Southern in the City

Leaving the Blog

2007-01-09T12:53:00.000-08:00

Ever since I've moved over to Myspace, I have greatly neglected this blog and decided, since most people don't read it anyway, to do away with it! So thanks to readers who have been out there, and hopefully the future of blogging will remain strong even without me :-)

Lauren Greenfield's "Thin"

2006-11-20T12:28:00.000-08:00

This is really supposed to be about my experiences as a new New Yorker, but since I've been doing that for so long I think it's time to discuss something real. I ran across "Thin" by accident on Sunday afternoon. I was flipping through channels and happened to hit on it. I had heard it mentioned earlier but then it completely slipped my mind that it was beginning in November. So I watched it yesterday and spent nearly the whole time quiet on my bed staring intently at the TV and even more intently at hte girls who were risking their lives trying to make themselves disappear. It helped me understand how far I've come in the past ten or so years. While I completely agree that once you have a disorder or an addiction you are never "free" from it again, I also understand that I am at the healthiest point I have been in years. I eat- a lot. For real. Yes, I still struggle with compulsive excercise and sometimes with purging but for the most part i am able to hold it together.

And I am so glad. Watching some of the patients- many in their twenties and thirties try to piece their lives back together was heart wrenching. There are plenty of pictures of me from high school and college, looking very thin at times, or having fatter cheeks than normal. But I can't imagine going into the hospital for the fourth or fifth time at the age of 25 or 29 or especially in my forties. Yet many of the patients at Renfrew have to deal with just that. They didn't get the help they needed when they started running down the wrong path and by the time someone offered to help them it was just too late to go any other route than expensive in-patient. What makes it worse is that insurance puts stressors on them that they shouldn't have to deal with.

I'm glad that I got some form of help. Maybe it wasn't the best, but it helped me survive my mother until I moved out and was able to assert my needs better. Boyfriend is even more helpful. Before I wasn't willing to talk about what I was afraid of with anyone (including friends nad therapists) but he has helped me see past the disorder, to see that there is such a long road ahead and that things can get better. THe worst part is that most eating disorders are treatable. It's just that people don't know or don't want or ask for help too late.

The Apple Doesn't Want its Picture Taken

2006-11-06T10:22:00.000-08:00

So during an interesting visit from my good friend E we went uptown to see the famed Uptown Apple store. I think it opened almost a year ago and is located on 5th Avenue right in front of FAO Schwartz. It's this great glass cube with an apple in it and you actually go downstairs to reach the store. The store is pretty neat, but no more so than most Apple stores. Except it does have the advantage of a 24 hour Genius Bar. So E and I went and talked about Macs and played around on the Macs and didn't buy anything and left. On the way out she said she wanted to take a picture of the cube for this website she works for. I said I would wait around, that was fine.

This particular night they were doing a little construction work but it didn't appear to be anything major or life-altering. Just a little cleaning up around the edges. E took out her camera and prepared to take a photo when suddenly a geeky blond guy showed up right beside us and said "Actually it would be better if you didn't do that."

"What?" E and I both said at the same time, looking at this Mac employee with slight confusion and amusement. It sounded like he had just told her not to take a picture in New York. Which is a very, very rare occurrence, since most of hte city's industry is based on tourism to some degree and -surprise!- tourists take lots of pictures.

"The apple doesn't want to be photographed." We laughed because at first we thought he was kidding. Since the apple is an OBJECT, not PERSON, it's difficult to imagine it being any more offended photographed than prodded at with saws and drills.

"I'm sorry," E said, "Could you repeat yourself?"

Again he told us that he would rather we didn't photograph the Apple tonight, but come bakc in the morning, when all the work was set to be done. E and I said okay, then crossed the streeet where she took a photograph, pointing out that he actually couldn't PREVENT us from taking a photo of the building since there was not an official Apple exec there to stop it and secondly that was the most ridiculous thing she'd ever heard. I had to agree, but I thought what was most absurd about it was the fact that he had assigned the Apple not only a personality but feelings about having his picture taken. That was crazy. At least it was in my eyes.

It always amuses me how people believe they can tell people what to do in that regard and get away with it. In case you are up here and are taking pictures of buildings (this does not apply to people), you can do that unless the actual owner of the building tells you you cannot. You can take as many pictures as you wish and no one will say a word, most likely. So take a picture of the Apple, even if it is under construction. I promise you won't hurt its feelings.

Apartment Therapy

2006-11-02T09:40:00.000-08:00

Last weekend was supposed to be cold and rainy so I picked up a book called Apartment Therapy to deal with it. I thought that maybe by changing around my interior I could somehow also work on my life or something. In a way that was true. I did change some things around in my apartment and it did help significantly. I changed some things around, cleaned out stuff that should have been released long ago, and bought a new showerhead. That's right. A new showerhead. Something small but that would make the apartment more comfortable.

I think i've been nomadic for so long I'm always scared to do a lot of work in a place I'm renting. You never know how long you're going to be there, and you don't want to sink a lot of money into somewhere you'll only be for a couple of years. A lot of places also don't allow change, like painting or redecorating or knocking down things. I moved around a lot through college, rarely staying in one place longer than a year, and I always hated that feeling of packing up and moving again. A lot of the times i moved not by choice, if you get my drift.

Slowly I'm starting to desire a homebase. Somewhere that I can spend a long time trying to fix up and make liveable. Somewhere I can always go. I need a homebase. I'm at an age where my parents house just can't do that for me any longer, and actually often makes it worse because I realize that I need somewhere to call my own. Of course you can try to do that with the space you're in and I definitely do that. When you live in a city like New York it's really important to have somewhere to escape to, and that's part of it. That's part of the reason why New Yorkers are always so obsessed with real estate. Because no matter how much you love this place, you also love escaping to somewhere safe and cozy. If that were not the case, people wouldn't have country homes in Westchester or Connecticutt!

What was great about this book is that it is laid out in a really easy format, has awesome suggestions for other books to read
and is done in a way that just about everyone can do it and without putting that much money into it. It has different graphs for setting up various areas of your home and speaks a lot about letting things go that don't fully complement your life, that don't really improve how you feel about yourself and your life.

I guess the point of this is that I am slowly getting over the nomadic thing. I might be moving around for years and years and years. who knows where I'll land next? But while I'm doing that, I'm going to try and make every home as comfortable as I can.

Reproduction

2006-10-25T07:52:00.000-07:00

I know that this is really just supposed to be about my experiences in New York, but it all kind of works itself out and blends together because this does matter in context of my life in New York. Several of my friends are going through divorces, or are divorced. I know that statistically it makes sense but when it's happening to people you know and love it's much harder. ANd I hate those people that tell them to work it out. How can anyone judge what is best for a marriage? I know that when children are involved, it probably is best to make sure that soemthing as final as a divorce is healthy. But when you're young and it's just the two of you and you have no assets, getting a divorce is emotionally heart wrenching but understandable.

One of my friends who is going through is just finding out who he and his wife really are. They probably shouldn't have gotten married so young, maybe he should have gone to grad school first, but what's done is done and the only thing left is moving forward. Then he finds out that an issue they had agreed on was never really agreed on. They had agreed not to have children. With overpopulation and the encumberment of diapers and bottles, mixed with her adopted background and their desire to travel, it made sense. Then, recenttly when he is with her she tells him she does in fact want to have kids, just not with him. That he's depressed and there are genetic connections and she doesn't want her children to have to deal with that. Of course he points out that since she was adopted, she doesn't know enough of her family background to be sure that there isnt anything in there. Then he says something that few people really say. He says "So What?" So what if he isn't perfect and has all these problems in his life. Is that a reason not to have children?

I haven't heard that in a long time. My own mother discourages me from raising a family on a regular basis because of my struggles with depression and eating disorders throughout my life. She throws out there that there are genes for alcoholism and addiction in my family background and do I really want to spread that on. So I always thought that I couldn't have children. That I would be doing the world a disservice by having them. Surprisingly I've always wanted to adopt babies. I think that there is no reason a child who is already here and needs to be loved should struggle so that selfish forty somethings can spend thousands on in-vitro in order to produce their own babies.

Then I thought about the stigma of depression and mental illness. People with mental illness, at least severe mental illnesses are discourage from having children. Yet I read all the time about women with breast cancer who give birth to daughters and people with diabetes having children. I have trouble understanding how that is acceptable. If anything my own parents should have given more thought to having children- with every family member having cancer at some point or another, strong ties to circulation problems and diabetes, heart trouble, it would have made sense for them to throw the idea out. But the biological urge to reproduce was so strong they did it anyway.

Ironically one of my friends recently told me she wouldn't adopt because she wouldn't want to take on whatever weird problems the child might have. I almost think it's better that way. Definitely better than purposely bringing a child into the world who you know stands a high chance of physical defects and illnesses such as cancer, diabetes, congenital heart problems. How is that any different than bringing in a child who has a chance of developing depression?

I pointed out to my mother that I'm probably the best prepared future mother in the world. That since I have experienced debilitating depression, eating disorders that wrecked my life for years, I would know what to look for. My parents certainly did. Back to my friend- he's right. There isn't any reason for his wife (soon-to-be-ex) to assume he would be a worse father than anyone else in our gene pool. With all these crazy mutants coming out of in-vitro and surrogate mothers and being born to chemically impounded 50 year olds, it would actually be nice to have more children that come about the regular way, bringing with them normal diseases, born at a healthy weight to young, healthy parents.

New England is a lot further than I thought

2006-10-19T06:28:00.000-07:00

So for some reason I've always believed the whole Northeast is squished up into one little area of the country, thus making travel in and among the states really simple. No wonder the Mayflower Pilgrims decided to stay in Massachusetts regardless of the horrible weather and worse food situation. Beats trying to make it across the country. Before when I said that they should have headed south I thought I was off base. Until I was invited to Vermont for the weekend.

In my head it seemed easy. I would hop on a train and take a ride, maybe lasting a few hours, straight through the state to Burlington. Too bad the ride I was referring to would last a minimum of 7 hours (in a car I don't have) or 9-10 hours (via train or bus). Since I hate riding longer than 6-7 hours, it sucks to think I have to go to all that trouble just to get to a state that is tiny and close by (Just look at the map!) Makes me wish the high-speed trains of Europe all over again. It's crazy to put that much effort into going somewhere for literally two days. Plus in order to fully enjoy the weekend I would have to take a day off work (another option that's not really an option). Wow, the things we do for our friends.

It's just weird. I always heard about people living in New Jersey and Connecticutt and even Pennsylvania and commuting to New York City and it never seemed to be that much of an ordeal. So why is it that things are so much further than they seem? While I understand trying to get to Maine might be a long and exhausting process, I can't see how going to Burlington Vermont could possibly take that much effort.But it is. A TEN HOUR BUS RIDE? A few years ago my friend spent three days on a Greyhound and nearly lost her mind. Really.

I think that all the cartographers responsible for maps of the Continental United States be required to express how unrealistic the maps are. Yes, I know it's not really half an inch, but the scales never make sense without a ruler. What they could do is just have printed in red across the top "IT'S A LOT FURTHER THAN YOU THINK." That's the kind of map I'd like to buy.

3000 Condoms

2006-10-16T09:37:00.000-07:00

I knew that would get your attention. In the 21st century safe sex is not only vital, it is easy to obtain. Not that Ii'm encouraging sleeping around, because I'm definitely not, but did you know that the New York City health department will send as many free condoms as you want to a business or dormitory? I didn't until B's neighbor called up as a joke and ended up with literally 3000 on his doorstep. I kid you not. So they were going to have a party and hand them all out but he left town, and the condoms, locked up in his apartment. Yes, I guess he really thinks he's going to get lucky.

It got me to thinking about the various free services NYC has to offer. And there are plenty. Boyfriend has a book called "Free and Dirt Cheap in New York" that works on this entire basis that most forms of entertainment can be found for free. Some of it is in higher demand than others- we all saw what happened with Meryl Streep in Central Park's Shakespeare in the Park this summer. People were actually SCALPING free tickets. That's sad. And there are some really nice things in New York that are free, like the Dance Theater in the summer at Lincoln center and the Staten Island Ferry (also I heard that beer on the SIF is only like 3 or 4 dollars). I personally enjoy walking around the city and wandering in and out of stores so over priced I'm surprised I get in, thus feeding my material desires without costing me a dime.

It's funny how when you get up here and actually start to live your life it doesn't matter so much anymore that you can't afford to do a lot of things people think of when thtey come to New York- opera, theater, Pastis on a Friday night. You become excited about finding an amazing Italian place in your neighborhood, when toilet paper is on sale at the grocery store, and when you get through the line at Trader Joes in under 10 minutes (For anyone who has visited the Union Square location you know that's a rarity). THere is always so much going on here. Boyfriend and I can find just about any form of entertainment from a hookah bar to an improv comedy show (they are both abundant). I've also made friends in various areas who are helpful when it comes to finding things to do at a reasonable price- waiters that take off our drinks, bouncers taht remember us from the week before. Those rae really the people you need to know to get around in the city.

I Am Legend

2006-10-13T09:35:00.000-07:00

What i like about New York is feeling cool when I have to walk through or around a movie set and can pretend that 1) I see these things all hte time and 2) sigh like they're really annoying (which they are to a certain degree but I have gotten to see Jimmy Fallon up close so it's WORTH IT. The past several weeks a new Will Smith Movie, titled "I am Legend" and based on a book of the same name has been filming all over the city but quite a bit in the downtown area. My guess is it's easier to make the downtown area look dirty and unsafe, since it certainly seems and smells that way a good portion of the time.

They were filming on Mercer St. yesterday when I was walking back from lunch. I had noticed on the way to lunch that there was an exceptional amount of plant matter spread all over the place. I thought it was weird that there was so much of it but whatever, so is Manhattan. When I returned from lunch they were spraying down a variety of cars with dirt to make them look like they were involved in some sort of dirt explosion and there was an awesome table set up on the sidewalk with various types of food nad drink. Naturally however, when i headed that way I was stopped by a very large man with a walkie-talkie who said, "I don't think you're an extra. Are you?" Guess I must have been looking pretty rough, since the premise of the movie is taht Will Smith is the last man on earth, sicne everyone else has been turned into bloodthirsty vampires. It's going to be fantastic, right?

Boyfriend told me that the book is one of his favorites and I was surprised to learn this since usually he treats this kind of thing with scorn. So he was pretty excited and we'll probably track after them this weekend. Anyway, back ot my story. I didnt get to eat any of the cast food, Will Smith was hiding out in a trailer on Spring Street, and i had to get back to work. But I like the thought that in a few months or a year people will get to see where I live and work. I'll definitely go see it. I think it's amazing what these people can do with the wonders of editing and airbrushing.

There is a whole message board sat up on the website to track where they're shooting each day. Literally a ton of NYU students are essentially following the cast and crew all over the city. I'm actually surprised at myself for becoming so used to it so quickly. I remember when I was first here I would stand mesmerized as they shot various parts of the film but I'm not quite that absorbed anymore. I have some other things to do and I know the neighborhood better and understand that it's a popular one. It's amazing to live in the Village, home of some of the most famous Hollywood A-Listers (or second home) and just a fun place to live in general. Did I mention that Philip Seymour Hoffman was at the bar ACROSS THE STREET FROM MY APARTMENT the other day? And that SJP lives only about eight blocks from me? Of course, she has a whole house while I have a room that's probably smaller than her bathroom, but you can't be choosy in a city where a million dollars buys you next to nothing in housing.

Searching for Our Past

2006-10-10T07:23:00.000-07:00

I keep getting these emails from websites that claim they'll be able to connect me to every person I ever wanted to find from high school. I find it entertaining thatthese places will try to entice me with emails claiming that people have been searching for me and don't I want to know who they are? But it brings me to an interesting issue- what is this obsession we have with our past?

Most of my dreams are very vivid and a lot involve characters I went to school with, lived with, worked with, or had vague contacts with through other people. I remember very clearly a lot of things from school and I'm wondering why anyone would want to relive them. For the most part my school experience was good. I had plenty of friends, made good grades and was okay enough at sports to at least make the team. But there were a lot of things that were terrible- getting in trouble with my parents, having to sneak out to see my high school boyfriend, fights with girlfriends that led to us not speaking for weeks or even months, failing grades (particularly in math), SATs, college visits and applications. It all led to who I am today, and I guess I could say that what doesn't kill you makes you stronger but I went to my 5 year reunion and was simply amazed at how little we had changed. I thought that college would make my class a more tolerant, better group overall but what I found was that every single one of the girls was exactly the same. The snobs were snobby, the nice girls were nice, and one girl had finally lost her virginity after claiming that she would wait until she was thirty or married. For the most part I was amazed to find that most of hte girls were even LIVING in the same place they had during high school. They had no interest in new experiences whatsoever, in living somewhere that would force them to actually think about who they had become.

I never wanted to be one of those women who are constantly fighting with their high school selves. Like the "mean girls" in Romy and Michelle's High School Reunion, i was proud of them when they finally realized that they were living the life they wanted to live as opposed to the life that had been assigned them at 18. So many of my "friends" are doing just that, living the life that was picked out for them. Like David Sedaris said, "No matter how successful I am, I am still considered most likely to burn your house down". he went through the same struggles in his family, dealing with what would come of being assigned a place in life practically before you're aware of your own reality and can remember your name.

I guess that's why I find it amazing that there are so many people out there who are looking for each other. Are you trying to remember why you are who you are? Are you trying to remember what it was like to have been chosen Homecoming Queen your senior year? It never fails to amaze me the way people handle themselves when it comes to high school. We become high schoolers again. On MySpace people are constantly 'touching base' with people they knew even vaguely during school. We are happyto hear that the school bully ended up in prison, or that the beauty queen was in a car accident that destroyed her face. Sure we may not admit it and we can pretend all we want, b ut that is the truth, isn't it? We are never above being human.

Maybe I'll become one of those people, out of my mind with the need to find out about the livese of others, to compare myself with them and see who fared better. Or maybe I''ll just believe that we are living the life we make for ourselves, with or without those experiences and people.

Physics Experiments are more fun in NYC

2006-10-04T12:43:00.000-07:00

I've seen several high school physics experiments going on in the city over the last few days and have to say they are a lot more interesting in New York. IN NC, we would examine gravity and speed, blah, blah, blah through dropping things out of our second or third or occasionally fourth floor window. Here, I've seen two seperate sets of kids dropping certain htings from maybe the 30-40th floor of their apartment building. Yesterday there were three boys gathered on a fire escape down here in SoHo who were "fishing" and got a gay man right on the back of his Lilly Pulitzer? shirt. It was HILARIOUS. He started screaming at them while they apologized between gasping with laughter. I have to admit I chuckled along with other adults who didn't know where the heck a blob of sticky stuff had come from. Wind is a very powerful element here. Really.

Then today I was on my way back from lunch when I noticed the sweeetest old couple sitting on a bench and staring at one of the huge high-rises that popped up in the middle of Greenwich Village. When I looked up I could faintly make out some sort of blue string dangling. Following that down, I saw three kids huddled over a bright blue ball of yarn, one recording notes while the others argued about something scientific. I stopped to watch for a few minutes when suddenly, as if moved by a puley, a shoe started flying up in to the air on a second piece of blue yarn. It was crazy, since th ball had not seemed to move. But that's what happens, apparently, when you set up a lever system that lightweight on a building that tall- it takes a long time for messages to go back and forth.

Kind of made me want to go back to a science class.

Six Degrees of Kevin Bacon

2006-09-29T10:22:00.000-07:00

It's one of my favorite games from college, and I thought I'd share it because I found out my co-workers didn't realize that anyone can be connected to Kevin Bacon. Well, any major actor. And me, now that I've met Marcia Gay Harden.But anyway, the game is fun and everyone should know how to do it!

1) You must connect the actor WITHIN 6 OR FEWER MOVIES.
2) Obviously it must have Kevin Bacon in it.

Example:

ELVIS PRESLEY worked with Edward Asner in Change of Habit (1969)
Edward Asner worked with KEVIN BACON in jFK (1991)

So it gets a Bacon score of 2.
Can be used with or without alcohol. Can be used on long car trips when the driver is getting lost. Can be used when procrastinating homework or at any other time.

:-) Makes me happy!

The Knock off Louis

2006-09-28T06:51:00.000-07:00

Sometimes I get asked to do really weird things at work that seem totally out of whack to me and should seem abnormal to the people that have me do them, but apparently it was all fine print in my original job description. Yesterday afternoon one of our VPs (who commutes in from PA) asked me to go down to Canal Street and get his daughter a knock-off Louis Vuitton. There are a lot of factors in heading down to Chinatown for knock-offs and one of them is that they don't really trust men. This man happens to look exactly like a cop and since he was raised in Brooklyn his accent doesn't helpl his case. For some reason every sketchy salesperson ever trusts me so its not a problem for me to head down there and at least try. So he gave me some cash and away I went. Walking down there I planned out a strategy. First and foremost to go into a couple of booths and check out their wares.

Canal Street has two knock-off industries going. There is one that involves really bad knock-offs that look kind of like what a bag might look like but definitely isn't. Then there are the really good knock-offs that are kept behind closed doors and have to be found through these people on the streets who whisper the brands they carry into your ear. There is a hum of "Prada, Gucci, Dior, Louis Vuitton..." that you won't hear anywhere else in the world.

I wandered in and out of booths, finally selecting one off a street that seemed to at least have the right brands tacked on the bags. I loitered in there for a few moments before casually passing hte woman who ran the booth and asking, "Louis Vuitton?" She shook her head and motioned to a small statured Chinese man who was bouncing up and down the street, collecting people in a general area. I went up to him and nodded. He nodded back and shoved me through a plain metal door into a dank hallway with about six other people. We were herded into an elevator and went up an indiscernable number of floors before the doors opened into near-blackness. The man jumped out, looked up and down the hallway, motioned for us to be quiet, then herded us into a line. I saw doors all over the place, all labeled in letters and locked with padlocks. One of them was just closing and behind it I saw the white glow of the Dior summer collection. He pulled out more keys than a janitor, selected one and opened a lock, again shufffling us all into a room. This was full of Louis Vuitton hanging on the walls, carefully displayed on shelves. They were fantastic knock-offs and I was pleased to see the one that the VP's daughter wanted on the wall. I selected it and told him this was the one I wanted. We bargained for a few minutes, came to an agreed price, and I handed him the money while he knotted it in a plain black plastic bag. It was not dissimilar to a drug deal or buying porn.

He asked if I was done and when I said yes, jumped back out into the hallway, looked up and down, lips pursed, eyes narrowed. He waved me out there, shut the door behind me shuffled me back down the darkened hallway, opened another door and pushed me into a stairwell, slamming the door behind me. I was in a stairwell in a building I had never seen before and had no idea where the heck I was. I followed the stairs down and came out of another door in the wall, back into Daylight and the hustle and bustle of Canal Street.

It was such a funny experience but at the same time such a common one. You become really used to having to do such things in order to purchase knock-off bags or sneak into hip clubs or whatever you're trying to do. I think it's part of the New York way of life.

We all love Lohan

2006-09-27T06:55:00.000-07:00

Yeah, right. i can't believe the girl gets as much coverage as she does. And I hope her publicist gets fired. Who else wouldn't try to cover up things like showing up late or not at all for work, visiting the hospital repeatedly for what seem to be bad hangovers, and staying out most of the night, thus creating hte late to work and hangover situations. It never fails to amaze me. How did we get to the point where we began to allow this teenage actress to become a regular on page six? I for one am very curious.

Lindsay is pretty. She had an eating disorder (which she later denied) but isn't looking too shabby these days. She has a little sister (can't wait to see HOW she turns out) a father in prison (who published an apology in a UK paper) and a little sister (also on her way to being another lIndsay. She dates older men, is good friends with Paris (wouldn't you want to be) and yet at the same time works on Disney movies (Herbie, anyone?). I have to say she has led some kind of life. Her mother believers she can do no wrong as firmly implied in every interview the woman ever does. To be honest, if my daughter were in a career that spilled into 7 figures, I wouldn't say a damn word either. We wouldn't want it to end up like Macauley Culkin or someone who declares emancipation because his or her parents are keeping the paychecks. I even saw a Law and ORder like that last night where a fifteen year old Russian model was supporting her entire family over what she made on the runway.

