I have decided to chronicle my journeys here in brief as there are a few people who are casually interested in what I am doing and my lifestyle is not exactly conducive to a whole lot of communication (or sleep) of late.
This is not a “blog” – the new term for web logs or diaries. I suppose it would qualify, but I really despise the term. I still don’t even like to refer to “surfing” the web. I prefer to peruse the web.
That said, the most recent entries are on top, the oldest are on the bottom. Sorry if that messes you up. But not too sorry. Enjoy! 12/13
Taking my first sick day in about forever. Man, I'm bored. Just called in to the office but they have things covered and didn't have time to talk to me. Man, was unemployment this boring? Well, being sick isn't any more fun here than it was in VA, but at least this is a town where you can have Gatorade, Jello, and Ritz crackers delivered to you any time day or night. And if your strength starts to come back to you at 2am, you can walk to the corner and get some chicken bouillon cubes and more Gatorade. Ah, sweet sweet Gatorade, you nursed me back from the grave...
12/12
Well, I thought I'd have a laid back weekend. Sleep late saturday, wander around the city, enjoy myself. Instead I got food poisoning. I'm pretty sure it was Ziggie's Cafe on the corner, I was feeling fine until I went there. And the thing is I had been there before and I had seen health code violations and I vowed to myself that I would never eat food there. But what harm could one cookie do me?
I'm feeling better now, a little weak and my head is pounding, but I think the worst is behind me. Don't go to Ziggies.
12/9
Interesting thing this week. The company I'm working for opened the Nasdaq market one morning this week. We got to go out and join our CEO on stage as he rang the opening bell. Evidently we were on CNN or something. The cool thing was that they broadcast the opening on the side of their building, seven stories high in the middle of Times Square. So there was our logo and our boss' face much larger than life looking down on the tourists and drifters.
9/27
Back in NYC. So good to be back in NYC. I flew down to VA for the weekend to see the Tarbox Ramblers. I know it may seem a bit extravegant to fly to another state just to see a band, but I missed their mini-tour because I was out of work and broke. So I owed it to myself.
The show was great. They have some new members and they were really playing well together. But spending some time in VA made me very glad I moved away. I rented a car, so I got the full VA experience: fighting traffic, waiting for interminable stoplights. It was a crazy-making experience.
Plus I had forgotten how phony my old neighborhood was. For one thing, they've bulldozed over a lot of the cool stuff and character and built a bunch of chain stores. Second, all the "beautiful people" running around trying so hard to look like characters from Sex and the City.
I'm very glad to not live there anymore. Although my "Die Republican Scum" t-shirt was much better recieved that I had anticipated.
9/8
Today was a bad day. I got up and put on a new shirt, I was feeling pretty good. It was raining and I realized that I'd left the big umbrella at the office, but it was okay ,I had the little one. Fortunately I decided to wear my old shoes. I only got to the end of the block before I realized that the little umbrella might as well have not been there. The rain was coming down in sheets and the streets were flowing like rivers.
By the time I got to the subway, a fifteen minute walk, I was drenched and my shoes were soaked through. My train stopped in the tunnel just before 59th street and just sat for a while. It turned out that I was lucky, though. It only took me an hour to get to work. I must have been on the last N train to get through. Today saw the worst subway trouble since the blackout. Trains were stuck for hours.
Meanwhile at the office, I'm wet and freezing at my desk and becoming aware of a bad smell. One of the lakes I had to wade through must have had a high urine content as my feet and cuffs of my pants were starting to reek of it. I could barely stand to be near myself.
At lunch I ran to the dollar store and bought a new pair of socks just to warm up.
It was a rough day at work - I had a lot to do and a lot of meetings. I was one of the first in and one of the last out. When I finally got out of there I got home to find that the postman had destroyed my new Netflix DVD. So I ran down to Bed Bath & Beyond, but couldn't for the life of me remember what I needed. I picked up a few things, but the cashiers were fooling around and taking forever so I got impatient and walked out.
It's amazing the recuperative power of a couple of really long showers.
8/29
Well, the republicans have invaded. The rich old bastards' convention starts tomorrow and they've been trickling in all weekend, bringing security concerns and transportation problems with them.
So today I marched in the big protest. It was really cool; I had never marched in any kind of protest before. Those who knew me in college might find that surprising. I did some anti-racism stuff in college, but I was too busy organizing to do much marching.
The march was cool. It felt like being in a parade. Everyone was very politically charged, but they were also very positive. A lot of them were really funny as well. Drum corps and sign carriers and folks with flag covered coffins. It felt good to be a part of it. I almost missed it - I woke up at noon and saw it on TV. Damn, I thought, I missed the big march. So I called my mom. An hour later when we finished on the phone I saw that it was still going on so I jumped on the subway and joined it. Hours later it was still going strong. I think they said 400,000 people participated. The cops were pretty cool as well.
It felt good, though, to be in such a liberal town. If I were still back in VA, there would have been scores of rednecks and pissed off kids in khaki pants and polo shirts shouting at us. Young republicans are the worst. A very good day.
8/22
I'm realizing I forgot to tell an amusing anecdote. I was at my brother Cassidy's place Saturday night and my most excellent friend Rachel was supposed to come by. She shows up and races in to the house needing to use the phone. It turns out that she accidently left her purse on top of her car when she pulled out of a gas station and it flew off somewhere along the road. It had everything in it. So we grabbed a flashlight, or a "torch" (she's English) and drove back up to look for it.
In the middle of the GW parkway, right across from Roosevelt Island we saw the bag on the side of the road. Rachel slams on the breaks and jumps the car up on to the curb. Before she even stops, my door is open and I'm out and running. It's like we're some kind of ninja team. We recover her bag and wallet but can't find her bank card. We walked up and down the street but the card was green and grass was growing on the side of the road. After a few minutes I was standing there holding the flashlight at my side, about to suggest it was time to give up. Rachel looked down and the flashlight happened to be pointing directly at it. Nutty.
Anyway, I'm back in NYC. It was good to see my friends. Now it's good to be back in the city.
8/21
Well, I'm back in VA. Not something you've read on these pages in a while. I came back to visit my friends, of course, but also to get registered to perform weddings. You see, as you may or may not know, I am an ordained minister of the Universal Live Church. No, I am not a secret religious freak. ULC is just a church that has been around forever that will ordain anyone who wants to be ordained regardless of faith or lack thereof.
So I am supposed to officiate a wedding this fall and I needed to get my certification. I had to show up at the courthouse, show some proof of my lofty position of minister, and pay $24.
It's been crazy to be back here, though. On the one hand it's kind of nostalgiac. On the other hand it almost makes the last year feel like a dream. My only regret so far this weekend is that El Pollo Rico, my favorite Peruvian chicken joint, was closed for renovations.
8/9
Greetings my friends. I'm back on terra firma. Or at least terra newyorka. My California trip was cool and very successful.
Basically, here's the deal. The whole product marketing team flew out to San Jose for a week of meetings at our office out there. The meetings started monday morning and, as it didnt' cost any more to fly out early, I went out Saturday. I had never seen San Francisco before but I wanted to hear what all the hubbub was about.
