Start Your Weekend Off with Photos from This Week in NYC

I was just in the shower when dudes with a vacuum showed up to vacuum my apartment to rid the floors of the final remnants of sodium bicarbonate. I love that they are doing this because I don't own a vacuum cleaner.

Awkward, though.

Now two men are vacuuming my floor while I sit here watching them. I suppose I could leave, but my inner cynic doesn't trust them with everything I own.

So, dear readers, you get to enjoy my killing time! Here are some photos I took this week:

D and I couldn't get into International Short Films at the MOMA, so we ended up walking around the city to enjoy the beautiful weather on Wednesday night.



D likes the street lamps because they remind him of the alien on the War of the Worlds poster.





D said "Let's take the bus so we can see New York City!" These are a couple photos from my first NYC bus ride.





My company participated in the JPMorganChasedCharityRace in Central Park last night. I went there to be "supportive girlfriend" rather than "supportive employee." I didn't even walk the race. Instead, I eagerly awaited D at the finish line. D didn't win, but he came in like 17th out of 15,000 people! I was thrilled. He was not. It is interesting how neither of us think that what we do well at things or perform well enough, and how we're both constantly trying to convince the other that they've done a great job. With this particular issue, I felt like I had the hard data and statistics to back up D's performance, but he still wasn't having it. Either way, I am "proud girlfriend" today and realize that I forgot how powerful, ahem, post-sports pheremones can be.



Prior to the race, I thought "This will show me what being a sports photographer is like! Maybe when I grow up I can be a sports photographer! D will be so excited that I will be showing an interest in racing sports!"



I soon realized that I had no interest in the race itself after D crossed the finish line. I wonder why I don't have a competitive bone in my body. I feel like I may be the only person on the planet who finds competitve sports offensive.



When the 10th place runner crossed the finish line, the woman next to me exclaimed "He came in 10th! That means he gets the raise!" I can't believe that sports prowess is being rewarded in the workplace. This race isn't about prestige, its about charity. It's not like "Whatever company the first place runner works for is the coolest company in Manhattan!" No. Why should someone get a raise, at work, because they can run fast? Freaking ridiculous. I was mortified. I wanted to be like "Right, and the woman with the four kids at home who couldn't run this race because she had to go cook them dinner should get a raise for being an awesome single mother."



Anyway, I digress. I decided as I was snapping random photos (incidentally, at random, I managed to capture the 3rd, 4th, and 5th place runners from my company in group shots) that maybe I should be a post-sports photographer.



I really like all of these photos of people looking bizarre and in agony. I had far too much fun last night scanning the crowds for runners who were making weird faces.



For example: the guy in the background of this photo looks like he wants to kill the guy in the foreground. Awesome!



D and I went back to our company tent where everyone was like "D, you're our pride and joy! You are amazing! You are the best! WOW! ZOWIE!!!! You came in two minutes ahead of your time last year! YAY!" I was waiting for them to say "We're going to give you a $20,000 raise for being athletic even though that is entirely irrelevant to how you do your job!" It is weird to feel like "the girlfriend" amongst people you see every day. This is something that constantly bothers me. Feeling awkward (as did D, which is one of the reasons I love him), I stepped away and called M to feel like I exist.



When M got off the phone to eat dinner, I said "D, I really need to get out of here. This is weird." He said "I know." Overambitious D (who the night before said "We should go to this tomorrow - we will leave immediately after the race!" and I didn't say "Dude, you're going to be sweaty and tired and dying and it's an hour from the city and ok whatever you want but I think this is overambitious") and I headed to Prospect Park in Brooklyn to see/hear William Kentridge films. It took us forever to get there because the trains were being uncooperative. When we got there we learned that there was a suggested donation (wtf?) and that it was about a million times more crowded that we'd anticipated. We sat down on the grass and couldn't see because people were standing in front of us. D was tired and ruined from the race, so we ended up leaving about 20 minutes after we got there. I was slightly disappointed that D was a wreck, because there was an awesome playground and not a child around to use it.



The pheremones were wasted, and I returned home alone to my post-sports photos.

Vegetables

I am offended that Avirl Lavigne is a vegetarian.

I am voting for Damon Albarn .

I know you are all tempted to vote for Casey Kasem, but please, do not.

Short Cuts

As I walked down 8th Street last night, holding D's hand, I nearly bumped into a girl who was holding Matthew Modine's hand!

Gasp.

"Oh my god! That was Matthew Modine!" I said to D, who quickly turned around and tried to get a look. He had missed him. I hate the short millisecond celebrity sighting that cannot be shared.

"What did he look like?" he asked.

I explained that he was wearing a white t-shirt, shorts, and a white baseball cap that was only mostly covering his terribly bleached hair.

"Wow. Matthew Modine. Man."

I had such a crush on Matthew Modine. When I was a medical-school bound pre-teen, I watched Gross Anatomy repetitively. I enjoyed watching Matthew Modine transform into a hot but sensitive medical student, and imagined myself as the future Mrs. Dr. Modine.

When we got back to D's apartment after wandering the city aimlessly for hours in order to enjoy the nice weather and make up for being shut out of sold-out MOMA short films, I said "You know, it's weird. If Matthew Modine had wanted to trade, I'd have said no."

It wasn't the most articulate compliment. What I'd meant to say was "I used to have such a crush on Matthew Modine, but now that I am with you, I have no interest in him. If he'd said 'Swap - D can have my girlfriend and I'll take you,' I'd have been like 'No way, Matthew Modine! I have D now! I don't need to think about you in the 'Memphis Belle' and salivate any more! Take that, Matthew Modine."

"You wouldn't have traded what?"

"I'm saying that I'd have to think about it if he offered me $1,000,000 to sleep with him. Because, well, you're awesome."

D said "Huh. He's pretty awesome, though. You really don't think his Modine-itude could sway you?"

No, D, it is precisely because you say things like "Modine-itude" that I will never sleep with Matthew Modine.

Because, really, Matthew Modine was about to say "Dude, let me take your girlfriend!" but we were walking too fast.

Matthew Modine would never say cute things like "Modine-itude."

