A Comrade Visits

sea urchin skeletons with sea background
Originally uploaded by Amelia PS.

Last night Jen came over to keep me company at the house. We heated up a pizza and got into a bottle of Cote du Rhone. Then I gave her a walking tour of Old Greenwich. We looked at all the houses, decided which ones were kept up well, which ones had nice yards and wondered who allowed the handful of McMansions to be built along Sound Beach Avenue. I loathe McMansions. If you live in one, please don't invite me over.

We were admiring the really old houses on Shoreland Drive when it started to rain, and we headed back home. We stopped at a Baskin Robbins to get ice cream. The rain stopped by then so we sat in Binney Park for a while and ate our dessert until it got really dark and I started to worry about the Boogie Man.

Tomorrow is likely a beach day with Old Skool Christine. Sunday I'm going to a BBQ at Jen's house, which she just bought and I haven't seen yet. Good times!

I['m a sucker for stories about neuroscience, so here are two:

Last night on the train home I read an article in Scientific Amercan Mind about burn out caused by work stress. Check it out.

This week's New Yorker has a great piece about a girl who had half her brain removed.

The Pseudo Commuter

This week's column in The Simon is about being a pseudo commuter into NYC. I hope you like it.

The House Sitter

A place that held so many bad memories ...
Originally uploaded by asmundur.

Here is why I'm a bad house sitter: Every little creak or bump at night sends me into a tizzy. Last night I was writing on the computer and blasting music and I started to hear things falling and crashing downtstairs. I picked up an empty beer bottle and went downstairs, ready for some action. It turned out it was just The Boys chasing each other around, as they often do since it seems these cats are nocturnal.

I have this ridiculous fear that some sociopath is hiding out in the basement, a la Buffalo Bill in Silence of the Lambs. The fact that the lights are out in the basement doesn't help, either. It's always just Maestro and Mozart, doing what cats do best.

Two strange items: I was reading this week's issue of Us Weekly yesterday, impressed mostly by the Tori Spelling piece. Who knew that her mother, Candy, has a room in their monstrous house dedicated to her extensive doll collection and two "gift wrapping" rooms?

More important were two small items on The Record page. I usually read this for dish on celebrity divorces, but two items under Farewell caught my eye. It seems that Patsy Ramsey, the mother of JonBenet, died of ovarian cancer on June 24. How sad.

Right underneath was another notice that E. Pierce Marshall, the man who battled Anna Nicole Smith over his father's estate, died of an "aggressive infection" on June 20. How strange, especially after Anna won the Supreme Court Case.

And who said that celebrity weekly offer no real news? I ask you.

Hi.

I know some of you are watching today and clicking around, so I just thought I'd say hello. Hope all is grand with you.

Watch Out For Non-Drivers

Clear the sidewalk!
Originally uploaded by beuk.

I thought I was going to have to drive to the station this morning when the rain was coming down in buckets. However, me driving is verboten, unless there is a feline accident, or we run out of wine, whichever comes first. Since it was raining and since I haven't driven a car in a year, and have barely driven in seven years, I wasn't that jazzed about having to start up again in heavy rains.

Luckily, the rain stopped and I walked the quick half mile to the station. As I walked, on the sidewalk, I noticed the cars speeding by...and this was in a really residential area. On the corner by the little park, a guy in a Toyota didn't see me and had to stop short. A few minutes later, while trying cross Sound Beach Avenue, I literally had to walk into the middle of the street to let a car know I wanted to cross. How come no one was expecting pedestrians? There are sidewalks and crosswalks. The enclave in tiny. Walking only seems natural.

I thought about all this while I was on the train and figured I was just being cranky. Perhaps my bitterness lay more in my inabilty to drive well than dodging motorists at 8:00 AM.

Then this morning I came across this article about the young bicyclist who was killed Monday while on Houston Street. He on his way to work and sadly became the third person since 2005 to be killed on Houston Street.

My point? If you drive, please expect that people might be walking or biking. I realize people are obsessed with driving, and this is an obsession I have never understood. (This obsession with driving has also led to the obesity problem in America, but I digress.)

The Commuter Class

Daily commuter 101
Originally uploaded by Shahin Edalati.

With Le Doug off fishing, I am Mistress of the House in Greenwich for two weeks. This involves hanging out with The Boys (Maestro and Mozart), keeping the kitchen clean and staying far away from Doug's car. I have been given strict instructions not to use it unless one of The Boys are bleeding from the eyes, etc. I have not, however, been told to stay out of the liquor or Doug's collection of Bordeaux. Muhahahaha!

(I kid, I kid...)

That said, if you are a friend and you live in the Fairfield County area. Call me, etc. as I will need to amuse myself. And I can't drive the car. I'll be taking the Metro North into the city every morning for work, but it will be nie to have evening plans. I know, I know...me as commuter is kind of funny, especially since I don't wear suits or read the Wall Street Journal. And what of my poor little apartment in Gramercy? It's so neglected, so empty. What am I paying $1,300 a month for?

Here are some links, since I haven't done links in a while:

I found this interview with my friend Jen Armstrong on Mediabistro. She and Heather run Sirens Mag.

The New York Times wrote a great piece about war widows who have a hard time collecting benefits after their husbands die in combat.

Fly-Fishing Is Hot

Le Doug is off to eastern Russia this week (way past Siberia, kids) to go fly fishing for king salmon and the like. I will be be watching The Boys, Maestro and Mozart, because putting them in a kennel would have been far too traumatizing for all parties involved. The Boys love the house, sleeping on the dining room table and chasing each other around the TV room. Who are we to stop them?

As Doug packed, I tried on his gear.