The trip was great. SF is as beautiful as people say it is. It also has the added advantage of being a place I couldn't ever seeing myself living in, so I don't have to worry about uprooting myself again any time soon.
It was a really good week. I drove a crappy rental car, stayed in a hotel room that was nicer than my apartment, ate in some good restaurants, and was very productive at work besides. I also experienced jetlag for the first time.
Here's something interesting. The first couple of mornings when I woke up in the hotel room, I had that moment where I wasn't sure where I was. I have done so much bouncing around the last year, though, that this feeling was actually kind of familiar to me. It's kind of an odd sensation.
I took the red-eye home and didn't sleep a wink on the plane, so when we landed at JFK at 6am, I was pretty beat. One of my coworkers and I grabbed a cab back into the city. Morning traffic was pretty thick and our driver cut off some other car, not in a major way, but the guy started screaming at us. Then he threw a quarter at our rear window. A minute later he drove up on the shoulder and cut in front of us so we couldn't move. He got out and started banging on the windows. Our driver started to get out, but I yelled at him to let it go because he still had a fare. All of this was made even more surreal by the fact that I was so tired I was starting to see trails.
Good week and I'm glad to be back.
8/3
My friends and faithful readers, I thank you for your patience. At last I have something out of the ordinary to report. I say out of the ordinary rather than interesting, because my life has not stopped being interesting, but the interestingness was getting rather ordinary. As I write this, I’m in a hotel room in San Jose, California. That’s pretty out of the ordinary.
My whole team from work came out to Silicon Valley for the week for a bunch of meetings. I flew out a couple days early to check out San Francisco, which I had never seen before. I got in late Saturday night and spent all day Sunday in SF.
As I write this, I realize that I’m kind of too tired to write. I’ll tell you all about it when I get home and get some rest. I now understand jetlag.
7/20
Okay, here's a little typical Adam story. I was talking to my mom on Sunday and I wondered allowed when the tomatoes would be in. Anyone who knows me knows that I am somewhat obsessed with tomatoes. Not those sickly pale pink things that, as Garrison Keillor put it, they strip mine down in Texas. No, I'm talking the fresh off the farm, sun ripened, available three months a year real tomatoes that explode with flavor in your mouth and make your eyes roll back. The good stuff.
Well, you can imagine my dismay when she told me that Gary's been selling them since the 4th of July. Gary is the owner and proprietor of the farmers market near my mom's house. Coincidentally it's where I had my first job out of college, picking tomatoes in that same field. But that's another bizarre story.
Here it was, Sunday night, and I hadn't gone to the greenmarket downtown this weekend. No tomatoes for me! Well, this was unacceptable. So I ran out to Eli's Vinegar Factory, the gourmet warehouse on the upper east side. I figured Eli would have some good tomaters. Sure enough there was a sign for 'Upstate NY Tomatos'. They were $5.99 a lb, so I only got a few of them. I was giddy with anticipation when I got home, I even stopped to get some bread and bacon. Imagine my disappointment when I cut into one and discovered the same crappy ball of flavorless pulp that I can get on a sandwich in any bodega in the city.
So I did what any red blooded American would do, I got up really early on Monday and went down to the greenmarket before work. The farm fresh tomatoes were only $2.50 per lb, so I got about 4 lbs worth. I got in to work on time but couldn't resist temptation - I cut into one of those suckers for lunch.
7/18
I command the awesome power of steam! Unfortunately that turns out to not be quite such an awesome power. I bought another of those steam cleaners. I’ve been obsessed with the damn things since I saw an infomercial about them years ago. I bought one while I lived in VA but it didn’t do jack so I returned it. Now I bought another on QVC and I have to say I’m unimpressed. I honestly don’t think it does anything that a green scrubby and some soap won’t do. Alas, my dreams of melting away all gunk and grease with a jet of boiling hot vapor are dissipating like the weak jet of steam issuing from the nozzle of my piece of crap cleaning tool.
I also bought a kickass new knife. It’s a 12-inch carbon steel Sebatier. I got a steal on it but am still a little embarrassed to admit what I paid. Still, this thing is frighteningly sharp and extremely comfortable, if a little large for the size of my kitchen.
Mainly I’ve just been concentrating on work. I’m getting up to speed and feeling like I’m contributing. Not quite used to getting up early every day, though.
7/7
My loyal readers! I do apologize for staying away so long. The transition from Adam, Man of Leisure to Worker Adam has required some adjustment. Namely, the abandonment of mid-afternoon naps which always put me in the right mindset for journal writing. Do not despair, though, more journal entries are coming. Photos, too. Pretty, pretty photos.
Hang in there, folks. More funny is on the way.
6/21 Cool
Oh yeah, Adam the job-havin’ guy finally went out and bought himself an air conditioner. Now, I could have gone without. The heat was getting pretty bad, but not so bad I couldn’t take it. I will admit that the heat woke me up one morning, but I was okay with that. It was the pollen that drove me to Blood Bath and Beyond to get a window air conditioner. It has a digital thermostat, timer function, and wireless remote control.
Of course anyone who knows me won’t be surprised to know that I set the thermostat for 80 degrees.
6/17
My dear readers, I have not forgotten you. Time constraints are just a little different when you’re working.
First of all, I did end up meeting up for a drink with my new Puerto Rican professor friend. Saturday night we met up at the Rainbow Room atop the NBC building on 49th street. The place has a reputation for being obscenely expensive, but I’d never been there before and decided that I would sacrifice one drink at expense account / rich tourist prices in order to have the experience under my belt.
The view from the place was amazing. You can look down on buildings you spend every day looking up at. Plus, as it was a clear night, you could all the way down to the end of the island. It was breathtaking. And on top of it all, mi amigo nuevo is a regular there so they comped us. I still have no idea what my two ginger ales might have cost me.
This week was the big strategy planning meeting at my new job so people flew in from all over the world for a big marathon meeting. You can imagine me trying to sit still for eight hour stretches. In the evenings we all went out to dinner.
The first night we went to a nice Italian restaurant in the village. The menu was ambitious and exciting but the preparation was a little bit uninspired. Still, pretty good food, the octopus was really quite good. The ambience of the place is what I really liked – it was in a rustic, slightly dungeon-like wine cellar. The kind of place that makes you forget you’re in NYC.
The next night we went to Chelsea Piers, a giant entertainment complex on the waterfront, where we had use of two golf simulators. I proved beyond a shadow of doubt why I should not golf, but got to chat with some members of my new team.
Last night I left work a little early so I could get uptown and buy an air conditioner. I had no problem with the 89 degree temperature in my apartment, and I could have lived with the extreme humidity, but there’s something growing in my neighborhood that was causing my throat to close up. So I picked up a relatively small window unit, all I need for my closet sized apartment. I have to admit, reluctantly, that AC is delightful. It’s only 82 degrees in my apartment, but it’s dry and feels so much more comfortable.
I had a couple of social engagements in the evening, both of which were fun but neither of which is worth going into, but suffice to say that they have left me exhausted and with not enough hours to catch up on sleep. I’ll sleep this weekend – needless to say I don’t have any father’s day commitments.
5/28
What a week it’s been, what a night I ended it with.
