In preparation for this morning's headache

I'm on my second martini. I'm listening to the songs I downloaded from Itunes. You don't understand how upset I am about Pandora being shut down. They were informing me on so many artists that I had no idea existed. Pandora (god bless those guys) kept the songs that I "thumbs upped" and I took the list and went looking for the tunes on Itunes. Most of them weren't available. (There's something wrong with that. I'm sitting here with cash on hand to purchase, but no, for whatever reason I can't. The music industry is what happens when capitalism goes wrong.) How can they not want my money? It's gotta be the middlemen who are the fly in the ointment. Damn middlemen. I shall never be one, that's a promise.

I never write posts inebriated.Yet here I am doing it. A rare glimpse into the alcoholisation of my brain. Spouse is sitting next to me, working furiously, under enormous stress, so I can't disturb him. He's sashaying in his chair to the music I downloaded though, so happiness reigns. I wonder in the clear yet foggy light of morning if I will have the balls, cojones, nuts, boules to post this. I'd give it a 50/50 shot from this vantage point, lol.

Tomorrow I finish my spring contracts. I guess tomorrow is today if I post this. What this means is that I now have 4 hours of work per week for the next 11 weeks. I'm trying to hide it from spouse. If he sees me loafing constantly, he will be resentful. But loaf I shall. I'm reading Angels and Demons now and the 4th Harry Potter should be in my grubby little hands this weekend. I've set my sights on knitting booties and biking, so those activities should be forthcoming.

What else. Life is dullish. No big news tragedies to pontificate on, unless you count the passing of Charles Nelson Reilly. He was fun wasn't he? Gone like we all will be. I finished the 5 people you meet in heaven. Pfft. I could have written that. I felt like each "lesson" was old news. Nice try, but my life experience has informed me better. I should write a fucking book like that, or like Zen and the Art of Motorcycle maintenance. But I have no credentials. You can't write a self help book without credentials. All I've got are my experiences (like everyone else) but no middlemen to vouch for me, lol.

Okay, spouse is getting crankified. Apparently it's almost time for dinner. Another apparency seems to be that I will prepare it. Good thing I defrosted chicken breasts. Now what to do with them. I think I"ll go the shake n bake route. Mwah!

Tp update

When we bought this place last year from Pornstar, we inherited some things that he left behind in the garage. Mostly, it's crap that we have gotten rid of little by little. Do you remember the toilet paper? There are boxes and boxes of commercial sized toilet paper. Each box contains four giant rolls. We are on our third roll now, because it takes us 11 weeks to go through a roll. I made an inventory yesterday and counted 22 boxes. So let's see. 22 boxes times 4 rolls times 11 weeks. Hmmm. 968 weeks. There are 52 weeks in a year so a little over 19 year's worth of toilet paper sits in the garage.

How much would we spend on toilet paper over 19 years? By my calculations, around $1000. So I guess I should be thankful for the gift. Still, I wonder how 19 year old toilet paper is going to feel down there. Maybe time will actually soften it up. Let's hope so.

Weekend update

We watched three movies over the weekend - Babel, Borat and Shortbus. By far, we liked Shortbus best. Have you seen this film? I have a feeling it's not the kind of thing you'll find at Blockbuster or Walmart because it's full of evil, evil sex. Before we watched it, I asked our friend Dan what it was about. He said, "It's about a sex therapist and a gay couple." And I have to say that he was right. However, it was so much more. The best way that I can put it is that it was raunchy, yet deep.

Yesterday, after a marvelous breakfast outside at the marina with mother in-law, we hit the garden centers of HomeDepot and its competitors. It's get-the-garden-together weekend and we did just that. I've got rosemary, thyme, oregano, mint and something else I've already forgotten. You know the pointsettia that you buy for Christmastime from the supermarket? Yeah, ours never died. So I put it into a bigger pot. It'll probably die now, lol . I'm hoping it lives to see another Christmas.

Saturday night we barbequed horse and kangaroo. I had nothing to do with these purchases. I did eat them though and thought, "why didn't we just get a regular steak?" I did have something to do with the dessert. Earlier in the day, I whipped up a batch of banana-nut bread and banana-walnut ice cream. A warm slice of the former topped by a scoop of the latter was divine after dinner. Even so, my innards weren't so thrilled with the meat and banana overload.

