Rolf's: Magical Christmas Wonderland

My friend Christy introduced me to an amazing place last night: Rolf's on 3rd Ave. at about 22nd. This place really is magical at Xmas time--not that I've ever been there at any other time--but before I say anymore, I'll just show you the land of dolls watching over you with Brooke Shields eyebrows and Austro-Germanic steins filled with European beer served by Indian bartenders.

Post-Birthday "Poop"

I miss posting graffiti it was the whole inspiration for this blog. So here's some more. Graffiti using the word "poop" always makes me laugh. It's so juvenile, and so opposite of all of the posturing one has to do in New York at times. It just breaks it down. I get so uptight about the posturing, but it's just a part of the game, a part of life here. Sometimes that's one of the reasons I feel like I have to leave this place. But the thing is, there are a few things I still have to do here. You know how your gut tells you you're not done yet, even though you feel like you should have been done years ago? Mainly, I think I've just been lazy and sad (one feeding the other) lately and not opening my eyes to see, so I've been lost. Time is passing and I'm getting older, and still have yet to do much I'm proud of. I'm working on it, it just hasn't come to fruition yet. For some of us it takes longer. I guess I just have to honor how long it's taking me.



I just turned 37 on Tuesday, and was having a conversation about failure with a friend the other day. And when you take the argument that you're a failure to it's logical end, you generally end up realizing you're not a failure at all, really, you're usually right in the middle of doing the things you set out to do, you're in the thick of making that success you long for. The main thing I want to try to remember is that I came from a very different kind of place. I mean, I grew up in a trailer park. For real. And here I am, trailer trash all growed up, having published only a couple of poems, but having gotten into a respectable MFA program, making a decent living in new media, having had at least a couple of big love loves in my life, blessed with interesting and kind friends and family, surviving in a machine of a city that can really chew you up, and finding at least a little happiness along the way. No, I don't have a tenured spot somewhere or a book deal, or scads of money, and I'm not out saving the world or traveling everywhere I'd like to go, but I have done well at trivia, hammed it up at karaoke and had a few good kisses in my time, and (the elephant in my head and virtual room here, if I'm honest) am no longer under the heavy thumb of poverty, and, well, that's a poopload to be thankful for. Happy birthday to me, if I do say so myself.

Doogie Howser, speaker of truth!

See more Jack Black videos at Funny or Die

I'm a little late catching on to this, but it's so awesome, I had to put it up.

Getting Ready for Tamil!

I'm heading to my friend's wedding in South India in February, and this is helping me out.

I'm Thankful for Mexican Wrestlers and Mariachi Bands

This video is fun! I just saw a ton of mariachi bands last night, so the fashion perked me up here. I have some lame video of it that I'll put up in another post.

So this band, Noah and the Whale, was recommended to me by LastFM, who thought I'd like them based on my loved tracks. LastFM, so thoughtful.

I really need to visit Mexico. Magic, man, magic. It's in Mexican blood, in the literature, in the water. Time for some español lessons. Escuchar, fools!

Oh yeah, Happy Thanksgiving!

It's Cougar Time

So I was talking to my mom about dating, and how most people available are quite a bit younger than I am because most people my age are married and having kids. She said, "They call them cougars. You might be a cougar."

OK, then. Mother-approved. Guess it's cougar time.

NYC Moments

I was walking to a connecting train at the 14th St. station and was walking behind a middle-aged man and his two teenage sons. He was instructing them to sing along with him (I assume for their performance in the station), and he broke out into the falsetto chorus of "More Than a Woman" by the Bee Gees. Repeatedly.

Sometimes I am in love with this city and everybody in it.

Crybaby Time

Life has been wonderfully busy lately and filled with good things like lollipops and rainbows. I'm also getting used to a new phone with a new camera, so hopefully the next few subway graffiti photos I post will be gorgeous. :)

Unfortunately, I didn't get an awesome new iPhone, but I did get a phone that has a whole darn keyboard on it. Unfortunately, the damn thing can't simply tell me when and where a movie is playing, like my last, less fancy phone, could. Ah well. You make concessions.

I just had to comment, though, on the fact that I am, for the first time in my life, actually PROUD to be an American. Tuesday night, I was out among hoards of other screaming, crying, proud Americans, who lit fireworks in the street and woo-hooed out their windows at the top of their lungs. New York City partied like it was 1999--work tomorrow be damned. And I woke up and floated through the day feeling like the night before I had just met and hooked up with the person I was going to marry.

Foux de Fa Fa

Though I'm no big fan of Flight of the Conchords, I heart this "video," and the song, actually. Aye-ah! I would be ok if my life were like a big, fake '60s French stereotype for a few days.