It was my first week at the new job and it was really stressful. I was freaking out around mid-week, feeling like I didn’t know what I was doing. By the end of the week, however, I settled down and realized that I wasn’t supposed to know, I was new. But I think the job is going to be good. My team is really smart and it feels good to be working again. It makes me feel… legitimate, maybe? Like I’m a normal contributing part of society.
My office is just a couple blocks away from Times Square, and I walk through it to get to the subway. This always is interesting and sometimes even quite amusing. The downside is that I’m going to have to go out and buy some more khakis.
Tonight Schaff and I went out for a drink. We went down to our favorite pub, Biddy’s, and bellied up to our favorite table. While we were there some very young women came in. One at a time they wandered over to us to chat. It turns out that they are from Rochester, kind of sheltered suburbanites, very innocent and friendly, and they were in the city for the first time to celebrate one of their 21st birthdays.
Needless to say they were very silly and, being quite attractive, had no trouble finding people willing to talk to them. One of them, the crunchy granola one, latched on to me and Schaff for a while and stayed at our table talking. She was so youthfully idealistic and naïve and… well, so damn sincere you just wanted to hug her. You wanted to shield her from the harsh realities that were lurking just on the other side of that college diploma.
It is worth mentioning here that she was really hot. And I would have stood an above average chance with her, I think, but I couldn’t have lived with myself if I took any kind of advantage of such an innocent, well, child really. (21 years old, lest anyone cast aspersions.)
Schaff and I were on our way out when we ran into an older gentleman, quite drunk, who was also staggering out. He asked us if there were any other nice bars around. Already warmed up to conversation by the young girls we chatted for a while. It turned out that he was really funny and thought us to be so as well, so we went back inside for another round. I was on my fourth ginger ale, I should mention.
It turned out that the guy was a professor of some sort, who was from Puerto Rico and was currently on some kind of sabbatical to write a book. About what, he didn’t tell us. It was one of the funniest conversations I’ve had in a while. We talked about art, literature and philosophy, cracking really smart jokes at every turn. I was giving my “A” material and he was giving right back. My throat is still sore from laughing.
So I gave the dude my email address and he said he was going to take me out for tapas. I’ll let you know if I ever hear from him again.
When I finally left it was 4:30am. I felt a kind of obligation to keep an eye on the Rochester girls as I was probably the only honorable man in the bar, but they were showing no signs of leaving. So I made them promise to get in a cab and not try to navigate the MTA drunk in the wee hours. So, my little angels, I hope you made it home.
5/25
Just a quick note here as I take a break from reading through some stuff for work. There's so much to catch up on. I haven't been the "new guy" in so long. I don't like it. I like knowing what I'm doing, what I'm talking about.
But the job is cool. My teammates are really smart and enthusiastic. So far they are patient with my complete ignorance about our product. The office is pretty groovy, too. It's on the 35th floor, a couple blocks away from Times Square. You can even see the Statue of Liberty from our hallway.
Okay, back to work...
5/17
Wow, the news, it’s strange to actually have news and not just weird happenings in NYC. And for once, the news is good. I got a job. That’s right. I start work Monday. I’m going to hold off on officially releasing the details until I actually have a desk and a computer, but a company I had been pursuing made me an offer today and I accepted.
This was particularly sweet as I had just come home from the doctor’s office where the doc told me that it didn’t appear that I had re-injured my ACL. (the expensive and painful ligament inside your knee) I smacked it pretty good at a kickboxing class Thursday night and I really thought that I had undone my surgery. Relief doesn’t begin to describe what I felt when the doc told me that it looked okay. I told him I could hug him and he hastened his exit. I sometimes forget I’m in NYC and threats of hugs from strangers are more ominous than they were in the ‘burbs.
Good day today. And I have a whole week off. I just have to finish up some greeting cards that are due Wednesday. I’m rejoining the working world. Nutty.
5/8
I just added something new. In order to tie in my "lunch" theme, I have hired a chef to supply recipes for the site. Check it out.
5/4
It's late, I'm not tired, and there are a few dishes left still clean.
I took a boxing class tonight. I have been meaning to for a while and tonight I finally got around to it. The first ten to twenty minutes were no problem. I spent the rest of the class tip-toeing on the narrow line between keeping up with the class and keeping my dinner down.
But this class made a couple of things clear to me. For one, I am out of shape. I've been wandering along the treadmill and amusing myself with the weights, but I haven't really been working out. When you're in a class and the instructor doesn't stop when you get a little winded, that's when you get in shape.
I know some people hate me for saying how fat I am, and I admit I'm not obese but I'm far from svelte. But what's important is that I'm not in shape. When I was doing Tae Kwon Do I was tough. I still had a gut but I was solid. I could smash boards with my hands and feet, though that didn't come up very often, but I felt better. I moved better. I was tough. I liked it. I'll be back at boxing next week.
5/2
Okay, Schaff is out of the old apartment. Completely moved: furniture, carpet, the whole nine yards. So now I can fill you in. For those of you who didn’t know, her old roomie was a complete nut case. Read back, if you will, over the entries I wrote when I was living there. Imagine, if you will, that one of the girls was a passive aggressive, manipulative, mental eight-year old with a knack for revising history and cognitive dissonance. Perhaps you’ll understand better why living there was so difficult.
I could go on for pages with anecdotes of her bizarre and inexplicable behavior, and I may some day soon, but this evening I will concentrate on the matter at hand. She stole the dog.
That’s right; Schaff’s roommate stole her dog. We had a feeling this could happen; the roomie was getting very attached to the dog. Schaff woke up last weekend and found the roommate, the dog, and the dog’s stuff gone. When confronted, the roommate said that it was her dog and she was keeping it. She claims to have a lawyer (though she hasn’t paid her rent in months) and has vowed to fight for it.
It turns out that getting a stolen dog back is not so easy. The NYPD filed a report but wasn’t very interested in getting involved. So I did some legwork, talked to some lawyers, I even got to meet Agent Sandano from Animal Planet’s Animal Precinct. So, the wheels are in motion and I hope we get to stick it to that dog-stealing psycho!
I also got to go to the wedding of my friend Christine, a former dominatrix, and her husband, a drag queen. Needless to say it was out of the ordinary. There was a sword swallower, a burlesque dancer, and a spoken-word interpretation of Cramps songs. Then they exchanged vows, which were really sweet, and Saint Reverend Jen, of Lower East Side fame, pronounced them man and wife.
Beats any Catholic wedding I’ve been to.
4/28
Oh, loyal readers, I apologize for neglecting you. I have been helping Schaff, one of my best buddies, to move. Worry not, there are a bunch of amusing stories coming once it is all in the past tense.
In the mean time, you get the sneak preview to my bio page.
4/20
Well, I finally sold the upright bass. Why is it that the things I owned that I thought had the most monetary value were the hardest to sell? My truck took forever to sell, and then no one wanted my bass. Although I have to admit I didn't work very hard at selling it. I only listed it on craigslist. A lot of nibbles, some odd offers for trades, but nothing ever panned out. So I finally lugged it down to Guitar Center to see what they would give me for it.