Or, maybe its just because I am a grown up now and don't have crushes on celebrities.

Right.

This all would have gone down differently had we encountered Christian Bale on the street, because right now D would be saying "I thought you said he was giving you a million dollars to sleep with him! Where's the money? What are we going to do with all that money? This is awesome!" and I'd be saying "Oh, well, actually, ummm, right. Remember that million dollars? Yeah. I made that up," and D would say "Oh, ok, cool."

So yeah.

Celebrity Sighting: Matthew Modine With Bad Hair.

Aweshummmmm.

Too Short For Short Hair

SM and I had nice, delirious conversations last night. He visited again in order "to get as much sleep as possible" before he goes on tour and has to indulge radio audiences and bar staff and bands he doesn't like.

I played some of my new music for him, and in response to one song, he said "What were you thinking of when you wrote this song?" "Content-wise?" "No, what song were you thinking of?" I said "I wasn't thinking about any song." "Just listen..." he said.

We listened, and I still had no idea what he was talking about.

SM has an amazing ability to be harsh and critical about my music without my feeling sensitive. I love people who have the innate ability to be purely constructive.

He said "You know? That Radiohead song? From The Bends?"

I quickly abandoned My Mundane Life in Song and scrolled through Radiohead songs on my Ipod until we found the song in question.

"Shit," I murmered, and was immediately thrust back into the existential crisis involving familiarity.

It's the same chord progression. Fine. This happens. But. Do I only think things I write sound good because I've heard them before?

And, back to a topic from the earlier post, is it the same with people? Are we only drawn to people because they remind us of something/someone else? Is everything we like/do based on familiarity?

SM thinks its all about familiarity. Regularity. "Everyone does this," he explained, and relayed an anecdote about his current band that threw me into convulsive fits of laughter.

But.

Am I unable to write anything new because things I haven't heard before seem wrong to me?

I am happy, at least, that I ripped off a short Radiohead chord progression, since I still get goosebumps every time I hear any melancholy Radiohead song. It would have been tragic if I'd, for example, accidentally rewritten an Avril Lavigne song.

SM said "Knowing this will help your songwriting."

Yes, but knowing this may also stop my songwriting.

I don't know. I am frazzled and crazed at work and someone I work with has started calling me "Daria."

And then on Monday....

... I walked into work and my computer was dead.

It had a black screen. Whenever I did things that usually help, such as turn it off and then back on, it did this weird sort-of-black screen thing and then said "Insert System Disk to Reconfigure."

I emailed the appropriate people from Bench Buddy's computer. A dude appeared a few hours later, looked at the computer, and said "I am just going to take this away."

Sniff.

He took the body away and I began to weep for Lost Lego People and things I hadn't backed up on the server. Most of my science was saved, but I lost all of my links to random blogs as well as some science programs that require licenses that are going to take a while to reinstall. This is not good. I can't do my work very efficiently.

I am distressed. I've lost a computer at almost every job I've had and usually they save some sort of image of the desktop or history or something. Not here. No. "It's dead" and they take it away without even trying to revive it.

I have been very efficient at the bench throughout all of this, which is good because I am getting slammed at work. I am caught up on projects and have determined that my identity has not been stolen after talking to the IRS, and have determined that I do not owe an additional $1200 in medical bills on top of what I already owe. Now all I have to do is receive my security deposit and I will be a happy girl.

I am going to write out experiments now and not figure out what primers to use for sequencing because all of my files were on my former desktop, and even if I had them, I couldn't read them because I no longer have the extremely priveleged license to do so.

The Weekend Looked Like This....

The weekend was:

Drinks on Bench Buddy's roof, followed by much drunkenness and inadvertent honesty and feeling as though I actually have friends. We went to see The Forms at Lit and I was unimpressed. R was far more unimpressed than I was, to the point where he and Bench Buddy fought. I have never seen Bench Buddy so giddy with delight, which is why I didn't feel like I had to explain how/why I thought it sucked. I just said "Wasn't my scene, sorry."

Saturday was walking in Manhattan. On my way to Eyebeam I saw a truck unloading tropical-looking trees that were "for rent." Eyebeam itself was, well, yeah. Perhaps I don't really care what a color sounds like. I spent my time there either tripping or feeling elated that I didn't bring my parents there last weekend.

Next was the Comic Con. I met E there to see the costume contest, which was adorable (I clapped loudest for The Ghostbusters, who ended up winning, due to authenticity and effort!; the little Anakin kid was, however, the cutest thing ever but I didn't vote for him because I felt that he must have been being exploited by his parents). Aerosith was a disappointment. Prior to their set, I thought "It's going to be really impressive to see people play instruments while in costume!" Apparently that would have been too impressive, since they didn't actually play instruments. They put on a tape and pretended to play. How middle school lip-sync contest of them! Not even, since they were wearing masks.

I then headed to Macy's, where I purchased a dress for The Argentina Wedding! Woo hoo. I did not, however, purchase a wrap since wraps apparently cost more than dresses. I'll just freeze.

I then went home and got 14 hours of sleep.

Sunday was comprised of repeated attempts to go to the MOMA for the Lee Friedlander exhibit that were foiled by my mood or by phone calls. Both the mood and phone calls needed to be dealt with, so the wasted day was worth it. I still haven't caught up on all phone calls, but progress is being made.

SM arrived on Sunday night and we went out and said things like "I forgot how you are..." and "You've changed... and it's good." I drank watermelon martinis with actual pieces of watermelon in them and was feeling hap py until the following morning. D met us and I witnessed his being nervous for the first time ever. It was endearing, and it is good that yet another friend approves.

Which brings me to the week, which I will write about shortly...

What if Christian Slater Was Batman Instead?

Date: 6.19.05
Style: Cheesy and Sounds Like Every Other Song On This Blog!



Description:

I had an hour to kill yesterday while waiting for my friend SM (from MA!) to arrive at my apartment. I thought "What better way to kill time than to write a song about Christian Bale!?"

It's terrible. It's my first attempt at recording piano (no keyboard anymore - sniff sniff) so pardon the hissing in the background. I had to layer 4 piano tracks on top of one another in order to get enough volume to actually hear it.

