behind you, jumpin' around in your hoodie, sweatin' like a fat dude at the Old Country Buffet...this shit was electric. Great, great show.
Anyhow, this is really just a short post for the benefit of Dan Deacon, who opened for the main act. Dan, you know that raised platform at the front of the dance floor? It's called a stage, dude. And when you're playing a show in public, you should sort of get up on top of that thing instead of sitting at your computer down on the floor for no reason. Not that there's much to see at these types of shows anyway, but if I wanted to stand there and just listen to a bunch of ho-hum electronica in the dark, I could have stayed home and punched in a couple of pre-sets from my mid-1980s era Casio keyboard. At least try to put on a show or something. Come on. These tickets aren't cheap. And that flashing skull from the Halloween shop in the mall doesn't count.
Girl Talk, on the other hand, while also just a dude w/ a Mac, rocked the house, y'all. Now THAT is how you put on a show. ON STAGE. With some video going behind you, jumpin' around in your hoodie, sweatin' like a fat dude at the Old Country Buffet...this shit was electric. Great, great show.
Friday, September 14, 2007
DC or Not DC
This has been the question for the past several months. Five and a half years into a long-distance relationship, one of us has to give in. Somehow, that one of us is me. Huh. I honestly never thought I'd lose that argument. I mean, I've got NYC on my side. But, alas, two more weeks and I'm out of here. The whole decision making process sort of happened in a blur, to the point that I'm not even sure there was a process at all. Yet I kind of think there will be some serious advantages to this move. And so, in the spirit of rationalization, I give you the Why I Think This Is A Good Idea list:
[Note: most people I talk to assume that the biggest benefit will be seeing my girlfriend all the time, as opposed to two weekends a month. Not so. If she moved here, I'd see her all the time, too. So that's a wash.]
1. The undeniable dream of working from home, in an actual home office: I am quite possibly the laziest person alive. Unfortunately, my parents neglected to set up a trust fund, and so I am forced to schlep off to work every day, where I am surrounded by idiots, some of whom actually seem interested in the business at hand. There is nothing worse than being in an office. Likewise for being on a schedule. Why can't I go see a movie in the middle of the day whenever the hell I feel like it? Why do I have to sit here till 6 (a completely arbitrary time) whether or not I'm busy? Uh, I don't know. But that shit is over. I've always wanted a home office. I've always wanted to live on my own schedule, on my own terms. Could I pull this off in NYC? Possibly, but there certainly wouldn't be a home office. I mean an actual, honest-to-goodness room (with door!) dedicated to my work and writing and filmmaking and Netflix queue building. I couldn't be more excited about this.
1a. Working from anywhere: The real beauty of telecommuting is the ability to shed geography. Maybe I feel like going to LA for a month. Maybe I just wanna head up to the Jersey Shore and visit the folks (and watch the Phillies stumble about). Maybe I wanna swing up to NYC for a few days. As long as I can get online, I can dash off my copywriting work and get paid. It's beautiful.
2. Lack of schedule = creativity: Of course, my laziness might totally squash this, but in theory, since I'll be working 3 days a week on average, I should have more time to write and pursue other creative interests, all of which have pretty much fallen under the bus since I went back to work. That documentary I've been wanting to shoot but couldn't find the time? Well, now I've got time.
3. Outdoor space: the holy grail of NYC living pretty much grows on trees down in DC (pun intended). As (both) avid readers of this blog know, my week in Maine was something of a revelation. I love the outdoors. Or, at least I love going outdoors for a few minutes to drink my coffee. It's not like I wanna sleep out there or anything. But damn, you should see our outdoor space. It's phenomenal! Manicured to within an inch of its life by the current stylish gay tenants. I'm sure I'll kill everything in about a week, but this place is like a damn botanical garden or something. I might need to buy some koi or some shit.
4. I am obsessed with food. Obviously, DC's culinary scene is, well, totally nonexistent. But the girlfriend has cobbled together a semi-obsessive circle of foodies who convene every 2 weeks for elaborate home cooked feasts. And guess who gets to just waltz into this scene? Yup, me. I'm gonna eat and drink wine like a maniac. This is the sort of thing I used to do in NYC until all my friend either had kids and moved to the burbs or moved to LA like normal people. Ah, dinner.
5. Never having to think about fashion, hairstyle, or physical fitness ever again: Have you seen the people down there? It's like you just woke up in a NJ strip mall circa 1992.
6. Paying off debt: As long as I stay in NYC, my credit card debt ain't going anywhere. And as long as my credit card debt ain't going anywhere, I better just keeping dreaming about my gigantic flat screen TV and super stylish Vespa motor scooter. But a year in DC will put a giant dent in this debt, which I'll celebrate by immediately charging the above mentioned major purchases. Ah, progress.
7. The ability to (mildly) impress people at cocktail parties: Saying you're a writer in NYC is pretty much like saying you're a garbageman, albeit a much worse paid one. Odds are, there's an actually successful writer at the same party. Or if not, everyone there is a "writer" of some sort. In DC, if you say anything other than "lawyer" people light up like you just got back from a moon landing. It reminds me of Boston.
8. Watching the Phillies win: As I'll be relegated to the lowly Orioles/Nationals baseball viewing options, at least I'll take heart in observing the Phils beat up on inferior competition, as opposed to being trifled with by the detestable Mets. Then again, Nats/Orioles? This is gonna be rough.
9. Never stepping foot on Amtrak: the worst thing about long-distance dating, by far, is all the time spent on Amtrak. There's nothing quite like washing down an abysmal workweek with 4 hours of torturous rail travel. I've seen Penn Station's Arrivals/Departures board in my nightmares.
I just ran out of coffee, so that's that. Would my list of Reasons Not To Move To DC be a gazillion times longer? Yeah, yeah. But let's not think about that. It's Friday and the NY sun is shining...
[Note: most people I talk to assume that the biggest benefit will be seeing my girlfriend all the time, as opposed to two weekends a month. Not so. If she moved here, I'd see her all the time, too. So that's a wash.]
1. The undeniable dream of working from home, in an actual home office: I am quite possibly the laziest person alive. Unfortunately, my parents neglected to set up a trust fund, and so I am forced to schlep off to work every day, where I am surrounded by idiots, some of whom actually seem interested in the business at hand. There is nothing worse than being in an office. Likewise for being on a schedule. Why can't I go see a movie in the middle of the day whenever the hell I feel like it? Why do I have to sit here till 6 (a completely arbitrary time) whether or not I'm busy? Uh, I don't know. But that shit is over. I've always wanted a home office. I've always wanted to live on my own schedule, on my own terms. Could I pull this off in NYC? Possibly, but there certainly wouldn't be a home office. I mean an actual, honest-to-goodness room (with door!) dedicated to my work and writing and filmmaking and Netflix queue building. I couldn't be more excited about this.
1a. Working from anywhere: The real beauty of telecommuting is the ability to shed geography. Maybe I feel like going to LA for a month. Maybe I just wanna head up to the Jersey Shore and visit the folks (and watch the Phillies stumble about). Maybe I wanna swing up to NYC for a few days. As long as I can get online, I can dash off my copywriting work and get paid. It's beautiful.
2. Lack of schedule = creativity: Of course, my laziness might totally squash this, but in theory, since I'll be working 3 days a week on average, I should have more time to write and pursue other creative interests, all of which have pretty much fallen under the bus since I went back to work. That documentary I've been wanting to shoot but couldn't find the time? Well, now I've got time.
3. Outdoor space: the holy grail of NYC living pretty much grows on trees down in DC (pun intended). As (both) avid readers of this blog know, my week in Maine was something of a revelation. I love the outdoors. Or, at least I love going outdoors for a few minutes to drink my coffee. It's not like I wanna sleep out there or anything. But damn, you should see our outdoor space. It's phenomenal! Manicured to within an inch of its life by the current stylish gay tenants. I'm sure I'll kill everything in about a week, but this place is like a damn botanical garden or something. I might need to buy some koi or some shit.
4. I am obsessed with food. Obviously, DC's culinary scene is, well, totally nonexistent. But the girlfriend has cobbled together a semi-obsessive circle of foodies who convene every 2 weeks for elaborate home cooked feasts. And guess who gets to just waltz into this scene? Yup, me. I'm gonna eat and drink wine like a maniac. This is the sort of thing I used to do in NYC until all my friend either had kids and moved to the burbs or moved to LA like normal people. Ah, dinner.
5. Never having to think about fashion, hairstyle, or physical fitness ever again: Have you seen the people down there? It's like you just woke up in a NJ strip mall circa 1992.
6. Paying off debt: As long as I stay in NYC, my credit card debt ain't going anywhere. And as long as my credit card debt ain't going anywhere, I better just keeping dreaming about my gigantic flat screen TV and super stylish Vespa motor scooter. But a year in DC will put a giant dent in this debt, which I'll celebrate by immediately charging the above mentioned major purchases. Ah, progress.
7. The ability to (mildly) impress people at cocktail parties: Saying you're a writer in NYC is pretty much like saying you're a garbageman, albeit a much worse paid one. Odds are, there's an actually successful writer at the same party. Or if not, everyone there is a "writer" of some sort. In DC, if you say anything other than "lawyer" people light up like you just got back from a moon landing. It reminds me of Boston.
8. Watching the Phillies win: As I'll be relegated to the lowly Orioles/Nationals baseball viewing options, at least I'll take heart in observing the Phils beat up on inferior competition, as opposed to being trifled with by the detestable Mets. Then again, Nats/Orioles? This is gonna be rough.
9. Never stepping foot on Amtrak: the worst thing about long-distance dating, by far, is all the time spent on Amtrak. There's nothing quite like washing down an abysmal workweek with 4 hours of torturous rail travel. I've seen Penn Station's Arrivals/Departures board in my nightmares.
I just ran out of coffee, so that's that. Would my list of Reasons Not To Move To DC be a gazillion times longer? Yeah, yeah. But let's not think about that. It's Friday and the NY sun is shining...
Monday, September 10, 2007
DC Real Estate
I've seen some crazy shit in my time -- a one-armed/no-legged juggler in San Diego, midget bowling, people who enjoy children -- but nothing prepared me for the sheer lunacy that is the Washington, DC, apartment rental market. I thought I lived in an expensive city, but after a weekend spent looking at places in DC, well, I stand corrected. There is simply no accounting for the preposterous levels of cash people are (apparently) plunking down to rent a place in our nation's crapital. To my mind, there are two factors which inform the value of one's living quarters: location and the quality of the housing itself. In DC, you get neither, and you get neither for an incredible amount of money.
For example: I looked at a god-forsaken basement hovel wherein I not only had to choke back vomit while perusing the bathroom, but in which my lanky 5' 9" (in shoes) frame was unable to stand fully upright. I've often wondered what it would feel like to be tall, and thanks to this craphole, now I know. Oh, and you also had to walk down an ally right out of South Central to get to the place. And the detestable sound of rampaging children could be heard from the apartment upstairs. And I'm pretty sure the landlord was sitting outside sharpening a knife when we arrived. And the kitchenette was apparently lifted wholesale from a 1970s-era mobile home.
The price? $350 more per month than I pay for a very nice apartment in Manhattan. No shit.
And this isn't an anomaly. Even when places weren't horrible, even when they were sort of comparable, I just couldn't see paying more to live in DC than I'm paying in NYC. It's like the entire District has lost it's mind. And I'm left to wonder, why would anyone choose to live there? The big plus of cities like Philly, DC, Providence, etc is that they are affordable. If the market's actually worse, why not just live in NYC? Seriously, I need answers. It's totally mind-boggling.