Now, at first I was very sorry to see the bass go, but after lugging it up the street, on the bus, down the subway, riding with it all the way downtown, then lugging it across town a few avenue blocks, I was glad to be rid of the damn thing. The worst part was the comments I heard. Okay, I'm a small guy carrying a big instrument. Please consider that I might not be happy to be lugging this thing around and reserve your comments until I'm out of earshot.
But the upshot is that I got a grand for it. I honestly didn't think a store would give me that much. Honestly, I would have taken an offer of $1000 from a private buyer. So I picked up a guitar I've always wanted, a mahogany Martin D-15. I finally have a Martin guitar, the Cadillac of acoustic guitars.
You know, I've bought and sold a lot of guitars in my life, but I haven't bought a new instrument since high school. I love that new guitar smell.
Also, it's finally warm here. Hell, it even got hot for a day. After such a long and lousy winter, we deserve this spring. And the energy in this town is amazing. Everyone is out on the streets and people seem more alive. Central Park is full of people and everyone is out walking their little dogs. It's really like a postcard.
4/12
Apologies, but evidently some spam-bot found this page and has been flooding my inbox with junk. So I have to pull the email links from the entry from the 6th. If you need me, you know how to find me.
Spam is evil.
4/6
I'm up late and I can't sleep. I think my sleep pattern has once again become screwed up. I'm a night person living in a day person's world. So I think I'll stay up all night tonight and go to bed at a normal hour tomorrow night.
Okay, not a lot in the news this week. I saw 28 Days Later on DVD this week and it kind of got stuck in the forefront of my brain for a few days. It was a really good take on the old undead movies that I used to enjoy. And having the "bad guy" be a communicable disease was nice as we all know that will be how humanity ends.
But I did have some problems with the film and I haven't had anyone to talk about them with. If you've seen the movie and want to discuss it with me, please drop me a line at BushIsEvil@AtomicLunch.com email address deleted and we can discuss.
What else? It's been warm here in NYC and I look forward to going out and playing soon. Alas, I have been having to focus on my job search. My as-yet-fruitless job search. If anyone knows anyone who can give me a job up here, please drop me a line at Search @ AtomicLunch.com
3/30
I finally quit Synergy Fitness Clubs. I joined them because they were the cheapest guys in town and they're open 24 hours a day. It's also kind of a crappy club and I am too lazy to go to a place that isn't nice. So I joined NYSC where they have a pool and a sauna and towel service and those little TVs over the treadmills. Life is good.
But you can't just quit a health club. Even though I didn't sign the year contract, I had to send a letter of resignation by certified mail. I guess they hope that if they make quitting a pain in the ass, people won't bother.
So I went up to the post office and the lady asked me "why is everyone quitting that club?" Evidently she had seen enough certified letters to that club that she asked someone what it was about. So it occurred to me, if you ask the movers and the morticians where the open apartments are, maybe you should ask the post office people which health clubs not to join.
But I'm happy with NYSC. With so many locations all over Manhattan, I'm never far from a bathroom when I need one.
3/28
The Tarbox Ramblers were playing at my old haunts in VA this weekend, and I had been planning to go see them. In the end I decided against it. The job search isn't going so well and I decided it would be pretty impractical to suffer the expenses just for a show. Luckily the weather in NYC was great and I had a good time in the city.
And I needed a good weekend, I had quite the shitty week. Without going into too much detail, everything technological decided to rebel, and I had to wait for a couple of deliveries, so I spent a lot of time sitting around my tiny apartment.
Tonight I committed the error of dozing off while watching the Simpsons. That means that, even though it was only a half hour nap, I won't be doing any sleeping tonight. So I went down to my favorite diner and had a slice of pie and a cup of (bad) decaf tea and did some writing. The novel I'm working on is really coming along well. And I suppose that was part of my impetus for moving here. Nothing inspires me like distraction, which this city has in droves.
Oh, also, after a technological oddessy, I have DSL. No, to all you perverts, I mean Digital Subscriber Line. High speed internet, baby. Mainly I like it because I can be online and the phone at the same time, but it is nice to finally be able to see all the funny Flash things that just took too long to load on dial up. (like mine)
3/23
I'm back in NYC after a trip to philly for the fifth annual Philly Classic Games expo. I'm not into classic games, but my best friend Cassidy is and I go down to help him work his booth. Imagine, if you will, a giant convention center room full of people buying and selling home gaming systems that are at least ten years obsolete. It was wall-to-wall Atari, Coleco, Intellivision, and the like. Also, a full arcade of old coin-op video games set for free play.
I have to admit here that I am a big fan of the Centipede arcade game. I watched a guy there get a score of over 700,000. My high score is about 59k. It was pretty cool. This guy had faster hands and reflexes than I can dream about.
The show is kind of a dichotomy. On the one hand, most of us do fondly remember game systems that we played as kids: time spent in arcades or in front of a TV, ruining our thumbs with buttons and joysticks. In that regard, this show was kind of something for everyone. On the other hand, attendance did seem to be dominated by geeks. A lot of pear-shaped people with no style, social skills, or basic hygeine. By Sunday night, that hall stank. My buddy, it seems, is one of the coolest people involved in the hobby.
Our friend Chris from England came to the show again this year. Man, if you thought us Jews were funny, spend a weekend with someone English some time. Racial profiling aside, that dude is hillarious. He was supposed to come to NYC with me after the show, but he was running out of money.
It was a weekend of work. Hotter and stinkier than working in a kitchen. But, as everything I do with good friends, it was fun. (oh, and we got to show an Englishman the fine American establishment of Hooters)It had been a while since I was that tired, and I think staggering around in an exhausted daze is good for you once in a while. It helps change your perception for a time.
3/16
Okay, sorry I haven't written in a while. People actually complained. I didn't realize anyone cared. Not that you don't care, but how exciting am I?
Not too much has been going on. I went to see my first off-off-Broadway show. It was a multi-media performance piece called The Loneliness of Noam Chomsky. It was pretty crazy and a really good time. Then I went to this thing called The Happening. The short version is that a huge art space was closing and about to be demolished, so they had a big art free-for-all with performance art and buckets of paint for people to paint on the walls. Nutty.
Oh, and I joined a new gym. I came to the realization that I'm not nearly athletic enough to go to a crappy no-frills gym, no matter how cheap it is. So I joined the Shangra La gym and have been enjoying the pool, the sauna, and even took a yoga class. Yes, yoga. Shut up.
I'll write more when something actually happens.
2/21
Well, I'm back in VA. Not something I'd written in here in a while. But I came back to help my best friend Cassidy celebrate his birthday. Right now I'm typing on his computer, soon to go to sleep in his guest room. An actual bed in an actual room with an actual door. Pretty swanky for the likes of me.
It's strange to be back. I have seen a bunch of my really good friends today, and it was great to see them again, but being here has also reminded me why I was so anxious to get away. Clarendon, the funky little part of town where I used to live is gone. It has been buldozed over and replaced with a shopping mall. Seriously, it is like someone installed two lane roads through the middle of a shopping mall in order to give it some major traffic problems.