The song itself is an abomination. But, who can resist a song about Christian Bale?

Lyrics:

Ever since the days of Disney musicals
In which you sold newspapers
You were young, you were misguided,
I was there, I was excited

And now you're Batman

I was there when you were swing dancing, you were a Nazi
And all the girls they were talking about that guy from Dead Poets Society
But I couldn't stop talking about you
I searched for a poster everywhere I went
Just like Gleaming the Cube
I couldn't find either but who cares
Who are those girls talking about now

They're talkin' bout Batman

The critics say you're the best
You'll save the franchise
And then you'll save all of us from Dukes of Hazard
And things like Episode III
The first two hours sucked
But I really liked the last fight
I was psyched when Natalie Portman died
And now I won't have to see it twice

Because I can see Batman

You can chase me down the stairs with a chainsaw any time of day
I'd be your girlfriend if you weighed only 128

I've been there through thick and thin
I even sat through Little Women
I'll be faithful to you Christian

Two decades of evolving fantasies
And now I can think of you as Batman

You're hot as Batman

Friday! Happy!

R was just in our bay and conversation turned to Karate Kid. R said "Yeah, and Hillary Swank was in Karate Kid 3."

Bench Buddy and I quickly jumped on him and said "No! That was The Next Karate Kid. Karate Kid 3 was a different movie entirely."

R looked at us in horror. Had he possibly missed a Karate Kid? Bench Buddy quickly and impressively recounted the entire plot of Karate Kid 3.

R said "The craziest thing is that Pat Morita was in it."

I said "Why is that crazy?"

Bench Buddy said "What else would Pat Morita be in?"

I said "A Happy Days movie? That would rule."

R, instantly consumed by venom, said "No movie of a TV show should ever be made ever again!"

Bench Buddy, without missing a beat said, "Yeah, but what would think of a Saved By The Bell movie?"

R lit up and said "Yeah, I guess that would be awesome."

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I was on the train this morning and there was an ad for the Bronx Zoo, and the ad said something like "Now your kids can ride giant bugs!" and showed a little girl riding a giant grasshopper on a carousel.

I am totally freaked out.

More like "Now your kids can get really freaked out by gigantic hideous bugs!"

Seriously. I can't think of anything more horrifying.

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I still have a pet peeve about people who press elevator buttons after they've clearly already been pressed.

What is more annoying is when like 20 people are in the lobby waiting for an elevator and somebody comes and thinks that if they press the button 100 times really quickly and with anger that they will be able to summon the elevator in a way that nobody else could.

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I had karaoke dreams last night. Sigh. I dreamt about Sid from Sid Karaoke. I need to do karaoke soon. Maybe when I am in Boston....

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It's Friday. I am so happy. This weekend is going to rule. I am free this weekend of visitors and boyfriend, so I will see galleries and go to the Comic Con to see Aerosith and watch movies and clean my apartment in anticipation of visitors and get lots of sleep. Tonight I will drink on Bench Buddy's roof, looking cute with new purple glasses with pink rhinestones, after checking out the Mr. T exhibit.

Have a nice weekend!

Do Not Eat at the Tick Tock Diner

Please. Do not eat there.

D and I intended to meet D's friend M at a diner last night prior to seeing Batman Begins.

D said "Yeah, you know, I'm getting there at 6:00. M's getting there whenever, so, you know, just get there whenever."

D called at 6:00 and said "Don't go to that diner. There's filming going on and it doesn't look like they have a bar. I'm going to walk around and find somewhere else to eat."

I left work at about 6:15 and went home to grab my hoodie, since it was winter yesterday. I called D who said "We're at the Tick Tock Diner, on the northwest side of 34th and 8th."

Word.

By the time I arrived, D and M had already had drinks and inhaled mozzeralla sticks.

I looked at the menu and decided what I wanted. Fifteen minutes passed and still no waiter. I was getting slightly concerned because I wanted good seats for Batman.

The waiter finally appeared and said "Can I get you anything else?"

We were like "Well, we'd like to order our dinner."

"Oh, right."

"I'd like the Santa Fe omelette," I said, and was met with a look indicating that suddenly I had seven heads.

"The Santa Fe omelette?" I repeated.

Still a blank stare.

I pointed to it on the menu. He shook his head in disbelief and wrote it down. He then said "What toast would you like?"

"What kind do you have?"

"Toast."

"Yeah, but what do you have?"

"All kinds of toast," very judgmentally.

"OK. Well, do you have raisin?"

"No."

"What do you have?"

"You know, toast."

"What kinds do you have?"

All confused "White? Rye?"

"I'll just have white."

Fine.

The food didn't come for a while and we started to get concerned again.

The waiter reappeared and said "Oh, I lost your order. I just don't know where it is. Can you give it to me again?"

We re-ordered.

The food still did not come, nor did our drinks.

He reappeared and said "It's coming soon..." and we said "Um, could we have the waters? And the beer? And could I get some silverware?"

Nothing appeared.

Finally the food came. No beverages. No silverware.

I said "Our beverages? And silverware?"

The beverages came out about 5 minutes later, and still no silverware.

I asked the lady in the booth next to us if I could have her extra set of silverware.

Finally we were able to eat!

The food wasn't bad. We were sitting at a really small booth so I had my toast sort of on the edge of the table with my knife hanging over the edge of the plate. A waitress blew by frantically and knocked the knife off of the plate, into the air, it bounced off of my shirt and then my pants and finally onto the floor.

She got all huffy, as though it was my fault, picked up the knife and stormed off. She didn't apologize, nor did she return with a replacement knife.

Terrible experience all around, and late to Batman Begins.

We ended up having to sit in the second row of a theater with a huge screen. I wasn't too upset about it, as I'd seen Spiderman under similar circumstances and rather enjoyed being that close to the action.

We ended up, however, having to sit in front of some woman who had her three year old daughter with her. First of all - who brings a three year old to see Batman Begins? Second of all - who brings a three year old to see a 9:00 showing of Batman Begins? Third of all - yeah. Needless to say the kid was screaming and making horrified and amused noises throughout the entire movie. Very annoying.