Rowling on the brain

I keep dreaming I'm at Hogwarts. Remember how I mentioned that I couldn't let go into the Harry Potter books? That as an adult, I could appreciate how thrilling the stories would have been if I had read them as a child, but couldn't access that same abandon with my adult brain? Well, I guess I cracked that barrier. I devoured Goblet of Fire, so now I have read 4 Harry Potters in a row.

Last night I was in the castle and walking around the halls marveling, "The people really do move and wave in the pictures! It's real. This place is real." I saw Snape at the end of the hall and ran the other way and passed by a classroom. Hagrid was teaching. I can't remember anything after that.

The other night I was being chased by a dragon.

So I guess I have "let go" somewhat into the story, lol. I can't wait to get down to the library to get the next one (which is also the movie coming out, oh boy) and then the next, and then just about the time the last book is released, I'll have read all the preceding books.

This makes me a geek, doesn't it?

Half-assed Snippets

* Vitamin C seemed to help me kick it. I took many times the recommeded portion. The only residue is a rattle in my lungs and periodic expectoration.

* Across the street, there was a Harveys (Like Burger King). We ate there once and it was just horrible. I threw away my half-eaten hamburger and did not return. Then they went out of business and auctioned off the equipment. The place was gutted, and I was oh so hoping for a Starbucks et al, but no, it's going to be a pet supply store.

* I've decided I want a mini-daschund as the next dog. But we have to wait at least a year after Sara croaks as per spouse's edict.

* Pandora was shut down in Canada. (This really, really sucks.)

* Here's a face that made me laugh out loud. It's mine of course.

* I was thinking about how the substances that are abundant on Earth are necessities for us. Sunlight, water, various minerals, salt. And that those things that are quite rare are poisonous. Then I thought I was probably wrong, I really don't know nearly enough to make an assessment.

* This last picture I recall quite well. I was 11 for Easter 1977, and the neighbor's great dane had attacked my scalp when I hugged him. This necessitated a hospital visit and a week of slowly diminishing pain. I had to wear this for a week - not a happy Ricky.

This n that

So I've got this rental car see. And I'm learning what it's like to drive around this city. You know what? It's LA all over again. Clogged roads, and amazingly aggressive driving. I find myself shouting "Hey, you're endangering my life!" every few minutes as those who know these streets well dart in and out of lanes and cut people off at will. My favorite is the jump in front of you and slam on the brakes - honestly, what is wrong with people? (Don't they know I'm in a RENTAL car!?)

American Idol is over. For me it was over when Melinda got booted, but Jordin got me choked up as she sang through tears after being crowned the winner. In the car I listen to talk radio, and there was a caller yesterday that pronounced, "American Idol is for stupid idiots." The host replied, "Well, I guess my daughter and my mother are stupid idiots then." Actually, the host was pretty good at calling people stupid idiots himself without out and out saying it. This is the problem with "pointed" or "biased" programming. If you're not on board with the host's views, you are spoken to patronizingly as though you were an idiot. The same goes for blogs. If it's a conservative or liberal blog, there's a lot of denouncing, but very little "I see your point," and "that's interesting, I hadn't thought about it that way." More often, it's "you're illiterate" or "you just don't get it." This is not meaningful or edifying. This is closed-mindedness.

A song for Steve Sherman

I once had a boss named Steve Sherman. Must have been about 1991. He was an odd little man, if he were an actor, he'd have been cast as the quirky balding guy, not really like George from Seinfeld, but more like that guy from My Dinner with André. I thought he was a little too much at times with his Napoleon complex, but we got along anyway, and eventually, I found myself hanging out some nights at his place smoking a joint. He was someone I would have never chosen as a friend, but whom I came to respect and whose company I eventually enjoyed. His fingernails were always impeccable.

I remember the time he was most furious with me. As the manager of the dining room at the Ritz Carlton, he had the right to sit down with anything from the menu at the end of the night. We employees were limited to the cafeteria foodstuffs, which, although arguably edible, could not compare to the chef in the dining room working on getting his Michelin star. Steve had us well trained to set his table up at the end of the night so that he could dine while we ran around closing up shop. It was on one of these evenings that I unscrewed the salt shaker at his table and watched from the corner of my eye as he poured a mountain of salt onto his filet mignon. Enraged, he shouted,"Who did this!" And ran around accosting everyone, who once having seen the mound of salt on the steak, had melted into giggling hysterics. I finally admitted through tears that I had done it. He sent me home and took away a shift to punish me. He had apparently forgotten the adage - those who tease you, love you.