And the evidence of why this is not my home is clear. As soon as I got back here I felt out of place. I drove past intersections where I got lost time and again, sat in traffic jams with no apparent cause other than people's lack of desire to reach their destination, and fought for parking. The emotion I felt when I looked out at the Washington monument was relief that I don't have to live here anymore.
I do miss the LL Bean store, though. Man, I could spend hours in that place.
2/9
I guess I should write something here as I haven't updated in a while. I wouldn't want to disappoint my two or three regular readers. Who are you guys, anyway?
I don't have a whole lot to report, though. I mean, it's been kind of business as usual. I have gone to some book readings and walking tours and junk. I've been writing a lot of greeting cards and looking, so far unsuccessfully, for a full time job. I am in the process of switching to an electric razor, so my face hurts pretty much all the time lately. I'm having fun in an uneventful, not very exciting way. Just waiting it out till spring.
Okay, I just read down and noticed that I haven't mentioned the greeting card thing. I'm writing freelance for a greeting card company. They send me a handful of images every couple weeks and I write a bunch of captions for them and send them back. It's not bad money and it's kind of fun. Sort of like a humor Rorschach test. So now when I meet people and they ask me what I do for a living, I tell them I write greeting cards.
2/1
Reason I love NYC # 26:
I came home from the gym and decided I wanted some bread. So I went to Eli's Vinegar Factory, home of the greatest bread I've found in the city. On the way out of there I noticed a FREE wine tasting at the wine shop next door. So I stopped in and tried a couple of sauvengon (sp?) blancs and a couple of cabernets. I think I'm a little buzzed. No food, exercise, and alcohol make a funky combo.
Anyway, free wine on the street. I love this town.
1/30
Well, first things first. I got a reply from the Cran-Grape people. Just a form letter. Not even a coupon. Oh well, it doesn't diminish my love for cranberries, grapes, and artificial flavorings.
I also went to the DMV again this week. I finally managed to convince them to give me a NY license. It was literally easier to find a no-fee apartment in Manhattan than to exchange a valid out of state license for a NY one. Read about it here, if you care to.
This week I switched my internet service provider, kind of. I got an Earthlink account yesterday and cancelled it today. I had a small bit of trouble with the software, but when I called customer service, the guy was a jerk to me. On an ordinary week I might have let it go. But this week I had gone to the DMV and all my patience was used up. When the guy said "Well, if you don't like the software, don't use it," I replied "Okay, I won't. Cancel my account right now." So AOL gets my money for another day. Does anyone have a dial up service they like?
The Tarbox Ramblers are on tour! That's right, my favorite band has released their LONG awaited second album and is hitting the road to spread the word. I saw them in Brooklyn, but due to my new car-less lifestyle, I didn't make the Philly or Arlington shows. Bummer. Check 'em out at www.TarboxRamblers.com
Stay warm.
1/18
This is exciting. For the first time since I moved into this apartment, I stepped out of the shower onto a dry bathmat. My shower door has had a major leaking problem, and though I had managed to fix it about 70%, it was still a long way from fixed. I had a few more ideas of things I could have done to fix it properly, but they would have taken time and money, and let's face it, I rent. So I put a shower curtain inside the door and now the water goes nowhere.
To all the people who wondered why I would leave the luxury of my giant VA apartment to come live in a little closet in NYC, here's one good reason: A little victory like a dry floor would have meant nothing to me in VA. Here, it is a source of joy. Being able to appreciate the little things is a skill I definitely want to cultivate.
This is also amusing. I had a few spare moments, so I wrote a letter to the Ocean Spray people. I am quite fond of their product, Cran-Grape. It's a delightful concoction of, well, I'm guessing it's cranberry juice and grape juice. I was hoping the letter would prompt them to send me a coupon for some free drink. I have time and I'm thirsty. Here's the letter:
Oh, beloved Cran-Grape. What is it that makes it so great? That sets my soul afire. That soothes my palate, then leaves it hungering for more? I don't think I can drink enough Cran-Grape. Sated only until the bottle is empty!
Thank you. Please never stop making Cran-Grape.
I'll let you all know if I get anything from them.
1/15/04
Somewhere out there, there are millions of people who can go to bed before midnight, and managed to stay asleep all night. I’ve met these people, talked to them. As far as I can tell, they possess no great secret. Why, then, do I wake up a little after midnight and stay up the rest of the night if I ever fall asleep before 12am?
Of course being up all night isn’t quite as frustrating in New York as it was in Virginia. Your options aren’t limited to the 7-11. Tonight I decided to go to the gym. I had the place to myself from four till five-thirty AM, unless you count the sleeping counter guy, which I don’t as I don’t suspect that he can actually count.
So when I finished my regular workout, I took a stationary bike near the window and watched the snow fall. It’s been so amazingly cold here lately that the stuff is just freezing to the ground as soon as it hits. I look at the scant cars that drive at this hour and I know that the roads will be a mess once rush hour starts. I also know that that is largely someone else’s problem, and that makes me feel better.
1/7/04
Happy New Year! Yes, I'm finally updating. Isn't it ironic that the times when I'm doing the most stuff, I have the least time to write about it. But never fear, I am here. With updates.
I spent xmas in philly. No, to anyone who would ask, I did not go to see the damn tree at Rock center, but I did accidently get within a block of it and was almost trampled by the hordes of tourists. "Ooh, that's St. Patrick's cathedral, dontchaknow?" Yeah.
One of the cool things about this xmas is that my mom got me a little digital camera. It's just a little cheapy model with really low-res, but it is fun and takes some interesting pictures. You may view my handiwork
right here. Interestingly, my best friend in VA got the same camera from his mom, and an old lady I met on the bus got one for her nephew. Forget Tickle Me Elmo.
Well, here's hoping everyone has a good new year. Especially me.
12/16
I am finally getting better after a bout with the flu. What I thought was just a bad chest cold turned into a mercifully minor bout of the flu. Still, if you've ever spent any time in a studio the size of a closet, you know that you don't want to spend a whole week in one.
But I have christened my apartment. I made my first stock in my tiny kitchen. Don't ask how it came out, of course it came out well. If I were somehow unable to make stock I suppose I would just pack it in and live under a bridge. I may still.
I have a new enemy. The New York DMV. An even bigger, stupider, and less efficient bunch or bureaucrats than the VA DMV. They should all rot in hell, and I suppose it will be a while before I get a NY driver's license. Bastards.
Oh, to cheer myself up the other day I bought a marzipan pig from some really old and evidently famous candy shop in my neighborhood. I love marzipan, but I also love things that are cute. So I have been attempting to eat this pig as slowly as possible. At first I would reshape him to cover where I had nibbled, but that is hard to do when all you have left is a face. I shouldn't buy cute food.
12/10
If moths love bright lights, why don't they fly toward the sun?
I'm sick. Four days of no heat has left me with a chest cold. But at least it's warm in my apartment again.
Seriously, that moth question is vexing me.
12/6
For the first time since I was 16, I don’t have a car. My truck sold this weekend. Beloved truck, it served me well. I’ll miss it.