Also annoying was the fact that many people decided that it would be acceptable to talk throughout the movie. There was a huge thug factor at this movie, and I was convinced that a knife fight or shooting would break out. An argument erupted somewhere in the stadium seating about 15 minutes into the movie. Two groups of people literally screaming at each other. What was the fight about? No idea. Probably "Yo, assholes, stop talking" and then "I can do whatever I want!" and then "Shut the fuck up!" A lot of people left entirely, some people switched seats. Mostly people were just screaming and murmering and getting out of hand. I don't know how it was resolved, but the first half hour of the movie is basically lost to me.

Also annoying was the fact that the movie theater was 3 degrees. I had my hoodie zipped all the way and the hood on and then pulled it up over my face and was still shivering the entire time.

Also annoying was the fact that I have been sick. Well, I don't know if I am sick but something has been awry for the past few days, starting with Tuesday when I took a three hour nap in the middle of the day. I have been exhausted, but not like flu exhausted. Like weird internal exhaustion, and today I am exhausted and am sometimes having a fever and sometimes my hands are shaking to the point that I can't label tubes. Weird. I averaged at least one yawn a minute during the movie, and nearly fell asleep a couple of times.

This all being said and having seen this movie under duress, my opinion is: FUCKING AWESOME AMAZING WOW BLAM POW PERFECT!

My thoughts:

1. Christian Bale - best Batman thus far. He was amazing. He played it believably dark and smartly.

2. Katie Holmes - not nearly as annoying as I'd feared. (On a similar note, I saw the preview for Dukes of Hazard and I feel really bad about it, because I think that the casting of Jessica Simpson is goint to prevent anyone from seeing it. Her annoyingness quotient far exceeds the coolness factor of the rest of the movie).

3. Gary Oldman - he somehow managed to not be creepy! Who knew that was even possible? He is endearing and wholesome as the future Commissioner Gordon.

4. Michael Caine as Alfred - ADORABLE. We had to fill out an audience survey and you had to pick your favorite character, and I went with Michael Caine. He is so cute and wonderful in this movie.

5. Cillian Murphy - WOW. He is going to be a huge star. I fell in love with him in 28 Days Later. I had a hard time choosing between him and Michael Caine as my favorite character. He is beautiful. There's something enchanting about his face. He's pretty. And an amazing actor.

6. Morgan Freeman - yeah. Of course he was wonderful. He always is. He is a national treasure. The most exciting thing about Morgan Freeman in this movie is that he is a scientist! He was throwing around "receptor" and other terminology. D became spastic at one point, punched me and said "That's a gas chromatograph (or something to that effect - I don't know anything about chemistry)!" Morgan Freeman was all "I analyzed your blood and receptor content and catalyst and blah blah blah - it was difficult" but then managed to develop an antedote to the chemical in the same day. I love movie science.

7. Other cast members such as Tom Wilkinson, Liam Neeson, Ken Watanabe - all awesome.

8. The strength of this movie is the characters. Everyone is perfect. I can't stop gushing about this movie. I am still high from it.

9. The fight scenes at the beginning between Liam Neeson and Christian Bale are quick and gorgeous.

10. My only complaint might be Gotham itself - it was a little too CGI and shiny.

11. Thematically it was intense - fear and guilt and duty etc. It was tortured without being cheesy.

12. Script - perfect.

Yeah. I could go on and on. Net: I loved it and you must all see it.

That is all.

Concentrating

It is difficult to concentrate at work when you know that you will be seeing Batman Begins in a few short hours!!!!

Christian Bale as Batman. Does life get any better? It is bizarre to me that I have had a steady crush on Christian Bale since the early days of Newsies. Tastes change and evolve, yet Christian Bale remains a constant.

Men have come and gone - Corey Haim, William Baldwin, Ralph Fiennes - but Christian Bale persists! YUM.

In other movie news, I watched Maria Full of Grace last night, which is an excellent movie that gave me an ulcer about 10 minutes into it.

OK. I really should work and stop shreaking "BATMAN!" every five minutes.

Laundry - Epilogue

I have been dropping off my laundry to be washed by someone else since I moved.

I know - you were worried! What if someone stole my laundry? What if it was returned smaller to me due to shrinkage? What if what if what if?

These were all legitimate concerns, and concerns that I shared with you.

There had been no issues until I picked up the sheets/towels that I had washed post-parents' visit.

I got home, opened my neatly folded and lovely-smelling towels, and found, to my surprise, men's clothes!!!

All of my items were returned, with the addition of a large pair of pants and large shirt!!!!

I am plagued with guilt. I know this is not my fault, but I feel awful. I figured I'd be able to bring them back to the laundromat and the woman who works there would instantly know to whom they belonged. Everyone who drops their clothes off there, like me, must be a regular, and after a certain amount of washes, the people who work there must learn what clothes belong to whom.

But no. The woman, who speaks to me in a combination of English and Spanish but who I am learning to understand, had no idea who the clothes belong to.

She too felt terrible. "This never happens!" she said. I feel awful. I left them with her, but now there is a man out there who is missing his khaki pants and his large red button-down shirt with weird blue paisley things on it!

And now I am newly paranoid that my clothes will accidentally be given to someone else! Hopefully the person who gets them will be a large man who knows nobody who will fit into my small clothes and will return them because he is plagued with guilt.

Sigh. I shouldn't be thinking about this at all, but I feel so bad.

Poetry

I had a dream last night that Anonymous sent me a poem that expressed how my blog had changed his life for the better. He sent a photo of himself along with the poem.

I then had a dream in which these huge balls of red smoke were in the sky in my hometown. I was in a crowd of people looking at the sky. These balls would appear above the canopy of trees in my parents' back yard and would then be hurled towards the earth. We couldn't tell where they were landing, nor could we tell what they were. I said "I think it's fire" but then someone said "No, because there's no fire on the ground indicating where they've landed." The military soon appeared, and told everyone that we had to be rushed to protective camps. "Terrorists," they guessed, and forced us to move along.