I need to improve!

visited 28 states (56%)
Create your own visited map of The United States

I stole this idea from Gren.

I need to travel a lot more before I die! My world travel is S-A-D. Good thing it's on my list!


visited 9 states (4%)
Create your own visited map of The World

Cyclerament

Bedford Ave., a few blocks from my house.

This made me laugh

Because I'm bored with dead animal art. Isn't that kind of just another form of the readymade? Bleh.

Helvetica Exhibit at MoMa

From, like, last year. I'm trying to get the images off my cell phone!

PS: If you've never seen the documentary Helvetica, Netflix it! Especially if you dig on typography.

Just another Friday Night at the Abbey

Friday night playing pool at the Abbey on Driggs in Williamsburg. I forgot how much I love this bar. An unpretentious bartender. In Williamsburg? Playing Mexican wrestler/alien movies? Sweet Jesus, thank you!

Too Precious

Atom Smasher Turned on Today!

The huge Large Hadron Collider was turned on this morning in Switzerland, and will be smashing subatomic particles together with mindblowing force next month. This sucker is so powerful, it takes a month to rev up. People are afraid of black holes, and have protested the machine, since they think it'll blow us into oblivion. As long as this technology doesn't make for more retarded weaponry to carry out mass murder like the atomic bomb, I'm cool. I'm actually not "cool"--I'm really excited to see what they find!

I wonder if we can expect really weird things to start happening in the next few months. Evidences of other dimensions and shit like that. Wow. I think it's fascinating and beyond exciting! I wonder if they'll get evidence to scientifically prove string theory. I'm on the edge of my seat! Totes neat! I kinda feel like a kid at Christmas, and these other dimensions are Santa Clause. But real.


http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=94422852

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=94439915

Shitty Flash intros are to animated gifs as ______ is to what?

This is a hilarious compendium of some of the worst of the worst in Flash intro movies, according to this Urlesque site (a name I love). I have no words to describe these Christian mimes...but their intro has plenty!

http://www.urlesque.com/2008/05/13/the-webs-12-most-awesomely-bad-flash-intros

RIP, Mr. "In a World..."

I just heard on NPR that the guy we ALL know by his voice saying "In a world..." in the movie trailers has passed away.

I also learned his name: Don LaFontaine.

Gustav skimmed NOLA, but left Baton Rouge gasping

The news hasn't said anything. I got more from this blog than any news source. For all I could hear on WWL, the Baton Rouge area is fine. But really, to hear my mom tell it: the place is an utter wreck and people are having a very hard time. Trees are down. Electricity probably won't be back for up to 3 weeks. A curfew is still in effect. It IS improving, of course. There are of course things to be grateful for. But I'd be grateful for some information, if I could find it.

I finally got in touch with my mom after a few days of hearing nothing. My parents are not doing well. Luckily, their neighbors are generous and have a generator and my mom's store is giving them food. Also to be grateful for: their cats survived. My mom was worried about them. They are safe, another small favor, but Pop is diabetic and finding food for him has been not all that easy. And Ike might be on his way.

Still lighting candles and doing my version of prayers. If anybody reads this and knows any news, can you pass it my way? I'd be grateful. Thanks!

Fun Fact

Both I and the Magnetic Fields' genius lyricist Stephen Merritt were copy editors at Spin magazine.

I met him once at a show my friend Ben was doing with his band The Isotoners. I was cool and just treated him like anyone else, even though I wanted to share the above fun fact with him. Ben even thanked me for not acting star struck.

God Bless the Old Folks at Home

Thank God Gustav wasn't as bad as it threatened. But still, my parents are without power and had to evacuate their trailer near Baton Rouge. The only reason that worries me is because of my dad's health. Crossing fingers, but they seem to be ok, according to a text from my dad. Pretty lucky this time around, though. Thanking the stars.

Gustav vs. The Love of My Life

I thought Katrina was bad. Gustav sounds like it could be extra scary for New Orleans.

Funny that my friend Erin was just blogging about relationships with cities and these lines are at the end of a CNN story about Gustav zeroing in on The City That Care Forgot (one that has frequently been referred to in relationship terms, throughout history and literature--Faulkner, when he was writing for the Times-Picayune and came to town at the suggestion of Sherwood Anderson, had written those New Orleans Sketches and referred to the city as a "kindly old whore"):

"Bette has the means to leave new Orleans. She and her husband could jump in their car and take off. During Katrina, she briefly relocated to Houston, and while happy she made that choice, she couldn't stay. She had to return to her city.