I’m also experiencing my first New York blizzard. If you live anywhere on the East coast you know that we’re being barraged with snow. I was a little surprised by it yesterday when I headed out to meet a friend for lunch. Undaunted by a lack of appropriate footwear, I headed downtown for dim sum and became a walking snowman on the way. When the weatherman used to talk about “the snow sticking”, I was primarily concerned with it sticking to the road. Now it was sticking to me. Already there was good accumulation when I went to bed last night.
This morning when I woke up, I looked out my window and could see the fire escapes piled high with fluffy white snow. I met my buddy and we headed toward central park, a sight I just had to see. I was glad that I managed to trade in my waterlogged sneakers for a decent pair of boots otherwise I might have lost a toe.
The park was amazing; we entered right by the reservoir, a huge lake in the middle of the park. It was dark and choppy with the wind, ringed in white and the tall buildings on the other side of the park were barely visible through the falling snow. We walked all the way down to 72nd, about twenty blocks, and the cold didn’t even bother us that much without the strong wind between buildings. Anywhere there was a little hill there were little kids sledding and all along the trails there were snow-shoers and cross country skiers and playful snowball fights.
We finally headed back into the city and wandered back up to our neighborhood where we engaged in another famous New York City inclement weather ritual: we spent the rest of the day in a neighborhood bar. The little Irish pub was empty when we slid up to the bar, but people slowly straggled in and we all enjoyed a fun sense of camaraderie, our bartender making us hot toddies to warm us. I didn’t drink a lot of the stuff, I have the tolerance of a little schoolgirl, but I could definitely see its warming appeal. Especially after the bartender and I engaged in a friendly little snowball fight, chasing each other around parked cars and packing snow with our bare frozen fingers.
Tonight, however, I am not enjoying the winter weather. My heat has been off and on for the last few days, and tonight it is off. I talked to the building superintendent earlier this evening and he was working on the problem with “the mechanic” but the radiator is still cold and I kind of expect that the super and the mechanic are both at home in their warm beds thinking they’ll get a fresh start on that pesky heater problem in the morning.
I have some warm blankets and a fighting spirit; I think I’ll make it through the night. If not, spend a moment to speculate whether I could truly survive without a car.
To my truck out there, wherever you are, I hope your new owner appreciates you. I hope he takes care of you, and I will miss you. Vaya con dios, mi camioneta querida.
12/3
Man, it’s cold. It’s about 21 degrees outside and the wind is blowing hard. It’s like the wind is saying “Hey cool guy, nice leather jacket. You’re my bitch.” But to those of you in VA who are thinking some smart comment about getting what you ask for, I notice that it is only about four degrees warmer there. So there.
Well, I’m back in the city after Thanksgiving. I’d say it’s good to be back, but all I’ve done since I got here is deal with new apartment issues. Let me just pause here to say that Verizon are a bunch of blithering idiots. I look forward to getting settled and getting on with my life.
Well, I wrote a thing about how I was done with VA, but I just noticed that I already wrote that, so I'll just share an amusing factoid: The floor in my apartment is so slanted that my wheeled desk chair keeps rolling away from my desk. It's making me crazy, I have to shop for a new chair.
Next time I promise I'll have something interesting to say.
11/25
Well, a crazy couple of days and a lot of miles travelled in a short time, and I am done with the Commonwealth of VA.
I spent my first week in the city unpacking and arranging and spending way too much money on food. It is hard to cook when your kitchen is buried on boxes, but I still managed to find some food bargains in my neighborhood.
And I did have the challenge, the first week, of not having a phone. Verizon couldn't get a technician out to my apartment until a week and a half after I had my service turned on, so I ran up my cell phone bill and walked up to the 96th street library once a day for the half hour of internet time I was allowed. My phone still isn't working, but I can dial out, so I can get online.
Let me just pause here to say that Verizon are a bunch of RETARDS! And I mean that in the pejorative sense, not to say anything negative about people with limited mental faculties.
So I still had a few things in my old apartment and I had left it rather dirty; I had to drive back down there and clean the joint up. I looked into renting an SUV to drive down there, but it was almost a hundred bucks a day, so I worked a deal with my mom where I borrowed hers for free. I drove down to VA Sunday night, cleaned until the wee hours of the morning, finished cleaning Monday, and handed in my keys monday afternoon. I had expected to feel a little something more when I left that apartment for the last time. I guess by then I was just pretty much over it.
Monday night I drove back up to Philly, crashed overnight, then tonight I drove up to NYC to unload my stuff and came back. So now I'm hanging in Philly until turkey day.
It's kind of funny, I worked very hard, planned and schemed and dumped a lot of dough and went through hardship in order to move to NYC. And in my first month of living there, I spend the vast majority of it away. I look forward to settling in and really being there.
11/15
I'm in! After some of the most unpleasant days of my young life, I'm finally moved in to my new apartment. It's a giant pile of boxes in a tiny room, but I have a bed and it is all mine. Very excited. Well, as excited as I can be. I'm pretty spent.
You see, yesterday I spent all day loading crap into the least comfortable rental truck in the world. Then I had to do the final packing touches, which turned out to be quite a lot. As soon as I thought I was done I would turn my head and see a whole bunch of shit left that I had to deal with. It was maddening.
When everything was loaded, I put all the trash in the back of my pickup and drove it to the dumpster. I had a crushing moment when I realized that that could possibly be the last time I drove my beloved pickup. My buddy Cass is selling my truck for me while I'm away. Anyone want to buy a truck?
Then, with my back sore, my muscles spent and my hands all cut and raw, I got in that horrible rental truck and drove up to Philly. Sleep was nice but too brief in Philly and this morning I headed out for NYC. Driving that truck in the city kind of sucked, it is nothing but blind spot.
Everything was heavy and awkward and everything took twice as long as it should, but the move actually went pretty easily. I even, believe it or not, managed to park right in front of my building. That's got to be some kind of good omen.
So I'm here, I'm in one piece, I'm exhausted but I have a bed. I don't have a phone in my apartment till Friday, so I'll be slow to answer email, but I think I'm all set.
Now we'll see if I can make it there....
11/11
Well, I’m back in VA. Of course if I’m updating this page I must be in VA – my computer is down here. For now, anyway. Right now I’m all about packing and cleaning. The big move is Friday and I feel very far from ready. Well, far from physically ready, that is.
I saw something this evening that I am relatively sure I will never see in NYC. I was walking home from the only take out food place in walking distance from my Arlington apartment and I spied a raccoon peeking in the front door of a neighboring apartment building. He saw me and started to run, so I made the only animal sound I can approximate – the barking of a squirrel. This got his attention and he stopped to look at me.
As I got closer to him I started to worry a little, I’m pretty sure raccoons are one of the types of animals that get rabies and junk, but when I got within about eight feet, he scampered up a nearby tree. I watched him climb, he got way up there and I thought to myself that if the people who lived on the top floor looked out their window, they’d see his little masked face looking at them. But I don’t know those people so I didn’t tell them.
So this weekend was my first experience driving in NYC. I was worried as hell, I’d only seen NYC traffic from the back of a cab and it was daunting as hell. Once I was in there, though, I really actually enjoyed it. It was like a test of my driving skill and my knowledge of how wide my truck was. It was driving the way you’ve always wanted to, cutting in and out of lanes, squeezing in wherever you think you can fit, never checking your rear-view. It was like a sport, and one I was pretty good at.