At our one year anniversary of opening, he came to work very excited. Before we opened in the evening, we had line-up, where Steve inspected our uniforms, hygiene and equipment. This night he presented each of us with an engraved wine opener. "Only the best for my staff," he announced and explained that these wine openers were top of the line, guaranteed for life. Mine said "Richard". It is the only meaningful gift I have ever received from a boss. Ever.

Shortly after that night, Steve was offered a better position at a competing hotel and left the Ritz. I still hung out at his house sometimes and caught up on how his "new life" at the Biltmore was going. He seemed right proud of his position and I was truly happy for the guy.

A month later, Steve was killed in an auto accident as he drove home from work late at night. A drunk driver plowed into him and took his life. It was quite a shock, the man was barely thirty. I went to the funeral and at the entrance there was a poster with lots of pictures of him from his cut-short life. I took one look at it and started crying. And I couldn't stop. Sobbing and crying so much that I drew stares from others. I didn't understand what had come over me. For the next hour during the service, I cried continually. It was the grief that catches you off guard. I know I was caught off guard.

Over the years, I have cherished that wine opener. I keep it way in back of the utility drawer so I always know where it is and only use it when I have a nice bottle of wine to open. Every time I do use it, I think of Steve (thanks Steve!), his too short life and his funeral. I imagine how he would have been now, puffed up and executive like, and pretend that maybe he really didn't die at all. Last week, I couldn't fine the cheapy wine opener, so I took along the Steve Sherman corkscrew so that we might enjoy some wine in our New York hotel room.

And wouldn't you know it, that opener was in my bag. The bag that was stolen in Times Square.

Goodbye Steve Sherman, I'm really going to miss you now.

Orificial

Well the reporter came yesterday to interview me on the strike, which began at midnight last night. You can see the spot here. I'm off to rent a car this morning, as I will have no way of getting to my worksites without one. Also, I am going to keep my eye out for a junker to keep in the garage. You know, a piece of shit $500 car that runs, and can get me out of jams like this. Okay maybe a bit more than $500. It's really sad that even in a town like this, a car is necessary.

The virus rages. Spouse brought me home the "anti-viral" kleenex. I had requested the "aloe lotion" kleenex, but he couldn't find it. I don't really get the anti-viral kleenex. Am I supposed to cram it in all my orifices? (I will admit that I crammed it way in my nose and wiped my throat with it) Or is it to protect others when they toss your used tissues? (I don't know about you, but I go out of my way to avoid touching others' used tissues. ) At least I've got a low stress day. Go rent car, read Harry Potter (I got Goblet of Fire from the library) and go have sushi this evening with students as our final class. I'm dreaming of giant wasabi globs to open my nasal cavity. Current nasal cavity condition - air cannot be drawn through.

What else? Spouse has the day off to supervise the exterior door(s) installation at the triplex. I'm going to give him the camera today to get before and after pics. It better be stunning for seven thousand dollars is all I can say. Okay, this post is dwindling, much like the bank account. Ta ta for now.

Blogiversary etc.

I forgot my own blogiversary. Two years! (well at this point it's two years and two days) The great thing about this (for me) is that I can go back and see what was happening one year ago, and now two years ago too! Sometimes I check back and think, "It seems like this was just a couple weeks ago." The older the mind, the faster time slips through it.

Both spouse and I came down with colds yesterday. And when I say came down with, I really mean slugged and pummeled by. Something else we brought back from New York I imagine.

You know how the universe likes to play jokes on people? Yeah, well, here I am snotty and feverish, coughing and moany, and today(TODAY) a reporter from the local TV station is coming to interview me about the strike. The transit strike is set to begin tomorrow. The essential services council has deemed that "rush hour" service will still be in effect. The problem with that is that I need to travel around town during the day to get to my classes. So I reserved a car. This strike will cost me 1% of my annual pay for each week it drags on. This infuriates me as I have to take a pay cut in order for these (well paid, don't let anyone fool you) guys to get a pay raise. I'll let you know how it turns out.