But Lohan is different. She is pretty, but not beautiful, Fairly well-proportioned but has a lot of freckles. So why do we love her so much? Her "natural" C-cup? Her inability to show up anywhere on time or appropriately dressed for it? Her lack of a quality publicist (now I'm imaging they're just a friend of the family's who happened to be bored when Lindsay came important enough to talk about.

I dont' really have any answeers. THe metro has written about her a lot in the last few days. It's gotten to the point where I'm as sick f her as of Balenciaga knock-off bags. Come on Korea. You and LIndsay should get together and talk about how to make thinsg look better for each other and your selves.

The Last Kiss

2006-09-25T06:22:00.000-07:00

On Saturday i went with Boyfriend and Friend C to see "The Last Kiss" the new Zach Braff flick hat has gotten really good reviews and is supposed to be all around fabulous. But while the soundtrackis excellent (if you're into that angsty emo I-wear-a-hoodie-with-everything scene) the movie didn't live up to it. Essentially Zach Braff plays a character who is on the verge of 30 and has a now- pregnant girlfriend he can't decide if he wants to marry. What I found to be teh most realistic aspect of Jenna (Jacinda Barrett) is that while at the beginning of the movie she retends she wants the same things as her boyfriend, like not getting married, it turns out that she's just like all the other women out there who want to be married and say otherwise. I mean, I have a few friends who are serious about the staying single for life thing, but most know that if they met Mr. Right they would jump on him. And for good reason, I might add!

But Jenna has gotten herself into quite a predicament. She's almost engaged and pregnant and heading around to different friend's weddings with her boyfriend while he continues to avoid the subject of buying a house and really beginning a new life together. Thus enters Rachel Bilson as Kim, a sophmore at the local University who obviously has a thing for older men who are on the verge of a life crisis. She sits with him up in this treehouse drinking beer and saying that she can't imagine a life with no more surprises (essentially what she means is sex with the same person for the rest of his life). So then he's scared. Yes he has this really great girlfriend who is smart and beautiful and wants to have his kid, but more tempting is this tiny, flighty, don't hold me back my roommate's out for the night college kid.

So he begins a kind of affair with her. Meaning that thy're hanging out without him telling his girlfriend. That he begins lying to this woman he wants to be with. It becomes this twisted trap as his friends either begin to develop relationships or the ones they're in begin to fall apart.

The point of the movie is that nothing is guaranteed. And that, even though you can love someone with what you think is everything you have, you might be able to screw it up in a moment. My boyfriend and friend hated it. Without a doubt, and he spent the rest of saturday humming The Shins and looking "unsatisfied with life". Which was hilarious. But while I definitely didn't like it, I thought there were good scenes. Really good scenes that made me grateful to be in the life i'm in.

Looking Forward To

2006-09-22T08:14:00.000-07:00

a beautiful weekend. The weather is supposed to be lovely and the temperature is even better so I hope there are lots of opportunities to hang out outside in the wilds of Manhattan. One of my really good friends is coming to visit in just a couple of weeks and I'm hoping the weather holds out until then. She sent me a few things she wants to do, so I'm trying to organize them. They include:

* Statue Of Liberty
* Ellis Island
* Ground Zero
* Empire State Building

I think I'll add on

* Central Park
* the Staten Island Ferry
* Walk along the Hudson

It's so hard to plan when someone is coming up for just a couple of days. It's like being hit in the face with so many things to do and definitely not enough time. How do you get a true sense of New York without living up here for a while? I don't' care if you decide to hate New York, just give it some time first, right? I have a feeling she'll love it and it's the escape she needs from the South. Sometimes that place still feels extraordinarily oppressive.

Come out and Play Weekend

2006-09-21T06:35:00.000-07:00

This weekend is come out and play weekend- comeoutandplay.org
Essentially it's games for grown-ups, like Spy School and Space Invaders and some weird New York ones like Wall Street wannabes. I like the idea that in the midst of our fast paced Manhattan lives we are still seeking the solace of childhood recess. Remember recess? Being let out after lunch and nap (at least in Kindergarten) to run wild for an hour, swing around the tetherball poles, climb up and down the dangerous jungle gyms (at least while I was a kid, everything was made of iron and steel- I'm shocked more children didn't die) and the all inclusive merry-go-round. I remember that was where you wanted to be, hanging out desperately as your forty pound body got swung around faster and faster.

My playground was really fantastic. It was about two acres with plenty of things to do. Since we were a country school we often got to see farm animals that had gotten loose and wandered over, and we even got to play somewhat in the woods (which is where a lot of people had their first kiss, sunlight in between the trees- very romantic). We just had to keep moving. There was only one "fat" girl in my class. You just weren't fat at age 8. Probably because we actually had balanced meals, snacktime and a full hour of being thrown outside unless it was pouring down rain. EVERY DAY.

I feel bad for kids now. They have to deal more with the political side of school. Meaning that a lot of elementary schools only average about 90 minutes of recess or gym time PER WEEK. Can you imagine? No wonder people are becoming fatter. Sure you may think that we're also becoming smarter and that might be true. But in the end it won't matter ifyou're too obese to get out of your house. it makes me think of "What's Eating Gilbert Grape?" when Johnny Depp's character finds out his mother will have to be taken out of her bedroom by crane. They end up burning down their house because they simply can't take the ridicule anymore.

So back to Come Out and Play Weekend. Sure you might be one of those super skinny New Yorkers but even if you are it wouldn't hurt to come out, check out the city this weekend. Maybe they'll give you a Hall Pass as a prize or something.

Brother Wolf

2006-09-19T06:34:00.000-07:00

Last night I went and saw the best play. It was a reading of play by Preston Lane, who comes from both UNC- Greensboro and Yale. He is a playwright (in case that's not obvious) and from what I can tell he's brilliant. It was a really wonderful play of 5 scenes, 3 sermons and some beautiful Appalachian bluegrass music. The real old kind. The guy who played was Riley Watts (also of Cold Mountain fame) and he was brilliant.

Essentially the play takes place in 1840s and present day Appalachia on the border of NC and TN. I've never been that far but I've heard about those deep mountain people. They're different, and their accent is the closest accent to the Old King's English there ever will be. I imagine that once our culture has fully infiltrated theirs we'll lose a part of our heritage we can never get back. But that's not what this is about. This is about "Beowulf". That's write. I said "Beowulf". Are you seeing the similarities now? Except his name is Brother Wolf and he steps into God's House to protect his family from Gren-dell, the evil demon.

It's passionate, well-articulated and feels authentic. I love the shadow voices and the way they play off each other. From what I saw ofthe press kit the set is excellent. Plain but not too plain. The story of Grendel's Mother and her murder of Mabel Wolf are amazingly done. And the Rattler Man is a character that would easily fulfill Cormac McCarthy's dream antagonist.

The whole thing had a McCarthy feel to it as we are led through the story of love, death and forgiveness in the Christian way. I was riveted by the spirituals and totally absorbed in Brother Wolf's tragic life. I also liked the way so few characters played so many. Preston Lane I actually met on the elevator but was so modest I did not connect it was his play I was watching until I saw his name under the title.

Plumm NYC

2006-09-18T07:02:00.000-07:00

Saturday night I went to a club for the first time in probably 2 months. It's not really my scene. I mean, I love dancing, but I can't handle dancing until 4 a.m. and then getting up the next morning. Have to say I'm impressed with all my friends who do it. We were supposed to meet at Plumm for DJ Massi at 11 p.m. on Saturday night. I was there on time and they rolled in at 12:30. During thetime I was there alone I had to buy myself a drink (which I hate doing) and deal with various guys hitting on me because they thought i was alone and lonely. There are big differences between the two, by the way. The funny part was that around 12:30 a.m. I went outside to call my friend C and ask her what the heck was taking so long and there they were, fuming because they couldn't get in. So I endedup being the one to get them all in. It turns out that if you're really nice to bouncers and get in there ridiculously early, they'll let whoever's with you in. Thus I had my cool moment of the night.

Inside at this point what had once been empty was now packed with people, promoters and security. There were about 9 of us and as we moved through the crowd I could feel myself getting more and more sweaty and claustrophobic. Which is why I never shower before going out- i know i"ll want to as soon as I get back in! So I'm usually clean but not squeaky and generally start sweating so by two a.m. I'm not the world's most pleasant sight.

Around 1 this guy actually named Luigi started hitting on three of us- one of C's friend is a model so it shoudln't come as that big of a surprise. What was weird was that I had a blow-pop i'd picked up in teh bathroom and took out of my mouth to take a shot. When I did, Luigi actually grabbed it out of my hand and bit off the rest of it. one of the most disgusting things that has happened to me in a long time. If there are any guys out there reading this, IT'S NOT SEXY. DON'T EVEN BOTHER. So we took the shots then I was dragged to the downstairs area to meet someone's promoter. My goal at all times in a club is to 1) NEVER pay the cover charge and 2) Drink for Free or not at all. I stick to those rules and for the most part they work out well. There are always guys willing to buy you drinks.

At 1:30 I was ready to go. I'd been there for more than two hours, danced, drank and was exhausted. So I started the Good-Bye process. Depending on intoxication levels it gets very complicated but essentially it took about twenty minutes. Fortunately Plumm is located right at the corner of 14th and 8th, which also has the subway station with the ACE L lines available. All quality ways to get home. While I normally don't do that- I would usually take a cab, most of my money had gone to the one drink I had at Plumm that I had to buy.

Rainy Fridays

2006-09-15T12:49:00.000-07:00

So all day long we've been lisening to the type of music you might hear in an orthodontist's or maybe in one of those really cheesy medical malpractice law firms. They pick a radio station and let it play no matter what it plays. So besides hearing "Borderline" and "It's Raining Men", I've also heard Gnarls Barkely and Abba. Not that i have a problem with any of those in small amounts, but I HATE listening to it non-stop and over and over. Did I mention radio stations tend to play the same ten to twenty songs over and over? I think it's because they assume that you're driving while you're listnening to the radio and then you get to your location. Surely you're not in the same radio range for so long that you notice the repititive pattern. Oh here it comes. Oh God. That song... "Bad Girl".... oh yikes. I'm sitting here at a computer, entering various data and listening to "Bad Girls".

Friday is kind of a blah day anyway. I arrived at work mostly wet because I looked out the window and again it looked like it WASN'T raining in the courtyard but when I got down to the street it was definitely raining. And I was late and didn't have time to run back upstairs and change. So I came to work anyway and just dealt with it. Which is what I do on a daily basis now. I'm desperately waiting for the rain to end. I feel like last fall wasn't quite so rainy. And on Fridays i always spend most of the day waiting for it to be over, so I can move into weekend mode. By far my favorite. Pull on some comfy clothes, crash in front of the TV, stretch and relax. I love it.

Tonight's supposed to be wonderful anyway because Boyfriend and I are having a stay-in date night. Our first purposeful one in a while. It involves wine and good food that I don't have to pay for. Because I think it's possible i have one of the most generous men in the world. Really. He's incredibly nice. So I have that to look forward too. What I don't have to look forward to is a long after work workout because I was too lazy to drag my butt out of bed this morning. Next week I swear I start going early in the mornings. With all the evening events I'll have going on in my life, it will be a definite plus to get working out in the morning and get it out of the way! I hope this doesn't become a pattern this winter- fighting sleep to get up and get going. It's so hard to convince yourself, even statistically on cold, wet mornings when you're so comfy in bed!

This weekend should be prettier and more fun. There are a ton of options including but not limited to: Responsible Dog Day, Museum of Natural History (one of my favorite city spaces), The Met, Central Park, City Island in the Bronx. It's all very exciting and I love it. Oh yeah and of course clubs on Saturday night with the girls (Boyfriend hates them. And who can blame him?)

The Boots Debate

2006-09-14T08:03:00.000-07:00

There is a weird situation with me and rain. When I get up on what is supposed to be or is a rainy morning, I prep for it by getting dressed in my normal clothes, pulling on a raincoat, then checking outside to see how hard it's raining in order to determine if I need to wear rain boots. But I'm on the courtyard side and for whatever reason, unless it's a monsoon, it NEVER looks like it's raining out there. Its like a completely different world from the courtyard to the street (where it could be pouring and I would never have guessed). When I was young I was staying with my aunt one time and remembered a phenomenon that could only be described as amazing. I was in her backyard, playing, when it started to pour. Turning to go back inside I noted that it was pouring as far as the eye could see. My aunt was in the front yard weeding at the time and I assumed I would meet her inside. When I got inside she wasn't there so I went to the front to find out why. She was in the sun in the front yard, weeding. I ran outside and looked around. It was sunny and dry. I told her about it and she didn't believe me so together we went to the backyard. Lo and behold, almost the instant we hit the grass on that side of the house we were in the pouring rain. This kept up for about half an hour. It was one of the most amazing weather events i have ever seen and definitely one of the strangest. I couldn't believe that we were on the dividing line.

That's kind of the way it is here within my apartment. Inside, in the courtyard, it appears to never rain. Yet outside it pours. It's all very confusing. Without fail, I am always surprised when I step out the first glass door and find it pouring outside. Usually it means turning around, going back upstairs and pulling on boots and grabbing an umbrella, then arriving at work soaking wet anyway. Who knows if I will ever learn my lesson. But I have reason for doing it that way. Because my rainboots are knee length theey're a pain in the butt the whole day.When I was in college I wore those adorable LL Bean duck shoes which worked just fine. I even brought them with me when I moved to New York and wore them to work the first rainy day we had. Which was a major mistake. The minute I stepped off a curb I was up to my knees in water, explaining why people here where galoshes no matter what.

Relaxtion Period is Over

2006-09-12T09:22:00.000-07:00

and I mean over. All of a sudden the world is in full swing again, including New York. Most companies have stopped their early Friday afternoon closings, people are beginning to close down their Hampton houses, and things are moving a little faster. People are wearing darker colors and walking faster and i heard a lot more horns blaring this morning than I've heard in a while. I also saw a child outside the Preschool across the street throw a tantrum and thought "Ah, normality." It's weird being stuck in NewYork during the summer because it feels like no one else is here. Everything is empty and everyone on vacation. You walk slowly to avoid melting.

Of course now you can pick up the pace again. Christmas is on the horizon so most companies regardless of what they do are preparing for the holidays. Children already have the school holidays marked on their calendar, which include Columbus Day and all the Jewish holidays. I'm tired just thinking about school and don't start for another two weeks. But for me it is the changing of the weather that means the most. I'm actually craving a long walk inCentral Park because it's gorgeous outside. It almosot makes me believe (however briefly) that unemployment wouldn't be that bad.... just kidding. I have too many friends working like three jobs to make their rent here.

I think that's the only downside to actually living in New York. You come here to visit and you think "what a wonderful place", full of things to do and places to go and people to see. And that's completely true. But you can only really do those things if you have the money to do them. And if you're not working. Pretty much leaving the ladies who lunch able to do that. I liked that about Sarah Jessica Parker's character on Sex and the City. She was a writer, meaning she was working but she could also flex her schedule around other things. Whereas I am never able to take a day off because it's beautiful. Very different.

So if you're moving here, DO IT. Because living here is the most amazing part of my life ever. But if you're visiting appreciate all the time you have on your hands to do fun things during the week! Or if you're living here and job hunting appreciate those hours in between interviews when you can visit exhibits at the Met or check out Washington Square park, hear poetry being read at some beatnik coffee house.

Five Year Anniversary

2006-09-11T11:24:00.000-07:00

since September 11th changed everything we knew about New York. The city that rested above everyone as a golden world of fantasy literally crumbled before our eyes on television. I spent weeks trying to remember what New York had looked like to me the first time I went, at 17, and couldn't. I couldn't remember the skyline at all and it made me sick to my stomach. Now things have changed so much I can't imagine it without the holes in downtown Manhattan that are the World Trade Towers. At night two glowing posts rise through, faint beams of light stretching what seems to be infinitely towards the sky. To so many people those towers were infinite, their shadow cast over so much of downtown.

Today is gorgeous, which seems especially fitting, since the day this happened was also beautiful. Perfect temperature, blue skies, barely a breeze, warm sun. Everyone was bustling around, getting coffee and papers and preparing for the morning. School children were on their way to school when that sound occurred. I've heard that even now people who were down here for the event jump at sirens and loud noises, even now, when everything is supposed to be so secure. The people who were involved are still trying to adapt to living life outside the Towers.

But I'm happy. This has been the first anniversary I haven't cried for everyone and everything that was lost in those attacks, haven't cried for the injustices that occurred to those of Arabic descent after 9/11 and is still occurring to this day. How my brother and so many others have been sent to participate in a war we should never have been involved in. This year I was calm. I didn't sleep well but have felt okay, have been able to get through my work without much interupption. Someone once told me that I was one of the most sensitive and insensitive people they had ever known. Insensitive (too often!) to the plights of the individual, but overly sensitive to plights that affect large groups of people, such as children in Africa, or civilians in Bosnia. Trees being chopped down in California and Washington. I used to cry driving home from high school through a huge farm that was being turned into a sub-division. Or when the ducks that lived on our river didn't come one year. But my friends talking about their boy troubles or school troubles or life troubles I didn't relate to as well. I'm still not sure if it was a compliment or the worst insult I've ever received.

That's why today is so important to me. I understand that its important to everyone in this country and really all over the world, but to each his own. That which affects our world affects me. That which seems to only affect me does not.

Coney Island

2006-09-08T07:41:00.000-07:00

On Sunday I went to Coney Island for the first time. It's hard to believe that I've lived in NYC for over a year and never made it that far into Brooklyn. But I hadn't. So away we went, adventuring to the last stop on the DF/NR train. We got off and there was nothing but boardwalk. Down a few steps and out into the blinding light of the Sun on the water. And that light is always blinding. There is the smell of fried food and sea salt and you can hear the laughter of children and seagulls. It was amazing. I felt alive for the first time in days.

We started heading towards the amusement park, towards the Cyclone and The Wonder Wheel and all the carnies and games that had been there for so many years. It was like stepping back forty years. I expected to see hippies and drifters. And while there were plenty of both they were too modern to keep up my fantasy. I wonder what it must have been like coming to Coney Island on that first Memorial Day in 1920. Stepping out of carriages and jalopies and off the subway (still very new) and entering into an amusement park on the beach, a boardwalk that literally fed into the sea.

Things are older now. You can tell watching the rides that they have been around for the last 86 years. But at the same time nothing has changed. The games are essentially the same, the Wonder Wheel is still using all it's original parts, and you can still get baked clams and hot dogs with your soda. There are families running around, mothers shouting at their babies not to get too close to the water, lifeguards sitting up in the bright orange stands. People fishing off the pier. People sunbathing, listening to the radio, breathing in the air. It feels alive.

We went on the original rides- the Cyclone (1:50 of the worst part of your life), the Wonder Wheel (screeching metal cars swinging you out over the park), the Spook-a-rama (small cars swinging you around in front of "scary" monsters and dead people). We ate until we were sick- sausages and funnel cakes washed down with cold sodas. We played the games- I won a Care Bear shooting water into a hole that propelled a bear upwards. We sat on benches on the boardwalk watching some seagulls fight over a hotdog bun.

We were actually leaving, cutting through a side street when we saw what would by-far be one of the most interesting experiences i've had in New York. A freak show, promising fire eaters and an inflatable boy was only $6. It was continuous, running for nearly 18 hours. We watched in horror as a woman carefully danced with a 13.5 foot albino python, as another ate fire, tribal symbols tattooed across her face as the lit batons swung casually around her. Each act only took a few minutes but was more grotesque than the one before it. We watched the world's youngest female sword swallower as she deftly took on a four foot long, at least five inch thick blade then BENT over to allow someone else to pull it out.

It definitely made the experience seem surreal. And i think that's what makes Coney Island so great is that it feels surreal. You are truly Alice stepping through the Looking Glass.

Labor Day Means Change

2006-09-06T06:39:00.000-07:00

I like Labor Day a lot. I'm not really sure why, but I do. Maybe it's because there's something in the air about starting school again or something. I used to love getting ready for school. So yesterday when i was walking around, watching all the children who started school, I had to admit I was a little jealous. I miss the feeling that a new school year brings, with fresh changes. Each year was viewed as a chance to improve upon the last, whether it was improving my math grade (always difficult) or getting my braces off (sophmore year). I used to love arriving to hear the gossip from the summer. Which relationships had broken up, which new teachers were cute, and where we would pick up with our friends during lunch period. When I was at boarding school it became even more meaningful since we were unlikely to see each other during the summers. People went home, began camp, began working, or just hung out but for the most part not in Raleigh.

I wish I could recapture that feeling I got when I was in school. The feeling that you would be able to erase mistakes you had made the year before, maybe forgive a grudge that was getting the best of you. I always loved it when teachers told us that we were beginning with As, we just had to keep them. I remember the first day after school, getting home with just the right amount of homework- enough that you could finish with plenty of time to spare, and yet still feel somewhat accomplished. I used to make a list of goals each year that I wanted to accomplish. Most of the time it had to do with actually paying attention in the classroom (something I always struggle with) then applying old knowledge to new, then being more outgoing. Since I was pretty shy in high school, it was an effort to do all that I did and keep a smiling face.

Could we recapture that emphasis on success that we had going for us in school? All the way through we were encouraged, told that we would grow up to great things, that we would make our parents proud. I have to question if any of us were able to do that. I wonder where everyone in my class is now. Some of them I still keep in touch with, writing letters and emailing back and forth, being a part of. But for the most part I have no idea what happened to the 58 girls that I graduated with. I don't know who's already married with children, who's really building a career, whos' still just hanging out, maybe waiting tables while working on their graduate degree.

Maybe I'll take this as a time to have a fresh start, to become more energized about my life and what can be accomplished. New York definitely has that energy. It's just up to me to capture it.

We are Moving Towards Fall

2006-09-01T06:21:00.000-07:00

The latest homeless man sleeping around the corner from my office was in a box today. That's how I can tell it's starting to turn towards fall. When the homeless begin being a little more careful about what they sleep on or in. He's new. He began sleeping out there last week and I guess he just became homeless because he was clean-cut and healthy looking. Now it's starting to look like he hasn't showered and that maybe he's been out there a while. But I know the truth. That he's probably just been made homeless.

There are other signs, too. Little things that are going on that you probably wouldn't even notice if you weren't looking for them. Like the pool in the dog run has been turned upside down. And people at the gym are starting to blow dry their hair instead of leaving with it wet. I always feel mixed up this time of year. I love fall, it's one of my favorite seasons. Yet I don't like the idea of shorter days and longer nights. Of freezing on the way out to bars and clubs. Having to use coat checks and watching frosty breath in the air. Putting away dresses nad t-shirts because it's too cold. On the other hand, I feel more alive during the winter. I'm not sure why. Something about the cold air wakes me up, helps me get going. I sleep better and feel better overall.

I wonder what will happen this winter. If I'll survive another New York winter. If I'll be able to deal with below freezing temperatures and heavy coats. I feel ready. Maybe.

Hurricane in New York?

2006-08-30T13:41:00.000-07:00

Otherwise I really can't explain why it's so disgusting here this week! Yuck. Just a little FYI for y'all: if you move up here buy a rain jacket. My friend C just moved up here a few weeks ago and has actually not owned one since she was a little girl. First of all, since she's from FL I thought it was a pre-req. So I asked her what she did when it rained and she shrugged and said, "Sat in my car?" Secondly, sitting in your car is definitely not a NYC option, especially since you don't have a car. Unless you are incredibly rich and/or famous. Which I doubt if you know me. Because if you were you'd be having your secretary reading this today then calling me to tell me how wrong I am.