Then I tried to park…
So, does anyone know anyone who wants to buy a pickup truck? Though selling the truck does feel like I’m selling a small part of myself. A small but important part. A reliable part, as well.
11/1
Well, it is official. I am a New York City resident. I have taken possession of my apartment on the Upper East Side, the big keys residing in my hot little pocket. I even have a gym membership at the 24-hour gym right up at the corner. My little apartment, its entrance nestled snugly between a furniture upholsterer and a window cleaners, faces the back of the building where it is quiet and the view is of the fire escapes.
Getting in was crazy, many hoops to be jumped through, many items to be faxed and re-faxed. But in the end it was all worth it, and the space turned out to be larger than I had thought it was.
So next steps, get all my stuff up there and find a job. The way I see it, as long as I have a place to call home, everything else will come with time.
10/21
Already I am seeing that typing will be difficult. I'm so tired. You know how in cartoons they show little bubbles over a character's head to indicate that he's intoxicated or been knocked over the head with an anvil? I'm seeing those little bubbles at the moment.
It's been an odd week. I seem to wake up in a different city every day. I got a call for an interview in NYC, so I drove up to Philly, crashed for the night, then went up to the city the night before the interview. I had only paid for one day of parking in NJ when I got a call on the train for another interview on Monday. So I went back to Philly Friday night, crashed in Philly for the weekend and went back to NYC Sunday for my interview monday.
Sunday I looked at an apartment that I wanted, but I had to run back to VA to get some info for the application. So... after my interview Monday (and for some reason I decided to meet friends at a pub in the evening, I'm a ginger ale-caholic) I got a late train back to NJ where I had left my car, drove to Philly, then continued back to DC. I got in around 3am, but was plenty wired from all the Dr Pepper I consumed to keep from falling asleep at the wheel. I didn't get to sleep till some time around dawn, but had to get up early to fax my info to the broker.
Long story short, I got the application in and am waiting for the results. I haven't had a good night's sleep in about forever. I am actually keeping my fingers crossed that I get the opportunity to pay $100 more a month for a studio that will fit in my current living room.
Ya gotta love it....
10/14
It seems like I barely finish typing that I'm back in NYC and I find myself in VA again. How weird is this: One day I'm taking the 6 train downtown to go to The Strand (a giant used bookstore) and mere days later I'm driving down I-95 in a 400+ horsepower Corvette, on my way to a greasy hot rod shop in Fredericksburg, VA.
There's really something to be said for taking a muscle car on the open highway. I recommend everyone try it at least once.
Anyway, I'm back in VA for a few days. I had nothing going on in NYC and figured I could job hunt as effectively from my big apartment with my bed. I'm going back up in a couple of days. It's getting so that when I wake up, I have to look around to figure out where I am. But I guess I'm getting used to that.
10/10
Well, I'm back in NYC and it feels good. I'm really feeling at home here now. I think for me a big turning point was when the subway stopped feeling like a baffling ordeal and started feeling like an amazingly convenient way to cover a lot of ground quickly.
Now, I'm no spring chicken. No chicken of any season, for that matter. I always knew that apartments were crazy expensive in Manhattan. I didn't expect to be able to afford my own place for a while. Why, then, did I allow my hopes to be raised when one of my roomie's friends said he was giving up his apartment and expected they would rent it for roughly what I'm paying in VA? Maybe there really is some optimism in me. Maybe I live in a fantasy world. Yeah, probably the fantasy world thing.
Anyway, I looked at the apartment. I loved the apartment. I came to find out that I couldn't begin to afford the apartment. But the landlady did have some places in my price range. I had never seen an apartment with a bathtub in the kitchen before, but I'm constantly seeing new things in this city.
My budget allows you to cook and bathe at the same time.
So dreams of my own place dashed, I took to wandering the streets. I wandered right into a movie shoot on the upper east. It wasn't very exciting, but I saw Woody Allen, a longtime hero of mine. (for his films, not his prowess with young Asian women) My first New York celebrity sighting.
As far as the cooking for my rent thing goes, I just keep raising the bar. I really should have paced myself on the recipes... More to come, my chums.
9/28
Well, I’m back in VA for a visit. Time to take care of some business and recharge a little bit in my big luxurious apartment. I was a little worried that I would get back here and find it so comfortable that I would never want to return to NYC. But then…
This morning (afternoon) I went to visit the coffee shop where I used to work. It was good to see everyone again and I had a really nice cup of mocha java. I left there feeling pretty good. My next stop was Best Buns to get a loaf of good bread to make a sandwich with the better-than-decent tomatoes I had picked up in Philly. I ran up the GW Parkway to I-395, thinking I would take that to Shirlington where the good bread lives.
My flaw, however, was taking 395 North, rather than South. Next thing I knew I was on the bridge across the Potomac and into DC. No problem, I thought. I’ll just take the first exit and turn around. But it is never that easy in DC and next I knew I was in one of those long tunnels heading further and further into lord-knows-where. After about a mile I reached an actual intersection where I pulled a u-turn and popped out in the middle of the Mall. After ducking and dogging my way through the slack jawed tourists I saw a sign for 395 and headed toward it.
Of course, in the usual DC style, there was the one sign but then no further indications. I made a few lucky decisions, though, and was soon back on the highway. In bumper to bumper traffic. This first holdup was due to merging traffic. There was plenty of room, but people got a little panicked and slowed way down anyway. Once I got past that it was smooth sailing for about 100 feet when I hit the next traffic jam. This one was for an exit ramp, again no real reason beyond driver-terror. The final traffic jam on the five miles of highway I traveled was due to an accident on the shoulder. Everyone had to get an eyeful, right?
Finally I got to Shirlington and found that there was nowhere to park. The only spot had one of those signs that are showing up around here, you know the ones: This Space Reserved for Expectant Mothers or Mothers with Small Children. Yeah right. Until the DMV issues a license plate for pregnant women, those spaces are fair game. What about the parking spaces for people with heavy packages or uncomfortable shoes?
So as I fought my way through the crowd of slow walkers, polite door holders and middle of sidewalk stoppers, I suddenly felt a lot surer in my decision. Get me back to New York with the rest of the fast and the impatient.
9/18
It sounds like the folks back home are hunkering down for the storm. Me, I'm just just trying to figure out how to make a buck in this town.
I will say this, my roomates are some pretty lucky girls. I have been flexing my culinary muscles a little and they seem to be liking it. Portobella burgers, poached salmon with saute'd vegetables, turkey meatloaf - one of my roomies is on a soup-only diet, so I made her up about a gallon and a half of gazpacho to last her all week.
And cooking up here is a joy, despite the tiny kitchen. I brought up my knife kit so I have all the essentials. The ingredients are everywhere, and they're good. Gourmet groceries everywhere, fantastic foods piled high in the New York fashion. The one thing I've had trouble with is the onions. I suppose they get a lot of abuse in this town because cutting into them is like setting off a bomb. Kind of like being shot with pepper spray. Not that I'd know what that is like...
As I said to my momma, I'll write when I get work...