Finally, Mom sent an old photo of me as a 2 and a half year old. She claims this was her first inkling as to my eventual orientation. I can't imagine why, lol.

The last New York post

We stayed at the Hudson Hotel in New York. You may have seen the bar while watching Sex and the City, as they filmed in there a few times. The rooms are very small, but have a lot of nice touches. There is one problem with the bathroom however, and, well, just watch:

New York goodness

We arrived Saturday night at 9:30 (over an hour and a half late), took the subway to our hotel and checked in. Then we headed out to Farmboyz place. I did not bring my camera, but you can see a group shot over here. The New York boys whisked us off to the Eagle, where we saw some of the local customs. I wish we'd been able to see more of these guys but with 11 family members in town, it just wasn't going to happen.

I don't have any pictures of the second day as my camera broke. Well it was broken until I decided to give it a big whack that evening (I figured what the hell, I'm going to have to buy a new one anyway) and it magically started working again. Here we are on the third day, taking the Staten Island Ferry across New York harbor.

I took 120 photos. I'd say 90 of them are of buildings and architecture. I could have walked around gawking for weeks.

I don't know about you, but it seemed like God got into this picture. It's Trinity Church, just near ground zero.

Crossing the Brooklyn Bridge on foot, you get some awesome Manhattan views.

This again, from the ferry ride.

At night, we dined and went to the theatre. We saw both Wicked and Mamma Mia. Wicked was a stunningly beautiful show. I would see it again. The folks treated us to an unbelievable gastronomic experience at Nobu 57. It's hard to describe, so let's just say it's Disneyland for Foodies. A cool grand for dinner for 4.

Other high points: picnicking in Central Park, touring CBS studios (mom's got a friend who works there), discovering Century 21 (a discount department store), happening into a comedy show one night, and loads of alcohol induced fun.

Luckily, the theft occurred on our last day there, so that was the only "bad" day. Here, I put together a little collage for the trip. Tomorrow, I'll give you a video tour of our hotel room.

Today the bad, tomorrow the good

Do you want to know what torture is? Sitting on a train for 13 hours to travel 300 miles. Honestly, you could make the round trip in a car for less than 13 hours. Our round trip on Amtrak (spoken bit-ter-ly) took 24 hours. As an added bonus, I had to pay my return ticket twice since my bag was ripped off during the trip, my bag which contained my train ticket and passport.

Okay, it's my own fault it was stolen. I had just picked up half price tickets for Mamma Mia in Times Square and stopped to grab a breakfast sandwich and diet coke at Mickey D's. I was so thirsty that I got up from my table to get a refill and when I got back to the table 30 seconds later, my bag was gone. As I was filing the police report at the local precinct, the agent looked at me as I explained and with incredulity asked, "You left your bag unattended?" I whined, "For 30 seconds! okay I'm an idiot." All she murmured at that was, "Mm-hmm."

So this morning I'm trying to get all the shit together to go down to the consulate to report the stolen passport and apply for a new one which I need before July to go to California. I'll handle that and then I'll get to downloading pics and whatnot. We really did have a blast, but that will have to wait til tomorrow.

Blogapalooza

First off, a rare HNT for you. I was trying to get a little sun yesterday afternoon so I don't blind everyone in New York.

Next up, we've got my annual Spring has Sprung video.



Then there's the tarot card doohickey everyone's doing. Here's mine. I particularly identify with the second to last sentence.

You are The Sun

Happiness, Content, Joy.

The meanings for the Sun are fairly simple and consistent.

Young, healthy, new, fresh. The brain is working, things that were muddled come clear, everything falls into place, and everything seems to go your way.

The Sun is ruled by the Sun, of course. This is the light that comes after the long dark night, Apollo to the Moon's Diana. A positive card, it promises you your day in the sun. Glory, gain, triumph, pleasure, truth, success. As the moon symbolized inspiration from the unconscious, from dreams, this card symbolizes discoveries made fully consciousness and wide awake. You have an understanding and enjoyment of science and math, beautifully constructed music, carefully reasoned philosophy. It is a card of intellect, clarity of mind, and feelings of youthful energy.

What Tarot Card are You?
Take the Test to Find Out.

And with that, I will close for the week. Tomorrow is a madhouse of work and trip preparation, and we part Saturday morning by train for the big apple. I'll see y'all next Friday with tales from our travels. Peace!