Location is the real killer, though. When you find a nice place in DC, odds are it's in the middle of nowhere. Or maybe there's a bus nearby or something. Or maybe it's "near stuff" in DC terms, which means stuff is in striking distance if you're in pretty good physical shape, have a car, or don't mind walking through the ghetto to get there. It's not like you step out your door and are surrounded by stuff. You're surrounded by other houses. Like the burbs.
So, if it's not location, and if you're not getting more for your money (aside from a single place, all were below average at best), what's going on? How are these prices possible?
But somehow we miraculously found a great place. Not sure how, but it happened. Still, I'd like to go back and punch that hovel-renting slumlord in the face.
For example: I looked at a god-forsaken basement hovel wherein I not only had to choke back vomit while perusing the bathroom, but in which my lanky 5' 9" (in shoes) frame was unable to stand fully upright. I've often wondered what it would feel like to be tall, and thanks to this craphole, now I know. Oh, and you also had to walk down an ally right out of South Central to get to the place. And the detestable sound of rampaging children could be heard from the apartment upstairs. And I'm pretty sure the landlord was sitting outside sharpening a knife when we arrived. And the kitchenette was apparently lifted wholesale from a 1970s-era mobile home.
The price? $350 more per month than I pay for a very nice apartment in Manhattan. No shit.
And this isn't an anomaly. Even when places weren't horrible, even when they were sort of comparable, I just couldn't see paying more to live in DC than I'm paying in NYC. It's like the entire District has lost it's mind. And I'm left to wonder, why would anyone choose to live there? The big plus of cities like Philly, DC, Providence, etc is that they are affordable. If the market's actually worse, why not just live in NYC? Seriously, I need answers. It's totally mind-boggling.
Location is the real killer, though. When you find a nice place in DC, odds are it's in the middle of nowhere. Or maybe there's a bus nearby or something. Or maybe it's "near stuff" in DC terms, which means stuff is in striking distance if you're in pretty good physical shape, have a car, or don't mind walking through the ghetto to get there. It's not like you step out your door and are surrounded by stuff. You're surrounded by other houses. Like the burbs.
So, if it's not location, and if you're not getting more for your money (aside from a single place, all were below average at best), what's going on? How are these prices possible?
But somehow we miraculously found a great place. Not sure how, but it happened. Still, I'd like to go back and punch that hovel-renting slumlord in the face.
Friday, August 31, 2007
Assorted String Instruments
I've been nursing a fantasy of learning the banjo for the past half year or so. Last night I got together with a few friends at Hill Country, the incredible Texas-bbq themed extravaganza down the street from my office. I've been a few times for lunch, but at night the place was really hopping. We got a table directly adjacent to the downstairs stage, where halfway through our meal (I had a quarter chicken dark, a single pork rib, white bread, campfire baked beans with burnt ends, cole slaw, and, this being NYC after all, a PBR) a 5 piece country bluegrass (or something) outfit began doing their thing. I had a really closeup look at the banjo player, and let's just say it was a rather sobering experience. I literally couldn't even begin to comprehend what his hands were doing. It wouldn't have been more alien or intimidating if he'd started flying around the room. I mean, I can't fly. How does he do that?
There were several musicians at the table, so I asked if the banjo was really as difficult as it looks. Not only did they answer in the affirmative, but two guitarists told me they wouldn't even know where to begin with a banjo. This was mindblowing, as I've been suffering under a lifelong delusion that once you've learned any string instrument, you were sort of covered on all the others (perhaps excepting fiddles and other things involving bows). But apparently even if you've played the guitar for twenty years, the banjo is another story altogether.
Looking around stage, I saw a banjo, a guitar, a mandolin, a fiddle, and an upright bass. Obviously the bass is out. What a terrible instrument to take up. Can you imagine schlepping that thing all over town? I was schvitzin' just thinking about it. Plus, it's obviously the easiest to play. Though I want it to be easy, I'm not sure I want it to be that easy. The acoustic guitar struck me as it always does: serviceable, okay, nice enough, but a tad on the commonplace side. Plus, if I learn to play guitar, I'm afraid I'll have to morph into one of those guys who sits strumming out on their stoop, playing and singing at a volume just audible enough to register as annoying. The mandolin was actually pretty sweet, and the dude playing it had a lot of nice moves. But it still looks like it's halfway to a ukulele. Do women find the mandolin attractive? Would strolling about town with my mini-mandolin case make me look cool? I'm really not sure, but it doesn't seem like a slam dunk. The fiddle is cool, but somehow way out of my league. The whole bow thing throws me off somehow. Plus, the musicians at my table vouched that the fiddle was probably even more difficult to learn than the banjo, as it doesn't have frets (whatever they are). I nodded like I knew what they were talking about. Which brings us back to the banjo. Super difficult or no, it just looks incredibly cool when a dude can play that thing. And I just really love the sound. The banjo makes me wanna quit my day job, also quit my night job (writing, in theory), also quit my fantasy baseball league, also cancel my Netflix subscription, and spend my days wandering about Appalachia, playing my banjo and chopping firewood to make ends meet. Can you even imagine the great beard I could grow in Appalachia? Goddamn. That's the life.
Anyway, I'm not sure easiness is the best way to choose an instrument. Aren't you like supposed to feel some calling or creative urge to pick something up? When great musicians start to play, is learning curve on their list of requirements? Somehow, I doubt it. So maybe it is the banjo still.
Oh, and a side note: GO PHILLIES!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
There were several musicians at the table, so I asked if the banjo was really as difficult as it looks. Not only did they answer in the affirmative, but two guitarists told me they wouldn't even know where to begin with a banjo. This was mindblowing, as I've been suffering under a lifelong delusion that once you've learned any string instrument, you were sort of covered on all the others (perhaps excepting fiddles and other things involving bows). But apparently even if you've played the guitar for twenty years, the banjo is another story altogether.
Looking around stage, I saw a banjo, a guitar, a mandolin, a fiddle, and an upright bass. Obviously the bass is out. What a terrible instrument to take up. Can you imagine schlepping that thing all over town? I was schvitzin' just thinking about it. Plus, it's obviously the easiest to play. Though I want it to be easy, I'm not sure I want it to be that easy. The acoustic guitar struck me as it always does: serviceable, okay, nice enough, but a tad on the commonplace side. Plus, if I learn to play guitar, I'm afraid I'll have to morph into one of those guys who sits strumming out on their stoop, playing and singing at a volume just audible enough to register as annoying. The mandolin was actually pretty sweet, and the dude playing it had a lot of nice moves. But it still looks like it's halfway to a ukulele. Do women find the mandolin attractive? Would strolling about town with my mini-mandolin case make me look cool? I'm really not sure, but it doesn't seem like a slam dunk. The fiddle is cool, but somehow way out of my league. The whole bow thing throws me off somehow. Plus, the musicians at my table vouched that the fiddle was probably even more difficult to learn than the banjo, as it doesn't have frets (whatever they are). I nodded like I knew what they were talking about. Which brings us back to the banjo. Super difficult or no, it just looks incredibly cool when a dude can play that thing. And I just really love the sound. The banjo makes me wanna quit my day job, also quit my night job (writing, in theory), also quit my fantasy baseball league, also cancel my Netflix subscription, and spend my days wandering about Appalachia, playing my banjo and chopping firewood to make ends meet. Can you even imagine the great beard I could grow in Appalachia? Goddamn. That's the life.
Anyway, I'm not sure easiness is the best way to choose an instrument. Aren't you like supposed to feel some calling or creative urge to pick something up? When great musicians start to play, is learning curve on their list of requirements? Somehow, I doubt it. So maybe it is the banjo still.
Oh, and a side note: GO PHILLIES!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Saturday, August 25, 2007
Top 20
I just got home and I'm really, really drunk. Saw "Hannah Takes the Stairs" at IFC Center (eh, average), then stumbled upon a preposterously amazing random restaurant that served incredibly strong frozen margaritas for $4, plus really awesome pasta, garlic bread, and salads. I'm barely lucid. It was phenomenal. I can barely think straight...but I was pondering an all-time favorite top 20 movie list in the cab home. I'm, again, incredibly drunk, but I'm going to give it the ol' stream of consciousness try. These aren't the best 20 movies of all time, they are merely the first 20 movies that occur to me as "my favorite." Off the top of my head, these are the 20 movies that make me, well, me. In no order:
The Goonies
Back to the Future
Raging Bull
Rushmore
Annie Hall
Manhattan
To Die For
Out of the Past
Trainspotting
The Princess Bride
The Natural
The Graduate
Sweet and Lowdown
The Godfather
The Breakfast Club
Saturday Night Fever
Raiders of the Lost Ark
Heathers
Rocky
Badlands
The Goonies
Back to the Future
Raging Bull
Rushmore
Annie Hall
Manhattan
To Die For
Out of the Past
Trainspotting
The Princess Bride
The Natural
The Graduate
Sweet and Lowdown
The Godfather
The Breakfast Club
Saturday Night Fever
Raiders of the Lost Ark
Heathers
Rocky
Badlands
Thursday, August 23, 2007
Me and My Mac
It's been twelve days since I ordered my exorbitantly expensive Macbook, or Powerbook, or whatever it's called. Twelve days and the thing hasn't even shipped yet! I hope this isn't a metaphor for how slow the actual computer will be (actually, given its price tag, I'd better be able to travel at the speed of light with this thing). It occurred to me during this interminably long wait that ordering a Mac is pretty much exactly like ordering a mail-order bride. But I mean ordering a mail-order bride around the turn of last century (107 years ago, not 7), back when your bride had to schlep over to America on some sort of tramp steamer and get caught up at like Ellis Island or something and then have to lug her gigantic steamer trunk out to the middle of the US via some rinky dink railroad. And there weren't phones or faxes or emails or FedEx, so I guess you just sort of had to wait until the mail-order bride plopped down on your doorstep, however long it took. Then once she was there, you could only keep your fingers crossed that she spoke English, was reasonably attractive (and fertile, this being a century ago, when people still enjoyed children), and didn't give you too much Eastern European socialist backtalk. Yup, that's me and my Mac.
Everyone I mention this ridiculous scenario to responds by asking, "Why didn't you just go to the Mac store?" Uh, for the same reason I don't attend Star Trek conventions. Cause I don't want to be in the same room with several hundred feverish Mac devotees drooling over phones and other slightly intriguing consumer items. It's creepy up in the Mac store. Seriously, I wouldn't look twice if Jim Jones started working at the Genius Bar (or whatever the hell it's called). If any of my readers happen to be scouting locations for the next Romero-esque zombie thriller/social satire, check out your local Mac store.
In the meantime, I wait. One day, perhaps, a computer will actually arrive. Hopefully I'll still be young enough to remember how to use it.
Everyone I mention this ridiculous scenario to responds by asking, "Why didn't you just go to the Mac store?" Uh, for the same reason I don't attend Star Trek conventions. Cause I don't want to be in the same room with several hundred feverish Mac devotees drooling over phones and other slightly intriguing consumer items. It's creepy up in the Mac store. Seriously, I wouldn't look twice if Jim Jones started working at the Genius Bar (or whatever the hell it's called). If any of my readers happen to be scouting locations for the next Romero-esque zombie thriller/social satire, check out your local Mac store.
In the meantime, I wait. One day, perhaps, a computer will actually arrive. Hopefully I'll still be young enough to remember how to use it.