So we went shopping to get her a water-proof coat. She doesn't yet have the concept of New York rain. It's very sneaky. It will look like nothing, look like nothing and all of a sudden you'll be in the middle of a downpour. Craziness. I guess there's a lot that you can't understand about the city unless you live here. But I think par tof the reason rain surprises us is that we can't see it coming. No one is ever looking past the huge buildings that cover Manhattan, at least not far enough to see the storms coming in off the waterway. IT's really fascinating. Plus I told her it rains sideways but she didn't believe me. I think, now that we're getting itno the fall I'm going to keep an extra set of clothes here, because I know the day will come when I will arrive at work drenched.

The good news about having her just here and not really settled in yet is that she could bring me lunch, which was awesome. I love eatin gfor free especially since so much of my income goes to food. Guess that's why I eat such simple meals all the time. Haha. One day I'm going to make enough money to fix whatever I want for dinner. I am going to live in an apartment big enough to hold a full spice rack and have counter space and whip up gourmet meals. Now that's something to look forward too. There's a lot in NYC to look forward too.

We're almost at Labor Day and I've been watching little kids get their school supplies together. I used to love doing that stuff. I would pack my backpack like two weeks before and be getting up early before I realized that. So I'm watching the NYCkids pack up their supplies.

Hurricane Katrina

2006-08-29T07:26:00.000-07:00

I think New Orleans is on everyone's mind today. It's been one year since the levees broke and the major city that was under sea level showed that it would withstand everything. We all heard horror stories about people stranded in the Saints arena and courthouse, of prisoners setting their own cells on fire to escape, of dead bodies floating through what was Jackson Square and the French Quarter. i remember watching television ,seeing people floating on old refrigerator doors and stranded on rooftops, desperately waiting for the help that would not even begin until 48 hours later. By far, this was the worst response in US History and I fully blame the government. One, for not repairing the levees several years ago when concerns of what a major storm would do to New Orleans came up, Two, for not responding any faster than they have.

For whatever reason, our government still seems to believe that the situation overseas deserves more time and attention than the one right here at home. I am sad every time I think of the Lower Ninth Ward residents, people who may have owned their home but were often way below poverty level. When Katrina hit, that was by far the highest death count, since something like eighty percent of the people who live there are unable to swim. More than ninety percent are barely literate, and hold down multiple jobs that don't pay much. They often have babies before they aren't considered babies. Crime and poverty rage around that area.

When Katrina hit, it just emphasized the racial divide. They were the last place helped, actually blocked off by the National Guard before they could get out of their neighborhood. There are stories of hte National Guard blocking off bridges and streets/canals, preventing people from escaping and causing them to starve to death on their rooftop or drown in the murky water. Bodies are still being found in that area, the latest one found in May in a home. Imagine, nine months later and we are still recovering bodies, still reuniting parents and children. People's families who are seperated are still away from each other, one parent having traveled North to work, the other in a FEMA trailer with children and other homeless family members, just waiting.

Waiting seems to be the name of the game here. Because that's all that people did when it happened, and are still doing one year later. One woman put it like this: When I told someone in charge what happened, they said I would need to call FEMA and tell them what had happened, where I would be. I said, 'I don't have a phone', 'I don't have a place to live', I don't know how to call you or where to tell you I've been or where I'll be.". She was exactly right. What phones were they supposed to use? These people had just lost their whole lives and President Bush is telling them to call FEMA and they'll be put on a list? What is most disappointing is that America is not set up for real disaster. That much is obvious. If we had been, we should have been in there within hours, pulling people out and transporting them to safer places.

Crime, particularly murder, has sharply increased. Thousands of people are crammed into FEMA trailer "cities" on the outskirts of New Orleans, living in swampy conditions with frequent power outages. Going in and out of the city is dangerous. Drug activity means there are often needles on the ground. Puddles that are too deep to dry out attract mosquitoes. People are crammed into singlewide trailers like sardines, often as many as 9 or 14 people to a single trailer meant to hold 3 or 4. Children sleep on sofas and dining room tables.

I can't help but wonder what would have happened if more places had been affected. If the hurricane had raged further up the coast, devestating the land and area around it. What would Bush have done then? Sure, it's hard to support a city of democrats who would rather lose their feet than vote for a Republican, but does that make it right, what was done? Does that make it okay to ignore an area of poor, minority souls who may not contribute back to Uncle Sam? I doubt it.

I Guess Gullible's Not Really in the Dictionary

2006-08-28T08:24:00.000-07:00

I have been duped for the first time since moving here. I mean beyond the average "There are eight children and a dog depending on me and I just lost my job as a chimney sweep" I mean really I fell for quite a line. This morning coming out of my apartment, I ran into a man on the street asking for cabfare. He claimed to be working in the costume department of Sweeney Todd and offered me free tickets if I could help him out, saying he had locked himself out of his apartment and had to go get an extra set of keys. So I gave him some money and my name and number and he said he would restore my faith in humanity.

Maybe I just have some deephearted sympathy for gay men in theater or something but I fell right for it. And gave him the last of my money for the week. All on this hope that he would return with Sweeney Todd tickets for me. It's actually a musical I really want to see so I'm excitd about it. Or at least I was. I wonder if he thought i had plenty of money. I can't imagine my Old Navy hoodie or worn keds would be screaming that but what do I know. I was clean and showered.

Then again maybe poor people just have more faith than others. Poor people are more likely to gamble, play the lottery, lend a hand or some cash, feed those with less than they have. I know that I alwasy give money to charity even though there are weeks where I can barely afford to eat! I'm also the type of person that buys meals for homeless people sometimes and can't stand the thought of a kid not getting school supplies. There are so many good things in the world and if we don't share them what kind of world are we living in? I understand that during the Depression rich people gripped their resources even tighter, forcing many to starve to death waiting for enough work to pay for a single meal. Unless they had a ton in the stock market, many of the wealthier people didn't even change their lives that much, maybe trading in a nice meal or two but certainly not waiting desperately in work lines for something, anything that would put water and bread on the crates that served as furniture. Reading the "Grapes of Wrath" I was amazed at the human condition, the willingness of one person to work for next to nothing while the wealthy kept getting wealthier. I loved those scenes when the cops ran people out of "camps" for enxt to no reason just because they had been paid off.

Now I'm poor, living in a depression of sorts. I have to be more careful with money than I ever was during college. It's crazy to thing that just a couple of years ago I assumed a college education would be all I would need to get a decent job. Now I'm realizing that isn't the case, at least not in the world of humanities. The glass ceiling still exists and to get out of it we have to look beyond what is going on in our heads.

My boyfriend was kind when I told him I had given all the money I had left to this man. He said "I hope the good karma means something".

Me, too.

MayRose Comfortable Food

2006-08-24T08:55:00.000-07:00

Located at 21st and Broadway at first you don't even really notice it. It's huge, for one thing, at least by New York standards, and just blends in really well with Gramercy Park area. But once you get insie, things change. For one thing, it looks like your stereotypical diner. Meaning that the chairs are yellow vinyl, and the tables are fake marble-top, and there are domed cakes sitting near a cooler full of Stewart's Root Beer and cream soda. The menu is exquisite. Not exquisite like escargot, but exquisite like every type of food you could ever want. Everything from mac'n'cheese to grilled shrimp. I'm not kidding.

I found it insane that there was so much going on in there. The waiters and waitresses for the most part don't seem to care if they come up to you or not. The atmosphere is totally laid back, not even flowers on the tables. THe space is even bigger from the inside and the crowd is eclectic. While we were there I saw a woman and her baby eating spaghetti, two businessmen arguing over coffe, and then there was us- some sorority girls, mostly southern enjoying planning for more serious events.

After looking over the menu, I ordered the "Blue Special" which on wednesday meant fish and chips- herby homemade fresh cut fries. How often do you get that? My friend B ordered an amazing looking burger that could come with mushrooms and guacomole. It was crazy. and it was pretty cheap. Yeah, I stuck with water, but I also shared a slice of carrot cake and ended up spending only $17 total, including tip! For all five of us the bill was less than $90. And that says a lot. Plus I was much more full than I had been in a long time. Which says a lot more.

Highly recommend it. It's almost down home cooking in the middle of Chelsea.

And I Heart New York Again

2006-08-23T07:21:00.000-07:00

After what seemed years of heat built up into a short time period, I'm happy to say that the weather has become much more pleasant recently. I'm actually enjoying my walk to work and I'm arriving dry, as opposed to dripping with sweat. I'm in a better mood and I feel better even while eating breakfast with the cat. New York can be such a wonderful city when it's pleasant out. People have no idea how much better it is! No one should be allowed to visit during July. If you come here for the first time then you'll find everything on fire, people with nasty attitudes and waiting on subway platforms will be as torturous as hailing angry cabdrivers who will force you to puke. You'll find yourself burnt and tired with no pools anywhere and paying way too much for food in mid-town. I'm dead serious about that.

It's much better to just wait it out and find out hwo wonderful the city is. Fall and spring are definitely my favorite seasons here. I'm really excited about wearing a little more clothing and having the leaves change and everything becoming beautiful. It's a good thought. Really. It's also changed my attitude about working. I'm trying my best to be happy with the choices I've made, to do the best job I can possibly do, and to make a difference up here in case I'm not stayng forever. Too bad I can't afford to buy a place up here yet. If I could, I would do it and just hang on to it while traveling. When I was younger I dreamed about using New York as a home base. This was, of course, when I was positive I was going to be a photographer for National Geographic and would be traveling a lot. I had decided I would be living par time here, and part time in Kenya. Isn't it funny how selfish our dreams are when we're young? I can't imagine ever finding a man who would be willing to do that. Move around all the time, follow me even though I wouldn't be making much money, staying faithful to me while I'm all over the place for who knows how long.

I guess I've grown up some in some regards. I still want to pursue photography and writing and learning, but I feel like i can incorporate it in a much better way. I am who I am, i just like to think I keep adding on to the good parts of who I am. At least I hope so! My worst fear is that one day I'll wake up and realize the path I followed wasn't the best one for me, so I'm trying to avoid that right now by letting my head and heart work together equally as opposed to letting one outweigh the other.

Dada Exhibit at MoMA

2006-08-21T09:32:00.000-07:00

Before I start with the intracacies of the Dada movement, I want to say it's one of my favorite in Art History. I used to hate everything related to Dada. When I first began my art history major in college, I was only really interested in Impressionism and early Renaissance. Then I finally took a class covering Dada and Early Modern. It was an irritation to me. Why the hell should i care about someone turning a fountain upside down or painting a red dot on a canvas and calling it artwork? that was before I understood that it was meant to be a mockery of the Art World as we know it. It came about during a time of unrest, leading into a terrible war and leaving us with some of the most important works of art in our world.

There is some controversy regarding who began the Dada movement, and where it actually started. I would have to say the roots definitely came out of Germany and Austria. That's where the term art de trouver really took off. But it moved, through France and into Switzerland, particularly during WWI. They felt safer in a neutral country, where they could do their art without persecution.

What makes Dada such as interesting movement is that it incorporatets political unrest with elements taken from other art forms (especially Primitive) and revives them in a way that people could take to mean various things. In this way DuChamp felt safe presenting a bicycle wheel on a stool as art while Jean Arp put together various collages that took in things from newspapers, old Dada magazines, and other elements. Often these were personalized, meant for certain people and in reference to private jokes.

Another element of Dada that is probably my favorite: the humor. There are a ton of pieces done as a joke in Dada. Marcel Duchamp and Man Ray first come into the m ind when one thinks of this, but Max Ernst is not far behind. Yes, there were plenty of pieces making political statements about what was happening with the worst world war known in history. But there were also pieces meant as a joke as artists and their populations tried to define what made art. The word "dada" itself is said to have been pulled out of a French German dictionary and means anything from "crap" to "a lot of nothing". Repeated over and over, it sounds like something a small child would say crying out for their father. So it perfectly fit this movement of artists looking for a place in their world and ours.

Your Place My Space

2006-08-21T07:54:00.000-07:00

I went to the NYC Fringe Festival's "Your Place" play on Saturday night. It featured a couple of my friends, which was one reason to go see it, plus it was essentially making fun of MySpace. It was really funny to watch. Because, for the most part, it was true. We all get on myspace, have these crazy layouts and pretend we're super fun when in fact we're probably just sitting at work bored. I've even gotten into it and I've never been that crazy about web stuff before.

Naturally there's all this hype about all the bad things happening to people on myspace. Namely young girls who invite strangers over to their homes after posting their nude photos on my space. Surely there's a better way to get a date! But is there a better way to communicate now? We can't have real conversations anymore, preferring to type in everything. I have actually been receiving so many text messages in the last year that i've had to change my plan to accomodate themm- it costs everytime anyone SENDS one to me.

Then, of course, I write in this blog almost everyday, sharing things that complete strangers could read if they wanted to- and some definitely do! I'm not even sure my friends read this stuff as much as random people do. Every day when I get to the office I immediately check several things- my personal email, my work email, my myspace page, and I update my blog. All online, all involving no actual person to person contact.

I think part of the reason the business world, at least, is embracing our technology is because it totally cuts out those embarassing phone calls. Nearly everything can be done through impassioned emails, rather than phoning someone to tell them how you screwed up. It's a buffer between yourself and reality. I think I'll keep it.

My New Favorite Thing- ClippyKit Bags!!

2006-08-18T10:40:00.000-07:00

Okay, so this week I spent most of my time at the New York Gift Show, thus explaining the complete lack of blogging going on in my life. Not that I'm sure anyone reads this thing anymore, but I will perservere! I always pick up a few things at the gift sow- hey, it's wholesale so a great way to go shopping!- but this year I picked up something nifty only one aisle over. Plus I learned all about the brilliant owner of this particular brand.

It's called a ClippyKit Bag. Named for Calypso Rose (cool name, right?), she began the company very recently after inventing her own bag. She made up this bag that was like a traveling scrapbook, filling it with ticket stubs, photos and other various pieces of memorabilia. So many people stopped her on the streets of London to ask where she got it that she had the brilliant idea of beginning her own business. So at the ripe old age of TWENTY-FIVE (way to make the rest of us feel better, right?) she has been named Britain's Young Business Person of the Year, had a BEST-SELLING ITEM AT HARROD'S (you know, that super awesome department store where you can't afford anything?) and is essentially selling empty, clear, plastic bags that have pockets you personalize yourself.

I'm in love with it. I had to buy one (y'all know how a Southern girl likes her pocketbooks!) and I picked up this really nifty lining (so it's a little bit private on the inside). Well, last night when I got home I immediately sat down and started filling it with stuff. It's the perfect size for it! The most surprising thing to me was that when all was said and done, it looked ADORABLE! I was a little worried that it would be kitchsy, etc, but instead it looks great. And I smile when I look at it because it has all these cute things in it that are special to me- buttons from my Met visits, a special card from my best friend B, naturally some Carolina pharaphanalia... it's a beautiful thing!

I'm writing about this because you should all go visit her website- clippykit.co.uk and check out her stuff. And remember, she's only twenty-five and has already started her own business that's actually working out for her!

Edna

2006-08-15T13:53:00.000-07:00

My Great Aunt Edna died on July 30. She almost made it to August but no cigar. 94 years old and had been living in an upper crust nursing home in Atlanta, ever since she lost her mind due to dementia. I find it hard to believe she's really gone. I remember rolling down the hill in her backyard in North Carolina, looking enviously through her many closets, lying down on her fancy bed in her fancy house, asking about the history of just about everything she owned and then some. She went everywhere, did everything and anything she wanted to.

The New York times said she was "the only girl who should rhumba.... Edna... a Southern Deb whose ankles are as graceful as her manners". She was called a "beauty, a mermaid, a one and only". During the 20s, 30s, and 40s, she modeled to help her family deal with the Depression. She and her sisters and brother lived in a great old pre-war building on 55th and 5th avenue. She never would have dreamed of leaving without gloves and a hat on. On the beach she wore a striped swimming suit that was about as skimpy as they allowed at the time. Two of my great-aunts modeled, but Edna did more shoes- she had a perfect size 7 foot with narrow heels and trim ankles. She wore Lilly before and during its coolest phase, Gucci and Chanel becuase they were the best.

She spent weekends in Central Park while she was dating various boys, listening to bandstand music, then moved out to Long Island when she married a highly respected New York physician and really came into her own. They had one child, whom they adored. She seemed to adore everyone. I liked what my cousin wrote about her, that "there was ever only one Edna. We called her beautiful. She was gracious and charming, yet so completely satisfied with herself." I can only hope to acheive that kind of status towards teh end of my life. She gave money as much as she spent money. She cared about everyone and knew everything about the family. Or at least she seemed to.

Which brings me to a more interesting question. that is, a question of family. I wonder how many really ineresting stories have been lost in the last two decades because no one cared enough to listen to the them when they ewre being told or record them for future generations. Edna's son said something about how much has been lost with her death, and even before when she was slipping inot what we were sure was Alzheimer's. It is a sad thing, that so much hitory has been destroyed simply because people wanted to keep their secrets. I can only hope to be more open than that with my nieces and nephews and if I ever have a family of my own. I used to love hearing her stories of how things came to be in my family. Now that voice is silenced and no one ever wants to talk about what happened to my family after the civil war, or how we lost everything we had been given. And so the silence travels to the grave.

Sizzle and the City

2006-08-02T13:51:00.000-07:00

It's that hot. Today was 105 degrees and it's going to go through the end of the week. I'm not particularly looking forward to seeing what's going to happen if it continues at this rate. Air conditioners are going and I'm mainly scared of a black out. If that happens, I'm taking off work and heading to NC until the power comes back on! No one shoudl have to suffer through this if they don't have to- go to Jersey and fast!

When I was in the dentist's chair yesterday he was discussing all the different beaches around the city. It's a shame that my lazy butt hasn't gotten to a one and Boyfriend and I have been talking about it since Memorial day. Wow. Crazier things have happened, I guess. I'm planning on playing hooky sometime soon however, and heading to a friend's house, with a pool. What's weirder is people's attitude. Cabs are in short supply since you are unable to walk more than a block before being assailed by the heat and have to stop and hail one. Women here are SWEATING, not GLOWING and it's nothing to be ashamed of since everyone else has the same problem. The subways smell terrible at rush hour because all the deodarant in the world isn't going to mask the smell of six million hot and dripping commuters. Mr. Softee is making a killing, as are those guys who sell bottled water for a dollar.

So what is being recommended? Staying inside and drinking a lot of water. And if you don't have a/c you're supposed to go somewhere that does, like Starbucks. Besides, how many New Yorkers can avoid going outside? iT's not like in other places where you simply cross baking parking lots to your car. This is you walk half a mile in this heat to get to your building from the nearest subway. I hope that the city can make it through. Because I can only imagine how murder victims are beginning to smell at this point unless they've been found. Check on your neighbors, people!

Even Lindsay Lohan is supposedly affected by the countrywide heat wave, showing up late or not at all to her current movie production. I'm sure it has nothing to do with her all night partying or inability to do anything without whining about it. But I, for one, am glad she has this horrendous heat to cover for her. I mean, who's going to argue with that, right?

Rabbit, Rabbit

2006-08-01T10:32:00.000-07:00

That's what you're supposed to say on the first of the month. Don't ask me why, I don't make the rules. The big challenge is saying it first thing. Instead of "Have you made coffee?" out of your mouth should come "rabbit, rabbit". Really. That's the only way to set yourself up for good luck throughout the month. Obviously if you're not superstitious this wouldn't apply to you. Wikipedia states "Rabbit rabbit" is a common superstition, held particularly among children. The most common modern version states that a person should say "rabbit rabbit" upon waking on the first day of each month and on doing so will receive good luck for the rest of that month. The exact origin of the superstition is unknown, though it has appeared in print at least as early as the 1920s in england, where is is most commonly said to have originated, though some reports place it even earlier in the 1800s. As with most folklore...there are numerous variations of the superstition, including:

* Instead of saying "rabbit rabbit' just saying "rabbit" or "Rabbits"
*Saying "rabbits" three times before going to bed and saying "hares"" three times upon waking.
* To counteract forgetting to say it in the morning, saying it backwards before falling asleep "tibbar, tibbar"

These are just a few of the ways to deal with the first of the month. I am always optimistic at the beginning of the month, mainly because it comes with a fresh start. All of a sudden things don't look so bleak. You have a whole fresh beginning going on in your life and it's going to be fabulous.

Isn't New York life always supposed to be fabulous? I really think it would be if only we didnt have to pay rent. New York rent is terrible. Everything else about New York is fantastic. I would love to live here rent-free, work at my job and then actually have money to spend on other things like theater and art and culture and some nice clothes. I wonder what would happen if Mayor Bloomberg declared a "rent-free" month in Manhattan. Wouldn't that really benefit the rest of the city? People would have more money to spend on things like cabs and other stuff and so income would be flowing but not disappearing into oblivion. Wouldn't that be nice? I wonder what would happen to the economy. Surely it can't cost that much to keep the living up.

I think it's a great idea. If you or someone you know speaks to Mayor Bloomberg, suggest it.

Holla!

2006-07-27T06:53:00.000-07:00

So I'm getting out of the city for the weekend, making thursday my last work day of the week. What a relief. It's funny how when your job becomes more about you surfing the web (which should be fun) you end up sitting at your desk blankly staring ahead and actually hoping for a task (after you finish writing in your web blog, of course). I'm trying to think of interesting things to update you on. Mostly it's the fact that I have become readdicted to Beverly Hills 90210. Who came up with that show? It came out when I was nine or ten and I was never allowed to watch it, so was really glad when I found out i could catch reruns as I got older. and now it turns out i'ts on Soapnet every day for roughly two hours, providing 12 hours a week of Brenda, Brandon, Dylan, Kelly, Andrea (still), Steve, Claire, Donna, David, and Valerie (except we all know it's just Kelly Kapowski with a little extra weight). Since I'm only in their sophmore year of college at CU, Andrea is still on with her husband Jesse and baby Hannah (again surprising given the fact that she's about 40, I mean 19) and Dylan is the latest drug addict/alcoholic. Of course we haven't gotten to Kelly's problem yet and David's about done with his. He's more interested in trying out kinky sex positions than anything else. So that's my latest obsession.

That and trying to get to the Met to see the last of the interesting "Transparency" exhibit on the rooftop. Oh yeah, and buying piano tickets. This definitely is a town where if you have a lot of money, options are limitless for culture and entertainment. Unfortunately I'm not there yet.

It's becoming an Epidemic

2006-07-25T07:01:00.000-07:00

Okay, so I know I just posted something about weddings last week, but there have been more changes in the last few days. For one thing, another one of my friends now has a ring floating on her finger and she's floating in air. She's getting m-a-r-r-i-e-d. In like two years according to her. But she's now among the engaged. I heard this rumor from a friend of mine who then said that our mutual friend J would be the next to go. "J?" I said. "No way."

When I got off the phone I told Boyfriend this, expecting a large laugh and agreement from him. Instead he nodded his head slowly and said, "I know." I said, "Know what?" "About J heading towards nuptial land." I was floored. "You do?" I said. "When did this happen?" "J said something about it recently. Not like it's going to happen tomorrow, but at some point." I sat there in silence, thinking that pretty soon all of my friends were going to be taken. And it wasn't going to be pretty. So I'm calling it a recent epidemic. Seriously I'm wondering how much longer we can be expected to deal with all the diamonds being sold throughout the East Coast. Because, contrary to popular belief, it's no longer just a Southern thing. It's all over the place. On top of that, I am currently aware of not one, not two, but three weddings that occurred this weekend involving friends or sorority sisters of mine.