I stared at the sky, wondering what was to become of Medway. I wondered why they'd chosen Medway as a target. The camp was a huge, white outdoor tent - imagine the type of tent you'd put up in your backyard if you were hosting a wedding.

I took my place amongst the frightened people. People were all lying down on their backs, just waiting. Nobody spoke. I located my VP in the crowd and said "I want to be near you, just in case we are the last two people left on earth and have the responsibilty of repopulating it. That way the species would have a chance of being tall."

I then realized that I had to go to the bathroom. The military was stern and would not allow anyone to leave the camp. I said "Listen, that is my parents' house. It's totally ok if I just leave for a second." They wouldn't allow me to leave. They could not be convinced.

Then, out of nowhere, Anonymous appeared! I recognized him from his photo. He said "I'll get you in there. It's the least I can do for you."

And then I woke up.

This is another instance of completely obvious and derivative dreaming. Fire in the sky, terrorists, not knowing what was going on. All based on Friday's weird experience of calm in the face of possible terrorism. Not being allowed to go into the house to use the bathroom was definitely a shout-out to Curb Your Enthusiasm (the episode in which Larry attends a pool party and the guests are not allowed to use the facilities in the house). The white tent was in response to Werner Herzog's The White Diamond, which I saw last night.

I am perplexed, however, by the sentimental dreaming about My Mundane Life In Song.

I am distressed that I am dreaming about blogs. And my blog in particular. What a waste of potential good dream content. Contagious media is taking over my neurons.

My subconscious is so uncreative.

Most Bizarre Occurence Of Life Thus Far

I left work early on Friday afternoon in order to go home to clean my apartment in preparation for my parents' visit.

I was, of course, a stress case. I'd hoped to be able to take a nap, but I couldn't sleep. It was oppressively hot, and I kept wondering "When will they be here?" I knew they were running late, but I had no idea how late they'd be.

Instead of taking a nap, I decided to clean. A lot. My parents would be very impressed! I swept, dusted, even wet-jetted the floors. It was at least 90 degrees on Friday afternoon and apparently my apartment gets really hot in the middle of the day. It was not fun, but this is what one does in preparation for parents' visit.

After finishing cleaning, I decided to unwind and hopefully cool off by playing some piano. I played for about five minutes and randomly looked over my shoulder and out the window.

I don't even know where to begin with this.

How do I describe what happened?

Outside my window was complete white. I couldn't see an inch outside the window. It was smoke billowing up, but it didn't smell like smoke. It was almost like being on an airplane in the clouds. Total whiteness.

First thought: "Hmmm. Sometimes my apartment gets really dusty during the day. Maybe the gas station, which is right below me, does some sort of weird cleaning during the day and that's what has been causing the dust?" Originally I'd thought that perhaps the dust was due to construction in the apartment above me, but maybe it was this phenomenon happening every afternoon.

The more I thought about it, the more I thought "No, this can't be normal. I can't see at all. I can't even see my fire escape and I am standing a cm away from it."

"Come to think of it, I can't really see in my apartment right now." My entire apartment started filling with whatever the smoke was. I was standing at the window, and could barely see my piano across the room.

I took off my glasses and realized that whatever it was had accumulated on them as well.

I thought "Something has to be on fire. Is my apartment on fire? But it doesn't smell like smoke! What could be on fire? Is it the fan? Is the fan on fire and the smoke is going outside?"

"Is this is a terrorist attack? Fuck! What if this is a chemical attack? FUCK!!!"

"Wait. No. This will pass."

"But what if this is chemical?"

"WHAT THE FUCK IS GOING ON!?!?"

"Now I am inhaling this stuff. This can't be good. Whatever it is, it's not good. Maybe I shouldn't stick around for this."

I quickly shut the windows and turned the fan, which was blowing whatever it was into my apartment, to reverse so that hopefully it would start to blow whatever it was out of my apartment.

I washed my glasses quickly, grabbed my wallet, keys, and cell phone and left the apartment.

I then ran back in to get my camera.

I really had no idea what was going on. I didn't know where I was going to go. I just knew that it probably wasn't the best idea to be in my apartment.

I expected there to be mad pandemonium in my building, but nobody was running around.

I thought "What if its only outside my window? What the fuck?"

Then I thought better of it, and realized that probably nobody was home since it was the middle of the day.

It felt like Terminator 2. You know the scene where Linda Hamilton is having the nightmare about the future and everyone gets blown away and turns into ash? That's how I felt. I felt like grabbing my window and screaming "Nooooooo!" as the pedestrians who were on the street during whatever this was were blown to bits.

Nuclear winter.

There was no sky.

It was just white stuff.

Outside of my building a crowd had gathered and the dust had literally settled.

A man was getting into his car, which was covered in the stuff. I asked him if he knew what happened. He was laughing. His friend soon joined us, and informed me that the gas station clerk who worked behind the counter accidentally pressed the fire button.

The fire department was already there.



At first I didn't understand, but then it occurred to me that should a fire break out at a gas station, that would be a very bad scene for obvious reasons. It makes sense that they need to be able to put it out themselves. And fast.

Apparently some asshole accidentally backed into the freaking button and set off whatever system is in place to put out a gas fire of gigantic proportions. This caused the entire gas station, as well as like two surrounding blocks, to be covered in freaking sodium bicarbonate.

This is the ground surrounding the gas station:



The owner of this car was getting gas when this all happened:



They called an ambulance for his wife, who was 8 and a half months pregnant.

Here are some more photos from the gas station:





I was irate. I realized, then, that my entire apartment was going to be covered. COVERED. I made demands. I said "I don't think you understand, PEOPLE. MY PARENTS ARE COMING IN A FEW MINUTES!!! THEY ARE STAYING IN NYC, IN MY MICROSCOPIC APARTMENT, FOR THE FIRST TIME EVER AND I JUST FREAKING CLEANED AND NOW MY ENTIRE APARTMENT IS COVERED IN THIS SHIT!"

The manager was "on his way" for about an hour.

Nothing came of this.