Wednesday, August 22, 2007
The Wonders of Advertising
So, I'm pitching some television commercial concepts to Cablevision today. The situation, essentially, is that they want to target Brooklyn, touting how they have the best tv, internet, phone, blah blah blah in the borough. Of course my instinct is to just make fun of everyone who lives there, so all of my scripts/concepts are mildly insulting. Anyway, I just heard from the geniuses I work for that I need to delete the word "freakin'" from all my scrips. Seriously. Freakin'. It's too edgy.
Where's my cyanide capsule?
Where's my cyanide capsule?
Tuesday, August 14, 2007
Random Thoughts
Things are really crazy right now. I can't get it together to write an actual post, but here's a few scattered tidbits from my incredibly satisfying and exciting life.
1. I've lost the ability to conduct myself on the fantasy baseball field with anything remotely resembling competence. How did this happen? My dwindling skill set suffers another hit.
2. Did the unthinkable Saturday and ordered a Mac. I can barely look at myself in the mirror. Steve Jobs is the PT Barnum of our time. I haven't felt like such a member of the herd since I voted for Kerry. What next, a tattoo? A Volkswagen? Brooklyn?
3. Two reasons for the Mac purchase. My beloved Toshiba blew up. And I want to learn Final Cut Pro. Alas.
4. But, after switching out the hard drive and ordering a power cord on eBay, the Toshiba has come back to life! Last night was my first with a computer in several weeks. And guess what: it completely sucked. I need to get back to nature or something. I fear I'm not cut out for modern life.
5. On the other hand, how can we live in a society where whoever invented Air Conditioning doesn't score a national holiday? MLK, Jr.? Gimme a break. Air conditioning!
6. My little sister is getting married in four days. I'm old.
7. My competent boss just left for a three week vacation, sticking us all with her incompetent partner. He's like a poodle flying the space shuttle. Unreal.
8. My run as the Greatest Matchmaker of His Generation continues unabated. Seriously, I have a gift. If anyone needs setting up, drop me a line. I'm a miracle worker. You should see these people.
9. Finally popped Reds in the DVD player after 3 weeks of it mocking me from the shelf. Turned out to be rather delightful. Warren Beatty's an attractive dude, in case you were wondering.
10. Veronica Mars Season 2: completely blew me away. Kristen Bell's performance is one of the very best I've seen on TV. She's outstanding, and the show is really, really well done. It's not the Wire or anything, but VM makes the American Office look like the BBC Office. It's that good.
1. I've lost the ability to conduct myself on the fantasy baseball field with anything remotely resembling competence. How did this happen? My dwindling skill set suffers another hit.
2. Did the unthinkable Saturday and ordered a Mac. I can barely look at myself in the mirror. Steve Jobs is the PT Barnum of our time. I haven't felt like such a member of the herd since I voted for Kerry. What next, a tattoo? A Volkswagen? Brooklyn?
3. Two reasons for the Mac purchase. My beloved Toshiba blew up. And I want to learn Final Cut Pro. Alas.
4. But, after switching out the hard drive and ordering a power cord on eBay, the Toshiba has come back to life! Last night was my first with a computer in several weeks. And guess what: it completely sucked. I need to get back to nature or something. I fear I'm not cut out for modern life.
5. On the other hand, how can we live in a society where whoever invented Air Conditioning doesn't score a national holiday? MLK, Jr.? Gimme a break. Air conditioning!
6. My little sister is getting married in four days. I'm old.
7. My competent boss just left for a three week vacation, sticking us all with her incompetent partner. He's like a poodle flying the space shuttle. Unreal.
8. My run as the Greatest Matchmaker of His Generation continues unabated. Seriously, I have a gift. If anyone needs setting up, drop me a line. I'm a miracle worker. You should see these people.
9. Finally popped Reds in the DVD player after 3 weeks of it mocking me from the shelf. Turned out to be rather delightful. Warren Beatty's an attractive dude, in case you were wondering.
10. Veronica Mars Season 2: completely blew me away. Kristen Bell's performance is one of the very best I've seen on TV. She's outstanding, and the show is really, really well done. It's not the Wire or anything, but VM makes the American Office look like the BBC Office. It's that good.
Friday, August 10, 2007
Beasties in Brooklyn
Caught the Beastie Boys playing the McCarren Park Pool in Williamsburg last night. Very cool show, very cool location - a super old, long abandoned public pool, now drained and turned into a concert venue. I've always been more fascinated with the Beastie Boys as a concept than an actual fan of their music (they seem to occupy a thoroughly unique pop cultural non-category), but they were great live. Really good. Glad I went. And surprisingly, it was the first time they'd ever played Brooklyn. Needless to say, they closed with No Sleep Till Brooklyn, which was obviously pretty sweet.
But the highlight of the night was a little old school Polish joint we ducked into for dinner before the show. I seriously gotta track down the name of this place, but it was on Bedford Avenue, probably around North 10th Street or so, West side of the street. Nondescript, for the most part. Small tables. Menu posted on the wall. But, man: for $6.95 I got a monstrous Polish kielbasa platter, with choice of potato (mashed, with bacon!) and two sides (hot sauerkraut, cucumber salad). Mix in some choice brown mustard, and it was a heavenly experience. We also split a side of above average potato pancakes and two ice cold 16 oz Polish beers recommended by the chipper, non-hipster waitress. My friend had a similar ginormous chicken cutlet platter. The tab? Thirty bucks. Once again, NYC is the best place in the world.
And while I'm on the subject, let me reiterate my longstanding belief that Williamsburg gets a bad rap. I lived there for 8 months once, and while I'm much too lazy to live in Brooklyn, there was a lot about the hood I really liked. Incredible cheap food, great bars, the ability to park a car on the street with no hassled. And the super annoying hipsters everyone (rightfully) hates have long moved passed the Bedford stop. That scene is old hat to the avant hip. And it's certainly no more annoying than the Lower East Side. Actually, it's about ten times less annoying.
But the highlight of the night was a little old school Polish joint we ducked into for dinner before the show. I seriously gotta track down the name of this place, but it was on Bedford Avenue, probably around North 10th Street or so, West side of the street. Nondescript, for the most part. Small tables. Menu posted on the wall. But, man: for $6.95 I got a monstrous Polish kielbasa platter, with choice of potato (mashed, with bacon!) and two sides (hot sauerkraut, cucumber salad). Mix in some choice brown mustard, and it was a heavenly experience. We also split a side of above average potato pancakes and two ice cold 16 oz Polish beers recommended by the chipper, non-hipster waitress. My friend had a similar ginormous chicken cutlet platter. The tab? Thirty bucks. Once again, NYC is the best place in the world.
And while I'm on the subject, let me reiterate my longstanding belief that Williamsburg gets a bad rap. I lived there for 8 months once, and while I'm much too lazy to live in Brooklyn, there was a lot about the hood I really liked. Incredible cheap food, great bars, the ability to park a car on the street with no hassled. And the super annoying hipsters everyone (rightfully) hates have long moved passed the Bedford stop. That scene is old hat to the avant hip. And it's certainly no more annoying than the Lower East Side. Actually, it's about ten times less annoying.
Tuesday, August 7, 2007
Real Life
Well, six days in Boothbay Harbor, ME, was just what the doctor ordered. And yes, I'm referring to the doctor I'm allowed to visit thanks to my substandard/embarrassing HealthNet benefits plan — ah, finally a perk! I knew advertising had a purpose in my life. (By the way, last time I visited a doctor, a dermatologist as it turned out, to have a look at the mysterious flesh-eating bacteria on my cheek [or Rosacia], the receptionist actually snickered at the site of my low-rent, cardboard HealthNet membership card. Oh, the humanity.)
ANYWAY: Maine. I'm afraid my ho-hum writing talents don't lend themselves very well to discussing the positive. So, suffice to say, Maine was great! Poetry it ain't, I know. But hey, it's a blog. Gimme a break. And you know what I mean. Maine was wonderful, relaxing, breathtaking, full of lobster, glorious and perfect. Like the Jersey shore without other people. Heaven. Best of all: no cell phone reception, no Internet, no cable TV. My God, I can't believe how perfectly wonderful that felt. Nothing tying us to reality, to jobs, rent, bills, correspondence, atrocious fantasy baseball teams, civilization, responsibility. It was a sublime. I felt like Emerson, but with plumbing. For what more might Man desire? Following this to its logical conclusion, I, er, concluded, whilst staring out across the glassy, chilled Maine water, swatting the mosquitoes (see, again the Jersey shore), that I could really do without the city. And not just NYC, but any city. Maine just felt...right or something. A good book, a bottle of wine, several crustaceans swimming in my belly... ah, Heaven.
Then the Fall. Back to my tiny apartment, to the heat, to the Internet (though, coincidentally, my computer just exploded, so I'm offline at home), the hustle and bustle of city life. Eh, I think I'm over it. Or slightly over it. Or ready for a brief respite, at least. Culture's overrated. Especially when one (shudder) must work for a living. And that's the worst of it, obviously. Being back at work, at my little desk, staring into a screen. What the hell's the point? Paying rent? Seeing movies? Enjoying the occasional decadent meal? I mean, that's it? Then what?
Pardon the sophomoric philosophical meanderings. I'm fresh back from the Wilderness, after all. More snark to come, promise. Next post: Mac vs. PC. Should I, will I, take the plunge???
ANYWAY: Maine. I'm afraid my ho-hum writing talents don't lend themselves very well to discussing the positive. So, suffice to say, Maine was great! Poetry it ain't, I know. But hey, it's a blog. Gimme a break. And you know what I mean. Maine was wonderful, relaxing, breathtaking, full of lobster, glorious and perfect. Like the Jersey shore without other people. Heaven. Best of all: no cell phone reception, no Internet, no cable TV. My God, I can't believe how perfectly wonderful that felt. Nothing tying us to reality, to jobs, rent, bills, correspondence, atrocious fantasy baseball teams, civilization, responsibility. It was a sublime. I felt like Emerson, but with plumbing. For what more might Man desire? Following this to its logical conclusion, I, er, concluded, whilst staring out across the glassy, chilled Maine water, swatting the mosquitoes (see, again the Jersey shore), that I could really do without the city. And not just NYC, but any city. Maine just felt...right or something. A good book, a bottle of wine, several crustaceans swimming in my belly... ah, Heaven.
Then the Fall. Back to my tiny apartment, to the heat, to the Internet (though, coincidentally, my computer just exploded, so I'm offline at home), the hustle and bustle of city life. Eh, I think I'm over it. Or slightly over it. Or ready for a brief respite, at least. Culture's overrated. Especially when one (shudder) must work for a living. And that's the worst of it, obviously. Being back at work, at my little desk, staring into a screen. What the hell's the point? Paying rent? Seeing movies? Enjoying the occasional decadent meal? I mean, that's it? Then what?
Pardon the sophomoric philosophical meanderings. I'm fresh back from the Wilderness, after all. More snark to come, promise. Next post: Mac vs. PC. Should I, will I, take the plunge???
Friday, July 27, 2007
Notes in Anticipation of Maine
It's been sort of a busy and uninspiring week, hence the lack of posts. I could talk about Chase Utley's broken hand as a metaphor for everything that's horrible and tragic in my life (this is a blog, after all), but instead I think I'll stick to some random musings regarding the week in Maine I'll be enjoying come tomorrow morning. I've never been to Maine. I have no idea what it's like or what you do there. But here's what I'm imagining:
-- Me in plaid shorts sipping some sort of lemonade through a straw.
-- Me strolling along the docks, discussing the tides.