Like a relationship that suffers a bad break-up and is stronger after a reunion, she worries that she hasn't got the heart to leave and then return a second time.

"When you stand out there by that river and look at that levee," she said, "you are just so blessed to live here. I am in love, and so I make my choice."

I feel a spell of insomnia coming on.

Roosevelt Island

Last weekend, I continued on my tour of NYC islands and visited Roosevelt Island. It felt like a big suburb in Queens, or like an offshoot of Jersey City's Newport residential area.

There's something about islands in the rivers surrounding this one big island of Manhattan--a sense of defying the impossibilities of their own existences, maybe. Roosevelt Island is so narrow--you can almost see the other side as you stand on the opposite shore. It feels like a little getaway, and at other times its history as a prison island seeps up from the soil (anarchist Emma Goldman was in prison here, and so was Billie Holiday--for prostitution!).

Before we'd even circumnavigated the entire island, we felt like we had to leave. It felt claustrophobic. Maybe the ghosts of prisoners were tapping on our shoulders, shuddering a collective, "Escape while you can!" That was a weird sensation.

The thing that struck me most was the rich juxtopositions present in the skyline: the stacks of plants visible from a grassy ballfield, for example. Industry looming in the distance, everpresent and unavoidable.



Even getting there was strange: there was a cloistered entrance that felt like a labyrinth you had to walk through to get to the bridge.


And once you arrive, you "land" in a parking garage that houses a dusty, defunct escalator.

OMG, I'm dyyyying....!

I have recently revisited one of the funniest blogs I've ever seen. I'm lucky I didn't pee my pants just now.

Visit The “Blog” of “Unnecessary” Quotation Marks

Governor's Island

As part of my project this summer, Operation Explore New York, I have been riding my bike a lot and going to cool places I've never been but always wanted to check out. One of them was Governor's Island.

My friend Erin and I had fun galavanting around this former Army barracks on an island in the East River between Manhattan and Brooklyn this weekend. This place called Castle Williams once imprisoned Confederate soldiers.



Also, there was miniature golf.

Weekly Photo Challenge: Ephemera

My entry for the first time in a while: a poster for the freak show at Coney Island--one of my favorite places on earth.

Mermaid Parade

This happened last month. This is Donald--he's one of those awesome radical fairies and he sure knows how to dress up in nautical dream fashion.

I am an overboard castaway or something. I'm caught in a net.

Squirt the Father: Fun for the Whole Family

When I was in Sioux City, we went to a cramped little junk shop a friend of my cousin's owns, and I got a kick out of this family game. I totally forgot the name, but what do you think Freud would say about it? (Question: did mom just take a handful of Valium before they played the game? She looks slightly stunned, like dad might beat her if she laughed too hard. Can't help it--this art is bursting with subtext begging to be deciphered!)

Love Conquers Bitches

In case you can't read it, someone scratched out the previous talk bubble that said "I am a Bitch" and added "Life is Love!" That made me happy. Love won today.

War Crimes

Ass Therapist

This guy actually taught me a few classes (no lie!)

Art

Olafur Elaisson show at MoMA

Got Bling?

U.S.A.

DO Make Me Over!

As ridiculous as it is, I am featured as a model/sample on a makeover tool at my job called the Total Beauty Makeover! You can even make over dogs and cats.

Send me some redonkulous makeovers of myself--or your own self. Prize will go to best one!

Been a Long Time

Again, life has gotten the better of me, and I have had trouble keeping up with the blog. I've been out of town and I have tons of good pictures to put up!

I went to Jazz Fest
I went to a family reunion in Sioux City, Iowa (Western Iowa! They didn't get flooded. Why is it that I just love places that get flooded horribly?)
I have been setting up some freelance work for myself
I'm beginning to reacquaint myself with the Jersey Shore as a singleton! The latest place I discovered: Snuffy's Clam Bar! It's also a grand place for wedding receptions!





They also have this crazy aquarium with a mysterious monkey dangling precariously above it--looks like he's about to "swim with the fishes."


And a very cozy bathroom!



My friend Christy, basking in the glory that is Snuffy's.


So, changing things, and that takes a ton of energy. Also some annoying health issues to deal with. Nothing serious, but definitely things that caused a bit of depression--which is enemy #1 on productivity! Another thing that affected my happiness: my horrible homesicknesss! This happens a lot.

Things I have been doing: more movie watching! All About Eve is my new favorite! If you've never seen it, I would describe it as Bitches Being Bitchy. Great dialogue!

Something you never see

The area where ads are normally posted painted over with black. It was like this for a few days. People don't like it, so they put Post-Its on them. But they're blank Post-its.

I like the way this looks. Like an 80s fantasia...