I decided to go back into my apartment building. The windows in the stairwells were only open about half an inch each, and this is what the building looked like on the inside:







When I got back into my apartment, it was, indeed, covered in a layer of the stuff. Every single item I own. Everything. Each book. Each CD that was out. Each item hung on the wall. My parents were only about half an hour away (they actually got stuck in traffic for 2.5 hours but I was thrilled because had they not hit traffic they'd have been in my apartment when all of this happened). I went on damage control and swept and mopped what I could, rewashed all the dishes, sent D, who turned up shortly before my parents, to the laundromat with all of the sheets and bedding and towels, started to wipe off all of my hair products and books and everything else I had time for. Sweeping helped but now the stuff is in between all of the cracks in the newly renovated floor. Everything in my entertainment center is covered and I don't have the stamina to unplug everything and rewire everything and wash everything and blah.

In-fucking-furiating.

I didn't have the presence of mind to take photos in my apartment, because my main concern was getting the apartment in semi-presentable condition by the time my parents arrived. I did, however, take this photo of the fire escape outside my living room window, which is a good representation of the condition of the rest of my apartment:



My parents arrived and obviously I was a stress case. They arrived with enough luggage for 10 people to be on vacation for 10 days. It was chaos. I was so wound up and distressed and mortified. All I wanted to do was clean or relax or make more demands. I didn't want an army of people to deposit 43 pieces of luggage in 300 square feet of floor that was covered in dust. I hated that I had to be the person who was like "Can you take off your shoes before you walk into the apartment? I don't want you tracking that stuff all over the place."

I have a couple feelings about the timing of all of this:

1. If my parents weren't visiting, I'd not have been home for this and therefore my windows would have been shut.

2. If this had happened, like, five minutes sooner my computer would have been destroyed. It was sitting on the table in front of the fan while I downloaded music while I cleaned. I put it in my closet, which was the only place that was untouched by the dust because the door was closed, right before I started playing the piano.

3. If my parents hadn't been running late in the morning and hadn't therefore hit traffic, they would have been there for this and it would have been chaos. Mom most certainly would have thought it was terrorists and demanded hospitalization, and they'd have one more piece of data supporting their feeling that I should move back to MA. Not that they think I should move - they love NYC - but they'd like to have me home. I imagine had they experienced this they'd no longer be in love with NYC. Not to mention that both the couch and new air conditioner would probably have been destroyed.

4. But, what are the odds of this sort of freak occurrence happening right before your parents' visit that already has you extremely stressed out and right after you just cleaned your apartment way too thoroughly?

I guess it worked out for the best, but consequently I had an extremely stressful weekend during which all I wanted to do was rid my apartment of whatever sodium bicarbonate residue I could but during which I instead dragged my parents, who again didn't want to walk anywhere, around the city. And, to make matters worse, when we (five of us in my small apartment - two parents, Brother, D and myself) were in my apartment, we couldn't open any of the windows because the fire escape was covered with the stuff and I didn't want it to blow in anymore.

Ugh.

I gave my photos to the super so that they could submit an insurance claim to have the building cleaned. I am hoping that they will refund me for the laundry and will pay to have my floors cleaned. I really shouldn't have to do that.

I really shouldn't have had to do anything. My super said "Did you take pictures of your apartment? We can have someone come in and clean it." "No, I already cleaned it because MY PARENTS ARE GOING TO BE HERE IN TEN MINUTES AHHHHHHH!" It's not like you can wait for this sort of thing. The place was covered. Unliveable.

Ridiculous.

Various firemen said things like "You had a fan on? Why? Why don't you have an air conditioner?" and "If you had an air conditioner, you wouldn't have blown that stuff in" and "Yeah, but if she had an air conditioner it might have been destroyed" and "You should get the gas station insurance to pay to put your folks up in the Waldorf." I got yelled at by some lady in the gas station for "taking photos on the premises." Fuck off, lady. It's the LEAST I am going to do since my apartment is covered in this shit because some stupid employee of yours doesn't know how to lean correctly.

Only in NYC, folks.

I am so getting renter's insurance tomorrow.

What a stressful weekend.

Peach Daquiris

They are good, but not when you drink many of them and don't eat dinner.

Groan.

The weather has been disgusting. Hot. It's the kind of weather during which you feel disgusting so you take a cold shower after work, feel refreshed, get out of the shower and sit stationary for about five minutes, and then become disgusting again. Post-daquiris I decided to pay D a visit prior to heading back to my apartment to clean in preparation for Parent Visit #4. D coerced me into staying the night, but I was unprepared. I didn't have any clothes other than a tank top that was, well, a bit sweaty from having walked many miles the day before (not to mention entirely work-inappropriate) and the clothes I had on that day. I decided to hand-wash everything (hand-wash!) and let them dry overnight.

I woke up this morning sweating to death. My stomach was extremely unhappy. Bitchy. D said "Were you cold last night?"

"No, actually, I was really hot, which is weird, since it seemed like it was cooling off."

"Oh, yeah, well, I shut the fan off because I was cold."

Seething. R says that D is non-responsive to the heat because he is half-Vietnamese. D says "I think I am meant to live in a hot climate. I just love this hot weather." Summer is my least favorite season. I am a spring/fall girl, and I can tolerate winter, because there are always ways to get warmer. Getting colder, however, is not easy, which makes summer frustrating.

I think this could be a problem, and we may have to start doing summer hours or something. Regardless, I very calmly explained my philosophy on sleeping and said "You see, D, when sleeping with another person, it is easy to get warmer but not easy to get colder. For example, you don't believe in multiple blankets. If you did, you could easily regulate your temperature. In fact, we could regulate our temperatures separately and both be comfortable. In the current set up, we each have only one option. Really hot or really cold. Not good. If you are cold at night, you could leave the fan on and then either use a sheet (or blanket!) or utilize body heat to your advantage. Shutting the fan off when its 90 degrees outside and when somebody else who can't sleep when its hot is in your bed is just not nice."

He understood. Progress!

It was then that I realized that my clothes were still wet and that I therefore had nothing to wear to work. D said "You can wear my clothes." I said "Wearing your clothes is just as obvious as wearing the same clothes I wore yesterday." I ended up blowdrying my clothes. I am, however, wearing D's giant navy man socks, which makes me laugh and makes me no longer bitchy.