-- Me shoving every lobster roll in the great state of Maine into my mouth.
-- Me hiking for five seconds.
-- Me upside down in a kayak unable to flip back over.
-- My girlfriend asking me to cool it with the lobster rolls.
-- Me reading Cloud Atlas for a few hours, then switching to US Weekly.
-- Me thinking the Lobster Fest would be a hell of a lot better without all these other people.
-- Me getting lost on the drive up there.
-- Me hanging out with hippies.
-- Me watching the sunset while eating a lobster roll.
-- Me reaching into the water, pulling out a lobster, and biting into it.
Hmmm, that's all I can think of. Oh, but here's my Grand Vision of what it will be like in Maine: I picture that as I drive into the state, suddenly there will be people lining both sides of the highway like there's a marathon or the Tour de France going by. But instead of a race, it's just me in my Toyota. And instead of cups filled with water, all these people are holding out, obviously, hot dog rolls filled with lobster meat. So we roll down the windows, stick our hands out, and grab as many lobster rolls as we can while driving by. Ah, Maine.
-- Me in plaid shorts sipping some sort of lemonade through a straw.
-- Me strolling along the docks, discussing the tides.
-- Me shoving every lobster roll in the great state of Maine into my mouth.
-- Me hiking for five seconds.
-- Me upside down in a kayak unable to flip back over.
-- My girlfriend asking me to cool it with the lobster rolls.
-- Me reading Cloud Atlas for a few hours, then switching to US Weekly.
-- Me thinking the Lobster Fest would be a hell of a lot better without all these other people.
-- Me getting lost on the drive up there.
-- Me hanging out with hippies.
-- Me watching the sunset while eating a lobster roll.
-- Me reaching into the water, pulling out a lobster, and biting into it.
Hmmm, that's all I can think of. Oh, but here's my Grand Vision of what it will be like in Maine: I picture that as I drive into the state, suddenly there will be people lining both sides of the highway like there's a marathon or the Tour de France going by. But instead of a race, it's just me in my Toyota. And instead of cups filled with water, all these people are holding out, obviously, hot dog rolls filled with lobster meat. So we roll down the windows, stick our hands out, and grab as many lobster rolls as we can while driving by. Ah, Maine.
Friday, July 20, 2007
Documentary Rundown
I'm shooting a short documentary this weekend, which will mark my first time behind a camera in about nine years, as well as my first attempt at nonfiction. The last time I shot something, it was actually on film!!! Remember that stuff?
To prepare for this possibly catastrophic happening, I've spent a few months cramming as many documentaries as possible into my Netflix queue, and even condescended to catch a few in a theater (sorry, just finished reading The Red and The Black. to save you the trouble, here's the best thing about the book: the way they throw the word "condescended" around. good stuff.).
Without further ado (it's Friday, after all) here are some mini capsule reviews of the docs I remember. For best results, read this along with your own Netflix page open.
Let's Get Lost: absolutely gorgeous, borderline mesmerizing, though I felt a better familiarity with Chet Baker's music going in would have helped. Still, very good.
New York Doll: sad, bittersweet, and strangely inspiring. Really like this one.
Lessons in Darkness: minor Herzog, I'd say. but beautiful, eery, and powerful in spots. Fans of long helicopter shots set to Wagner will not be disappointed.
Little Dieter Needs to Fly: A can't miss, must see. Excellent, primo example of Herzog's nonfiction work. I'm leery of Rescue Dawn.
Wings of Hope: Not on Dieter's level, but a fine companion piece. Saw them both at Film Forum, along with Herzog himself in person. Best day at the movies of all time.
After Innocence: Heartbreaking. This one really got to me.
Darwin's Nightmare: an unexpected disappointment. too long, too slow getting to the point, too many sequences where the filmmaker rests solely on the fact that "Hey, check this out. I'm really here with a camera." I confess to not finishing it, which is rare for me.
Running Stumbled: completely stunning, though I would have like a tad more context. Still, if you want to watch a familial train wreck play itself out, this is your movie.
Who the #$&% is Jackson Pollock?: Outstanding! Possibly the best doc I've watched during this stretch. Colorful characters, infuriatingly snobbishness, a good mystery of sorts, excellent production, this one had it all. The scene where he interviews the famous art forger encapsulates what documentaries are capable of, in my opinion. Simple and stunning.
Gigantic: A Tale of Two Johns: made the mistake of watching this the same night as Pollock. suffered terrible by comparison. atrocious production values, yet the caliber of talent interviewed is eye-opening. didn't finish this one, either.
The Wild Parrots of Telegraph Hill: watched this reluctantly, but was quite surprised by it. touching, intriguing, heartbreaking in spots.
Deliver Us From Evil: was really looking forward to this, then hated it. felt like watching a 20/20 piece, but slower. did not like the approach at all. turned it off after twenty minutes. Eh.
Jonestown, The Life and Death of Peoples Temple: Outstanding, haunting. I didn't know this story well, other than the kool aid stuff, of course. In fact, I didn't even realize audio tapes exist of them drinking the poison. Unbelievably powerful glimpse into the darkest corners of humanity. I couldn't sleep after.
Street Fight: interesting, compelling, a good watch, though I confess to not having thought once about it after.
Cocaine Cowboys: just ok. don't go out of your way.
This Film Is Not Yet Rated: another one I liked, but pretty much forgot about the second it was over.
The "Up" Series: a true masterpiece in every sense of the word. watch them all, in order. if you have even a passing interest in cinema, this is required viewing.
My Architect: pretty good, but definitely skippable.
Marjoe: it's pretty much the same scene over and over again, but this story of a child preacher turned hippie con man is fascinating and engaging throughout. as much a documentary about charisma as anything.
Koko: A Talking Gorilla: fascinating in the extreme. what exactly does it mean to be human? and if that sounds a little dry for your tastes, this film costars the cutest biologist (or whatever she is) in the history of modern science. which might not be saying much, but still.
Unknown White Male: exhilarating exploration of memory and identity. breaks down what it actually means to completely lose one's memory. imagine tasting every food again for the very first time! as the film puts it, to experience the world as an infant, but with the appreciation of an adult. brilliant. watch this one.
Our Brand Is Crisis: excellent and frightening. and this is what American liberals are doing abroad! jesus.
Well, there are more, but my fingers hurt and it's lunchtime. Hope that's enough to get you started!
To prepare for this possibly catastrophic happening, I've spent a few months cramming as many documentaries as possible into my Netflix queue, and even condescended to catch a few in a theater (sorry, just finished reading The Red and The Black. to save you the trouble, here's the best thing about the book: the way they throw the word "condescended" around. good stuff.).
Without further ado (it's Friday, after all) here are some mini capsule reviews of the docs I remember. For best results, read this along with your own Netflix page open.
Let's Get Lost: absolutely gorgeous, borderline mesmerizing, though I felt a better familiarity with Chet Baker's music going in would have helped. Still, very good.
New York Doll: sad, bittersweet, and strangely inspiring. Really like this one.
Lessons in Darkness: minor Herzog, I'd say. but beautiful, eery, and powerful in spots. Fans of long helicopter shots set to Wagner will not be disappointed.
Little Dieter Needs to Fly: A can't miss, must see. Excellent, primo example of Herzog's nonfiction work. I'm leery of Rescue Dawn.
Wings of Hope: Not on Dieter's level, but a fine companion piece. Saw them both at Film Forum, along with Herzog himself in person. Best day at the movies of all time.
After Innocence: Heartbreaking. This one really got to me.
Darwin's Nightmare: an unexpected disappointment. too long, too slow getting to the point, too many sequences where the filmmaker rests solely on the fact that "Hey, check this out. I'm really here with a camera." I confess to not finishing it, which is rare for me.
Running Stumbled: completely stunning, though I would have like a tad more context. Still, if you want to watch a familial train wreck play itself out, this is your movie.
Who the #$&% is Jackson Pollock?: Outstanding! Possibly the best doc I've watched during this stretch. Colorful characters, infuriatingly snobbishness, a good mystery of sorts, excellent production, this one had it all. The scene where he interviews the famous art forger encapsulates what documentaries are capable of, in my opinion. Simple and stunning.
Gigantic: A Tale of Two Johns: made the mistake of watching this the same night as Pollock. suffered terrible by comparison. atrocious production values, yet the caliber of talent interviewed is eye-opening. didn't finish this one, either.
The Wild Parrots of Telegraph Hill: watched this reluctantly, but was quite surprised by it. touching, intriguing, heartbreaking in spots.
Deliver Us From Evil: was really looking forward to this, then hated it. felt like watching a 20/20 piece, but slower. did not like the approach at all. turned it off after twenty minutes. Eh.
Jonestown, The Life and Death of Peoples Temple: Outstanding, haunting. I didn't know this story well, other than the kool aid stuff, of course. In fact, I didn't even realize audio tapes exist of them drinking the poison. Unbelievably powerful glimpse into the darkest corners of humanity. I couldn't sleep after.
Street Fight: interesting, compelling, a good watch, though I confess to not having thought once about it after.
Cocaine Cowboys: just ok. don't go out of your way.
This Film Is Not Yet Rated: another one I liked, but pretty much forgot about the second it was over.
The "Up" Series: a true masterpiece in every sense of the word. watch them all, in order. if you have even a passing interest in cinema, this is required viewing.
My Architect: pretty good, but definitely skippable.
Marjoe: it's pretty much the same scene over and over again, but this story of a child preacher turned hippie con man is fascinating and engaging throughout. as much a documentary about charisma as anything.
Koko: A Talking Gorilla: fascinating in the extreme. what exactly does it mean to be human? and if that sounds a little dry for your tastes, this film costars the cutest biologist (or whatever she is) in the history of modern science. which might not be saying much, but still.
Unknown White Male: exhilarating exploration of memory and identity. breaks down what it actually means to completely lose one's memory. imagine tasting every food again for the very first time! as the film puts it, to experience the world as an infant, but with the appreciation of an adult. brilliant. watch this one.
Our Brand Is Crisis: excellent and frightening. and this is what American liberals are doing abroad! jesus.
Well, there are more, but my fingers hurt and it's lunchtime. Hope that's enough to get you started!
Wednesday, July 18, 2007
Mike Tully Made Me Do It
I must confess to never having heard of this whole meme tagging thing before, if that's even the correct terminology. I have heard of chain letters, though, and how they bring unspeakably bad luck onto those who dare break the chain. I usually ignore them, figuring my luck can't really get much worse. But when you get a shout-out in Boredom at Its Boredest, you'd better get off your ass and deliver some goods. And I'm not in a particularly funny mood this morning, so I'm gonna just take a serious and straightforward approach. Well, here goes:
Rules:
1. We have to post these rules before we give you the facts.
2. Players start with eight random facts/habits about themselves.
3. People who are tagged write their own blog post about their eight things and include these rules.
4. At the end of your blog, you need to choose eight people to get tagged and list their names. Don’t forget to leave them a comment telling them they’re tagged and that they should read your blog.
EIGHT THINGS ABOUT JOSH THAT HE PROBABLY SHOULDN'T BE TELLING YOU
1. I used to be a Mets fan.
2. I am practically consumed by body image issues.
3. I feel trapped by the theoretical implications of having chosen a "creative" life. Likewise, by the pseudo sense of importance that comes with living in NYC.