It's weird. In the 80s, the average age of first marriage went up significantly. Then throughout the nineties it remained pretty high. Now, all of a sudden it has dropped back down- the average age for a woman being 25, and the average age for a man being 27. That's the lowest it's been in decades. It makes me wonder how all the women libbers out there would have felt had they known their efforts were going to be for naught, that in the end, it would come back to where it began- wives in the kitchen, spatula in hand. At the ripe old age of 22. I'm interested in this sudden turn.

Don't get me wrong. I definitely want to get married someday. To someone I love and care about and feel I can spend the rest of my life with. But there are other things that need to happen first, for me. One, that I become totally financially independent. Two, that I'm able to go to grad school and develop a career I love. These are important things, too. I think everyone should live on their own before they get married. Just so they know they can do it! If nothing else, so they can feel good about themselves and their work without having tot have another person. Yes, I know I'm one to talk since I'm in pretty serious relationship with Boyfriend, but it's true. If I hadn't met him, I think I would have remained single for a long time. Actually, I had planned to remain single until I met him, and even when we first started dating and it was a casual thing (of course, that was over three years ago). But I'm also one to admit when I have a good thing. And I definitely have a good thing going right now.

A Silver Polish Chicken and Wendy's Medium

2006-07-24T13:29:00.001-07:00

I received one of the best emails of my entire life today. It contained a photograph of a friend's chicken. Not just any chicken, but a Silver Polish Chicken named Lucy who enjoys riding around on people's shoulders and goes "visiting". There is no end to what can happen in this world. That practically made my day.

The reason I bring up Wendy's is I went there for lunch today and ordered a combo. IT's not something I do on a regular basis but they've discontinued my favorite salad- Chicken Spinach Salad, and there was a crowd and I was under pressure. So I picked a number and went with it. Whe nthe girl asked me if I wanted a medium drink, I gave her a strange look but said yes. It's always been my understanding that medium drinks are standard with combo meals. Then she hands over 32 oz of soda. I'm not kidding.I walked back to the office iwth a bucket of soda. It was awful. So now I assume that 24oz constitutes a small. It's crazy to think that we have gone from 8 oz (in the 1950s when fast food restaurants really began taking off) to 24 oz SMALLS. I wonder what our 1950s versions would think of it.

I understand that Americans consume more than the norm as far as fast food goes and quantities and such. Entire books have been written on the subject. We know that we consume more calories and food than any other country and provide access to more gyms than any other country while maintaining the highest percentage of overweight and obese people. Not that we've truly made the connection. Otherwise there wouldn't be this issue.

The funny part about it is the reason we receive so much when we order "combo" meals, is that we literally asked for. We demanded to get our money's worth in the moment. No matter that open-heart surgery will cost aheck of a lot more than a burger and fries in the long run. What matters is that we receive as much fried and saturated foods as possible for a mere five or six dollars. I'm sure ther will be an increase of cholesterol problems in my generation coming up. I watched as the man in front of me, roughly 5'10" and probably well over 300 pounds ordered the "extra-large" combo meal. It was absurd to think of him consuming that much food, probably packing on more weight without even realizing it.

What kind of country have we become? That we are willing to ignore all the signs of impending doom in our arteries to be satisfied that we filled up with enough burgers and fries. It's frightening at the least, and difficult to imagine anywhere else but here. I'm not sure it would happen anywhere else but here. For some reason people seem to have significantly fewer self-control buttons than those in other countries. And they definitely eat. You'll never see a Frenchman pass up a baguette for breakfast or an Italian aspargus fritti. But for some reason they are much, much, smaller than we are. And that's what interests me- where did we go wrong? Why aren't we taught healthier ways to eat? Why do we expect so much out of food? It's not just to keep our bodies running. I'm sure we could do that on hafl the calories we consume. But there is some underlying reason we insist fast food places continually increase their production.

A Silver Polish Chicken and Wendy's Medium

2006-07-24T13:29:00.000-07:00

Addicted to Weddings

2006-07-21T06:26:00.000-07:00

No, 'm not in particular but there is some kind of trend going on. I just want to list weekends I was aware of/invited to people's weddings:

June 17
June 24
July 8
July 15
July 22
July 29
August 12

And that's just who I'm aware of! Never mind who might actually be getting married currently and I haven't heard about them. I'm amazed at how many people are tying the knot. Not in general but in my age group. There's not a single person on here who is over 25. Seriously. I guess things are just so different in a city. Maybe it's because there's more to do or something but that definitely is not happening in New york. Most people wait until they're older, probably 29-33 is the largest age group. And a whole lot of people much older than that!

I have to say i admire my friends who are able to commit themselves so totally to another person right out of college. While I'm committed (no pun intended) I'm certainly not ready to be legally bound to him. It's not about love or family or any of that. It's about retaining some sort of independence, being able to go where I want to go and do what I need to do before I settle down and begin a life with someone. Every girl has twinges of jealousy when it comes to watching her friends get married, but at this point the jealousy has faded into a sort of sadness. It seems like marriage should come when you're fully ready to share your whole life with someone, and if you do that at too young an age you miss the chance to be independent and selfish. I think Selfish is good. Selfish means you can spend some years buying ridiculous clothes and getting manicures and eating whatever you want and doing laundry whenever you feel like it. To me, binding two people together means that from then on they should always consider each other before themselves. And it feels like we're too young to be doign that.

A lot of that has to do with wartime. It's shown again and again that war causes the marriage age to drop and the birth rate to go up. People's instinct tells them to reproduce to protect themselves and their families. It's some kind of natural instinct to dash for rings when bombs are exploding overseas. There's a reason for itt, I'm just trying to figure it out. And since this war seems like it's going to go on for quite a while I imagine we'll continue to see the marriage age drop and the baby rate rise, at least fora few years until people once again realize they can't afford all these children and divorce lawyers.

The optimism it takes to get married right now is astounding. YOu're fighting a less than 50% chance of survival, and hoping for the best when you take those vows. So here's to you.

The One Year Anniversary

2006-07-20T08:33:00.000-07:00

passed without much fanfare, I'm sorry to say. It was on Tuesday for my one year since beginning with my company, and Saturday for the one year since I actually made the official move to New York from small town North Carolina. And what a journey it has been! I can't believe how much I've learned in such a short period of time. How cities work. Why public transportation is such an amazing thing. And why I need to plan for my future better.

So I'm doing that now. Working out the details, coming up with various theories of what I would want my life to be like and who I want to include in it. Watching my friends change jobs, go back to school, graduate from school, get married, settle down, get divorced, move forward with their lives. I feel so fortunate to be not just an observer, but a true participant in living up here. I'm able to enjoy my friend's accomplishments, mourn them their losses and know that if the same happens to me I'll be lucky enough to have the same response.

I'm also figuring out what I want to do and don't want to. I'm slowly becoming aware that I'm not really cut out for a 365 days a year, 9-5 job. But working out how to make that into a life that allows me to be independent is a whole other realm. I remember working during the summers when I was in college and being aware that I liked it. Liked having that free time in the evening and morning when I wasn't concerned about what kind of grade I was going to get on a test or finishing a paper or editing my stories. I liked just writing to write, and working to pay the bills, and reading any book I felt like. Now, here i am only a year and a half later, wanting out, wanting to figure out how to pay my bills and reading but also how to move up in the world and do a job that I am going ot be rewarded for doing. It's difficult enough to figure out what you would possibly want to do for twenty or thirty or even forty years, but I'm on the way. I can't believe just ten years ago I was only beginning high school, that I was dancing and doing gymnastics and going to camp. Certainly not worried about paying off credit cards and contributing to an IRA account and saving some money because I would eventually want to own a house. Ten years ago I couldnt' think past how I looked in a two piece and why my boobs weren't as big as one of my friend's.

Thinking about how things hve changed, how I've grown and my friends and I have parted and gone our seperate ways is crazy. It's an amazing world we live in. I couldn't of dreamed of the boyfriend I would have now, or imagined I would manage to work out a relationship that lasted longer than a TV mini-series. But I am doing all of the above. I have my own apartment, my own space, I cook for myself, do my own laundry, clean and watch TV on my own time make decisions about whether to spend my weekends in bed or at a gallery. And it's awesome. Yay for the One Year. It's given me time to realize what I'm capable of and why my life could work out for hte best.

A Good Night's Sleep

2006-07-12T12:28:00.000-07:00

I am a sleeper. One of my greatest feats is being able to fall asleep in many different situations, particularly while traveling. One of my friend's all time jokes is that I missed a lot of Europe since I slept through most of it. And I love sleep. I have friends who never seem to sleep. They're out at a club til 2 or 3, up at 7 and do this several times a week. I have to say I'm impressed but that is definitely not what my body's about. The last few days I have definitely not been sleeping as much as I would like to. This is because of various reasons from being out with friends to staying up late reading. For no reason. Oh yeah and watching reruns of Beverly Hills 90210 (I had forgotten how much I loved that show!)

So it's not that big of a surprise that my diet has completely fallen off track. I've been scrounging for food the last few days, trying to figure out how to make it last at least throgh tomorrow (where my food will be covered until Tuesday, thank God). It makes me feel like I'm in college again, eating from paycheck to paycheck to parental deposit. But I can tell i miss sleep and it's going to be a while before I'm back on a consistent schedule.

Generally I try and sleep 9-11 hours. Oh yes, I am dead serious. When I was in college I was up every morning at six to write until around 8 and then go to the gym and then to class, then to work. Yes, it was exhausting. But I did it anyway. And pretty well, I might add. But moving up here, my schedule became busier than ever, and I was excercising a lot more. Therefore I eat more and definitely try to sleep more. I understand why it's so easy to develop all kinds of disorders in such a crazy environment. You're constantly squeezing through people, running to catch trains, walking miles to get to certain stores. I'm not kidding. That's on top of going to the gym, which I still do. If only to keep some weight on my frame, keep the muscle going. I am definitely not considered skinny up here but I would rather not be thought of as large in any sense of the word!

Sleep, however, has always been a priority. During school I rarely if ever went out on school nights, even in college. I wen tto bed by 10, 10:30 because I wanted to! I thought it was dumb to sacrifice sleep to drink beer at He's Not or try and pick up guys at a club. I still do. I mean, if the man is at a club or a bar, it's kind of cheesy right? But now I understand why I sleep so much. It's because when I don't I feel and look like crap. Right now, even as I write this, my skin is pasty, my under-eyes are practically purple, I'm sluggish, have a headache and am drinking caffeine like it's going away tomorrow. Dammit, let me have my ten hours!

Boyfriend's Birthday

2006-07-11T12:32:00.000-07:00

I'm very proud of myself about Boyfriend's birthday. First of all, I gave him video games, and you really can't go wrong giving a guy video games. Secondly I planned out a simple birthday dinner that really surprised him and he was super psyched about it. We ate at Cosmic Cantina (13th and 3rd Ave). They have happy hour until 8 there and some of hte best sangria in the city. They are also seriously understaffed. there was ONE WAITRESS for the whole restaurant last night! Awful for her!

So then we came home and watched reruns of family guy and I was again too keyed up to sleep and had to get up at 6 this morning for personal training at 7. After this I only have one more session and really hope I can inspire myself to push as hard as I've been pushed by my trainer. He is fabulous! I highly recommend one, even if it's just to show you how to use the weights and correct form and all that good stuff. I feel better than I have in years.

Now all I want to do is crash at home and SLEEP. Instead I've got to pack for another business trip that I'm leaving for on Thursday morning. I'm in Atlanta through next week. This means I will be even more tired by the time I get back. AHHHH! And I'll definitely have no more food. Anything I do have right now will probably be gone by then, courtesy of the boyfriend- he's staying at my apt. while i'm gone to take care of the cat and fish. It' skind of funny in a sad little way.

Then, in a couple of more weeks I'm off again to look at grad schools and figure out where to go with my life. Yikes! Whoever would have thought that after spending FIVE YEARS, count 'em five, in undergrad I would be so eager to get it going again! I mean, who's to say that the work market will be just as bad after a coupleof years of grad school and it will just be more time spent not working?

But that really has nothing to do with Boyfriend's birthday. We were discussing last night how this year was the fourth summer we'vve celebrated birthdays together- beginning with my 21st oh so long ago. I like that. I like our relationship, how well we know each other, how much we geniunely care for one another. I even like that kind of sad feeling I get when something really funny or dramatic happens and he's not there to witness it by my side. When I'm out with friends at a bar and he's not sitting next to me. Even though he's really quiet, he's still a hugepart of my life, and smart and funny and when he says something people listen. That's one of his best qualities.

Now that this is turning into a "suck-up-to-my boyfriend" ramble, I'm going to stop myself.

The Devil Wears Prada

2006-07-10T06:38:00.000-07:00

I think every working girl in Manhattan went and saw that movie. I knwo that if you have worked in any industry related to publishing, advertising, or anything HR-heavy, you have to see it. You will spot people you didn't realize were "characters" in your workplace. Think you're the only one that has to go get your boss' Starbucks in the morning, while you are too poor to afford filters for your coffeemker? She's in there. Running personal errands, walking your boss' dog, it all makes sense now. That's everyone's experience here, apparently. Certainly not to the level that Miranda Priestly works her office up, but it's there. The underlying fear, the teeny tiny paychecks, the ridiculous requests that you would refuse were you living anywhere other than Manhattan.

Anne Hathaway did a great job as well. Sometimes she seems too goody-goody for her own good, except of course in "Brokeback Mountain". Beyond that, she sticks with positive roles. I guess it's good, since in The Devil Wears Prada, a 6 is considered bordering on obese. I also liked that view because it drives me insane that Manhattan is so focused on being absolutely tiny. Anything bigger than a two and you're guaranteed to get some strange stares in certain areas. Yet I promise you that in the rest of the world, being an 8 or 10 or even 12 is not only okay, but embraced as being a "normal" size. This is definitely a concentrated area of wanna-be and true anorexics. Seriously.

Overall, I thought the book was better (though the book isn't fantastic or anything) but I loved the movie rendition. THey cut out the importance of some characters, and made others more important, but most importantly, they stayed true to figuring out the differences in book plots and movie plots. In the book, Andy has an issue with her best friend and roommate developing alcoholism over the course of their living together. In the movie this is completely cut out but I was relieved. Imagine how busy it would have been with both Meryl Streep and a drunken twenty something vying for poor Anne Hathaway's time.

Yes, I agree that hte ending was contrived, that they shot down Gap faster than a hungry hunter, and they have/had the most amazing movie wardrobe I've ever seen, but that doesn't stop me from loving it. Or fantasizing about a Balenciaga bag.

We're definitely getting older, but Wiser?

2006-07-07T06:33:00.000-07:00

I was invited to eight weddings this summer. Seriously. Count the invitations. It's crazy to 1) imagine I have that many friends and 2) imagine that all of them are getting married. But since I'm in NYC and broke and hot, i'm only going to one of them, in August. It's near DC, so I'll have to take a train down there, stay in a hotel, and pay for whatever else will be happening during the festivities. Did I mention it's black tie? This wouldn't be a problem except Boyfriend doesn't own a tux and isn't really a fan of going since he doesn't know the girl who's tying the knot.

It's hard to explain why I want him to go. I guess I could say that I spent a lot of years going to weddings alone because I didn't have a boyfriend, or I had one but he was definitely not the type you take to weddings. So now I have one, and he is the type you want to take to weddings- literally tall, dark and handsome with these amazing eyes and gorgeous hands- but he's not as in to the idea. We're poor and it will definitely cost a lot to attend this event. I understand that. But at the same time a bunch of my friends are going to be there, and I want him to meet them, want them to meet him, so when I talk about my wonderful boyfriend they'll have a face to put with the name.

I wonder how long I will go on growing up, going to "grown-up" events, and yet still throwing a fit when my boyfriend doesn't want to spend a fortune on a wedding of strangers. I can assure him all I want- that he will lvoe these people, that there will be an open bar, that he gets to spend a weekend in a hotel. And a nice hotel at that. But it's still complicated. still trying to figure out if I'm mature or if I'm being a whiny brat about the whole thing. And I wonder if this has drawn a rift between us.

Yay for weddings.

Celebrating my Future Escape

2006-07-06T08:16:00.000-07:00

I'm trying my best to work out some situation for myself. To figure out where to go from here. I feel like each time I get older, more things happen that I cannot control. It surprises me. When I was younger, I always thought you gained control as you gained age and perspective. Now I'm wondering if it's the complete opposite. In letting my parents control my environment, meals, etc, when I was younger, I could focus on things that were smaller but more important to me. I remember how I kept my porcelain dolls organized, and how carefully things were wrapped when they were stored. I even remember a time when I thought I would always live in my bedroom, just the way I had it decorated (from the age of 11, thanks very much). There comes with that a chance to look ahead. Now that was something I didn't do a whole lot of at that age.

Sometimes i wish we could get back the perspective we had as kids. Remember when each day was individual? You didn't worry about tomorrow, you only focused on what was happening today and how you would deal with it. Yesterday may have been regrettable but you would get over it. There are plenty of ways I wish I could go back and change things. Things that i did or didn't do as a little girl and will never have the chance to do again. But for the most part I'm okay with myself the way I turned out. There are a lot of things I could have done differently, but I wonder if they would have left me in New York.

My friends are beginning their grown-up lives. A huge number of them seem to be marrying their college boyfriends and buying houses and embarking on careers I wonder if they'll like five years down the road. But I'm glad I'm doing my own thing, glad I'm taking the time to stop and examine what this life is about before trying to figure out how to escape from it. I may never get to live in Europe or Asia or Africa, but I can try and be happy right where I am. I just finished reading "Grapes of Wrath" (which I started in high school but couldnt' appreciate until now) and realized how what those characters wanted more than anything in the entire world was to stay where they were. Where they had been born an their parents before them. We take our homes for granted. I can't imagine my parents ever letting go of the farm, selling off our horses and moving into a more urban environment. I think it would hurt my feelings!

It doesn't matter how old you are, or how long you've been away from your parents/guardian's world. Home is still home. Most things in my room haven't even changed that much in twelve years. Prom dresses hanging in the closet, pictures of me as a baby sitting on the same dresser I've had since I was about five. There are a lot of things I got rid of when I left home for boarding school, and then for college, but more has remained the same over the years.

Celebrating Our Independence

2006-07-05T06:32:00.000-07:00

The fourth of July is generally a time mostly known for great sales at department stores, flags everywhere and huge barbecues. Oh yeah, and fireworks. It's always impressive to me that we constantly preach peace but in honor of our country's independence we explode small rockets and bombs. I find it really amusing. I've only begun enjoying fireworks in the last few years. When I was little, I hated fireworks, and my hearing is still pretty sensitive but not to that point anymore. Guess it's true that each decade you lose a good amount of hearing. But I can appreciate that there is some artistic merit in really grand displays of fireworks. Mainly when I think about them, I imagine my brother and his friends when they were younger lighting bottle rockets and running backwards.

The ones in New York are not quite as huge as the Boston fireworks, but there is definitely a lot of thought put into them. Various shapes and sizes exploded into the air, including planets, smiley faces and geometric shapes. I told B and C that I thought what would really be brilliant was if someone could coordinate Bloomberg's face entirely in fireworks. That would be entertainment.

We were super duper American yesterday. C baked this AMAZING made from scratch apple pie, we had sandwiches, potato salad, I provided chips and salsa (because arguably almost everyone enjoys and can eat this dish) and we had american soda. Brilliant move to take a picnic out to Gantry State Park and prep ourselves for the display. There were a ton of kids out there (many already dressed in their pj's) and even more people. We all oohed and aahed at the same time, which in itself would be impressive.

I wonder if this year's fireworks display meant any more than other years. Mainly because we are in war, and because this is not what our forefathers envisioned for this country (at least I hope it's not). Maybe every war is meant to be "the war that ends all wars". i liked Judi Dench's line in "Mrs. Henderson Presents", when she says, "I know because my son died in war that he truly died in vain". Why? Because there will always be more wars. There i snothing heroic in sending headstrong, irrational eighteen year old boys into a battlefield. Surely you remember how you were at eighteen? BElieving that immortality was yours, believing that nothing could change you, alter you, much less kill you. When I walked past the quaker church on Saturday I was surprised to find that they had ribbons for everyone who has given their life in Iraq- so far the number hovers around 2300. Looking at the tags, that included ages, there were very few people over the age of 25. That is frightening. That we are killing the best part of ourselves. And then celebrating with explosions.

Career Changers, Anonymous

2006-06-30T10:04:00.000-07:00

So I'm reading the Suze Orman Book- Young, Fabulous and Broke (excellent for basic information) for about the fourth time and trying to make sense of it. She spends nearly a whole chapter on careers and how to deal with starting out in them. Which is where I step in. I'm trying to decide whether or not to stay at my job for another year. I've been here about a year, and gotten a raise, and it's going fairly well. But it's difficult to decide whether I should try something different (to show flexibility) or stick with the same position (to show loyalty). It's amazing to get out in the working world and discover this. That you're actually expected to ork about 50 years of your life, day in and day out. Very confusing. And boring.

I read that women have to be challenged more than men. That's why, this author surmises, so many elect to stay home with their kids. Because it's guaranteed they won't be doing the same thing two days in a row. This author was saying that many men are comfortable with being in their jobs for long periods of time before retiring, while women wanted and needed different things to do. Of course I just read an article in the home paper about a woman who's been the secretary for a local law firm for fifty years. She's 84 and still goes to work every day. It is amazing. Then again, I think, she elected to live in my tiny town in North Carolina.

So I'm on the verge of figuring out where I need to go from here. I wish it were easier. I wish I had a sign from someone that it was time to move on. But so far, nada. There was a job I applied for back in May- when I was convinced I needed to change, and quickly! but I didn't hear from them until today. When they think they might want me in the position. The good news is it pays a lot more than I'm making now, I would have much better benefits, and I'd be doing something I'm thinking about doing anyway. The bad news is I'm probably going to graduate school next fall and am not sure it's worth it to switch careers at this point, for the next ten months.

Some decisions obviously have to be made, and they're going to be serious ones. But I'm hoping that with some guidance I'll be able to make the right ones.

The Race for Retirement

2006-06-29T12:18:00.000-07:00

There is one factor of my parents generation that I can't get over. That is, that they are essentially the last generation to be guaranteed retirement benefits. Not only do they have IRAs and 401K plans, they also have pensions and Social Security and health care coverage. My grandmother can live comfortably off both her pension from nursing and my grandfather's since he died. She never had to worry about these things as early as I did.

My aunt and I spoke about it last week at the beach. She asked if I was investing and I said I had started when I was about 20. When she expressed surprise I had started so young, I had to ask if she was really taht surprised? Didn't she listen to the news? We are the first generation to have to deal with the loss of Social Security (since it was founded) with no retirement agreement from our companies- now you're not even expected to stay very long. We have been warned since the mid 1990s that there will be no company matches or stock options for the majority of us, that there isn't a pot of gold at the end of the rainbow. With that news, can you blame me for starting early? I began working on my portfolio when I was 19, and from there have invested successfully every year. This year I opened an IRA account because I'm not planning on living off the government when I get old, and they're not planning on supporting me.

It's depressing, when you think about it. You used to get a nice watch and a party when you retired. Now you can't even think about itt until most of your friends are dead. I think it's kind of funny that if my friend B and I talk, there is a large chance our conversation will move towards our future retirements. And we're both under 25.

A Living, Breathing Organism

2006-06-28T07:11:00.000-07:00

Okay, so I'm a bit of a craigslist addict. I'll admit it. It's not that difficult to get addicted. First of all, you can find essentially anything you could want. And I mean anything from a sofa to a Steinway to someone to hang out at the bar with. Seriously. My friends date on craigslist, get their furnishings from craigslist. I have reacched out to friends on craigslist, developed connections and really had a chance to look at apartments I wouldn't have even known about with it.

But this isn't really what I'm talking about. What I'm talking about today is trying to get out of the city while being poor. It's not as easy as it sounds. You don't want to put the effort into day trips, and yet you can't afford a Hamptons home. Again, craigslist. Where there is a section specifically for "Housing Swap". Meaning you and someone you don't know switch houses rent free for a day or a week or in some cases, several months. I'm fascinated. I love the idea of being able to do this and trying to work out when I could do this. It's like having a cheap vacation!