He also gave me a shirt to wear. He said "This shirt is small. It's tight on me. It will fit you."

I insisted "It won't."

"I think it will."

"It won't."

I wasn't even going to try it on (because, obviously, it wasn't going to fit) but I decided to humor him and said "This is going to look like a smock on me."

Then I started to laugh, because I haven't said "smock" in over a decade.

Smock. It sounds like a verb. Or a derogatory term for something.

It then started to pour, which is stressful because my Parents and Brother will soon be en route to New York City with a couch tied to the top of their SUV.

They will also be bringing an air conditioner. I asked them to pick one up for me because (a) it would be cheaper in MA than in NYC and (b) it would be easier for them to get one than for me to transport one and (c) there was no way I was going to get one prior to their visit and it is best for all of us that my apartment not be a raging sauna while four people try to sleep in it. They originally bought one that was a bit on the small side (I want to use one air conditioner to cool my entire apartment because it is a raging sauna) so they picked up another one instead and, gasp, kept the original one for themselves!

I was not raised on air conditioning. My parents are opposed to it - my theory is that its a financial opposition - and were hard-core fan users. Consequently I have been a hard-core fan user and am not fond of air conditioners. Over the years, though, I've gotten more used to air conditioning through more hotel stays etc.

Anyway, Father called last night to make sure everything was coordinated for Operation Remove Apartment Door to Deposit Couch and said "We kept that air conditioner and, well, it's cold! This is great! Wow." He just couldn't get over it.

Whatever guilt I had regarding asking my parents to find an air conditioner for me is now alleviated by knowing that their lives have been vastly improved by this experience!

I am working a half day today (half day Fridays!). I am going to run home and clean, read my mail, put the fan in the window, nurse my ulcer regarding my parents' visit and try to stifle my being convinced that they will hate my apartment and be very disappointed in me, and try to think of fun things to do with people who don't like to walk at all or be outside when the weather is less than optimal.

I am thinking street fairs! Flea markets! Coney Island! Wining and dining! MOMA! Will my parents enjoy these things? I have no idea.

I have decided that a potentially effective method to get my parents to walk is to say "You can either walk or, Mom, you can hail a cab." My mother will be afraid of this and will then be psyched to walk if it means avoiding the awkwardness of summoning a cab.

(Incidentally, people in NYC call them "taxis," but I have yet to incorporate this into my daily speech.)

(Incidentally, people were making fun of me last night for saying "wicked." Half of the people thought it was lame, but half found it endearing, so I have no feeling on this whatsoever. I wish they would just get over it.)

I am starving. I really want pancakes, but I can't go get any because I have to get tons of work done in order to get home in time for The Couch.

Allegedly The Chairs are being delivered to work today. How awesome would it be to have Couch and Chairs?

And, in the most exciting and bizarrely fantastic news of the year, Sid and Buddy Karaoke is now on Thursday nights at the bar we normally go to for Happy Hour on Thursday nights!!! This bar is right around the corner from D's apartment. I can now live out my fantasy of becoming a Sid and Buddy regular!!!!

Weeee!!!!!!!!!!!!!

In My Head...

.... right now, on repeat, is Lionel Ritchie's "Say You, Say Me."

I have no idea where this came from.

UPDATE: I do have an idea where this came from. I also have a Pinback song in my head that sounds similar. Well, not really. There's one measure of an instrumental in this song that sounds like the melody from the chorus of "Say You, Say Me." Thank god I figured this out!

Soup

I just braved the hot soup that is NYC to adventure into China Town on my quest for cheap lenses for my four pairs of eyeglasses that now require a new prescription.

Get ready....

Now, as you all know, most things in NYC are ridiculously overpriced. In fact, until two weekends ago, I was convinced that everything, from groceries to socks to bathroom accessories, was overpriced in NYC.

Then I found Fabulous Fannies, with their fabulous but cheap eyeglasses!

The fabulous people at Fabulous Fannies referred me to a place in Chinatown that they said was the best deal in the city.

This place is apparently the best deal in the world because...

Are... you... ready....

$65 for one set!

$65!!! I am getting four sets of lenses for only $20 less than one set at Evil Pearl Vision.

And they didn't even try to pressure me into getting anti-reflective coating!

Ah, New York, you have my heart again.

Topic: Human Pheremones

I think they exist. They are not universal, though. Perhaps pheremones attract us to certain people, but its not like those certain people are attractive to everyone.

A chemical basis of attraction isn't that far-fetched.

I remember seeing some weird documentary in high school or college about a pheremone-research lab. Apparently people in this lab didn't get along well with one another. The PI secretly left out some pheremones in a beaker or something and all of a sudden people started getting along.

Anyway, Human Pheremones are the Topic du Jour because I think I am experiencing something pheremone-related this week.

I look exactly the same as I looked last week.

I am behaving exactly the same as I behaved prior to this week.

I am carrying myself the same way that I have always carried myself.

Suddenly, people at work are coming up to me and saying "You look great!" and "Your hair looks wonderful like that!" and "Don't you look nice!"

Random people on the street have been talking to me. Men have been smiling at me. People in stores have been bizarrely friendly.

I sneezed outside yesterday in a huge crowd and someone actually stopped walking, turned around, concerned, and said "God bless you!"

D said "Maybe everyone's just in a good mood because its finally sunny."

Maybe. But I definitely look exactly the same and people are all of a sudden telling me I'm cute. Or maybe its the summer attire. But are people saying these things to everyone who is suddenly showing arm? I think not.

Or maybe its just because I am swollen in certain places, which is a much more depressing explanation of people's suddenly being nice to me than my sudden production of some sort of universally responded-to pheremone.

OK. Work now.

Nails on the Chalk Board....

... are nothing compared to the grinding metallic horror that is the sound of a key being made.

Dear god.

The poor boy at the hardware store around the corner not only has to listen to that sound all day but has to listen to it in the absence of air conditioning while being exposed to the fabulous aroma that is NYC in the summer.

I should bring him a popsicle or something.

Lenses

I buy eyeglasses like some people buy shoes. Or purses, depending on who you are.