4. Writing a blog makes me worry I've become everything I despise.
5. Sometimes I feel like an asshole for not liking children. But, they're dreadful, right? What am I missing?
6. My favorite joke: What's better than winning a gold medal at the Special Olympics? Not being retarded.
7. I'd be much happier cooking in a fish shack on the Jersey shore, living in a bungalow by the beach, watching the Phillies on TV every night, and writing occasionally when inspiration strikes. Of course, I'd never have the nerve to drop everything and actually do it.
8. I wish I had Mike Tully's hair.
Whew! I feel like I've just been to the shrink, which I've never actually done by the way, but am more than a little intrigued by the prospect of doing so. Then again, a blog is basically free therapy, right? Hope all four of my readers enjoyed this voyage to the center of my soul. Now I'm off to cower in shame.
Alas, I fear this exercise was all for naught, as I literally don't know a single blogger other than myself. Guess I just don't travel in such circles. If I think of anyone, I'll be sure to come back and complete #4. Until then, may the Gods of broken chain letters smite me where I sit (seriously, it's only 11:30 and I'm at work, so please, please smite away).
Rules:
1. We have to post these rules before we give you the facts.
2. Players start with eight random facts/habits about themselves.
3. People who are tagged write their own blog post about their eight things and include these rules.
4. At the end of your blog, you need to choose eight people to get tagged and list their names. Don’t forget to leave them a comment telling them they’re tagged and that they should read your blog.
EIGHT THINGS ABOUT JOSH THAT HE PROBABLY SHOULDN'T BE TELLING YOU
1. I used to be a Mets fan.
2. I am practically consumed by body image issues.
3. I feel trapped by the theoretical implications of having chosen a "creative" life. Likewise, by the pseudo sense of importance that comes with living in NYC.
4. Writing a blog makes me worry I've become everything I despise.
5. Sometimes I feel like an asshole for not liking children. But, they're dreadful, right? What am I missing?
6. My favorite joke: What's better than winning a gold medal at the Special Olympics? Not being retarded.
7. I'd be much happier cooking in a fish shack on the Jersey shore, living in a bungalow by the beach, watching the Phillies on TV every night, and writing occasionally when inspiration strikes. Of course, I'd never have the nerve to drop everything and actually do it.
8. I wish I had Mike Tully's hair.
Whew! I feel like I've just been to the shrink, which I've never actually done by the way, but am more than a little intrigued by the prospect of doing so. Then again, a blog is basically free therapy, right? Hope all four of my readers enjoyed this voyage to the center of my soul. Now I'm off to cower in shame.
Alas, I fear this exercise was all for naught, as I literally don't know a single blogger other than myself. Guess I just don't travel in such circles. If I think of anyone, I'll be sure to come back and complete #4. Until then, may the Gods of broken chain letters smite me where I sit (seriously, it's only 11:30 and I'm at work, so please, please smite away).
Friday, July 13, 2007
The Phillies Are Ruining My Life
Well, this is nothing new, I suppose. Rooting for the Philadelphia Phillies has been an ongoing exercise in heartbreak, misery, and crushed dreams for the greater part of my adult life. The annual charade otherwise known as Philadelphia Phillies baseball bears a greater resemblance to the Old Testament than to a supposedly recreational experience. In other words, my people (in this case, the Phans) have really got it rough.
I, of course, blame Boston. If it weren't for the misery of freshman year at BU, I wouldn't even be in this mess. I wasn't even much of a baseball fan back then. I had a passing interest in the game, I suppose, but probably couldn't name more than a few players, and certainly wasn't emotionally invested in any meaningful way. But then I shacked up with a sociopath in a prison-cell like room on Babcock Street. A room which, incidentally, looked out over the highway that might deliver me back to the real world, as I then liked to call the NY/NJ/PA Tri-State area. It was 1993 and I was terribly homesick. Am I a pathetic whiner? Yes. But Boston also really, really, really sucked back then. It was brutal. I hear it's improved.
And the Phillies? Well, 1993 just happened to be one of those magical seasons, where all the stars align and it feels like the universe is having a little fun in your favor. The 1993 Philadelphia Phillies were a bunch of overweight, beer-guzzling, mullet sporting, blue collar nobodies that couldn't have been more "Philly" or less likely to succeed at the game of baseball. They were colorful, lovable, and perfectly summarized by first baseman John Kruk's immortal response to a woman who dared ask how an athlete could exhibit such deplorable personal habits: "I ain't an athlete, lady. I'm a baseball player." These Phillies drank, smoked, and gambled. They also won a lot of baseball games.
My best friend at BU grew up in Philly. He was also homesick, hated the dorms and the city and everything in between. We both had long distance girlfriends (a new and novel experience then), and though I'm not from Philly proper, south Jersey is close enough, and so these lovable losers somehow came to feel like home. The Phillies, to us, stood for everything we missed and had left behind. That sounds cheesy now, but when you're seventeen, away from home for the first time, and really really unhappy, you grasp at anything. It was the Phillies and Kurt Cobain, and both ended up pretty much the same.
When the Phillies beat the heavily favored Atlanta Braves in the National League Championship Series to advance to the World Series against Toronto (this was the final year, I believe, before baseball re-aligned and introduced the Wild Card), I'm not sure anything in my life has matched the sheer exuberation and jubilance of the moment. I can see Mitch "Wild Thing" Williams leap for joy like it happened yesterday. With that moment, I felt a bit better, like I could stick this whole college thing out. This was unbridled, pure and irrational happiness. I can barely even explain it.
But as life-affirmingly glorious as that moment was, this is still Philadelphia Phillies baseball we're talking about. Not only did my newly beloved Phils go on to lose the World Series, they lost in the most heartbreakingly dramatic, gut-punch fashion imaginable. Joe Carter's Series-winning homerun off Wild Thing (who'd soon be run out of Philadelphia and, not too longer after that, be gone from baseball altogether) has become one of baseball's all-time signature moments. It's the homerun every kid who's every pretended to be a baseball player has dreamed of hitting, has acted out hitting in the backyard. It's the Hollywood fantasy of what baseball, and sports in general, is. Any retrospective of indelible moments will include this homerun. It's magical, fantastical, and timeless. And we were on the losing end.
This was fourteen years ago. I'm 32 now, and the Phils have never recovered. They haven't been back to the post-season since (despite the Wild Card, which makes it much easier), and each season brings a new crop of overpaid, highly-touted saviors, all of whom flame out in spectacular fashion. The Phillies lose. This is what they do. And I'm still waiting, like I need to finish the narrative that began in my tiny room on Babcock Street. I want the ending that should have happened back then. I want to move on.
The Phillies, of course, have other ideas. With one more loss, they will reach an (admittedly arbitrary) nadir of futility. They stand perched on the precipice of historic incompetance. With one more loss, the Philadelphia Phillies will have lost 10,000 games. No team, in ANY sport, has lost this many games. Of course, no team has lost 9,999 games, either, so it's not like the Phillies are breaking someone's record. 10,000 is just a big round number, a symbolic monument to 124 years of losing. Since 1883, the Philadelphia Philles, the oldest single city team in baseball, has won the World Series a total of once. Think about that. 124 years. One Championship, in 1980. That is a dizzying achievement.
The Phillies, so meaningful in my life, are a national laughingstock. Their ineptness has transcended the sporting world and become something larger. Whether or not you have any interest in baseball, even if you hate sports, 10,000 losses is a noteworthy happening. My daily life has devolved lately into a series or articles, forwarded by friends and coworkers, detailing the depths to which the Phils are about to sink. Today it was Salon:
www.salon.com/news/feature/2007/07/13/phillies/
Last week it was Sports Illustrated and NPR. This story is everywhere and unavoidable. Do I find it amusing? Yeah. But I also sort of hate it. Why can't they just be good? Why is this so difficult? Why have the Arizona Diamondbacks and the Florida Marlins, two teams created IN THE 1990s (or thereabouts), won three World Series between them? Why does it have to be this way?
Earlier today, my friend Jim sent this missive from Philadelphia:
I, of course, blame Boston. If it weren't for the misery of freshman year at BU, I wouldn't even be in this mess. I wasn't even much of a baseball fan back then. I had a passing interest in the game, I suppose, but probably couldn't name more than a few players, and certainly wasn't emotionally invested in any meaningful way. But then I shacked up with a sociopath in a prison-cell like room on Babcock Street. A room which, incidentally, looked out over the highway that might deliver me back to the real world, as I then liked to call the NY/NJ/PA Tri-State area. It was 1993 and I was terribly homesick. Am I a pathetic whiner? Yes. But Boston also really, really, really sucked back then. It was brutal. I hear it's improved.
And the Phillies? Well, 1993 just happened to be one of those magical seasons, where all the stars align and it feels like the universe is having a little fun in your favor. The 1993 Philadelphia Phillies were a bunch of overweight, beer-guzzling, mullet sporting, blue collar nobodies that couldn't have been more "Philly" or less likely to succeed at the game of baseball. They were colorful, lovable, and perfectly summarized by first baseman John Kruk's immortal response to a woman who dared ask how an athlete could exhibit such deplorable personal habits: "I ain't an athlete, lady. I'm a baseball player." These Phillies drank, smoked, and gambled. They also won a lot of baseball games.
My best friend at BU grew up in Philly. He was also homesick, hated the dorms and the city and everything in between. We both had long distance girlfriends (a new and novel experience then), and though I'm not from Philly proper, south Jersey is close enough, and so these lovable losers somehow came to feel like home. The Phillies, to us, stood for everything we missed and had left behind. That sounds cheesy now, but when you're seventeen, away from home for the first time, and really really unhappy, you grasp at anything. It was the Phillies and Kurt Cobain, and both ended up pretty much the same.
When the Phillies beat the heavily favored Atlanta Braves in the National League Championship Series to advance to the World Series against Toronto (this was the final year, I believe, before baseball re-aligned and introduced the Wild Card), I'm not sure anything in my life has matched the sheer exuberation and jubilance of the moment. I can see Mitch "Wild Thing" Williams leap for joy like it happened yesterday. With that moment, I felt a bit better, like I could stick this whole college thing out. This was unbridled, pure and irrational happiness. I can barely even explain it.
But as life-affirmingly glorious as that moment was, this is still Philadelphia Phillies baseball we're talking about. Not only did my newly beloved Phils go on to lose the World Series, they lost in the most heartbreakingly dramatic, gut-punch fashion imaginable. Joe Carter's Series-winning homerun off Wild Thing (who'd soon be run out of Philadelphia and, not too longer after that, be gone from baseball altogether) has become one of baseball's all-time signature moments. It's the homerun every kid who's every pretended to be a baseball player has dreamed of hitting, has acted out hitting in the backyard. It's the Hollywood fantasy of what baseball, and sports in general, is. Any retrospective of indelible moments will include this homerun. It's magical, fantastical, and timeless. And we were on the losing end.
This was fourteen years ago. I'm 32 now, and the Phils have never recovered. They haven't been back to the post-season since (despite the Wild Card, which makes it much easier), and each season brings a new crop of overpaid, highly-touted saviors, all of whom flame out in spectacular fashion. The Phillies lose. This is what they do. And I'm still waiting, like I need to finish the narrative that began in my tiny room on Babcock Street. I want the ending that should have happened back then. I want to move on.
The Phillies, of course, have other ideas. With one more loss, they will reach an (admittedly arbitrary) nadir of futility. They stand perched on the precipice of historic incompetance. With one more loss, the Philadelphia Phillies will have lost 10,000 games. No team, in ANY sport, has lost this many games. Of course, no team has lost 9,999 games, either, so it's not like the Phillies are breaking someone's record. 10,000 is just a big round number, a symbolic monument to 124 years of losing. Since 1883, the Philadelphia Philles, the oldest single city team in baseball, has won the World Series a total of once. Think about that. 124 years. One Championship, in 1980. That is a dizzying achievement.