This n that

Does it look like I have "free cigarettes" stamped on my forehead? Geez, I sat for 10 minutes outside the library to enjoy a smoke in the sun (it was close to 80 degrees yesterday) and six, count 'em six strangers approached me for cigs. Two of them offered to buy a cigarette and were clearly disturbed when I said, "No." Are there this many smokers out there who bum off strangers? I don't want to "sell" them either as I'm pretty sure it's illegal and anyway buy a damn pack if you smoke!

At the library, I found the second and third Harry Potter books as well as "The 5 People You Meet in Heaven". (though this one is in French, they were out of the English copies) I hope it's enough for the 20 hours of trainride to and from New York.

I'd blather on, but I've got an early class today. So I'll leave you with another sunset pic. This one from two days ago shows a rare phenomenon - a sun pillar. This happens when the light passes through ice crystals. The ice crystals have to be flat octagonal shapes and all tilted the same way for this to occur. The sun is actually below the horizon here. Even Serge was intrigued.

When janitors rule

Here we go again. A strike has been called for May 22nd which will shut down the public transportation system up here. Once again, it is the janitorial workers who will cause it. 2000 floor moppers have the power to disrupt a system that transports a million people a day. 2000 floor moppers who currently make $22-$25 an hour. From what I can tell, the union and the city are about 2 % away from agreement on a contract. ( the city is offering 8% over 5 years, the union wants 6% in three years.) It looks like the city is offering more, but since it's over a period of 5 years, the union is balking.

I watched one of these guys mopping the metro station floor yesterday. I've never seen anyone move so slowly. It was difficult for me to suppress my rage. I've got nothing against a fair wage, but ANYONE can do that job, so why is it that they are guaranteed work for life at a constantly increasing wage? And why do they have the power to shut down a very important part of the economic engine up here? I'm sorry, but that's too much power.

The moment I heard the news yesterday, I reserved a car in case they can't avert the strike. Last time they struck, I lost $500 from lost work. This time, it'll just be the $200 for the rental car.

Bee panic

I saw two different kinds of bees yesterday. I had just read in the paper/heard on the news/saw on the internet Einstein's famous (or at least now it is) prediction that if the bees go, we've only got four years left. Apparently some mysterious agent is causing colonies to collapse, and the media is only too happy to start "the sky is falling" machine. Truth be told, their mesmerizing chant was working its charms on me as I was sitting on the patio soaking up a bit of sun yesterday. "Could this be how it ends? Wait. Isn't there always somebody crying "it's the end of the world"? Still, no bees means no more food for animals to eat because the plants need pollination to procreate." And then a big black and yellow bumblebee floated by. A few minutes later, a little regular bee inspected a newly laid sara dump.

After a nice brunch at the diner down the street, we got home and there was a message from one of the tenants at the other building. Apparently, the big bumblebees are building a hive under the deck. They did this last year and we just gave them room, but now there's two girls living in our old place, and they are not really the kind of girls who can hang with the "bumble bee hive on your patio" thing.

I wouldn't worry too too much about the imminent demise of bees, the ones on the tenants' patio notwithstanding.

Sunset , caribou and Fockers

This was sunset yesterday. We barbequed caribou that our friend Dan brought over. That was the first time I've eaten caribou. I liked it. It has a tanginess like liver, but not too, too.

It just kept getting better and I left the table several times to take pictures of the sky as it morphed from gray to pink to purple. You're lucky I'm only posting three. (Click for ginormous versions.)

After our guest left (or maybe he was the chef) we turned on Meet the Fockers. I'm sorry but the most important funny bit in that movie is the word Asshole, but since it was on broadcast tv, they had to cut everyone to say ass. Excuse me, but if a baby's first word is "ass", that might make a few oldsters chuckle. However, if baby's first word is "asshole", well, now we're in comedy territory (which is how the movie is written). They could have even kept it funny if they had dubbed it to "anus". But no, it was like, oh I don't know, taking out the Baby Ruth scene in Caddyshack.

Vacuuming meditation

Yesterday, I came home and decided to clean the house so I wouldn't have to do it on the weekend. I haven't vacuumed in three weeks and the balls of Sara's hair were approaching melon girth. With the music blasting, I danced around sucking them all up. It occurred to me that my adult habits are a reflection of my childhood. Well a reverse reflection (which is what a reflection is anyway, when you look in the mirror, you're not seeing what everyone sees looking directly at you) anyway. I realized that everything I had to do as a child, I'm loathe to do now.