9/11
Well, I'm finally up here, have been all week. It's an odd date to be writing this, but honestly it was pretty much business as usual here today. I'm sure there was something at ground zero, but I haven't had a reason to be down there since Monday.
So what am I up to, you are wondering. That's why you look at this page. I got up to NYC on Sunday afternoon and have been concentrating most of my efforts on finding a job. I'm sleeping on my friend's sofa in a nice apartment on the Upper East Side of Manhattan. In exchange for the roof over my head I'm literally cooking for my keep. I make some food and they let me stay here. Not a bad deal, eh? Of course I also had to bathe their dog the other day, but we won't go into that.
So far no breaks on the job hunt, but I have a few leads and I believe it will be easier to find a job up here while I'm up here.
Man, I love this town! You wouldn't believe the food (unless you live here). I went to a market the other day called Zabar's - it was the first thing I've seen here that really blew me away. They had the best selection of kitchen supplies I've ever seen anywhere and their prices were comparable to VA. Downstairs they had a supermarket and a prepared foods section that was incredible. I got some fresh pasta there that was so good it barely needed any sauce. Just some fresh garlic infused olive oil. They know how to eat in this town.
9/3
For those who know me, you know how tough this was: today I said goodbye to my geckos. (for those who don't know, a gecko is a small lizard) I can't take them to NYC with me and I don't know anyone who would be willing to care for them indefinitely, so I had to give them up. Luckily, though, I found a vet who was willing to add them to his collection. That's a veterinarian, not a veteran. No flashbacks of Charlie in the bush for my little guys.
Even though they are going to be living a better life than I am, I was sad to see my little guys go. They weren't cuddly, they didn't do tricks and they were biologically incapable of affection, but they were great little pets nonetheless.
9/2
What a nutty week it's been. After I left the cafe I had one whole day to run errands before my trip to Philly. I ran around like crazy and still managed to get a few naps in.
Wednesday I jumped in the truck and headed up to Philly, the city of my birth. My sister was in town and we only get about one family reunion a year, so it was not to be missed. Without getting into too much tedious detail, it was a nutty week of good food, good times, and just a bit of mayhem.
I will say this - I did get to see the Tarbox Ramblers in Philly. It was a really groovy show. The fiddle player has left the band, so it was kind of a different sound. And Philly on labor day weekend is pretty deserted, so there wasn't much of a crowd. The result was kind of an intimate show, a little slower paced and very soulful.
Schaff came back to VA with me for the weekend. It was a pretty good time. We went to a pool party at Cass' house and I dove through a radio control boat in their pool. Then I worked my last day at the coffee shop, which was pretty uneventful. I'll miss all my good regular customers.
Then I put Schaff on a train and slept, slept, slept. Ah, sweet wonderful precious sleep. Never underestimate its value. Speaking of...
8/25
Two days in a row. Amazing. But I am tired and can't sleep.
Today was my last day as Adam the Cook. With minimal fanfare I dropped my whites in the laundry room for the last time and left the kitchen behind me. I am exhausted from working seventeen days since my last break, but I can't sleep.
Working in the kitchen was tough. It was hot, dirty, damp, and dangerous work. My hands are calloused and cut, my feet are likely not the same shape anymore, I haven't been to a movie all summer and I've been to the gym roughly eight times in the last two and a half months. And I've made very little money from it. Why, then, do I already miss it?
There is a certain freedom working in the kitchen. I can call my coworkers "dah-ling" or "loca" depending on my mood, curse at will, and tease my boss without fear of reprisal (other than equal teasing). I was free to be a jackass.
But there was also the food. All I did all day was prepare food, talk about food, eat food. Even philosophize about food. I got to clean chicken in 80 lb. batches. I got to stir fry thirty plates of food at a time. I made vinaigrette by the gallon and pulled soups from thin air. Hell, I even almost started to know what I was doing.
Maybe it's just the exhaustion and the caffiene catching up with me. Maybe it's just apprehension at beginning the next leg of the journey. Maybe I'll just miss how good I looked in chef's whites. But I'm already missing that damn cooking job.
8/24
Wow, yesterday was the 2 year anniversary of when I got laid off from AOL and I didn’t even notice. I was honestly just too tired. The chef had the week off and one of the other cooks didn’t show up for half the week, so Sarah and I were scrambling to get out of the weeds all week.
It was funny, by the end of the week we got caught up and Friday was kind of surreal as we were casually taking our time to prepare our specials. I tried a few recipes for the first time and met with success. Hell of a last full week.
I almost feel like I’ll miss the rush when I leave. The mad scramble to get the special and the soup and the sides out before service, making sure nothing falls between the cracks. It’s kind of a rush. I certainly look forward to getting at least a little rest. Last night was my first full night of sleep in over a week and I was really getting kind of loopy. Sad thing is, I don’t think anyone noticed.
8/13
Well, here’s the big news: I am out of here. After two years of trying to find work in NYC, I have decided to just go up there and seek my fortune. One of my oldest and best buddies, Schaff, has some sofa space she’ll be willing to let me use. So I’ve given notice at both of my jobs and I’m starting to think of a plan.
I’m excited, but also a little sad. I know that I have become a much better cook since I started at the café, and I also know that the longer I stay, the more I will learn. But I also feel that it is time for me to move on to the next stage of my evolution, the next chapter of my story. Perhaps time will reveal this to be a mistake. But then a wise man once said that you only regret the choices you don’t make. Or maybe someone said that in a movie. I forget which.
7/19
My head is still spinning a little. I took a week off from the café and went up to NYC. We’ve been kind of slow, so the chef told me to take the next week off. I considered taking the time to catch up on rest, but then I figured as long as I have a free week, I might as well do something interesting with it. So I did what I always do, went up to Manhattan.
Of course I was on a bit of a tight schedule because the Tarbox Ramblers were playing at Iota on Friday night and, being such a huge fan, I would never forgive myself if I missed them playing a show so close to my home.
We had a good time in the city. Schaff and I walked all over the place. We failed to get soup at the Soup Nazi, he’s closed for summer, but we will be back in the fall. I learned that it is hard to find a place to eat when you have a (freakish) small dog in tow, but walking the dog is a great excuse to get out and wander around aimlessly in the middle of the night.
The Tarbox Ramblers kicked butt, by the way. They have a new bassist, which worried me. But he fit right in and the show was amazing.
Now it’s back to work in the food mines…
6/29
Welcome to the news. Here’s where I am in the world. I’ve been working weekdays at as a cook at a nice little café in Falls Church, and working weekends at a gourmet coffee, tea and spice shop in old town. My cooking skills and culinary knowledge have been growing exponentially, but working seven days a week has greatly reduced my fun and job-seeking time.
It is summer and my best friend has a pool, but it is also raining every day. Perhaps some day we will look back on this time and say “hey, remember that summer when there was actual dry land?”
There is nothing in the world quite as nice as leaving a boiling hot kitchen, stepping into a hellishly humid outdoors, then getting to your friends’ house and jumping right into the pool. Instantly all is well with the world…
I have also been taking video production classes at Arlington Community Television. My eventual goal is to produce a series of cooking shows. I figure as long as I’m trapped here in VA, I might as well do something with it.
Cool