The Phillies, so meaningful in my life, are a national laughingstock. Their ineptness has transcended the sporting world and become something larger. Whether or not you have any interest in baseball, even if you hate sports, 10,000 losses is a noteworthy happening. My daily life has devolved lately into a series or articles, forwarded by friends and coworkers, detailing the depths to which the Phils are about to sink. Today it was Salon:
www.salon.com/news/feature/2007/07/13/phillies/
Last week it was Sports Illustrated and NPR. This story is everywhere and unavoidable. Do I find it amusing? Yeah. But I also sort of hate it. Why can't they just be good? Why is this so difficult? Why have the Arizona Diamondbacks and the Florida Marlins, two teams created IN THE 1990s (or thereabouts), won three World Series between them? Why does it have to be this way?
Earlier today, my friend Jim sent this missive from Philadelphia:
"This morning, WMMR dumped 10,000 marbles down the Art Museum steps to celebrate the Phils 10,000th loss."
That sounds about right. Time to stop typing...
That sounds about right. Time to stop typing...
Tuesday, July 10, 2007
Tips for the DC Weekender
I just got back to town from a sweltering weekend in our nation's capital. Of course, it's sweltering here, too, and nobody has cars or central air, so I can't say New York is much of an improvement at the moment.
Anyway, here's a handy guide for anyone planning a summer trip to Washington, DC. I hope these tips and suggestions help you discover the beauty and splendor of our great capital city.
1. The 700 pound woman riding the bus has the right to reserve an adjacent seat for her travelling companion: a large pizza pie. Just let it go.
2. Do not watch Darwin's Nightmare five minutes prior to cooking crab cakes for ten people.
3. If you're a big fan of arson, I wholeheartedly recommend the local news. Any channel will do.
4. The Washington Post puts out a free commuter newspaper each weekday. It's called the Express, and not only does it kick the Metro's ass, but it's eminently more readable, newsworthy, and impressive than the actual Washington Post. Good stuff.
5. A little something for my fellow baseball fanatics: it's strangely fascinating to discover a culture in which the Orioles and Nationals are deemed newsworthy. Don't squint at the TV. It's really them.
6. When the white gentrifying yuppies decide they NEED a fish fillet from Whole Foods, stand back and get the hell out of the way. Nothing will prepare you for the sense of entitlement displayed by this segment of the DC population. It's startling and they are to be avoided. These are the same people who think nothing of plopping down a monstrous 3-floor Target/Marshalls/Best Buy mega complex in the center of a supposedly newly desirable urban neighborhood. This is the kind of thing that doesn't go down in NYC without a MAJOR fight. But in DC they just push this shit through. This is bad stuff. Let them get their fish first. It's just easier.
7. If some shirtless dude with a garden hose invites you to hose him down, take it as a compliment. It's not like he asks just anyone.
8. There is absolutely no shade. Get used to it.
9. If you walk for half an hour without passing (or seeing) another pedestrian, do not be alarmed. Or, actually, be alarmed. I'm not sure what this means.
10. The DC Metro is like crawling back into the womb. Provided the womb can take you anywhere you want to go except Georgetown. But if you've ever been to a shopping mall, feel free to skip that part of town anyway.
11. Speaking of the Metro, I recommend acquiring an advanced degree in particle physics before attempting to figure out the ticket dispensing machine.
12. Be sure to brush up on your Supreme Court Justices. You might actually find occasion to discuss them.
13. Do not be alarmed by the absence of a glass partition between the front and back seat of a DC taxi cab. How do you know you haven't just been picked up by some random dude with a car who's going to kidnap and murder you? Um, I'm not sure.
14. If you find yourself strolling down a sidewalk strewn with bones, rest assured that these are chicken, not human, remains. At least that's what someone told me.
I hope that helps.
And now, without further ado, I give you the tangentially related, overly brilliant pop culture reference o' the day, courtesy of the highly esteemed and honourable Mike Tully. This one goes out to all you DC fans and natives. After 5 minutes or so spent struggling to describe PRECISELY just what brand of annoying two filmmakers (who shall remain nameless) happen to be, a conversation initiated by my own desire to understand just why nobody seems to personally like them (though I think their work is quite good), Mike scratched his head, pondered, then managed to summarize the depths of their souls in the space of three perfectly played words: they're "DC Black Cat" he said. Pure and utter brilliance.
Anyway, here's a handy guide for anyone planning a summer trip to Washington, DC. I hope these tips and suggestions help you discover the beauty and splendor of our great capital city.
1. The 700 pound woman riding the bus has the right to reserve an adjacent seat for her travelling companion: a large pizza pie. Just let it go.
2. Do not watch Darwin's Nightmare five minutes prior to cooking crab cakes for ten people.
3. If you're a big fan of arson, I wholeheartedly recommend the local news. Any channel will do.
4. The Washington Post puts out a free commuter newspaper each weekday. It's called the Express, and not only does it kick the Metro's ass, but it's eminently more readable, newsworthy, and impressive than the actual Washington Post. Good stuff.
5. A little something for my fellow baseball fanatics: it's strangely fascinating to discover a culture in which the Orioles and Nationals are deemed newsworthy. Don't squint at the TV. It's really them.
6. When the white gentrifying yuppies decide they NEED a fish fillet from Whole Foods, stand back and get the hell out of the way. Nothing will prepare you for the sense of entitlement displayed by this segment of the DC population. It's startling and they are to be avoided. These are the same people who think nothing of plopping down a monstrous 3-floor Target/Marshalls/Best Buy mega complex in the center of a supposedly newly desirable urban neighborhood. This is the kind of thing that doesn't go down in NYC without a MAJOR fight. But in DC they just push this shit through. This is bad stuff. Let them get their fish first. It's just easier.
7. If some shirtless dude with a garden hose invites you to hose him down, take it as a compliment. It's not like he asks just anyone.
8. There is absolutely no shade. Get used to it.
9. If you walk for half an hour without passing (or seeing) another pedestrian, do not be alarmed. Or, actually, be alarmed. I'm not sure what this means.
10. The DC Metro is like crawling back into the womb. Provided the womb can take you anywhere you want to go except Georgetown. But if you've ever been to a shopping mall, feel free to skip that part of town anyway.
11. Speaking of the Metro, I recommend acquiring an advanced degree in particle physics before attempting to figure out the ticket dispensing machine.
12. Be sure to brush up on your Supreme Court Justices. You might actually find occasion to discuss them.
13. Do not be alarmed by the absence of a glass partition between the front and back seat of a DC taxi cab. How do you know you haven't just been picked up by some random dude with a car who's going to kidnap and murder you? Um, I'm not sure.
14. If you find yourself strolling down a sidewalk strewn with bones, rest assured that these are chicken, not human, remains. At least that's what someone told me.
I hope that helps.
And now, without further ado, I give you the tangentially related, overly brilliant pop culture reference o' the day, courtesy of the highly esteemed and honourable Mike Tully. This one goes out to all you DC fans and natives. After 5 minutes or so spent struggling to describe PRECISELY just what brand of annoying two filmmakers (who shall remain nameless) happen to be, a conversation initiated by my own desire to understand just why nobody seems to personally like them (though I think their work is quite good), Mike scratched his head, pondered, then managed to summarize the depths of their souls in the space of three perfectly played words: they're "DC Black Cat" he said. Pure and utter brilliance.
Friday, July 6, 2007
The Perils of Facebook
So an old friend I haven't heard from in several years sent me a Facebook invite. Since I was at work and will do anything to kill time, I signed up, created a quickie profile, then spent fifteen minutes or so going back and forth with the old friend. In case you aren't in-the-know, Facebook's got something called a "Wall" where you essentially write messages back and forth. Um, it's EXACTLY like email. Which has me wondering what the point of Facebook is. Seriously, can someone enlighten me? Am I just an old fogey, or does this website serve absolutely no purpose other than stroking the egos of everyone on it? What am I missing?
Anyway, that's beside the point. For I come to you today with a cautionary tale. Somehow the single most annoying person in my office discovered my Facebook page. Soon enough, we were entwined, friends, networkers, whatever the hell you call it. We were linked. Okay, fine. But then the trouble started. This dude suddenly felt compelled to walk over to my desk, IN PERSON, to alert me to each and every minor update made to his own profile. All under the auspices of "you've gotta check this out." And I'm not talking once or twice, I'm talking like every ten minutes for the entirety of several afternoons. And he'd sit there while I logged in, schlepped over to his profile, and took in whatever post, video, or photo he'd uploaded. Seriously. Not only must I experience the gradually evolution of his Facebook profile, but I've gotta do it right now, immediately, while he waits! It's almost worse than working. Almost.
Finally, I realized that the problem didn't lie solely in the annoying nature of his character (though it certainly lied there as well), but in the fact that he'd manage to completely misinterpret the entire point of Facebook, of social networking, of the very Internet itself! Now, when I wrote earlier of my confusion regarding the point of Facebook, I was speaking of this particular virtual environment. What I mean is, I grasp the big picture. I understand where exactly lies the beauty and splendor of the Internet, of online activities in general: the Internet is a tool by which I may relieve myself from the burdens of actual, physical human contact. There's a reason why 98% of my communication is undertaken via email, and it's not cause I love typing. It's that I hate people. Not only am I thoroughly uninterested in the minutia of your Facebook profile, but I certainly don't want to have to talk to you MORE because of it. The entire point of the Internet is that we don't have to talk anymore, ever again! Let's run with that.
So be careful, Facebookers. Don't let this happen to you.
Ok, now for some $6 Indian lunch buffet.
Anyway, that's beside the point. For I come to you today with a cautionary tale. Somehow the single most annoying person in my office discovered my Facebook page. Soon enough, we were entwined, friends, networkers, whatever the hell you call it. We were linked. Okay, fine. But then the trouble started. This dude suddenly felt compelled to walk over to my desk, IN PERSON, to alert me to each and every minor update made to his own profile. All under the auspices of "you've gotta check this out." And I'm not talking once or twice, I'm talking like every ten minutes for the entirety of several afternoons. And he'd sit there while I logged in, schlepped over to his profile, and took in whatever post, video, or photo he'd uploaded. Seriously. Not only must I experience the gradually evolution of his Facebook profile, but I've gotta do it right now, immediately, while he waits! It's almost worse than working. Almost.
Finally, I realized that the problem didn't lie solely in the annoying nature of his character (though it certainly lied there as well), but in the fact that he'd manage to completely misinterpret the entire point of Facebook, of social networking, of the very Internet itself! Now, when I wrote earlier of my confusion regarding the point of Facebook, I was speaking of this particular virtual environment. What I mean is, I grasp the big picture. I understand where exactly lies the beauty and splendor of the Internet, of online activities in general: the Internet is a tool by which I may relieve myself from the burdens of actual, physical human contact. There's a reason why 98% of my communication is undertaken via email, and it's not cause I love typing. It's that I hate people. Not only am I thoroughly uninterested in the minutia of your Facebook profile, but I certainly don't want to have to talk to you MORE because of it. The entire point of the Internet is that we don't have to talk anymore, ever again! Let's run with that.
So be careful, Facebookers. Don't let this happen to you.
Ok, now for some $6 Indian lunch buffet.