So I'm checking into it. Finding out who is willing to put up with a cat in a studio apartment in exchange for me luxuriating at the shore or in the mountains or something. It's very ritzy. Really. In North Carolina, people just pick up vacation homes. THey generally purchase a place at the beach or a lake or just out in the country and then have it at their leisure (unless you have a beach cottage that you rent). But in the North that's not really optional. You can have whatever you want, but at a high price. Someone in NC would never dream of spending $10 million dollars on a house at the beach. And thats the lower end for some of the Hampton areas. But here, it's not only acceptable but practically normal. Such is New York.

And craigslist steps in for those of us without very large disposable incomes. We can swap houses or apartments for a weekend, take off to the country, pretend that you're meant to be living out there, and escape back into the city just in time to fall back into the work week. Sounds like a plan to me.

And She's Back (and better than EVER)

2006-06-27T11:28:00.000-07:00

I now understand why people used to make it a habit to go away for the whole summer. It makes perfect sense to me. I mean it. Disappearing for three months seems not only reasonable but wonderful! Then you come home with a whole new perspective and everything. So I took almost two weeks instead. Not only because I don't get three months, but also because I'm not at a point where I can be so transient. I'm not exactly sure how it happened. I guess I got a boyfriend, and then I got a cat. Then a fish. But I imagine the fish wouldn't even notice I wasn't around anymore as long as he was eating. So here i am. Now, in order to travel, i have to arrange a pet-sitter, wonder if boyfriend will remember to take out the trash and then deal with the stuff that piles up on my desk. And there is a lot of stuff.

I came in this morning (first into the office today) and found my desk covered with things I couldn't imagine dealing with. So instead I fixed myself breakfast and started slowly digging through the pile until I came across something more fun. That's the worst part. coming back and finding out no one can actually cover for your life. Wouldn't that be nice? If you came back from your vacation, and your house was clean, laundry fresh, and someone had been paying the bills and going to work for you? That's kind of what I imagine in my fantasy world. Maybe that's an idea for a company. It would be kind of like a temp job but with travel. Like, you would pay someone to take over your life for a couple of weeks while you went on vacation. They would go to your work, handle your family (if that's what you wanted), feed your animals, deal with persistent mother-in-laws or whatever, and make sure that your bills were paid on time and your house was kept up to your standards. I think it would be really neat. Maybe i'll check into that a bit more.

Either way, for right now i"m back at my desk with a ton of stuff to do and little time to do it in if I want to get out of here at a decent hour!

Celebrating with the Transvestites

2006-06-12T12:53:00.000-07:00

It seemed particularly appropriate, given that I live in the West Village and am surrounded by Trannies. So when friend C. suggested Lips NYC I thought it was a great idea. We would go, be hit on by gay men dressed as women and enjoy a show. And it was. Located at the corner of Bank Street and Greenwich Ave (right behind Artepasta) at first you think you'll miss it until you notice the male mannequin in the window, dressed completely in a white unitard with lips all over it. Then you walk in, and are greeted by hostesses in ball gowns with opera length gloves. I feel like the "queens' are given pretty much free reign over what they wear. But the outfits are fantastic. And it is definitely the kind of place you go in a group. It was full of bachelorette parties and blow job shots were being handed out all over the place. And they were served exactly like this.

There were only two guys in the group (one being Boyfriend) and I could tell that while this wasn't the most comfortable he had ever been, he had to find it somewhat funny. It's fascinating to me that guys are so much more sensitive about this than girls are. They are really much more aware of what's going on with the "other side". We think drag's hilarious, especially when the guy is gay, but I always think that straight guys view it as something very odd. Of course that's for a different blog.

So we ate there, and it was a RIDICULOUS bill for some people in there twenties, but a lot of fun. The emcee was hilarious, and the routines were very funny. I watched the bachelorettes, who were all insane, obviously. I always admire women who have that many friends willing to take them for their "final" single night out and share in the wonderful nature of marriage. They were wearing light-up penises. Seriously.

So, anyway, happy birthday to me!

The Birthday Celebration

2006-06-09T06:58:00.000-07:00

One positive thing about getting older is that you have a lot more choices in how you celebrate your impending birthdate. You can choose not to even mention it and just go about your business that day with a card from your parents. Or you can go crazy and throw a birthday party for yourself, or you can spend a whole weekend celebrating the fact that you are alive and in New York (which was my choice). I'll be spending essentially the whole weekend celebrating before heading back to NC to celebrate with my family and go on vacation- to the beach, no less.

It will start with tonight. Boyfriend is expected to give me my gift at some point this evening. I'm not exactly sure what it is but he seems really excited about it so it's either something I will love or the new video-game console. Yes, that is compromise in relationships. Either way, I'll be glad that he's willing to focus on me that much. Then we'll eat dinner or maybe we'll eat dinner before heading out to a bar or club or something.

I actually won a birthday party at a local bar, but didn't take the offer yet because I wasn't sure what other people wanted to do. I ran into the same issue when I was planning my friend J's bridal shower. No one could give me confirmations of essentially anything until about the day before. It definitely made it difficult to plan. Now i'm running into the same problem with my friends. Trying to get them on the ball before tomorrow so I won't be sitting at home. Since I'm heading out of the state next week for a while it was important that we at least make an effort to get together before then.

And it is a celebration. I'm not quite 25, whichis definitely something to be excited about. I'm living in New York City, the absolute best city in the world. I'm enjoying my life, I have friends and a boyfriend who I love. Overall it's a good time in my life. There are things that could be better and my salary could definitely afford to grow but that will come with time, and age.

6-6-06. We survived it.

2006-06-07T07:00:00.000-07:00

I'm actually surprised at the number of suspicious people on this planet. Yesterday was 6-6-06, but for some reason people disregarded the 0 in there and made it into 666, or the sign of the beast. Which beast, you ask? I'm not sure but he must be damn frightening. Women were determined not to give birth, an inordinate number of people called in sick, and people were in general more aware of bad things happening. Plenty of bad things happen all the time but for some reason yesterday held more clout. I'm actually jealous I didn't make more of an effort to be suspicious so I too could have called in sick and maybe stayed home and watched movies like "the Excorcist" all day or something. I'll have to remember it next time. Part of the hype was due to the remake of the movie "The Omen" with Julia Stiles (thats right, people) and that scary little boy from "The Sixth Sense". I am not really sure who his parents are, but he is the most frightening child I can think of. Really. I ha ve to agree with Julia when she says "Something's wrong with Damien." No child that young should have circles the size of saucers under his eyes. Please, parents, take him somewhere tropical and make him take a nap!

But anyway, back to the sign of the beast. 666. The mark of the devil. There are two locations of this in the book of Revelations (Yes, I read EVERYTHING) "He also forced everyone, small and great, rich and poor, free and slave, to receive a mark on his right hand or on his forehead, 17so that no one could buy or sell unless he had the mark, which is the name of the beast or the number of his name. 18This calls for wisdom. If anyone has insight, let him calculate the number of the beast, for it is man’s number. His number is 666 (Rev. 13:16–18, NIV). The other one is located in Rev 13:9, when Jesus calls on man to have the wisdom to be wary of the mark. When Hitler was tatooing the Jews, many people considered him the Anti-Christ and some still believe the Jews are marked to go to Hell (I'm sure it wouldn't surprise you that the majority of these people are fundamentalist). Of course Hitler did not mark them all with 666, but you know how people are- they will stretch and exaggerate until they get what they want out of something.

I looked it up online and found a ton of websites analyzing the 666 symbol. One website claims that when the Anti-Christ comes, Because of Satan’s bitterness and his twisted humor, the Antichrist will bring out a literal 666 number in the years ahead. Revelation speaks to the entire Church Age, but it also speaks truths for that brief time at the end. The Devil will do this to fulfill God’s Word in the final years just before the return of Jesus Christ. The Antichrist and the governments will use 666 to identify the people in the world. This will put fearful pressure on Christians and cause much suffering....

The first beast will control the banking system. The Antichrist will then require anyone using the 666 mark to give allegiance to the world system of government. Satan, who controls the world system, will demand that people reject their relationship with Jesus Christ. This will help set the stage for persecution of the Christian Church.

I liked that. I, too, believe that the Government is a bad institution but if for any reason, then for the reason of having too many fundamentalist and strict conservatives in office. So I always find it ironic when people think that the Anti-Christ will take over (you think they're thinking of Democrats?) The idea being that they will mark people with the number 666 on their right hand (the hand of righteousness) and their forehead. Sounds very dramatic. I guess this way God will know who to let into Heaven and who to turn away at the "pearly gates".

But it seems to have all kinds of meaning. Michael Stifel (1486-1567) interpreted it to mean the Roman Pope (guess he was Protestant). But it's also been interpreted as a symbol for Martin Luther, Kaiser Wilhelm, Adolf Hitler (I think I already mentioned that one) and Nero. Effectively that covers almost every religion that is used in the Western World. Asia is left out, but maybe only because they think the idea of assigning 666 to everything that seems bad is futile. Like we are.

Washington Square Park in the Summer

2006-06-06T08:31:00.000-07:00

It's become a lot more relaxed walking to work since NYU got out. I think they must have had their JD and PhD graduations in the last few days, since I've been seeing more people walking around dressed up and wearing the weird octagonal cap on their heads They are headed for better things, I hope, sicne they or someone they know has been paying for them to receive their education at NYU or New School or any of those. I'm jealous too, jealous that I didn't think of it sooner, jealous that I thought i would really make it up here with a couple of bachelor's. So now my goals have changed. I don't just want a master's but a doctorate. I want to head to the top of the educational pendulum and swing from it like a monkey on a vine. Who knows if that would benefit me monetarily? I think the important thing is that it would truly make me happy, and in the long run isn't that what we all want?

I've tried for too long to put all my eggs into one basket. To count on certain things happening that I shouldnt' have been. And in realizing that, I'm trying to pull away from it and move into situations where I'll be able to better myself without worrying about others' approval. It was important for me to continue on and I'm doing it. It's a hard decision to apply to grad school this early. I know they're some people who go straight from undergrad, but I always feel like those people are the ones who are afraid to face up to the real world or else they are those crazy people who try and do it all before they're legal to rent a car.

My friend R and I were eating dinner last night, and she was telling me about seeing a friend graduate from UVA last week. She said that they were there and then this really gangly boy walks across the stage to receive either a master's or a doctorate. Who cares? you say. I say you'd better since he was only SIXTEEN years old and already holding an advanced degree in his hand. I wonder what his college experience was like. I can't imagine it was fun. He was probably too young to live in dorms, since he must have started college at 10 or 11, he woudlnt' have been able to date (hello, statutory) and I can't comprehend telling someone "I'd love to go out but have to get permission from my mom" in college. That seemed almost eerie to me. Here I am, almost twenty-four and trying to figure out my life, and he's laready got an advanced degree. He could teach college students. It seems very Doogie Howser, MD to me.

But what does that have to do with Washington Square Park in the summer?

The Break Up ( a movie)

2006-06-05T06:24:00.000-07:00

This week was really gross. And weekend. It rained pretty much the whole time, making it hard for me to motivate myself to go anywhere or do anything, much to the dismay of Boyfriend. We did hit up Dave and Buster's, this really neat arcade/restaurant place that actually has decent food. I was pretty shocked. Generally those kinds of combination places have really crappy food which the games are supposed to make up for. So we did DDR, played "slot" machines, and laughed at the tickets we collected that would purchase oh, I don't know, either a New York City change purse, or fake diamond necklace. It was really amusing. I love that kind of crap. Like CHuck E. Cheese but soooo much better.

Also saw "The Break-Up", new movie with Jennifer Aniston and Vince Vaughn. It makes you never wnat to move in with your significant other. THat's for sure. It also makes you seriously think about living together vs. being married and living together. Watching that, I was wondering what would have happened had they been married. It definitely would have been a lot more complicated than "pack up and get out". It also makes you think about hte risks you take when you merge your life with someone else's. When you put part or even most of your happiness in the hands of someone else. No matter how much you love them it is a risk. And probably the biggest one we take. I know it took me a really long time to trust that Boyfriend wasn't going anywhere anytime soon. And even longer to adapt to the knowledge that he was willing to move five states over just to be with me.

Several of my friends are getting ready or getting married, and in the process quite a few of them are buying houses and condos and starting to share a life together. I'm so impressed with them. Are they playing house or is this for real? Can you really be willing to settle down and spend the next eighty years with the same person, decorate a home together, do the dishes (or yell about not doing the dishes), share a bathroom and living room space and everything that that entails. It's something to think about. One of my friends who is much older got married last year and has to say it's the hardest thing she's ever done. She says that she didn't realize what it would be like to actually live with her husband. Both of them have lived on their own for a really long time, so learning to compromise was difficult. I have barely lived on my own but know that I'm a difficult one to compromise with. I want things my way most of hte time and will try just about anything to get them to that point.

I definitely admire them for pulling their act together, but at the same time want to scream at them that now is the time to make mistakes. To live on the edge (without going over) to not have to worry about a mortgage (something you'll have for the rest of your life), to be young and free and happy. I wonder if our generation is moving in the EXACT OPPOSITE as the generation before us. My parents didn't even think about their retirement before they were in their thirties because it wasn't as big a deal. They knew they would have social security and a 401K plan and everything else would work itself out. Now most of my friends are already concerned about retiring and we're just in our early 20s. We're worried we'll never work for a company that will offer benefits, we'll always be skirting the edge of credit card debt, and we'll have a hard time surviving.

So maybe i just won't worry for it today, and instead be grateful that i have a job and a life I love with people I love in it.

Home Searching is Like Soul Searching

2006-06-02T08:24:00.000-07:00

Extraordinarily expensive and ridiculously time consuming. What, you may say, already I'm looking to buy a place in one of the most expensive cities in the world? The answer... yeah. I hate to say it but I'm just like anyone else. I want to own a place. It is extraordinarily difficult. For one, I'm not in a position to buy right now, unless I happen to win the lottery in the next couple of days. but I love looking at houses. I love seeing what's on the market, what's selling, what's not, and why not, and how I will ever be able to manage to afford a place here. I'm hoping that in the next five years I'll come up with enough money to do so. Because it's important to own, as opposed to the thousands and thousands I've thrown out the door in rent in the last few years. When I add it up, I've spent more than $50,000 renting places. That would have been a nice down payment somehwere. And also, I firmly believe the mortgages in NYC would be somewhat less than renting the tiny room I have right now. The only problem comes in when you try and find somewhere you can afford in the first place. I defy you to do it, unless you have a great trust fund at your fingertips, or you work for Goldman Sachs.

I'm curious about why more people are buying now. At least people my age are. I think it's because we live in fear of having nothing to call our own. We won't have social security (set to run out in 2048). We won't have pensions or retirement plans through our company because they no longer do them. The cost of living is going up while salaries are not. Even areas that seem to be staying stagnant are increasing in price. Children are expected to cost an average of $250,000 not including their college education. Raise three and you're looking at close to a million dollars. Don't ask what'll happen if they want to go to Duke or Harvard. Many of my friends already own. Even if they're just townhouses or condos, they are still owned. I really think because in the long run it's cheaper. At least when you're paying your $800 or $1200 dollars a month you're not throwing it away. You're getting something in rerturn. A house to call your own.

Boyfriend and I walk around fantasizing quite a bit. When you're on the UWS or UES, you can't help but want one of those beuatiful old brownstones. I can imagine coming out in the morning with my dog, walkign down to the local cafe to read the paper. Working out at a gym nearby before going to a job I actually like. That would be a nice life. Did I mention this brownstone would be near Central Park and the museums? I would be able to hop over to important exhibits in a heartbeat, or grab a subway to head towards mid-town. In my head I see myself decorating it and it's lovely. And most importantly, it's something to call my own in this city of transient ownership.

Surprise Me, Why Don't You?

2006-06-01T08:17:00.000-07:00

The Heat here is shocking. Really. It's barely June and I"m already sweating up a storm anytime I step out of my apartment. Lucy now spends most of her days lying on my desk in front of the air conditioning vents, hoping to cool off. I feel bad for her. I feel baad for anyone with a permanent fur coat in this weather. It was really, really cold for so long I nearly forgot that it was going to get warm again and then boom. Here it is. Sweltering. Did I say that already?

So far I'm slowly dealing with the change and trying to look cute under layers of beading rolling down my forehead. I walk in the heat, wondering why I ever wanted it to get to this temperature in the first place. New York is a surprising city if nothing else. Everyday I make a new discovery. Like there is no in-between time here. Everything is very cut and dried. Seriously. It's awful. One day it's in the forties then it shoots up into the eighties with a ridiculous amount of humidity for aplace made entirely of cement. Air Conditioners drip onto the streets and the people walking the streets. People slow down because they have to and a heaviness rests over the whole place. The dogs are panting and children are crying and whining and have red cheeks.

Yesterday I even saw a fight break out between a cabbie and a rider at Sullivan Street. The cabbie was gesturing wildly and screaming and the man was screaming back while swinging A CRUTCH at his head. Seriously. The man had a crutch. Im not even sure why. So we all stopped to watch. Inoticed that no one took out their cell phone to call the cops but we all observed what was going to be pretty bad. Finally it ended with a bunch of F' yous and the cabbie taking off. I blame it on the heat. Riding along in the backseat of a cab with your legs sticking to the vinyl isn't fun for anyone. Really.

Friday of PayDay

2006-05-19T06:30:00.000-07:00

I love payday Fridays. They make me feel accomplished at 9 a.m. as I click and type and pay bills all in one fell swoop. You gotta love that. Though paying bills is depressing in the since that I watch my new balance sink away from me, all because of bill damage I've done the month before. Don't we all wish we lived in a world that provided free cable and utilities and threw in occasional shopping sprees?

New York is gray today. It feels like Northern California, but it's what I think of when I think of big cities. Kind of gray and rainy amongst huge concrete structure and people moving around each other. It's not what NYC is really like. There are a lot of beautiful days where I disappear into a park and sit in the sun and watch everything going on around me. But there are enough gray days to rmind us all to not take the sunny ones for granted. I woinder what I'll think of New York when I'm old. How I'll remember these days of being poor, in debt, trying to scrape together enough money for the subway but then getting free entries to various clubs and parties. I love that part of living in the city, of finding ways to do fun things without spending a lot of money.

So what would my ambitions be for the future? That paychecks continue to increase, that rent suddenly goes down or that I win the lottery and am able to buy an apartment. That I'll maintain friendships with the people who have helped shape my life up here, who do so much to support me and help me. That the days of not being able to buy new anything will be behind me and I'll stop depending on my boyfriend for food.

New York City Animal Control

2006-05-18T06:28:00.000-07:00

Last night I had one of the most disturbing experiences I"ve had in a long, long time. I was coming home from an absolutely amazing show- The Drowsy Chaperone- after a great evening with my friend C- who scored us great seats for free! and was in a great mood until I got off at my usual stop at the West 4th Street Station (for God's sake, dont' tell my mother I took the subway after dark). I was coming up the stairs and there was a homeless man sitting on the steps, hat out to collect money. That wasn't the disturbing part. What was disturbing was what was in his lap- several newborn kittens, twisting around each other in an old rag. THere were several people talking to him already, telling him that it wasn't a great idea to have kittens that young, asking where their mothre was. I stopped for a moment, horrified, then continued up the steps, resolved to call 311 and assuming that they would send Animal Control out to retrieve the animals.

After being on hold for a while I finally got put through to someone, and they told me that not only was there nothing they could do, that Animal Control wasn't open until eight. I badgered her enough for her to transfer me to the police but there was very little they said they could do. Besides, what would they have done differently with the kittens. So I cried and held Lucy and spent another hour and a half or so on the phone with various emergency vets around the city (all unfortunately private). I'm n ot sure why these kittens struck me as something to fight for, but the idea of them not having a chance really got to me. And I'm already very emotional when it comes to animals as it is.

This morning it started all over again. I began making phone calls and found out that Animal Control could not legally take away the animals. Then I called the ASPCA and was on hold for twenty minutes before realizing how late I was. So I walked to work on hold on my cell phone. Just as I was entering the building I finally got to speak to a real, live, person and it was such a relief to find out that I was not the first caller that morning and that they were, in fact,, on the look out for this man. Of course he had moved since last night, and God only knows where he sleeps during the day. But I have more hope that they will find him and at least find out what happened to those poor kittens. What i'm upset about is the lack of integrity on the part of city-wide vets and the police. They should all be equipped to handle these situations, or at least to humanely put the animals to sleep. I know it's hard- I've bottle-raised animals before and there is nothing easy about getting up and down several times a night to measure out liquid in a dropper, praying that it's the right amount, that they will live to see another day. But it's something they should look nto. Or at least give civilians access. Two ofthe vets I spoke with did not even have kitten formula on their premises.

Just makes me wonder where the tax-payer dollar is going. Yes, I'm aware that there are more pressing matters at hand- some could make a strong argument for the homeless problem, for one. But to place defenseless animals in the hands of a man who is probably mentally unstable or an addict just seems foolish.

Quarter Century Crisis?

2006-05-17T06:22:00.000-07:00

We can't be sure that that's what I'm having, but I have been having all the symptoms: trouble sleeping, desire for sweets and chocolate, major desire for caffeination, feeling my life isn't going anywhere, addiction to really nice handbags, and large "Jewish-lady" sunglasses. I wonder if someone's trying to give me a sign. TO PULL IT TOGETHER. Obviously cake and louis vuitton aren't really going to fix my problems, but in my mind they don't hurt. I was in Louis Vuitton the other day (Just Looking, Of Course) and said something about how often I came in here, and how addictive LV was. The saleslady leaned towards me and said, "We have customers who come in almost every day." Can you imagine marching into Louis Vuitton four or five times a week? Can you imagine how much money they must spend in there? It's insane. Really.

I mean, here I am, in an outfit pieced together from Gap and H&M and calmly looking at bags that cost upwards of $1000. May I remind you I haven't paid my taxes yet? Wow. Sometimes I even stun myself. And yes, I admit that I do love expensive bags and shoes and sunglasses, but ther eare reasons behind that, I'm sure. When I think of them I'll let you know. Do I even need a reason beyond a desire to always look chic? And I find it no coincidence that my favorite brands are French and Italian. Those people know what they are doing with the clothes industry. I keep imagining someone dropping a whole lot of money in my lap and have to say I can't think about being completely financially responsible with it. You can, to an extent, but then you need to treat yourself to something wonderful and absurd.

The problem with this scenario, is that I haven't had that much money fall into my lap. Turns out I'm just an average struggling twenty-something in the city. Pretending to be Rachel or Carrie but instead coming out more like the homeless bag lady extra. She probably made more for that role than I will this month. Which makes me think that maybe I am going through some sort of crisis. I wonder how many other people heading towards their mid twenties are in the same position. We are wanderers. The minimum wage hasn't gone up since 1996, gas prices are skyrocketing (not that it makes a difference when you live in the city), jobs are scarce, and the ones that are available don't pay anything. It's ridiculous for a twenty-something with a college degree to be working as an unpaid intern while waitressing somewhere yet it happens all the time. The rich get richer and the poor get poorer. I've never lived in a city where the wealth division is so obvious. No one believes in being discrete about it. There are plenty of good things to come out of this place- great actors, amazing designers, awesome cheap chinese food from Canal street.

Maybe it's less about being a crisis and more about pulling it together on our own. Learning to stand on two feet without our parents holding our hands, learning to accept the disappointment that comes with struggling. Learning that we are being built up, I hope, for something much better.