I bought another pair of glasses this weekend (and was an evil enabler of LBF who visited from Boston and left NYC with not one but two fabulous pairs of cat eye glasses with rhinestones!) and thought "I haven't had my eyes checked in over three years. Perhaps it would be a good idea to make sure my prescription hasn't changed before I put lenses into the new pair."

I made an appointment with Pearl because, gasp, I get a $5 discount on the eye exam through my insurance! Yes!

I arrived late, of course, this morning and had to fill out much paperwork, indicating whether or not I experience various eye-related problems. The paperwork made me feel healthy because I haven't had any eye-related issues other than being basically blind, but whatever! No double vision! No weird tearing! I checked "Yes" for chronic headaches, but I know that those are not eye-related.

The eye doctor. Weird dude. Very socially awkward. Very nervous. I'm not entirely sure that he was not an eye-checking cyborg.

He robotically said "Put your things on that chair, sit on that other chair, and I'll be back in a moment."

While waiting for him, I started to look around his office and couldn't help but stare at this horrific collage of photos he'd arranged on two of the walls. First of all, the man has no eye for layout. It was unbearable to look at, and the frames were awful. There were about 50 or so shots of various people on a beach. The sun was setting. Who were these people? I have no idea, because they were all in silhouette.

Silhouette shots are fine. I dig a good silhouette. Sometimes they are even pretty. The sunset was lovely. But, endless silhouette shots = overkill.

And, endless silhouette shots in an eye doctor's office are just mean. Is he trying to make everyone think that they have macular degeneration? I was like "Wait, have I gone blind? Wtf is with these photos? Is there something weird with the light in here? Can he see who those people are?"

Also, is he trying to hide the fact that he's plastered the exam room with personal photos which is bizarre, or does he think that he's being aht-sy?

I have no idea.

When he came back, he was all "You'll have to excuse me for a moment. I was out on Friday and they brought someone in to cover for me and there is schmootz all over my desk." He proceeded to osbessively-compulsively clean the desk with Ethanol for five minutes, and then began wiping down everything this other guy could have possibly touched, including pens.

We chatted while he checked my eyes, and I explained to him that no, I don't want contact lenses, because I have worn eyeglasses since the age of 5 and therefore feel no urge not to wear them. I've never had clear peripheral vision and I've been just fine, thanks!

Smarmy and without hints of robot he said "So, I guess I'm one of the few priveleged people in the world who have gotten to see your face without glasses."

Ew.

Yes, obsessive-compulsive automaton eye doctor, you are amongst the priveleged!

It's true, and, well, that's just weird. Unsettling.

Ewwwwww.

When he was writing out my prescription, he had to get his stamp out from a drawer. He opened the drawer and said "HA! Looks like that other guy on Friday didn't find this stuff!" and then laughed maniacally and explained to me how there is another guy who sometimes covers for him who breaks all of the equipment and uses his stamp to write prescriptions.

I said "Isn't that illegal?" Yes, it is. Right.

I said "Might it not be easier to just not have eye exams on the days you are out?"

What I meant to say was "Maybe you shouldn't take so much time off to frolic on beaches with your oh-so-mysterious friends who exist only in silhouette!"

Anyway, the point of all of this is that lenses cost $210 even with the insurance discount.

THE HORROR.

I will not be purchasing four pairs of lenses from Pearl. I won't even purchase three. I was thinking I'd be willing to give up one of the old pairs, but man. NO!
I won't do it. $210?!?! For one set!?!?

I am considering not getting new lenses at all, but it was really nice to see well. When he handed me a weird spoon and said "Put this over your right eye" I was shocked to learn that I can't really see at all out of my left eye even with the glasses.

I am also pissed because the woman was doing the hard sell on the glare-resistant coating, which is (a) unncessary and (b) annoying because it makes you see worse even though (c) people can apparently see your eyes better. I hate that coating, and I said, before I knew how much the lenses would cost, "Can I get these lenses without the coating?" and the woman was all put out.

I hate people.

No, I'm lying, I don't hate people today because there were two friendly policemen at the laundromat this morning who were excited about my Mighty Mouse t-shirt and who sang "Here I come to save the day!"

I am excited about my Mighty Mouse t-shirt every time I wear it, and was thrilled to be able to share my enthusiasm with singing policemen.

And now I must pour plates.

Until we meet again....

Letters in an Inbox

Do you ever catch yourself reading old emails when bored at work?

This sort of behavior used to be reserved for lonely nights at home. Candles, Elliott Smith CD's, the never-to-be-looked-at-again box of notes and ticket stubs and pictures you couldn't quite tear up excavated from under the bed that reminds you of better times gone sour.

Now we can do this at work.

I just tried to do it, and realized I'd deleted the folder's entire contents. And instead of feeling sad after reading the emails, I felt sad because I couldn't read the 400 cute, flirty, optimistic, painful, funny, terrible, hostile, sentimental, and oozing with love emails.

Clicking "Delete All" is much easier than throwing letters into the fire, which requires both effort and drama, and a fireplace. Where can you even find a fireplace these days?

I decided to go back two levels of sadness, and read loving things like:

"If I see something now by myself, while it will be cool, the feeling will be nothing like the feeling that I would get if I could share that with you."

and then

"I know that everything will work out with us. We like each other too much
and have way too much fun together."

followed by

"I DON'T CARE WHAT YOU DO WITH WHOEVER, JUST DON'T FUCKING LIE TO ME ABOUT IT."

I felt like I'd been punched in the stomach the first time I read that. I almost threw up. Again, I read it at work and wanted to curl up and die. How do you not cry at work when someone hurts that much because of you?

Reading it this time hurt again. The memory hurts.

Seeing things devolve in text is painful.

I went back and read every email D has ever written me and nearly started to cry, because what if things change? The writing is already changing. Beginnings are so cute. The effort, the creativity to woo, the constant reinforcement of "I love you" and "You were so cute this morning" and "I can't wait to see you tonight." Why can't things stay that way? Comfort ruins everything.

Sigh.

I can't believe we can do this sort of fucked up emo stuff while getting paid to work.