Tuesday, July 3, 2007
I'm Injured
Here's a little tip: If you're going to sprain your foot/ankle while running down a flight of stairs, be sure to do so in the comfort of your own home. Or at least close to home, or someplace where people own and drive automobiles. Trust me on this. Don't get hurt when the specter of the Chinatown Bus looms in your near future, or when the F Train decides to stop running, or when every taxi cab in New York City is stuffed with tourists. Because when you disembark from the festering, hellacious Third World-on-wheels that is the Dragon Coach, when you find yourself on some esoteric Chinatown corner, and you've only got one usable foot and there's no way to get home, well then you my friend are royally screwed.
I've spent the last 2 nights plopped down on the couch with bags of frozen peas rubber banded around my ankle. I have absolutely no idea where to get a pair of crutches, other than from the hospital (and the thought of sitting in an emergency room in NYC is obviously worse than the pain of my injury). Seriously, where do you get crutches? A drugstore? The supermarket? Home Depot? eBay? I've got no freaking idea. Where the hell do people get those things?
So my normally decadent 3 block commute to work (which I highly recommend by the way. living further than 3 blocks from the office is for suckers) has evolved (devolved?) into a comedy of errors. My pace is about on par with that of your average garden slug. I've actually found myself clinging to scaffolding for support, which marks the second handy use I've found for the stuff -- the first being shelter from the rain. People are staring at me like I've just wandered out from the local leper colony. So I'm limping, is that such a crime? And yeah, I'm wearing flip-flops. I can't get a goddamn shoe on my foot. Whatta ya want from me? It's like there's a photographer from Vice Magazine lurking around every corner, waiting to pounce and turn me into a Don't (sorry for the 6 year old reference. do people still read Vice? does it still exist?). I am the walking, poorly dressed wounded.
An interest aside: so, my feet are abnormally white, right? Actually, my entire body is a bit on the, shall we say, non-tan side. But my feet haven't seen the sun in years. They're sort of cadaver-esque, I suppose. ANYWAY, every coworker I've encountered (which isn't many, actually, since I take great pains to avoid them) has delighted in ridiculing the pigment of my poor innocent footsies. Except, and get this (!): for the Indian girl with whom I share an office, who's done everything short of swooning at the sight of my milky white appendages. Seriously, she LOVES them. She has complimented me (repeatedly) on how white they are!!! To say nothing of the wonderful state of my toenails and tasteful, not-too-hairy tufts upon my toes. But it's the whiteness she's really taken with! Now, as someone as pale as I, this is quite a revelation. It's like discovering that a culture exists where the women pine for guys who are 5'9", have terrible hair, and sport rather large schnozzes. So, I press for details and it turns out that in India, the whiter the feet, the more attractive a person is considered to be. In fact, people BLEACH THEIR FEET to make them more white! What??? Jesus Christ, where has this information been my whole life? You mean to tell me I've spent 30 years cultivating a sense of humor, when I could have just bought a plane ticket and picked up women with my white feet? Good God!
I've spent the last 2 nights plopped down on the couch with bags of frozen peas rubber banded around my ankle. I have absolutely no idea where to get a pair of crutches, other than from the hospital (and the thought of sitting in an emergency room in NYC is obviously worse than the pain of my injury). Seriously, where do you get crutches? A drugstore? The supermarket? Home Depot? eBay? I've got no freaking idea. Where the hell do people get those things?
So my normally decadent 3 block commute to work (which I highly recommend by the way. living further than 3 blocks from the office is for suckers) has evolved (devolved?) into a comedy of errors. My pace is about on par with that of your average garden slug. I've actually found myself clinging to scaffolding for support, which marks the second handy use I've found for the stuff -- the first being shelter from the rain. People are staring at me like I've just wandered out from the local leper colony. So I'm limping, is that such a crime? And yeah, I'm wearing flip-flops. I can't get a goddamn shoe on my foot. Whatta ya want from me? It's like there's a photographer from Vice Magazine lurking around every corner, waiting to pounce and turn me into a Don't (sorry for the 6 year old reference. do people still read Vice? does it still exist?). I am the walking, poorly dressed wounded.
An interest aside: so, my feet are abnormally white, right? Actually, my entire body is a bit on the, shall we say, non-tan side. But my feet haven't seen the sun in years. They're sort of cadaver-esque, I suppose. ANYWAY, every coworker I've encountered (which isn't many, actually, since I take great pains to avoid them) has delighted in ridiculing the pigment of my poor innocent footsies. Except, and get this (!): for the Indian girl with whom I share an office, who's done everything short of swooning at the sight of my milky white appendages. Seriously, she LOVES them. She has complimented me (repeatedly) on how white they are!!! To say nothing of the wonderful state of my toenails and tasteful, not-too-hairy tufts upon my toes. But it's the whiteness she's really taken with! Now, as someone as pale as I, this is quite a revelation. It's like discovering that a culture exists where the women pine for guys who are 5'9", have terrible hair, and sport rather large schnozzes. So, I press for details and it turns out that in India, the whiter the feet, the more attractive a person is considered to be. In fact, people BLEACH THEIR FEET to make them more white! What??? Jesus Christ, where has this information been my whole life? You mean to tell me I've spent 30 years cultivating a sense of humor, when I could have just bought a plane ticket and picked up women with my white feet? Good God!
Friday, June 29, 2007
Shopping A Book
Two years ago, I promised myself I'd never, ever, ever even consider writing another book. For those who haven't given it a shot, the Writer's Life bears more than a passing similarity to, oh I don't know, let's say the lifestyle of your average Roman slave boat rower. Actually, those guys probably had better benefits. Anyway, after 5 years of escalating poverty and diminishing self-esteem, I decided to chuck the whole thing and get into advertising. Here's my thought process: if I'm going to essentially be writing a bunch of crap for a corporate master (the publisher) anyway, I might as well just be honest about it, become a copywriter, and actually make a liveable wage and do stuff like visit the dentist. In publishing, here's how they get you: you're supposed to be so fucking happy and overwhelmed by the mythical chance to be published, that nobody feels the need to actually pay you or treat you like an employee, which you essentially are. The thrill of seeing my stuff at Barnes and Noble, I'll have you know, isn't exactly a substitute for the fact that I could barely afford to eat. When I say that my editor's lowest assistant, the kid right out of college with the most entry level of publishing jobs, was pulling down about 5 times what I'd get to write a book, I'm not exagerating. It's dreadful. But again, the romanticism of writing is supposedly satisfying enough. Yeah, right. Really, I was adamant: never again.
So, of course now I'm in the midst of shopping another book. Why the turnaround? A year and a half in advertising, that's why. Yeah, I can pay my rent and eat now...but, um, I work in advertising. It's DREADFUL. It's like the lowest common denominator every single day, nonstop. It's selling shit. That's it. That's the whole job. There's nothing else. Sell a bunch of shit, go home. Yeah, I realize there's a commercial aspect to all art/creative endeavors/etc. I mean, yeah I wanted my books to sell. I wanted to make a ton of money and all that. But there was still some sense of a greater good. It wasn't 100% rank consumerism masquerading as creativity. Which is what this is.
ANYWAY, this isn't my anti-advertising screed. This is merely a lament for how freaking long it takes to find out if you're even going to get the opportunity to return to the miserable life of writing a book. It's like, I know I hate it. I know I don't want to do it. And yet: I'm on pins and needles like I'm waiting for the hot girl in high school to return my phone call or something. It's crazy. I finished the book proposal two months ago, and since then I haven't been able to do a single goddamn productive thing, cause I'm too busy staring at a) my Inbox, b) my cell phone and c) my office phone for 8 or 9 hours a day. I can't concentrate. I can't have fun. I can't prepare for anything more than a day in the future, cause I'm hanging on to this ridiculous "oh, my life might totally change tomorrow" fantasy. And I'm hoping fervently that it happens. Why? Um, I kind of have no idea.
Ah, the Writer's Life. It's fantastic!
So, of course now I'm in the midst of shopping another book. Why the turnaround? A year and a half in advertising, that's why. Yeah, I can pay my rent and eat now...but, um, I work in advertising. It's DREADFUL. It's like the lowest common denominator every single day, nonstop. It's selling shit. That's it. That's the whole job. There's nothing else. Sell a bunch of shit, go home. Yeah, I realize there's a commercial aspect to all art/creative endeavors/etc. I mean, yeah I wanted my books to sell. I wanted to make a ton of money and all that. But there was still some sense of a greater good. It wasn't 100% rank consumerism masquerading as creativity. Which is what this is.
ANYWAY, this isn't my anti-advertising screed. This is merely a lament for how freaking long it takes to find out if you're even going to get the opportunity to return to the miserable life of writing a book. It's like, I know I hate it. I know I don't want to do it. And yet: I'm on pins and needles like I'm waiting for the hot girl in high school to return my phone call or something. It's crazy. I finished the book proposal two months ago, and since then I haven't been able to do a single goddamn productive thing, cause I'm too busy staring at a) my Inbox, b) my cell phone and c) my office phone for 8 or 9 hours a day. I can't concentrate. I can't have fun. I can't prepare for anything more than a day in the future, cause I'm hanging on to this ridiculous "oh, my life might totally change tomorrow" fantasy. And I'm hoping fervently that it happens. Why? Um, I kind of have no idea.
Ah, the Writer's Life. It's fantastic!
Wednesday, June 27, 2007
It's Like a Sauna Out There
Seriously, I think I'm dying. I need to move to the North Pole before it melts.
Got plans to see the Chet Baker documentary Let's Get Lost at Film Forum tonight. Not sure if I'm more looking forward to the film or to the air conditioning. Film snobs like it cold, right? I sure as hell hope so.
Got plans to see the Chet Baker documentary Let's Get Lost at Film Forum tonight. Not sure if I'm more looking forward to the film or to the air conditioning. Film snobs like it cold, right? I sure as hell hope so.
Monday, June 25, 2007
NYC, Good and Bad
Obviously, New York is amazing. No news there. And yet, seven years in, I find myself wondering whether the whole thing's worth it with increasing regularity. As more and more friends flee the city (either for L.A. or, heaven forbid, the suburbs), leaving my social life to fluctuate according to the ebbs and flows of my Netflix queue, it's easy to question spending about 70% of my monthly paycheck on rent. For one room, basically. But then again: what the hell am I saying? This city is life itself. If I'm bored here, it's no one's fault but my own.
This weekend perfectly mirrored my current love/hate relationship with New York City. First, the good:
It was gorgeous out Saturday. My girlfriend and I took a lovely bike ride down the west side of Manhattan, travelling south from 26th Street. This is one of my favorite summertime activities, and one of the best ways to see the city's nooks and crannies that I know of. It was especially fun to have her along, since I normally take these rides by myself. ANYWAY, here's why New York is the greatest place on Earth: so after about an hour or so of riding (with several stops, as I'm quite lazy), we stopped off at a little marina down near Battery Park/Ground Zero to grab a cool drink. The marina is framed by a sort of corporate park/shopping mall, basically the ground floor of a couple glistening office towers. It's essentially a fancy food court and some stores. So she watches the bikes while I run in to grab some juice or etc. As soon as I'm inside, I hear people cheering around a corner. Curious, I make my way over, and lo and behold the final ballroom dance competition from the end of Mad Hot Ballroom is taking place in this very mall, right now!
(OK, some back story: Mad Hot Ballroom is one of our favorite movies. If you haven't seen it, get it right now. It's wonderful. If you don't know it, here's the deal: In NYC, public schools in all 5 boroughs have ballroom dance programs. Kids who are still at the age where the opposite sex have cooties turn into perfect little ladies and gentlemen as they learn to foxtrot, swing, tango and etc. The whole 9 yards. Then these schools compete until one team is determined the NYC champs for that year. I'm not doing this justice. It's awesome.)