Immigration Vibes

2006-05-16T06:27:00.000-07:00

Yesterday I was walking home from work when a man approached me, babbling rapidly about money. He handed me an index card upon which he had written "out of work, 3 kids in Romania, need many to bring them here". i've never felt bad about refusing someone like I did with him. Truly I didn't have any cash to give him, but for some reason it just hit me that this poor man (if he were telling the truth, of course) had come here for a "better life" and to give his family one, and was instead wandering the streets collecting minute amounts of money in order to fly his children over. It's again one of the times I wish I had more money, wished I could have paid for a plane ticket for one of them or something. I have no idea how much it costs to fly in from Romania, but I'm pretty sure it's a lot more than you'll get collecting on hte streets of New York.

Whenever I have an experience like that, it makes everything in my life seem so minute and ridiculous. Really. Here I am upset because I'm struggling to pay the CABLE bill and this man is starving on teh streets trying to get his children back. Who wouldn't feel bad, right? Again, it's the American way of life. We struggle with the idea that we're not it in this world, that there is more to the situation than it seems. I complain about my job on a pretty regular basis, not unlike all my friends, who also complain. But at least we have jobs. At least we're citizens who don't have to worry that they'll take our jobs away for not being here long enough, that someone will figure out we snuck our way into New York.

I went home and watched TV and cooked dinner and read a book and went to bed in my own bed because I could. Because I had all that available- food and entertainment and a warm thick blanket when the air conditioning got too cold. But I wonder if he did, I can only imagine what kind of place he's living in and can't blame him for begging in SoHo where women pay several hundred dollars for a bra from Agent Provocateur or more for a pair of really nice shoes. When all he wants is for his family to be in the same country. Makes you wonder what it was that you thought was so important before, right? I'm sitting here super concerned I won't get into my first choice grad school program and he's worried that he won't get breakfast or dinner the next day.

Egyptian Make-up

2006-05-15T07:00:00.000-07:00

Yesterday I spent the majority of the day at the Met Museum uptown. There is an exhibit there running through July 9 on Hatshepsut, who happens to be one of my favorite historical women. She began her reign co-ruling with her nephew Thutmose III as Queen, but ended up dropping that in favor of King. She ruled for more than 15 years, and after her death Thutmose III had the majority of her statues destroyed and her name erased from all historical tablets. It's fascinating to think that someone was pretentious enough to believe he could completely erase someone who had ruled his country.

What I liked most about her, though, was her taste. She had excellent taste in jewelry, and her make-up containers are nothing less than gorgeous. Carved alabaster and faciene jars with motifs of gods and plants on them, small ebony q-tip like things used to apply kohl to the eyes, handmirrors made out of a single sheet of silver. I imagine that if I had such pretyt things to look forward to everyday I would spend more time putting on make-up and really dressing well. Why don't we anymore? What happened to vanities and seperate rooms for dressing? I don't think it was that long ago that the majority of upper-middle class and upper class women had seperate areas or whole rooms devoted to the act of getting ready. And that is a great thing. There is nothing better (to me) than transforming yourself into something beautiful and wonderful from that average person you were only a little while ago.

I enjoy the Egyptians. They really knew how to live their life. They ate well, napped well, did physical activities and even believed the spirt continued on in this lifestyle in the afterworld (which is why offerings of food and nice jewelry were given to those who were a part of it) Hatsphepsut was no exception, but from what can be found of her reign, did an excellent job as ruler. There were very few female pharoahs in ancient Egypt, but Hatsheptsut stood for everything a female leader can be- strong, fair and still very elegant and pretty. Have to say I'm jealous.

Now I spend about half an hour getting ready for an eight hour day that in the long run means nothing in my actual life. I know there is a lot going on in everyone's life, and that most people work jobs they consider unimportant, but it's difficult when you consider that at least the unimportant people in olden days were mostly doing a whole lot of nothing. And spending plenty of time outdoors.

Fast Paced

2006-05-11T09:13:00.000-07:00

Everything here is fast paced. When I get up in the morning I am usually exhausted already from the job that lies ahead of me. People here walk faster, talk faster, do things faster. Wall street execs handle multi-million dollar deals on a daily, if not hourly basis and nothing less is expected. If you've ever been on the stock exchange floor after it starts up, it is nothing but people in lab coats running around like chickens with their heads cut off and yelling numbers to each other. They control our economy. Watching the tickers go around and around you are more aware than ever of how fast everything has gotten.

Which makes me think about the peace of other lifestyles. Think about the Amish, for example. Their lifestyle has been virtually unchanged over the last several hundred years, since they arrived in the 18th or 19th century. They use manual labor to kep their houses and barns maintained, buckets to draw water from wells and pumps, fire to cook their food and light their candles. Everyone has their place in that community and while things move a lot slower than the city, there is definitely a sense of understanding that things will get done. In their own time.

And I think about the small communities of Japan where people start each morning with tea and a simple breakfast before beginning work, before starting their day. Where things are done almost languidly. I like the idea of slowing walking down a mountainside to work in a garden, and harvesting my own vegetables before returning to my house back up the mountains. Fresh air, excercise, healthy food.

Are we meant to be busy? I understand the drive to push, push push harder and harder, but not the drive to stay as far away from that as possible. I wonder what it would be like if New York slowed down. If the people who lived here walked slower, stopped to really appreciate some of the architecture and window displays here, enjoyed their Saturday afternoons at the various street festivals. Maybe we should have a protest that celebrates that.

Living on Your Parents Salary

2006-05-10T09:20:00.000-07:00

Let's be honest: Recent years have produced some of the most co-dependent adults out there. A huge percentage of us in our twenties and sometimes in our thirties are still depending on our parents for financial security. I think back to when my dad went to college. His father wouldn't even pay for that! He had to work his way through, and hard, then work his way into the business wordl before finally becoming successful. Me, my parents paid my tuition and most of my expenses through college, and now are my unofficial "roommates" in New York. I'm not even ashamed of it, because up here i imagine more than half hte poeple living on the island of Manhattan who aren't in on the Wall Street thing are surviving because their parents help them, whether it's with rent, clothes, food, cable. To even rent an apartment here, you are required to make forty times your rent. So if you were making 140,000/year, you would be renting an apartment that cost roughly 1/40 of that. Name a person making that much who's living in a studio.

you would think I would be really ashamed of this. In some ways I am. I have two degrees and a minor from an excellent University. I live a fairly modest lifestyle, especially for New York, meaning I have some nice things but for the most part shop at Gap and H&M. I eat in most nights and my friends and I try to find cheap places to eat all the time. Because we're all in the same situation. An extremely small income for one of the biggest and most expensive places in the world. I'm sure if i had picked mexico city instead, my life would be much different. If I had even picked a town instead of a city my life would have been different. But instead I chose New York. I chose a dream that had been coming on for more than a decade. A dream of seeing whta life outside of a small state and small town would lead to. I have found it to be the most amazing decision I've ever made. Imagine changing everything about yourself in under a year- how you live, how you work, what you want out of life.

I've come to appreciate the idea of an apartment or house with more than one room, of having a car to drive, of being on highways with the windows down and music blasting. Of not feeling bad that your suit isn't real Chanel, of not having to dodge hordes of people in lower Manhattan on Thursday and Friday afternoons. Then there is living in the Village, of being able to get up on a Sunday morning, pick up a Times and head to a local diner for breakfast. Of taking the train out to Queens to see a basketball game. Of ice skating at Rockefeller whenever you felt like it. Just because you felt like it.

Living like this takes money, money that I don't have. So yes I ask my parents for help. The best part is, they give it to me.

David Blaine is No Magician

2006-05-09T11:12:00.000-07:00

There is nothing "magical" in the least, about setting yourself up in a globe for a week and subsisting solely on fluids. There is nothing magical about starving yourself for 44 days. And I'm not sure I see anything special about leaping off the top of a building. But obviously the public does. Otherwise I guess David BLaine would be screwed. The man does nothing except plan stunts which will involve him a) risking his own life and b) television crews all over the place.

The only thing that impresses me about David Blaine is his complete lack of self-respect. How sad that the only way a man can make a living is to pull stupid stunts. Can't someone offer him an actual job? Or is he too much of a risk for company insurance? Many of my friends went up to Lincoln center this past week to check out Blaine floating around a bowl full of water, staring out at them (or seeming to. It seems he couldn't see while he was underwater. They made generalized comments about it, saying that he must be crazy, insane, it was weird, etc. But no one questioned it either, asking why the man would do this? And where is his family in all this? I can't imagine that his mother would have an easy time sitting back and watching her idiot son get all wrinkly and dehydrated, then try and force himself to hold his breath for nine minutes. For some reason I thought you sustained brain damage if you weren't taking in oxygen for more than eight. Of course, I imagine his body has sustained this abuse long enough that it doesn't even matter.

The more I see of David Blaine, actually, the less impressed I am with him. In his stunt last night he was handcuffed in something like eight places in this bowl. The idea was that he would be forced to complete this task or die. Except not really. The minute he really began struggling his team of doctors was right there, pulling him out and hooking him up to an oxygen tank. It wasn't like something you would do in the summer at the pool with all your buddies shouting out the seconds. He had actually been training with the Navy SEALS for this event. It was absurd. Training so that you could hold your breath for nine minutes underwater and then... what? Would you suddenly have some sort of ephiphany? Come to terms with the death of your grandmother? As far as I could see, the only thing he learned from this experience was that he couldn't do it, and therefore did beat the world record holder (who held his breath 8:58). I'm not sure where or how.

What I have to wonder about is why. Why did Blaine feel this need to make himself seem better than those who came before him? And what the hell does that have to do with being a magician? They showed him performing some sort of card tricks in the street, but I didn't see how that made him a true magician either. When I think of magic, I think of someone like David Copperfield, who actually makes himself disappear in weird places. At least that seems mystical. David Blaine trying to prevent his lungs from bursting doesn't seem all that fantastic. But I didn't really have any say in the matter, and America obviously felt differently since the whole hting was aired live on ABC and hordes of people filled Lincoln Center cheering him on.

Waiting in Line

2006-05-04T06:29:00.000-07:00

In theory it should save time to live in a big city. Everything is convienient, there are four hundred places to get the very thing you need, and always someone wtih the 411. But there is one small glitch in this system of supply and demand. Lines.They are everywhere- at the Duane Reade, the public library, and most bathrooms. Not that there aren't lines in North Carolina, but certainly not the way they are here.

At the supermarket down the street you are always in a mad dash to hop in front of someone. Someone's register is always being closed for the afternoon, morning, fifteen minutes, and then it's a race to join the queue that's open. You grab yor eggs and orange juice and try to break in front of that old woman who always uses about three hundred coupons at a time. And she gets social security!

It's really an unbelievable system to me. That we live in a place with ten million people, hundreds of thousands of cash registers and yet the lines are even more unbelievable. On sunday I was returning home from my Kaplan class and passed a random line on 4th street. Just people, maybe 50 gathered, playing cards, smoking, napping in lawn chairs. The line ended at Tower Records on Broadway, so I went in to find out what the line was for. This was about 6 p.m. on Sunday evening. The guy admitted that they were doing a special Pearl Jam concert celebrating their new CD. I said,

"Oh, so that's why they're in line out there."
"What?" He said, squinting at me through black-framed D&G glasses.
"All the people out there."
"No, the line doesn't start until tomorrow afternoon. They're just lined up waiting for the line."

They were lined up waiting for the line? A foreign concept. I remember the lottery at Carolina for basketball tickets, and camping out at State in high school for football tickets. but never lining up to prepare to LINE UP. It seemed a bit over the top. Not unlike New York itself. People are big on the lines. If you don't believe me, try to break in a Starbucks early morning line and see if you make it out alive, with all your appendages attached. I dare you.

Today I'm joining a line. Boyfriend scored us tickets to see Conan O'Brien being taped. And while the actual taping does not commence until 5:30, we will line up way earlier than that. I'm actually taking off work to see this thing happen. Plus Tom Hanks is going to be there. It's all very exciting. But we are lining up in the actual line, not the line to join the line.

A Man and His Dogs

2006-05-03T12:40:00.000-07:00

A flaming gay man walking four matching toy poodles. A girl dancing to something in her I-Pod. A guitar player p[laying some Pearl Jam cover. And that is New York. I passed about ten bakeries, forty sushi places, a Seminary, two public schools, and three small parks. On the cab ride from Javits back to our office.

Gift Show season has arrived again and with it the peace I only get when I'm in a cab going from one place to another. If I'm in the office I'm busy. If I'm not in the office I'm busy running errands, making sure our displays look good, sucking up to customers, praying for my legs to numb so I don't feel anything in my feet. It means I'm working longer days, weekends and smiling a heck of a lot.

Sleeping bette,r too, I guess, considering.

Immigrant Protests

2006-05-02T07:22:00.000-07:00

Yesterday immigrants were encouraged not to show up to work, school, or go shopping. To stop whatever they were doing, in order to show President Bush and the rest of the country how important the immigrant population actually was. Ironically, I and my co-workers came to work. We ate lunch (paid for with American money), I went to the gym (again paid for with money) and did everything that I normally do. Ironic, given that I am only a second generation American citizen, and my grandmother was an immigrant. While one half of my family was a part of the original settlers in Virginia and North Carolina in the late 1600s, the rest of my family drifted over on their own.

I wonder how someone can say that they are just going to stop letting people into the country. Do we need to slow down or limit the numbers coming in? Absolutely. But to just put an end to it, to threaten to deport people, some who have been here many years, is absurd. Even if we wanted to we couldn't possibly find every single legal and illegal immigrant located in this vast country. Our government can't even find money it sent somewhere. I would love to see Bush and his hunting buddies go after people.

It really makes you consider what being an American citizen is all about. I understand the concept. I understand that you're supposed to delcare your loyalty and you get a new passport and a social security number, and you sever your relationship with your old country. You literally begin again as a person. I love that concept. That you really transform yourself. Like a butterfly.
Except now those butterflies are getting chased out as quickly as they're trying to come in.

So yesterday the streets were crowded with peole waving flags from other countries and yelling that they deserved rights, too. I agree. They absolutely deserve rights and as much of a chance as we had.

The NYU Vibe

2006-05-01T06:37:00.000-07:00

This weekend was unequivocally gorgeous. Perfect weather, I was with my perfect boyfriend, we were practically skipping through the park. Actually, he's not so much a skipper but you get the point. I pulled out my camera for the first time in ages and shot a roll in Washington Square Park. It was incredibly crowded. I love this time of year. It's before the students leave for the summer which is really nice. I like seeing them hanging out and playing guitars (SO MANY GUITARS) and reading and listening to their IPods, essentially soaking up the student life.

I really miss that lifestyle. Even though you did have to spend a ton of time studying and working on papers and stuff you were almost completely flexible in what you were doing. Three hour lunches, and naps, and late nights out knowing you could sleep in the next day. Knowing that you could go on a weeklong hike because you had about three months for the summer. And a few days in the fall, Thanksgiving break, Christmas Break, you name it breaks. It's a very European system because it offers a ton of flexibility.

Now that I'm out and about, of course I realize that I want more of that in my life. More time off. One of the hardest things about moving to a city like New York is that unless you have unlimited money or plenty of connections, you're not going anywhere during the summer. I wouldn't even know the way to the Hamptons if someone gave me a car to drive out there! I couldnt' tell you how to get to Connecticutt rivers or lakes or anything of that sort. In North Carolina, I could get to a source of water faster than you could blink. It would only take a few minutes for me to get ready and then I was off. Seriously. I was within an hour of my parents lake cottage and a couple of hours of the ocean at any point and time I felt like it. Hello, public access. I never had to have an invite because I was a part of a standing invitation.

No Longer.Now I'm searching for sources of water and coming up empty and counting out vacation days, which are very limited. Trying to figure out wher eto move from here. How to work out such terrible things as summers. I may have to get a job scooping ice cream or something.

Custard Buns

2006-04-28T12:19:00.000-07:00

I've done it. I have finally maxed out my credit card and exhausted the parental resources. Now I truly am living on my own, on a pathetic salary (for New York) and figuring out how to do that. But helping that path is the discovery of Custard Buns. Not kidding. Those are a) delicious and b) 60 cents each. That's what I said. There's a bakery in chinatown that makes them and they really are that cheap and I love them. Thank God.

Really I find some parts of New York to be fantastically cheap, and other parts to be ridiculously expensive. It's kind of confusing, to tell the truth. Sometimes I don't have any problems finding cheap furnishings, food, books, music, whatever. But Boyfriend and I have on more than a few occasions, spent eighty or one hundred dollars on ONE DINNER. What is going on with that? For the most part, quality of food is high all over the city, not just in certain areas. And yet, some of the restaurants here will charge forty-five dollars for a cocktail and not blink an eye. And I have friends who pay that much and also don't blink an eye.

Naturally I remember the easy days at college, where my parents paid for just about anything and the money I made was mine to spend how I saw fit- mostly on things like movies, Barnes and Nobles, clothing. Things of that nature. But now, of course, I wish I could have just half the money I made and put it back in my account. It's amazing how much we waste during our college years, thinking that when we're out and on a salary we'll do just fine. For some, that's fine. If you're a business major, you'll probably be making plenty of money. But if you were a humanities major, you're not. Trust me. Unless you came into your trust fund on your graduation day, you're probably struggling with student loans (yes, you have to pay the university back) and other living expenses, like silverware. Seriously. Silverware. I never thought aobut that in college.

I also, of course assumed I would pack up all my things and bring them to New York with me. Again, I was wrong about that. I brought almost nothing to New York and had to start from scratch. Which isnt' fun, especially when you're on a budget. And Ikea is located in NJ. I've never understood why they won't open a NYC store. Think of allthe money that would bring in!!
But I'm still fantasizing about having my own place all the time. During lunch hour I was surfing craigslist, looking at listings for sale and thinking about what a bargain a one-bedroom for 399,000 is, especially in the West Village! it's sad that seems like a bargain. Really sad.

Then I think about what that much money would buy down south and it's a heck of a lot more. I could probably have several acres with a house. But I wouldn't have the Morton Williams right down the street. Or a drugstore that delivered. And I bet getting movies would be a huge pain in the butt. Besides that, life would be grand.

The Thrill of Apple Chill is Gone

2006-04-26T09:12:00.000-07:00

Apple Chill was essentially a pottery and arts festival begun in 1972. The idea was to give local artisans, potters, and musicians a chance to spread their wings and show their wares, and maybe make a little cash in the process. It began as a week long festival including concerts, community activities,ending with a pottery and artisan sale. It was a chance for the community to come out with their families and be proud to be a part of Chapel Hill.

Later on the festival was shortened to just span a weekend, and then ended up being a Sunday afternoon. Then, and I'm not sure exactly how or when this happened, the festival itself would end at six, and then "After Chill" would start. After Chill is mainly black teenagers and young adults from all over the region who come in to show off pimped out cars, motorcycles, and hit the Chapel Hill club scene (what there is of it). This would continue until roughly 11 p.m. with loud cars, radios, and people spanning Franklin Street and the whole downtown scene, blocking traffic for miles and making it difficult for other stores and restaurants to stay open. Eventually many local businesses actually began closing for Apple Chill, finding it wasn't worth the effort of finding people willing to work during such a disruptive time.

Then, Apple Chill took a turn for the worse. The crowds became dangerous after nearly a day of drinking and driving around. This year, Chapel Hill hired 235 extra policeman to peruse the area and make sure everyone stayed out of trouble. The arrest average rose. I remember my first year in Chapel Hill being unaware of After Thrill and going out that evening. I quickly became stuck in traffic on 15-501 near Franklin Street and screamed as a motorcycle with two passengers and no helmets swerved in front of me. Screamed because they almost ran into me and that they would have been killed or seirously injured had I hit them. I couldn't believe anyone in this day and age, with the knowledge we have about the dangers or riding BIKES without helmets, much less MOTORCYCLES, would be riding around illegally in Chapel Hill. But they were, and there were plenty of others along with them.

Gangs in Durham have certainly been growing in the last few years, or maybe just the effects of the gangs have. The law office I worked for was representing a case of a gang member who was on death row for his initiation- killing three women. One of the women he shot twelve times, and she survived, so now he's sitting in Central Prison. He's nineteen years old. So it was no surprise when rumors began to fly about gang members, particularly Crypts and Bloods, were heading into Chapel Hill for After Chill. How does a pottery show and arts and crafts fair turn into gang war turf?

I don't blame the mayor for saying that this would be the last year for Apple Chill. It was costing too much money, most of the people attending the show were no longer local, and local famillies and the community was afraid to go out after dark because of the violence that ensued. Because it's in the South, there's also the issue of race. White girls afraid they would get raped as part of a gang initiation (going there is like stepping back 50 years), black men afraid of getting arrested for being just that. It's almost a relief that someone finally stepped in and said Enough. Now the debate is what to do. Originally this festival was intended to bring hte community together and now it was pushing the community apart. Some people suggested putting the money elsewhere, into parks or taxes or something along those lines. I wonder why Chapel Hill couldn't just return to its roots and make Apple Chill what it was supposed to be- a festival celebrating a small community full of artistic talent. Maybe spreading the events over a week or month even would help bring the community together without the pressure of one day. Maybe it would help dispel the gangs who show up. Or maybe it would encourage them to set aside their guns (three people were shot this weekend and 87 arrested) and check out a Carrboro kiln.

They're Destroying Houston Street

2006-04-25T08:31:00.000-07:00

I remember a card coming from my mom's goddaughter. It was a thank you for a gift but she had included a sort of note to me in it. She moved up here after graduating from college, moved in with her aunt and uncle in the city and started a job at Bloomingdales. And hated it. Hated everything. After moving into a boarding house of sorts, she still didn't like it. Her roommates didn't speak English and wouldn't talk to her. Her job sucked. But most of all, she said, she felt like she wasn't really cut out to be a New Yorker. There was always too much going on in the city, construction that would literally change the way a street looekd and felt and could happen in as little as a day. I didn't quite understand her until I moved up here. Then it hit me. she was absolutely right. The city is always shifting and changing, parking garages being turned into apartment buildings, streets being torn up and repaved only to be torn up again, restaurants opening and closing so fast it's hard to imagine they served a single soul.

But I like this, like that everything is always changing. Every day when I walk home there is something going on. I have o wonder, though, what the city would look like if they took down the scaffolding. All of it at one time. Imagine if they just stopped, maybe even for a couple of weeks. Just stopped what they were doing and looked at what they had already completed, what was great about the buildings that were already standing. Its wishful thinking, I know, for a city with ten million people and new ones arriving every day, but what if. I like the way the city streets look when there isn't anything going on on them. Except movies and fun stuff like that.

The most miserable street of all, now that we're heading towards the summer montths, is Broadway below Houston. It's killing me to make my way through hordes of people all trying desperately to squeeze themselves into Urban Outfitters or the boutiques that line the streets that used to hold warehouses and strange artsy types. It's fasicnating.

Watching New YOrk, is like watching evolution in process. Much of New York rests on filled swamp land. I wonder what would happen if that ever fell apart.

Challah French Toast

2006-04-24T10:51:00.000-07:00

I never would have heard of it without being up here. I think. I can't think of a single Jewish person I knew from back home. I mean, I'm sure there were some, or at least descendants of some, but I can't think of anyone. It's a totally foreign culture to me. Sometimes I'll let out an oy, or schlep, or something of that nature, and I know a little about the Holocaust and where Long Island is located, but beyond that, no clue.

But Challah bread. Definitely something I wish I'd known about earlier. One of the great things about New York is the freshness of baked goods. You can get a great loaf of bread for not much more than you'd pay for a loaf of Merita. And the kinds of bread- pumpernickel, rye, challah, irish soda. It goes on and on. I have to admit that I'm a bread freak. You should have seen me in Europe- I was literally eating my way through it. And it was delicious. I can't believe I even made it back. I probably shouldn't have come back. I think I read somewhere that it's cheaper to live there. Maybe because all you eat is bread. They are the anti-thesis of America's idea of a diet. As opposed to Atkins, it's ALL CARB AND I LOVE IT.