Like cleaning my room. Taking out the trash. Doing the dishes. These were my chores to earn my allowance. I didn't have to vacuum though, so of course, now, I vacuum.

Then I started wondering what other things I'm opposite of as I was then. (Something's wrong with that sentence but I can't discern what.) I know I had to wear underwear when I was young. Giggle. Oh, and I had to take a shower every day. (Except when I was little and it was once a week. Those were the days.) Snicker. As I was sucking up the dust bunnies under the bed, I started questioning if I do things now I was forbidden to do then.

Let's see. I wasn't allowed to swear. I couldn't eat dessert first. (What a crock. Dessert is so much more satisfying if consumed first. After the meal, you're full, so the dessert is less delectable. Mom was right though, it could spoil your meal. ) I couldn't watch TV in the evening. And of course I couldn't smoke, drink and have sex. I was just about finished as I smiled, satisfied for having found a little key to my personality, and maybe that of many others.

We're rebels against the prison of our upbringing.

Then I thought, whew, I stink, and took a shower.

Snippets

* The astrologist predicts the future from the movements of the planets. The scientist predicts the future movement of the planets. Scientists are far more successful in their endeavor.

* Once, I thought, go into a gaybar and see a room full of broken people. (me included) But then I realized, go into ANY bar.....

* Did you see the Diamond-tini offered by the Ritz Carlton Tokyo? The martini (prepared tableside of course) is garnished with a 1.06 carat diamond. 15 thousand bucks. I can't decide if I'm more intrigued or disgusted.

* The subway system inaugurated three new stations last week. I've had a chance to see only one so far. Here's a collage of the De la Concorde station:

* Money only brings happiness if you're already happy.

* I used to have trouble getting up in the morning. Now I have trouble staying up at night.

* The pope continues to maintain that evolution is bunk. Once again, (and I know I'm inviting chastising) it looks like faith is stupidity chosen.

* Sitting on a park bench in Square Victoria yesterday, I looked down and noticed a message scrawled on the bench. It made me laugh. (There's a barely legible retort beneath: and proud of it you homeless piece of shit.) Prejudice is simply everywhere it seems.

* There was a Lamborghini convertible (with hideous neon orange seats I might add) parked in front of the W hotel yesterday. A crowd of men assembled, oohing and aahing over the overpriced heap. One of them said, "Man, this is the ultimate chick magnet." I laughed and thought, "No, it's clearly a dude magnet."

Chatter

I finished up one of my fave classes this week. We went out to lunch for the last class and I suggested a photo as a souvenir of our time together. I thought the pic came out great.

It has been a crazy work week and I don't have much time. That's why I did the fridge pic yesterday. The correct answers were found by many. Only one found the onion (cut in half and wrapped with plastic wrap on the top shelf.) The goat cheese is under the mozzarella (many thought it was the second tub of cream cheese) and many people spotted the trout under the pizza. Good job! Thanks for reminding me to pull out more frozen OJ.

Last night, we went to see the Cirque du Soleil. It was fab. I posted a mini- review over here.

A peek inside

Here's a rather intimate photo. The current interior of the fridge, sans the door's contents. (The door has all the jars of dressing, condiments, and whatnot.) I can't think of any interesting remarks about the contents of the fridge. That would be your job. Also, see if you can spot the goat cheese, onion, and mushrooms. They are all clearly visible. Bonus if you can spot the smoked trout. (Not to be confused with the two packs of smoked meat at the bottom right corner.)

The I got nothin' jive

I have no funny stories
No good ones to tell
The muse is on vacation
Dad blam her to hell

And so I sit intently
Staring at the screen
Pondering what I've done
And thinking of where I've been

Since yesterday I assure you
Little has come to pass
A little of this and a little of that
And a lot of sitting on my ass

The next two days are scary
Much have I to do
Places to go and people to see
And hopefully something new

Today I feel kinda geeky
Hence the corny rhyme
I do hope you'll forgive me
And come back another time.

Chorus

I got nothin'
I got nothin'
I got nothin' so I'm singing this song to you.