Forgetting the drinks, I run outside. We lock up the bikes and spend an hour watching the final round of competition. It's incredible. Not only is the show excellent unto itself, but we're standing on the set of one of our favorite movies, watching the drama play out live. Seriously, where else does this happen on a bike ride??? It was magical. And it's why everyone should live in NYC at least once in their life. I'm not saying you need to stay forever. But you've gotta do it once. This kind of thing is practically the norm.
And then, the bad: Same day, later that night. The girlfriend's sister is in town, so we fight our urge to plop down on the couch, order takeout, and stare quizzically at E!'s Sunset Tan marathon. I'm a dive bar kind of guy, but hey, it's Saturday night and I've got people in town, so I decided to up the ante a bit. New York magazine recently ran a small item concerning a new speakeasy connected to Crif Dogs, a hot dog joint in the East Village. What caught my eye is that apparently you go into the hot dog joint, then walk through a phone booth and into the speakeasy. Sounds kind of cool. And the cocktails are supposed to be quite good. Perfect.
Of course, it totally sucked. First of all, the door to the phone booth is about as intuitive as the cockpit in the space shuttle. So, picture this: I'm standing in an incredibly well-lit hot dog joint. Small tables stretch down the length of one wall. At these tables sit the type of preposterous East Villagers who'd be interested in a sit-down hot dog restaurant. The phone booth is on the wall directly opposite this wall of tables. In other words, I might as well be onstage as I stupidly poke, prod, pull, grab, and push every part of this goddamn phone booth except the right one. My pathetic fumblings singlehandedly broke the tension on what appeared to be 3 bad first dates. I was the evening's entertainment. It was awful.
Please keep in mind: everything I'm describing right now took place IN A HOT DOG JOINT. I'm not in line at Studio 54. I'm in a hot dog restaurant. OK. So I finally figure out how to enter the phone booth. I step inside and am greeted with a series of items New York mag curiously neglected to mention. I'm thinking you just walk in one door and out the other, right? Oh, no. Instead, the other door is closed, a camera is pointing down at me, and beside the phone is tacked an Instruction Sheet. Um, this blows. And it's not even a real phone booth phone. It's some crappy white plastic thing they picked up for three bucks at Radio Shack. Still, even though it's quickly dawning on my that this place is really, really not cool, I'm already in the phone booth. I can't just walk out in defeat, right? I pick up the phone, hit the button, and wait. And wait. And wait some more. Obviously, they're watching me through the camera. And they're not answering! I'm not cutting the mustard at a hot dog stand!
After another interminable minute of social torture, I cringe my way back out the door like the first idiot kicked off Survivor. My companions can smell the reek of social failure all about me. Oh, and I'm in a hot dog restaurant. My girlfriend decides to ask the Rubinesque (fat) girl behind the counter what's what. And this girl, who appears to double as the hot dog taste tester, looks down her nose at my girlfriend like she's just shown up for Truman Capote's Black and White Ball without any blue in her blood. Unbelievable! Chubster in a half shirt (who works at a hot dog restaurant) is giving us attitude!
I swear to God it feels like we're stuck in a science experiment. Have we earned our piece of cheese yet? I shuffle back over to the phone book. My people haven't suffered like this since the Old Testament. But I think I know the problem: obviously, a shlub from south Jersey like me ain't getting in. But they'll open the door for a girl, right? So I cajole the girlfriend's sister into giving it a go. She's leery, but relents. Here's what happens:
1. She picks up the phone.
2. Someone answers. Tells her they'll be right over.
3. She stands there for several minutes. Nothing.
4. Finally, the phone rings.
5. She picks it up.
6. Some unbelievably patronizing idiot says, "Next time, push the button on the phone."
7. She says, "I did. Someone said they'd be right over."
8. Idiot Who Works At A Hot Dog Restaurant says, ".......Oh. OK, someone else will be right over."
Now, I don't know who you imagine works the door at this super top secret, overly complicated speakeasy. But here's who actually works the door: Some middle aged, overweight, balding doofus in what appears to be a sweatshirt purchased at a blue light special circa 1989. And, for full effect, he's carrying a clipboard. Speakeasy doormen use clipboards? News to me. All that's missing is a velvet rope.
Anyway, using his girth to block our view of the fabled speakeasy's interior, Doorman asks if we've got a reservation. Huh? A reservation at a speakeasy? What's next, a disco ball at the bodega? Obviously, his question is about as preposterous as asking if we'd flown over on a Pegasus. Girlfriend's Sister stares at him for a moment. No, we (obviously) don't have a reservation. At which he glances down at his clipboard and begins studying the paper like he's splitting the atom. Uh, I can put you guys on the list. The list???!!!??? No thanks, dude. Girlfriend's Sister waves him away and we take off.
Here's how not cool the Crif Dogs Speakeasy is: a girl who lives in Boston realized how not cool it is.
And so, tail between our legs, we trudged off to a nearby bar, where I drowned my sorrows in a couple of wonderful, though ill-poured Belgian brews.
The moral? NYC is awesome until it isn't.
This weekend perfectly mirrored my current love/hate relationship with New York City. First, the good:
It was gorgeous out Saturday. My girlfriend and I took a lovely bike ride down the west side of Manhattan, travelling south from 26th Street. This is one of my favorite summertime activities, and one of the best ways to see the city's nooks and crannies that I know of. It was especially fun to have her along, since I normally take these rides by myself. ANYWAY, here's why New York is the greatest place on Earth: so after about an hour or so of riding (with several stops, as I'm quite lazy), we stopped off at a little marina down near Battery Park/Ground Zero to grab a cool drink. The marina is framed by a sort of corporate park/shopping mall, basically the ground floor of a couple glistening office towers. It's essentially a fancy food court and some stores. So she watches the bikes while I run in to grab some juice or etc. As soon as I'm inside, I hear people cheering around a corner. Curious, I make my way over, and lo and behold the final ballroom dance competition from the end of Mad Hot Ballroom is taking place in this very mall, right now!
(OK, some back story: Mad Hot Ballroom is one of our favorite movies. If you haven't seen it, get it right now. It's wonderful. If you don't know it, here's the deal: In NYC, public schools in all 5 boroughs have ballroom dance programs. Kids who are still at the age where the opposite sex have cooties turn into perfect little ladies and gentlemen as they learn to foxtrot, swing, tango and etc. The whole 9 yards. Then these schools compete until one team is determined the NYC champs for that year. I'm not doing this justice. It's awesome.)
Forgetting the drinks, I run outside. We lock up the bikes and spend an hour watching the final round of competition. It's incredible. Not only is the show excellent unto itself, but we're standing on the set of one of our favorite movies, watching the drama play out live. Seriously, where else does this happen on a bike ride??? It was magical. And it's why everyone should live in NYC at least once in their life. I'm not saying you need to stay forever. But you've gotta do it once. This kind of thing is practically the norm.
And then, the bad: Same day, later that night. The girlfriend's sister is in town, so we fight our urge to plop down on the couch, order takeout, and stare quizzically at E!'s Sunset Tan marathon. I'm a dive bar kind of guy, but hey, it's Saturday night and I've got people in town, so I decided to up the ante a bit. New York magazine recently ran a small item concerning a new speakeasy connected to Crif Dogs, a hot dog joint in the East Village. What caught my eye is that apparently you go into the hot dog joint, then walk through a phone booth and into the speakeasy. Sounds kind of cool. And the cocktails are supposed to be quite good. Perfect.
Of course, it totally sucked. First of all, the door to the phone booth is about as intuitive as the cockpit in the space shuttle. So, picture this: I'm standing in an incredibly well-lit hot dog joint. Small tables stretch down the length of one wall. At these tables sit the type of preposterous East Villagers who'd be interested in a sit-down hot dog restaurant. The phone booth is on the wall directly opposite this wall of tables. In other words, I might as well be onstage as I stupidly poke, prod, pull, grab, and push every part of this goddamn phone booth except the right one. My pathetic fumblings singlehandedly broke the tension on what appeared to be 3 bad first dates. I was the evening's entertainment. It was awful.
Please keep in mind: everything I'm describing right now took place IN A HOT DOG JOINT. I'm not in line at Studio 54. I'm in a hot dog restaurant. OK. So I finally figure out how to enter the phone booth. I step inside and am greeted with a series of items New York mag curiously neglected to mention. I'm thinking you just walk in one door and out the other, right? Oh, no. Instead, the other door is closed, a camera is pointing down at me, and beside the phone is tacked an Instruction Sheet. Um, this blows. And it's not even a real phone booth phone. It's some crappy white plastic thing they picked up for three bucks at Radio Shack. Still, even though it's quickly dawning on my that this place is really, really not cool, I'm already in the phone booth. I can't just walk out in defeat, right? I pick up the phone, hit the button, and wait. And wait. And wait some more. Obviously, they're watching me through the camera. And they're not answering! I'm not cutting the mustard at a hot dog stand!
After another interminable minute of social torture, I cringe my way back out the door like the first idiot kicked off Survivor. My companions can smell the reek of social failure all about me. Oh, and I'm in a hot dog restaurant. My girlfriend decides to ask the Rubinesque (fat) girl behind the counter what's what. And this girl, who appears to double as the hot dog taste tester, looks down her nose at my girlfriend like she's just shown up for Truman Capote's Black and White Ball without any blue in her blood. Unbelievable! Chubster in a half shirt (who works at a hot dog restaurant) is giving us attitude!
I swear to God it feels like we're stuck in a science experiment. Have we earned our piece of cheese yet? I shuffle back over to the phone book. My people haven't suffered like this since the Old Testament. But I think I know the problem: obviously, a shlub from south Jersey like me ain't getting in. But they'll open the door for a girl, right? So I cajole the girlfriend's sister into giving it a go. She's leery, but relents. Here's what happens:
1. She picks up the phone.
2. Someone answers. Tells her they'll be right over.
3. She stands there for several minutes. Nothing.
4. Finally, the phone rings.
5. She picks it up.
6. Some unbelievably patronizing idiot says, "Next time, push the button on the phone."
7. She says, "I did. Someone said they'd be right over."
8. Idiot Who Works At A Hot Dog Restaurant says, ".......Oh. OK, someone else will be right over."
Now, I don't know who you imagine works the door at this super top secret, overly complicated speakeasy. But here's who actually works the door: Some middle aged, overweight, balding doofus in what appears to be a sweatshirt purchased at a blue light special circa 1989. And, for full effect, he's carrying a clipboard. Speakeasy doormen use clipboards? News to me. All that's missing is a velvet rope.
Anyway, using his girth to block our view of the fabled speakeasy's interior, Doorman asks if we've got a reservation. Huh? A reservation at a speakeasy? What's next, a disco ball at the bodega? Obviously, his question is about as preposterous as asking if we'd flown over on a Pegasus. Girlfriend's Sister stares at him for a moment. No, we (obviously) don't have a reservation. At which he glances down at his clipboard and begins studying the paper like he's splitting the atom. Uh, I can put you guys on the list. The list???!!!??? No thanks, dude. Girlfriend's Sister waves him away and we take off.
Here's how not cool the Crif Dogs Speakeasy is: a girl who lives in Boston realized how not cool it is.
And so, tail between our legs, we trudged off to a nearby bar, where I drowned my sorrows in a couple of wonderful, though ill-poured Belgian brews.
The moral? NYC is awesome until it isn't.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)