Not that I don't love America. Isn't that what we're supposed to do now, a paranoid turn-around? You begin to say what negative thing you really feel about America and bounce right bakc with something that's great about it. So I'm going to bounce back by saying a big thank you to the "Jewish Reservation" out on Long Island, a people who definitely know how to cook, even ifsome of the stuff is a little weird.

Ebay Fiasco

2006-04-21T06:38:00.000-07:00

I've just recently really begun making purchases on Ebay. Yes, Iw as fully aware of it before but you have to be cautious when you're ordering this stuff and even more cautious when you're entering in your maximum bid. I can see why it becomes addictive. Nothing is worse than watching as someone outbids you in the last minute or minute and a half of an auction and walks away with what should hav ebeen yours.

Then I fell into a trap. I've won a few things on Ebay and really enjoyed knowing i didn't pay retail for them. But thus comes hte paradox of the Balenciaga bag. it's my new secret obsession. Retailing for $1000 and up, these bags are lovely, vintage looking and hold lots of stuff. They are being seen on everyone famous. Except i have a feeling that the famous people don't even have to pay for them. So I've become a little obsessed with them. Just a little.

I did what any American girl with a break at work and keyboard at her fingertips would do. I typed my request into Ebay's search engine and it came back with something like 600 of these bags up for grabs. Natrually I could see that almost all of these "authentic 1000% guaranteed bags were fakes" but there were a few that sounded convincing. So I bid on one, and WON. I was happily congratulating myself on getting this bag for more than 75% off when I came across an article about a woman who had been through a similar experience, paid a fortune for a "real" bag, and then received a fake. My stomach dropped. I began doing more and more research and found that i'm in no shape to be ordering Balenciagas on line. I'm not even sure what half of the stuff on them IS. And theres a big difference between paying 1000 for a real bag and paying a smaller fortune for a good fake bag. I checked on the street outside my office and have found they go for around thirty bucks. That's a much better deal.

So I waited impatiently for the package to arrive. Of course i hadn't been paying attention to where it was coming from and so I was being sent a purse from Switzerland. Thank goodness the girl who sold it to me was really nice about it. Otherwise I would have been even more stressed out. I waited, and waited. And waited some more. But hte bag continued to not show up at all and then I thought I really had been ripped off. So I kept harassing this poor Swiss girl with imperfect English and finally received the bag. Of course, i knew when I pulled it out that it wasn't real. Certain small details didn't match up at all.

Fortunately Ebay is set up to handle these disputes. If you use Paypal, there's a good chance you'll get at least some of your money back, and I was one of hte lucky ones. But I have learned my lesson. I made a phone call to the Balenciaga boutique to see if there was a chance it was real and the woman on the phone told me that in the five years she had been with hte company she had never seen a real one come off a website. What makes this worse is that when I told the Swiss girl this she was shocked, saying she had originally purchased the bag on ebay and was told it was real. I'm sad for every girl out there who thinks that you can get a $1000 bag for $200. Even if it was stolen off the back of a truck, no way would anyone part with those for so little.

Now I'm going to be a lot more suspicious about what I purchase off Ebay. but it saddens me that a website built on trust like this has so many false people becoming a part of it. I can only imagine what's out on the streets.

The End of an Era

2006-04-19T06:18:00.000-07:00

I realized today, walking to work, that never again am I really going to have a choice over whether or not to show up. Sure,you might say, no one is forcing you to work, though I'd have to disagree. My apartment owner, Time Warner Cable and Con Edison may not be literally behind me every morning dragging me to work but they certainly expect me to go so I can immediately turn over the money to them. That's the way it goes. And thus I am a part of hte adult world.

it's amazing, when you think about it, that people continue to work. I have to wonder if the human population was really designed to do this. What if there were no bills, if people simply performed jobs because they enjoyed them? Or if they didn't perform jobs for the same reason? I wonder, just maybe if that would work. There is the all too logical response of who would carry out the garbage, but I bet our prisoners could be forced into that one as part of their imprisonment.

What would I do if I had all that time? Maybe volunteer for a non-profit agency, definitely write, and try to figure out how to manage my life in a way that is beneifical to those around me. Sure I'm not perfect, but I'm certainly not incapable of handling certain aspects of who I am and what I can do to contribute. Isn't that what it comes down to? Who can contribute? Many of the great scientists in the world kept their theories shut up in drawers for years and years before finally releasing them to the public. Artists who weren't famous at all until after their deaths. People who use their money to support the arts or after school programs or help out with their churches.

I like the idea of the freedom of choice. I like the thought that I could control my own schedule and make each day different. one day i could be painting a playground, the next day lounging around someone's pool. I hoie that at some point I could have the chance to do that. Some people are born into independent money and while I"m not one of them, I'm sure that something good could come of it. Something good could come of everyone if they would just consider what they really want to do with themselves and their time

There was a special Dr. Phil on last week honoring people who made a difference in the lives of children. What was great about it was that these people were ll incredibly selfless. A woman in her thirties who had housed over 50 foster children, including many with disabilities. A man who had begun the Urban Music Program because he felt too many school swere cutting out music and making it difficult for those kids to have a shot at doings oemthing they wanted to do that had nothing to do with "No Child Left Behind". It frightens me that any president would implement a program so focused on narrow subjects that smart children were pushed outside the box and slow children wouldn't stand a chance. Everyone knows the program will ultimately fail or leave an overweight generation with no idea who Billie Holiday is.

I hope that some answers will start coming to me soon. I hope that I'll be able to take a good look at myself and see what I can become just by being that person, just by taking hte opportunity to leap.

On the Hunt

2006-04-18T09:16:00.000-07:00

Again, I'm not dressed appropriately for the weather. Yesterday I was wearing too little clothing, today, it seems, I am wearing too much. It's supposed to be almost seventy today and I'm in a turtleneck sweater (albeit cotton) with a skirt and knee socks. So I'm burning up without a hope of having time to change today. Ah, the New York Spring. How we patiently wait for consistent anything. It's almost as bad as it is in North Carolina. I may as well be in North Carolina.

And i'm on the hunt for a career change. Or trying to figure out a career change, is maybe a better way of looking at it. There are so many choices and I am just now starting to hunt through them, looking at different options and trying to decide where I best fit in in this place. The most interesting part of New York to me is that while the city has to employ literally millions of people and therefore has plenty of jobs at any given time, it's incredibly hard to find a job that a) fits what you're looking to do and b) pays enough for you to do it. I never fail to be fascinated by how quickly restaurants turn over and people become cab drivers, etc, yet in certain areas it seems dry.

So I'm back at square one, trying to decide, as so many other people in the quarter-century crisis are, what do I do with myself now? Where do I go? I truly feel we have the most opportunity of any prior generation and yet are the least grounded, most likely to wander the earth without knowing where to go or what to do. I know that's me. In my head I'm a hundred things, traveling down a hundred career paths. I'm everything from a pediatric AIDS specialist in Africa to a translator in France. I'm a magazine editor and a vet and a scientist. I write novels and plays while simultaneously discovering a cure for the common cold. I am a Pulitizer prize winning photographer for National Geographic.

Except really I'm still just a kid.

Day of the Lord (but come ON!)

2006-04-17T08:23:00.000-07:00

Easter Sunday is a really fascinating holiday, when you think about it. Here we are, celebrating the life, death, and resurrection of a man from 2000 years ago who happened to feed some people and spread something we call the Gospel. And he got famous from it and now has the largest "cult" following in the world, myself included. But there is something fascinating about the way Protestants view church compared to other sects, such as Catholicism and Greek Orthodox.

We believe in time limits for church. As hypocritical as that sounds, we like for our services to be a small part of our Sunday and our thinking about God and Jesus to be a larger part of our life. I don't feel any better when I'm in church for three hours versus when I'm in church for one. As a matter of fact I usually feel worse, thinking about how much I would rather be outside appreciating what God is offering us. Especially Methodists and Presybeterians tend to feel the same way. We would rather be doing other things with our WEdnesday nights nad Friday afternoons. Not to say taht there aren't plenty of people who spend their time doing all sorts of church related activities all the time. I'm just saying that for me, I can find plenty of ways to share in Jesus' love without being all up in his place.

Sunday morning was no exception. Generally the Easter service is pretty predictable. There are the traditional Easter hymns, a sermon about Jesus rising from his tomb, the children get candy and you wear a pretty hat. But yesterday the preacher at my grandmother's church added in Holy Communion. I would hav ethought that in order ot do that you would cut something out in consideration of all the people working on a large meal for their families in the afternoon. Yes, we understand that Jesus broke bread with his disciples before his crucifixtion, but he did only have 12 and in that church we had about 200 people. So it added almost forty-five minutes to a long enough Easter service and we were out late, thus eating late, thus I didn't ge tto spend much time with the family because I had to fly back to NYC. And what more would you like to know?

So i'ts made me reconsider my feelings about religion. I'm very religious, of course a G.D. liberal kind of religious, but religious all the same. I try to do as many good th ings for other people as I can. I even gave up time during Lent to do something good out of my way good every day for someone and found it so rewarding I think I'm going to keep it up.

Immigration Protests

2006-04-11T06:53:00.000-07:00

THere were about 100 full fledged protests yesterday afternoon regarding the bill that President Bush wants to pass charging everyone involved with illegal immigrants, or at least helping them to make a new start. Many of hte Republicans and Democrats for that matter want a change. They want to close down the borders, grant harsher penalties for people who aid these "fugitives" and deport people on a more regular basis. So yesterday afternoon thousands and thousands of people crowded the streets, proving what i guessed all along- that America is a country based on immigration.

Imagine if your family had been turned away at the border fifty or one hundred or two hundred years ago. Imagine if your grandfather, who arrived at Ellis Island with a dime in his pocket, had immediately been sent back to Japan or Europe or Ireland. What kind of country are we to preach the importance of religious freedom and a "dream", when we don't want people to have a shot at that dream? We already don't give them much of a chance. Many of them are unable to get green cards and thus havev to work illegally for ridiculous amounts of money, barely scraping by.

Americans have so many resources, so much STUFF at our fingertips. We produce more than half of the world's annual amount of garbage and yet make up less than 20% of the world population. We can go shopping and have thousands of items to choose from. I think about all the Russians who were forced to wait in line just for the chance to get a loaf of stale bread and I am shocked that anyone would turn them away when they come here and see a glittering array of brands and ingredients. Who are we to decide who gets to come in and who stays out? In theory, we were the ones who marched in here and got rid of the "Savages" already running this country for thousands of years before we knew about it. I'm sad that it even has to be an issue.

What should have been an issue was making sure that the immigrants could receive the correct paperwork, that they could get health insurance, have a warm, clean place to live, have schools nearby for their children, be able to get to work. We could make sure they understood enough English to get by, provide them with literacy tutoring. There are so many ways we could help the new people coming into our country. There are so many ways we should want to work with them, want to help them in ways maybe we didn't have when our ancestors were coming in.

The whole image of America has been based on immigration. Without it, the country would not exist. It doesn't matter if you're second or tenth generation here, you came from somewhere, and unless you're Native American you didn't come from here. I wonder what descent Bush's family is, where they came from, how they got to this land. If the thought of his great grandparents being turned away from the border doean't affect him, then I w ould have to say we have an actual unfeeling dictator sitting in the Oval Office. i'm tempted to say that now regardless.

That was what was so great about yesterday. Was that all these immigrants from everywhere but particularly Mexico and Puerto Rico and South American, pulled together as one group and marched. Marched for what was promised them on reaching American soil- life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.

It's Become a Race Thing

2006-04-10T06:49:00.000-07:00

The Duke Lacrosse team has been accused of gang-raping a stripper they hired for one of their parties about a month ago. The girl claims she performed a dance for them but tried to leave after being called various profane names. When she got outside one of the team members came after her, asking her to come back in. On going back in, she was forced into a bathroom and raped by several members of the team while others watched. After leaving the house she immediately went to the hospital and called the police. Smart girl, right? On the night of the rape she wen tahead and filed her report.

The next week the coach resigned and the lacrosse season was cancelled early. The week after one of the players was suspended from school. Beyond that, the team hired a defense attorney. And then, silence. Driving by the house you can see the bathroom window from which the girl was raped- blinds ripped down, hanging on edge. Much like she must be doing emotionally right now. It has been almost a month and NOT A SINGLE PLAYER HAS BEEN CHARGED IN THE INCIDENT. The community is in an uproar. The exotic dancer was black, and the majority of the team is white, and together it created a racial tension that would not have been there otherwise. Now it's about more than a private dancer's right to call it quits when she wants, it's about white men raping black women and then getting away with it because they are athletes at a prestigious private university. of course that university is located in a town that may as well be in the sixties according to racial problems there.

I grew up only about an hour or a little less than that from there, and remember being told, when I turned 16, not to drive there after dark in certain parts. To make sure that I knew where I was going at all times, to have my doors locked and cell phone on. To not be alone. Not just because it wasn't particularly safe for a young girl to be out by herself, but because I was specifically white. And that would be enough to provoke an attack. One of my co-workers expressed surprise that the event had turned into a "black/white situation" but I told her I would have expressed surprise if it hadn't. Sometimes it feels like intergration never happened in our neck of the woods. People are frowned upon for embarking on inter-racial relationships, crosses are still occasionally burned, and there are sections of town for white people and black people, further divided into those with money and those without.

Yes, it is physically beautiful. But it makes me cry to see how little we have advanced. Duke University Hospital is one of the leading hospitals in the nation and even the world but it still counts to be a certain race. What black groups are currently protesting is how long it's taken for anyone to be arrested. Those boys are still out there. They say had it been several black men raping a white woman, it would have already been done. Oh, how I wish I could say they were wrong, that we have surely moved further than that. But the truth is we haven't. We've barely taken three steps inthe right direction. And so there are rapists on the loose that should be behind bars. And a young black woman who must feel incredibly invalidated.

Katie Couric is Leaving

2006-04-07T08:28:00.000-07:00

not in general, but she is leaving the Today show after fifteen years (or more than half my lifetime). I was shocked to find out. She's moving to CBS. I guess they don't consider each other the enemy. It's really difficult to imagine what's going to happen to Today and what I'm going to do about my morning television watching. Which I may be doing a lot more of soon enough.

Yes, that's right. I"m looking into Grad School. Right now I'm working a job which has me roughly below poverty level without benefits. I can't imagine that every company is like this, but right now, since the economy is so hard-pressed, it's difficult to find any job with benefits and decent salary. People are becoming greedier and greedier and while CEOs are making tons of money, everyone else is struggling to make ends meet. Makes you think communism isn't such a bad option. At least then you'd be on a more even scale. Of course, I'm too damn liberal to live in a communist nation. Guess i"ll just stick with the facist one.

But this Katie Couric thing has me in shock. I always thought she'd stay at Today for forever adn instead she is moving forward. She said her heart told her this was the right move, and she'll be the highest paid and first important female evening news anchor. Thanks for making the path easier for all those girls who are wanting to move up in the television industry. And thanks for helping me think more clearly which will hopefully lead to better career choices.

The Devil Wears Prada

2006-04-04T06:30:00.000-07:00

I just finished reading it for the second time and must admit it's still as terribly written as the first time, but the story itself rings true. THere are a ton of bosses like that scattered throughout the city. Bosses who make their assistants show up at weird hours and then send them on errands for dry-cleaning and household supplies and copies. There are bosses who force their employees to show up at certain events, demanding everything from black tie to gallery openings.

When you're in your early twenties and just starting out in this city you can't say no, either. becuase you wouldn't even be here without the terrible job you're dragging yourself to five to six days a week. Maybe you're doing that and bartending on weekends because what I've found is that starting salaries aren't very high, considering living expenses and that college degree your parents photographed you with in the good ol' days of school, when you imagined job offers pouring in as people realized how smart, capable and fun you were to work with.

Job offers did not come flying my way and the ones that did offered no benefits, no vacation time and a salary that was less than my rent for a year. When one finally came along that at least pretende to offer me something useful in the way of experience, a tleast, I attacked it, happily leaping upon it the way a hawk leaps upon a snake in the grass. Jobs in New YOrk are elusive. They are never around very long (we pay people to literally carry things up and down the blocks) and you need some sort of psychic ability or connections to even know they're available half the time. Jobs in this city go back and forth with the discretion of the mob, or so it seems.

I'm worried about what's going to happen when I'm "done" with my current job and forced out into the world of the unemployed again. My first instinct (as with most twenty-somethings) is to go back to school, immediately, quickly. To duck back into the world of college and late afternoon drinking games and daytime television. I salivate just thinking about it. But then I read that you're not supposed to use grad school as an escape from reality. I mean, why the hell not? What better escape from the depression associated with the Republican party right now and our faltering economy?

My Political High Horse

2006-04-03T07:38:00.000-07:00

Boyfriend and I decided to check out the Darwin exhibit at the Museum of Natural History yesterday. We headed uptown in this gorgeous weather (and it has been GORGEOUS) to see the man himself's original just about everything- preserved specimens, notebooks, journals, letters, magnifying glasses. They had various fossils that Darwin used to develop his theory about the evolution of man.

What was most interesting about this exhibit however, was that there was not A SINGLE corporate sponser. Generally with this kind of thing they would have to have someone paying for everything, and that someone would usually be a huge corporation that would not only contribute money but be able to say that they helped educate the future generations. Not this time. The money was given by private donors. Without them, I doubt the museum could have put on this exhibit. Live Galapagos tortoises can't be found just anywhere. I'm pretty sure most people didn't even notice that there were no signs advertising Cingular or Chase Bank Manhattan. I'm pretty sure I wouldn't have noticed if I hadn't just read an article in the New Yorker about why there were no corporate sponsers. Maybe you can guess, or maybe you weren't even aware.

Bush. Our president doesn't believe in evolution. Not that this should matter in theory, because state and religion are seperated, right? Or are they? IN an age where science, Judaism, and feminism are actually once again struggling causes, Bush would not support the exhibit. He also strongly "discouraged" corporations from supporting anything that doesnt mention intelligent design. The museum refused to mention anything about Creationism or Intelligent Design because they are NOT scientific. They have no basis except in that of a few men who in 200 AD decided to write a book telling people how their lives should work. Bush, being a man and an exaggerator himself, fully agrees with the Bible and believes everything to be as it is written, but cannot except the evidence that is literally right before him.

As with the HPV vaccination, which will now go through a grueling process to be approved, thus guaranteeing that more than ten thousand women will contract cervical cancer before the vaccine is pushed through and hundreds of thousands will contract the HPV virus itself, Bush believes the only right way is his way. Never have we had a president with so much information at his feet and yet so little going on inside his head. His solution to the HPV virus was to push abstinence only education and tell people to only have one sexual partner in their lifetime. While it's true that this would prevent the virus, with a divorce rate of more than fifty percent and many girls sexually active before their 16th birthday it's unrealistic. But Bush doesn't seem to believe in realism, does he? He has hindered science more than any other president before him, turning the country into an evangelical machine.

The Darwin exhibit is only one of many examples of this. But I hope that the public attention continues to grow.

Service at Cafe Duke's

2006-03-31T12:26:00.000-08:00

Cafe Duke is located in the heart of Soho, at Broadway and Spring. It goes all the way through the building it's in, so you can also go in on the Mercer street side if you so desire. It's one of those really weird places that has a little bit of everything. Pasta, juice drinks, soup, sushi and a do it yourself Salad bar. Sounds nice, right? You can even access the internet in there.

But if service is everything, than Duke's is nothing. They have these women who work the front counter like machines, screaming "Next UP!" before customer A even has their stuff in a bag. They complain if you're too demanding- like, forgetting to ask for milk in your coffee WHEN YOU ORDER IT NOT AFTER. I can't imagine how many people they go through in an hour, much less a day. You've never seen a line move so fast.

Being from the South, it's habit for me to cough out "How are you today?". I could be kidnapped or robbed at gunpoint and have no doubt that's exactly what I would say. When the Yankees invaded the Confederacy during the Civil War, every one of them commented on how hospitable the Confederate Wives were, even though I'm sure we just wanted to stab them in the back. There are many stories about the Yanks being served on the best silver and treated like royalty. That's Southern teaching. Regardless of whether it's the President or Hitler (not that there's much difference this day and age) you just pretend they are the nicest, most interesting people you've ever met and be kind. Which is why Southern women are so much more dangerous. We'll conceal our distaste but feel free to gossip about it later.

When I first visited Dukes back in the fall I didn't believe my co-workers when they told me how rude those poeple were. I figured they were exaggerating and that the ladies behind the counter just hadn't been offered Southern hospitality before. Of course I was wrong. They could care less how nice you were to them as long as you GOT OUT OF THE WAY. I think the reason that place stays open is it's one ofa bout two restaurants down here in SoHo that aren't trendy and overpriced. By the way, New Yorkers are cheap when it comes to lunch. That's why we love the vendis.

Today when I went in for a diet coke and a snack (no, I haven't kicked my caffeine habit yet) the guy in front of me was an older gentleman. When he was called up I heard him say something to the girl behind the counter but wasn't paying attention. But by the time I got up there he was yelling at her to be nice. He said, "ALl you have to do is answer fine!" I don't know where he w as from, but preach it, brother. IT's the truth. All you have to say is fine. It's a lot more civil and takes less effort than not saying anything at all.

Beginning to be Spring?

2006-03-29T06:34:00.000-08:00

It has been a beautiful week. I mean a really beautiful week. There is nothing more refreshing than stepping into a spring morning, when the air is cool but you know it's on the way to warming up soon and green is starting to appear in places you least expect it. The sun is coming up earlier and everything seems brighter. I love this time of year. There is something about the changing seasons that I love. It makes me feel like a new person, coming out of the bleakness of a New York winter. It's a sigh of relief, really, a reward for making it through the cold and snow of the winter and late fall.

This really is one of my favorite times of year. I love the way everything smells, that the days are longer, that I can sit in Washington Square Park and read on a quiet Saturday afternoon. I can watch the children who are really benefiting from living in a world of sun and warmth trip and run down the streets of the Village, laughing and screaming. I remember when I was really little coming home from school, getting off the bus, and picking flowers as I walked up the driveway. I loved the feeling of dropping my backpack in the yard and immediately running around, dashing from swing set to yard and back. If only we as adults could capture those feelings of complete happiness at simply being alive.

I'm glad New York is changing for the better. This weekend my parents and my little brother were in town for the weekend to see me. It was pretty but still fairly chilly and they complained about that almost contasntly. Which was when I suggested they head to my apartment that has been like a sauna since late October. But what they got to see of New York is wonderful compared to what I have seen every day i living here.

I Have On Three Shirts

2006-03-22T07:41:00.001-08:00

and I'm still freezing and thinking about how wonderful it would be if I were still in bed, curled up with my kitty asleep. Instead I'm back in the corporate world and wondering how people spend forty or fifty years doing this same thing every day. No wonder they're so exhausted all the time. Now I understand more than ever why people have high blood pressure and heart attacks. This summer will be the first summer of my life that has not been flexible. Sure, I'll go on vacation with my family, but it won't be the easy trip it has been in the past. I've had to carefully manuever my time around how many days I have left for vacation, how many I've already taken, and what applies. I'll have to purchase a plane ticket and compare prices on that. Then I'll have to be sure and email everyone and their mother to let them know that I'll be out of town for a mere seven or eight days, emergency procedures in the event something in the publicity world goes wrong, and why they won't be able to reach me.

I've found the business world to be extremely dependent. If I call in a sick day I come back to piles of work on my desk and my co-workers saying, panicked, "I didn't know what to do." I wonder if it's the same overseas, where people pack up and often eave the country for a month or so. Do they check in? do the companies they work for fall apart without them? While it's nice to have so many people happily dependent on me, it goes to show that if I leave, no one else can do my job for me. Which is entirely untrue. It's not that it's a difficult job, just a very detail oriented. When it comes down to it, it's simply about getting some pictures in a magazine or newspaper as often as possible.

But I feel paranoid leaving even for the Easter weekend. Because no one can be sure what will happen, what will go wrong along the way. No wonder so many people take their laptops with them to the beach or mountains. They feel an immense pressure to be working even when they are not working.

I Have On Three Shirts

2006-03-22T07:41:00.000-08:00

More like the Kiss of Death

2006-03-21T07:08:00.000-08:00

Come on, New York. In less than 24 hours we will officially be in the spring season. Yet, today's 18 degree wind chill feels like anything but. It feels more like January than March. Maybe January was actually even warmer? I can't be sure now but suspect this is some trick God is trying to play on me. Because I'm new here and unsure of what this weather means. I did pack up my ski bibs, but certainly haven't even thought about packing up my sweaters yet. Or yes I may have considered it last week when temperatures jumped into the seventies but have now definitely changed my mind. Clearly we are not ready for this. clutching a cup of tea isn't helping very much.

But this hasn't changed how I feel about New York. Because love is love and sometimes you just have to roll with it.

Will it ever arrive?

2006-03-20T07:28:00.000-08:00

Spring is supposedly supposed to begin on Wednesday. It's supposed to be flowers, showers, some breezes, and then some. Unfortunately it's still cold, in the thirties here, and I'm constantly freezing. I didn't mind freezing December through now, but come on people, it's time fora change. I always think about the Pilgrims this time of year, and wonder why they didnt sail southward when they came over. How bad would an extra week have been, anyway? If you've been at sea for several months, why would it matter if you had to stay on the ship al ittle longer if it would mean being in a warm location. I would have waited an extra week to found America in Georgia.

Then I wonder why, when it was realized how expansive America could be, and how many locations there were, people didn't flock south. New York City should really be geographically located closer to Miami Beach or, if it had to be centralized, Raleigh. Why would they keep it in a place that regular falls below freezing, has wind issues, and is right on the water? Aren't there other port places,like Baltimore and Savannah that are also right on the water but don't have as many issues? I'm just curious about the choices settlers made.

I wonder what I would have done had I come over on the Mayflower. Insisted that the seasick people not throw up on me? Demanded better food than smoked fish? Rolled my eyes excessively at the stupid men that were undoubtedly "running" the place. i'm not sure, looking at the big picture, if I could have made any better decisions. Because what makes New York great is New York itself, not its location.

I'm becoming a theater critic

2006-03-14T07:59:00.000-08:00

Never would I have thought I would be attending the theater enough to make educated criticisms of it, but thanks to the hook-up of C, I have been to Broadway more times in the last month than in my whole life combined. No one is really sure how she gets her tickets but she does and they are generally fabulous. Which is why it pays to have a friend who has the connections. Evveryone should include one in their group.

So on Sunday, when she invited me to go see the Broadway debut of a play called "Well", I happily tagged along. We knew that it was a one-act play, but one act should not stretch beyond one hour unless it is highly entertaining. Which this one wasn't. the premise was wonderful- a daughter is trying to perform her play about health and illness while her mother sits in the background, offering sodas and "suggestions" about why she's doing it wrong. It was a good image of a mother daughter relationship. And there were some funny parts. But the whoel thing seemed generally overdone and I felt like I could have done a better job of writing it. Really. And I'm not even doing much writing these days.

But this is what I imagined when I moved to New York. I saw myself taking advantage of every cultural opportunity that came my way. And while I have taken advantage of quite a few of them, it's not going along quite the way i imagined it. I guess this proves that you can be cultured anywhere in the world, or not be anywhere in the world. There are people who have been raised here and never set foot in the Museum of Natural History. Not that I have either. But in my own defense I've only been here a few months. So I guess culture isn't really a reason to live in a particular location. Though there is a huge difference between the Littleton community theater and Broadway.

So I'm sticking with my lifestyle here for the moment, rushing along day by day and being a part of a wonderful place that shows me all kinds of differences just by walking down the street. And brings me back to reality by putting a terrible play on broadway.

For Real, Y'all

2006-03-10T07:51:00.000-08:00

I'm frustrated with my job. I'm sure there are hundreds of thousands of people all over the country who are saying essentially the same thing right now, but this is my blog and I'm here to feel sorry for myself. My boss has disappeared, before we could talk about my raise which I'm now feeling is not going to happen after all. It's incredibly discouraging when you put so much of yourself into a job only to get so little in return. Does money mean happiness? No, but it can cause a lot of sadness when your credit card bills are piling up around you and your boss is driving a car that costs around a quarter of a million dollars, but is unable to give you insurance or enough money to pay for living expenses. I wonder how much we are supposed to take in our jobs.

When does enough mean enough? THere are limits for everyone, and I have just about reached mine with this company. I have been patiently waiting and doing an excellent job. Thanks to my work, our publicity is shooting through the roof right now and I've brought on more new accounts than anyone else here this spring. I come in with a positive attitude and get as much done in one day as any human reasonably can. I rarely complain and instead put my mind to work, trying to understand this business better. But in any company, there needs to be recognition and compensation for achievements of employees. I think if more employers understood this there would be a better balance. Instead of purhcasing a car that is eight times an employees' salary look at the bigger picture and dole out the money accordingly. By making your employees feel appreciated you are setting up a better atmosphere and in hte long run a better company. Like Mike says in "Office Space", "That'll make you work just hard enough not to get fired.". That's what I'm currently doing. i'm currently working the bare minimum. Starting to come in a little late and leave a little early and in between deal with the reality of what this life is.

Corporate America is disappointing. In "Bait and Switch", Barbara Ehenreich tries to get a salaried job in the corporate world and fails miserably. She is shocked to find that with all the effort and time she put in, that no one is really a team player anymore, that CEOs would rather fire employees than take a salary cut, that people who move too far up the ladder too fast are cut, that more companies prefer temps because they don't have to pay health insurance. There are companies and organizations that won't take people over 35 or 40 years old, that offer little or no vacation time, that dont care if you spent the last five years at home with your kids- it was a gap.

I can't believe that this is what our country has come to. And we're not even doing all that well. We're in the midst of a war, we have one of the highest unemployment rates in the world right now, we give the least benefits of any developed country. In most European countries, mothers and fathers take roughly a year of paid maternity leave. Their companies feel everyone benefits from this arrangement and no one returns to work guilty that they didn't spend enough time with LIttle Annie. Here six weeks is the average but many places want you to take LESS THAN THAT. Having children is looked upon as a nuisance and something that takes away from your career, instead of adding to your ability to multi-task.

Of course I've done nothing but work for the past 18 years. i've been in school full time, adding on extra jobs and activities during the summer. I applied for everything, I did everything, I spent many sleepless nights working on things to heighten my ability to land a good job in the near future. Where has it left me? Discouraged and job hunting again. Trying to do something different with my life, trying to live on my own. No wonder so many people in their twenties and even thirties are moving back home. Our parents don't realize how different it is now, how people no longer care about what you're doing with your life, or what you're trying to accomplish, that you're supposed to slave away at being something in the corporate world, to be a busy bee.

Six Days of BORING

2006-03-08T14:10:00.000-08:00

So I haven't been updating my blog. So what? My life has been fairly boring this week. Work, sleep, study for the GRE, work, sleep, check to see that Lucy the kitten hasn't been destroying everything in my apartment, sleep. I think the only interesting thing would be my shot at Olympia on Monday evening.

Maybe it was all the hype after Turin, or maybe I'm just fulfilling my childhood dreams, but I signed up for figure skating lessons. Yes. Actual lessons with a coach who is obviously gay, and tiny girls who glide past me with the greatest of ease on the ice. Figure skating. The sport no one would have thought of when assigning me to athletics. When I was little I had asked for figure skating lessons, but my mother actually said no, since I was already dancing, singing, playing the piano, and attending Girl Scouts. Oh yeah, and I was playing soccer, too. Plus it would have meant at least an hour and a half commute each way to get to the nearest figure skatin grink. So I settled for pretending to be a figure skater by sliding around my room (we had wood floors) in socks.

When I moved up here, I imagined I would have a ton of free time to do things like skate, and ski, and generally be fabulous. i was wrong, of course. Turns out I don't have much more free time here than I ever did when I was a student. Maybe it's because my work days run straighter now or something. I don't know. Either way, I do know that I haven't skiied or skated since I got up here, both winter sports near by and things that I am not particularly good at.

I watched the Olympics, watching as Michelle Kwan was replaced by Emily Hughes (who has skated at the same rink I'm skating at, thank you very much) and as Sasha Cohen FELL in her only chance for gold. So it might have been the excitement from all of that, but before you know it I was on the phone and signing away my safety rights to be a part of the figure skating world. I showed up on Monday an hour early (for someone who is generally a few minutes behind this was good timing) and I got fitted for my skates. And watched as little girls no more than three or four feet high threw themselves into the air without a care in the world. I was completely confident as I stepped out onto the ice once it was my turn and promptly fell into the wall without going anywhere.

The guy checking us in for "Adult Skate School" looked at me skeptically and said, "Level?"
"Level?" I said right back at him without the look, since I was mainly concentrating on not ending up on my ass.
"What level are you?"
"What? Oh... maybe beginner?" Can't say I didn't warn him.
"Can you skate backwards?" Maybe this guy wasn't the brightest chip off the block,,but my God man I was hanging onto the edge of the wall with all my weight. I couldn't even skate FORWARD.
"Maybe." I said, trying to sound cooler than I actually was.

So he assigned me to a group where, get this, they were teaching people (many who have never been on the ice) to fall properly, so you had the least amount of bruising and broken bones going on. I was just practicing a bunny hop when one of the other skating instructors pulled me aside, shook her head, and said, "You go over there", pushing me towards a group that was, ironically, skating backwards.

The instructor looked me up and down, grinned, and said, "Welcome! We're just working on our swizzles. Please join in."
What the hell was a swizzle? I wondered, as I smiled back and said, "GReat! I'll just get behind these people over here,' pointing to everyone else in the group who was, I guess, swizzling backwards. At least, they were moving backwards without falling on their ass, so that's a plus. I'm not really sure what inspired the skating instructor to put me in the group, but she did. And so, in a brief moment I too was pretending I belonged in the group. Surrounded by people who were slightly wobbly on their skates but staying upright. Some were quite good. There was a much older woman (she must have been in her 60s) who was gliding across the ice with the greatest of ease. I was not. I was moving across the ice, but in a choppy motion that must have been extremely entertaining to watch.

I spent an hour on the ice, practicing my own "glides" ( which did not seem very glide-y to me), going in cirlces, literally, and generally trying not to fall down. I on ly endedup with three bruises.

Maybe not so different from the South

2006-03-03T07:15:00.000-08:00

There were tons of wrecks yesterday. And this morning. On the way to work I found that half of lower Broadway was blocked with fire trucks and spectators watching what appeared to be a disaster made with a city bus and a delivery truck. The sidewalks were icy, people were slipping and sliding everywhere, and schools in neighboring towns and states had closed for the day. There was barely any snow. Yesterday, while we were suppposed to get somewhere around 7 inches, we only got three. Which should have been nothing up here. But for some reason has turned this place into a bumbling mess.

What happened, New York? Where was the confidence seen trudging to work after the largest blizzard on record? Where were the snow shoes and boots with heavy treads on them? I have to admit I was a little disappointed. Besides the wind, I may a s well have been in a snow storm in NC. Last year, my neighbors and I used ski poles to get us up and down our super steep driveway. Going to school was a hell. But that was with like an inch of ice.

And naturally it was windy and cold. Since I was sick yesterday you can imagine how particularly wonderful that felt as I was leaving my nice cozy apartment with my sweet purring kitty. No wonder more people are choosing to "freelance" or work from home. There are some advantages, particularly when it's 11 degrees outside and you're wrapped up inside. People really were developed for hibernating. That's why we have so much disease floating around. Imagine if everything stopped for January and February. I wonder how much healthier we would be?

The UPS Man

2006-02-28T06:48:00.000-08:00

Every day we have the same guy come and pick up packages and deliver other ones to us. He whistles and sings and cheerfully loads our boxes full of books and F&Gs onto his handy cart and tugs them away to be sent to their destinations. Or not, as it turns out. The interesting thing about UPS is I always assumed the reason people sent things UPS was so they could track them all the way to their final destination, and that they could be signed for in order to make sure the receipient receieved them. Unfortunately this isn'tthe way UPS works. It turns out they're human, and they make mistakes, and packages get lost as a result.

I'm well aware there are dishonest people all over the place. I lived with one last year, content to lie about everything from laundry to using a handicap tag. So it probably shouldn't surprise me that somewhere in New Jersey, a UPS worker is tearing into other peoples packages and taking whatever seems nice. I guess it also shouldn't surprise me that there is a section on the UPS website where you are supposed to insure your packages to guarantee that they reach their destination in a timely manner or at all. I've never used this option. 1) because I wasn't fully aware of its purpose and 2) Isn't shipping something UPS kind of like insuring it?

Apparently not. It gets worse. The most expensive package I have ever been responsible for mailing out of htis office was lost, ad after a search (though I have my suspicions about how thorough it was) it has been declared lost in the system and I am supposed to claim it. Ironically, though, in claiming it, I am only going to receive $100 of the value of the items, which were really closer to five figures. So I'm in trouble, right? OR am I even at fault? Who is at fault? That's what happens when dealing with a huge company ilke UPS. You can't find someone to blame. Do I blame Man 1, who comes to our office every day and never forgets to ask us how our day is going? Do I blame N. at UPS, who is maybe 17 years old and obviously can't tell the difference between her ass and her elbow? Do I blame the scanning system in the Meadowlands which obviously sucks. Or do I just keep waiting and hoping it's going to turn up, somehow, someway.

Important lessons abound here. One, to know what you're mailing. I, acting as a robot, simply mailed a box, not knowing what it contained, and certainly unaware of the value. I like to think thathad I known the value I would have taken better care of it or something. Two, youc an't trust anyone. Really. For someoen in that warehouse to go tearing into other people's thingsb ecause they were angry about their own lives is just ridiculous. Three, what the hell is the point of UPS?

Wind Chill

2006-02-27T09:37:00.000-08:00

is a much larger factor in the city than I had ever imagined it would be. I understand cold. Alaska is cold, Antartica is cold, the American settlers were idiots to fall for the "I'll give you land if you move to Minnesota" line. But New York, while it is supposed to be cold is, more than that, WINDY. And there is a big difference. North Carolina can drop into the twenties and teens without a doubt, but rarely does the windchill push it beyond a few degrees. Here it's normal for the temperature to be 32 and the wind chill to be 12. That seems a bit unGodly, doesn't it? Or is it just me and those Southern bones?

I'm beginning to understand splitting the year between LA and New York is a wonderful option for those with the money- i.e. movie stars and Donald Trump. It makes perfect sense because who the heck wants to be here? That makes no sense. I don't want to be here right now. I enjoy cold weather, it's crisp and refreshing and definitely wakes you up, but do NOT enjoy wind chills that push it in to the negative numbers or below. That's just ridiculous. Extraordinarily ridiculous. Today is definitely a day I could use a house in Key West or Southern Cali or even Texas. Seriously. I tried to do the numbers in my head for how much it woudl cost for me to take off the winter months each year and spend them elsewhere and it comes to not good. Unless my first novel is a bestseller. So maybe i should be working on that instead of contributing to internet goo every day.

I wonder how many other people out there started a blog because they were beginning to get bored with their jobs, and one day at work realized that they could share their misery along with good things in their life, with the world. Even as I sit here I imagine thousands of others doing the same thing- pretending theyre working when actually they're typing in their diary. It's like in high school when you would write notes to your friends instead of paying attention in history or whatever. I'm sure that could explain a lot of gpas.

The longer I'm a part of the working world the more I question its validity. Humans are only here for an average of 80 years. That means that you spend more than half your life working, if you begin at 18 and end at 65 or 70. Even after retirement people are still working. My aunt retired from teaching and immediately went to work at a book company. Yes, it's only part time but it's definitely still a job. I'm reluctant to think too hard about it because the thought of this being such an essential part of your existence is kind of awful, when you t hink about it. Unless you're really out there making a difference, what are you doing? We know doctors and lawyers and teachers and clinic workers and personal trainers are making a difference, but what about the rest of us who sit and type or file all day? How are we helping a greater cause?

Maybe I'll start looking into how I am affecting my own lifespan, and understanding greater things can come if I make them happen.

When Friends Come to Visit

2006-02-25T09:24:00.000-08:00

I have friends in the city this weekend. My favorite thing about that is every one of my friends always begins by saying that they don't want to do anything too touristy. That they want to experience the "real" New York. Obviously that includes Urban Outfitters and H&M. THe funny thing about this is that I'm actually taking these things for granted at this point. I can go to those places all the time. Actually, more than that since usually I'm right beside one of hte other. The city seems to be run by these places. Clothing runs this city, in a lot of ways. It's much more important to be carrying a Coach bag than to have an actual apartment. Even the homeless people have nicer clothing than what you would think. Brands that I can't afford at this point. There's something about the status of clothing here that permeates the air.

It's difficult to explain when you don't live here. It's difficult to understand why a cashier at the Gristedes would spend her minimal paycheck on a pair of Seven jeans or Lacoste shirt, but I'm beginning to understand some of it. Movie stars of the fifties and sixties were required to sign actual contracts that stated they would always look good, that they would always be dressed to the nines with make-up and hair and wave and smile. You would never see them in their front yard picking up the newspaper in their bathrobe. Now when you look in US weekly or People you can see the stars coming from the gym in sweats or at the grocery store in a hoodie.

So we become used to living with these people, who are just that, with more popular jobs than we have. We become used to living in a magical world that doesn't seem real when you're not living in it. I'm always amazed when I go home how different it feels now. People driving in their cars to houses with yards and dogs, people mowing and washing cars and arguing over whether or not it's going to rain. Here people argue over who they see, if that guy really was Jason Bateman, if the woman with the baby was someone on the rise. Which means that when friends come to visit, it is only made more solid the kind of world you live in living in NYC. It truly is the most different experience you could ever have in the United States. I feel inspired.

And when they leave, you are left exhausted but with a renewed appreciation for things you had forgotten were really nice- a dog in a ridiculous sweater, the vendi man who knows who you, the chess match that goes on in Washington Square park nearly every weekend. It makes you more aware than ever of why you are living here instead of everywhere else.

Ring Of Fire

2006-02-24T06:34:00.000-08:00

I headed up to Broadway last night, on the tickets of one of my friends who has the best connections in this city, especially since she's only been here a few months. We went to see "Ring of Fire", sat about four rows from the stage, and listened to Johnny Cash's life in song, literally. It was wonderful.This very small cast of talented country singers who had gathered together with a very simple set and learned about how much he had absorbed through his very difficult life. They gave a small biography of him in the playbill and it talked about how much he had adored his wife. And he only lived a few months after she died, which I thought was kind of nice.

My mother called last night to tell me that one of her hometown favorites had died yesterday. Her husband died back in November and when Mama saw her, said she had never looked better (for 93). But she passed soon after. Which goes back to the connection we develop with the ones we love or the ones we grow old with. It always impresses me to hear about that, to hear and understand that love is so deep it becomes physical. Yes, her body wwas getting close to giving out and a massive stroke has more to do with the mind than heart, but it still works with everything that is full circle in this world.

Johnny Cash was very much like that. He had all kinds of problems with drinking and drugs and traveling all over the country, but in the end it came down to how he felt about June Carter Cash, and how she supported him through the roughest of times and the best, something that makes me happy for them both, that they found each other when everything else is uncertain in this world. No one guarantees that you're going to find the right person to be with for your entire life. There is no guarantee that you truly will stick it out for better or for worse,but they did. I think it gives the rest of us hope.

Star spotting? Tyne Daly, Cynthia Nixon, Nathan Lane. All coming out of their productions. I spoke to Cynthia Nixon.

Bleaders?

2006-02-23T06:38:00.000-08:00

I'm reading Julie & Julia book- about Julie someone cooking her way through the JC Mastering the Art of French COoking in a year, and blogging about it. The blog became a huge hit, and she got a book deal out of it and tons of dedicated readers and TV interviews. Which leads me to wonder about the principles of blogging. Why are we typing out so much of our personal lives on these things, sending it out into the world as if it's not private (when very often it is). Who knows who reads mine. I don't get that many comments, so I'm assuming hardly anyone, but it's an interesting concept. It's fascinating to think about why we do it. To get publicity? Most people are actually trying to get away from that. To pique the interest of someone new and maybe foreign? What do we have to blog about that's so damn important and interesting?

I started this back in August of 05, so I haven't been blogging that long, but I have read plenty of entertaining blogs. Blogs about the life of truck driver, updated about every 15 minutes. Blogs about a woman working as a partner in a law firm, though I heard somewhere that her i.d. was discovered and she was fired. Blogs about wedding planning and cleaning and going through med school. Just general blogs about people's lives. Online diaries that we feel obliged to write in on a semi-daily level and that we treat with the upmost respect. I can't go very long without writing something in mine, even if I have to rack my brain to think of something interesting I've done in New York recently. did I mention I finally saw Ground Zero? Or that I was finally going to a Broadway play tonight? Didn't think so. But I'm sure I've told plenty of stories about stepping in dog poop and not being able to flag down a cab. Or about cabbies who preferred to drive me around in circles rather than take me to my final destination.

In 4th grade, I carried my diary around with me- it was one of those cheap pleather numbers with a page for each day and a lock that inevitably would come unglued. I used it as an actual diary as well as for conversations with my best friend during classes. What happened was that one day in gym class, one of my classmates found it and he managed to read about half of it out loud to an appropriately amused audience until I finally realized what was going on and put a stop to it. I can still feel the way I felt then right now, and trust me it wasn't pretty. I yelled and screamed and cried and actually got excused from the rest of gym class so that I could go and cry in the bathroom with two of my friends to comfort me. I have always been a private person. One of the reasons I made friends so quickly when I got to college is that no one could figure out anything about me. Everything was a mystery.

Yet here I am blogging about it years later, in a place that is incredibly public and not unlike something in 1984. But here i am anyway, putting it out there "anonymously", supposedly.

Job Burn-out

2006-02-22T06:33:00.000-08:00

In Europe, most employers guarantee a month of holiday time along with all national holidays and bank holidays. They work shorter hours and weeks and yet get more done than Americans do and have time to spend 3 hours at dinner in the evenings. THey walk their children to school, take long lunches, and come back refreshed and ready to focus their time and energy again. Why don't we do this? Why am I only given an hour lunch per day and two weeks of vacation time per year? Why is our maternity leave shorter by eight to ten months than European maternity leaves? And they wonder why we suffer higher turnovers and less job satisfaction.

In the perfect world you would show up to work refreshed because you didn't have to be there until later, because you would never dream of taking your work home with you or working overtime, and because you just came off a month long holiday in the French Riviera. You would take longer Christmas breaks and when you decided to have a baby, take advantage of the full year's maternity leave that comes with that, so you would really get to know your baby and go back to work satisfied that you were making the right decisions for yourself and your baby. You would take two hour lunches on a regular basis and be there to retrieve your children after school and walk them home. You would pick up dinner from the market on the way home.

Instead I'm working a forty hour week (average) and taking one hour lunch breaks. I'm tired and burned out but can't take any vacation days right now because I want to make sure and have enough this summer when I go on vacation- for one week. I'm beginning to wonder if it's the job wearing down on me but then dont want to know because there aren't that many jobs out there for recent college grads right now and I'm lucky to have anything at all. I spend my days working myself as hard as I can, then get to the gym and home to cook dinner and take care of my little cat. I am mindless after work, able to sit in front of the TV or read awful novels before literally passing out in bed and waking up the next morning to NPR just to do it all over again. I've begun counting down the days until Friday, hoping the week will go fast enough to prevent me from having to deal with anything at all.

How do you know when it's time for a career change or when you're just tired and need a break? What are the signs that you should start hunting for other job opportunities versus sitting in an office all day waiting for something to change?