In a Vest With a Light on My Head. (The light is for when you have to get up in the middle of the night to pee behind a bush. No joke.)


Me in Waders. (They were really warm and water proof, with built-in booties, like footsie pajamas.)


These Are the Flies That Will Catch Amazing and Huge Fish.


None of It Seemed to Interest Mozart.

I Am Getting Better at Night Photogrpahy

I've been a busy little bee lately and happily still working on photo stuff. This week offered a few chances to work on night and dark-ish room shots.

Mike and Chopsticks


Candles for Ambiance


In other news, a class I taught yesterday was quite awesome, full of some very bright people. Defintely a great experience. I'm out in Greenwich today and will be for most of the next two weeks. Maestro and Mozart can't be left alone.

Tuesday.

Jellyfish
Originally uploaded by adetskas.

I'm a bad little blogger for not updating much this week, but for someone who technically does not have a job, I am strangely busy. Like, out and about busy, and I don't mean floating from party to party. Today seems like it will be a little slower. I finally got my hands on a decent box and plan to clean out my closet, toute suite. It's time to change the karma of my apartment, and that means tossing out old sweaters, shoes and prob even some books.

Other than that, I have little to offer today. No celeb sightings, no adventures, no photos of extremely fluffy cats. If you need me, I'll be lurking around Union Square, as always.

Operation Maestro and Mozart

Last year, Le Doug's cat of 14 years, Spitfire, died. A few months after I met Doug, my comrade Pookie the Fearless succumbed to pancreatic cancer. We were both bummed about losing our furry friends so we decided to try to find a new one. Doug loved Himalayans, Spitfire's breed, whereas I was partial to orange tabbies. We decided to try to find two Himalyan kittens.

Over the next few months I went online and found a variety of breeders, none of whom were in NYC. None we quite right, either. Some didn't have the right kind of Himalyan (we were looking for a seal or blue point) and we wanted two males. Some breeders or "catteries" were willing to ship us a kitten. (Uh, no thanks....that's just weird to get a kitten in the mail.) A few breeders that I spoke to in NYC wanted upwards of $1,000 for one cat. Geesh.

Finally one day I stopped in my local pet shop and asked if they knew any Himalyan breeders. The clerk didn't but suggested I check Petfinder.com. They had breeds of all kinds and, best of all, they were shelter cats and dogs who needed home.

I clicked around and eventually found a listing for a young Himalyan kitten named Maestro. I forwarded the link to Le Doug, who called me later that night and told me to plan on going to Montreal. He spoke with the contact in Montreal, a woman named Maggie, who said that Maestro also had a friend. After much back and forth over shots and boarding, Le Doug committed to the cats and we were on our way to Montreal, to meet "The Boys."

P.S. Montreal is an amazing city and I highly reccomend you take a long weekend up there. Old Montreal is particurally cool, for all you hep cats.

All photos from the kitty mission can be found here.

Stopping for Water and Air in the Middle of Nowhere, N.Y.


A Strange Fund Raiser That Involved 30 People on a Fake Tandem Bike Circling Montreal.


Fluffed and Ready to Take on Montreal


Two Attractive Francophiles.


The Town Hall at Night


A Cool Fountain Near Old Montreal


Everyone Watches World Cup at 9:00 AM. Go Argentina!


Doug Meets Maestro at the Shelter. (Maestro is six months old.)


I Meet Maestro. (Mozart did not like all the noise in the shelter and preferred to stay in his cage.)


Mozart, at Home and Free From His Cage and Carrier.


Taking a Late-Night Stretch


The Boys, Two Days Later and Very Happy in Their New Home.

Oh, Canada!

feeric montreal II
Originally uploaded by David -=ThePretender=-

.

I'm off to Montreal early in the morning to pic up the cats. Back on Friday!


In other news, while I was schlepping bags towards the subway en route to Grand Central, Jimmy Fallon passed me 20th Street. This is not the first time this has happened. In fact, this happens so often I think he is starting to recognize me, as if I may be one of his neighbors. (If living a block away on the other side of Gramercy Park is the making of being a "neighbor.") Maybe one day I should invite him over for tea and Scrabble?

I said nothing to Fallon, who is strangely hot, but a woman behind me actually stopped him and said, "Hey! You're Jimmy Fallon!" He just kept walking.

New York living rule #1: Never stop a celeb in the street and point out to them that they're famous. Behavior like that is so gauche that she doesn't even deserve to live in NYC.

Running and Upcoming Cats.

Flying Men Serie
Originally uploaded by Arnold Pouteau's.

Dorothy Parker once said, "I hate writing, I love having written." I would like to amend that with my own version. "I hate running, I love having ran." (Run?)

With the rain gone and weather cooking, this is perfect running season. When summer rolls around I start running regurally, thus beginning a weird, if not sick, whittling down of myself. I started when I was 20 and still do it, even though the herniated disc threatens to rear its head. However, running parks doesn't seem to be an issue. Treadmills bring the disc back, running in the East River Park seems to calm it down.

Tonight the park was full of runners and bare-chested guys playing soccer on the track. There was some running clinic also going on, with 30 and 40-something chasing around the loop over and over again.

The run wasn't easy, but after being away from it for a few weeks, I didn't expect it to be. Hopefully tomorrow I can get another one in. Le Doug and I are off to Montreal on Thursday morning to pick up kitties that we are adopting from a shelter. Yes, we had to go to Montreal. Don't you know there are no cats in New York City?

The kittens are named Maestro and Mozart, a Himalayan and a Persian, respectively. The lady at the shelter says that Meastro is quite the singer.

Pics will be posted as they arrive, naturally.

Gramercy = Crazytown

Posturing
Originally uploaded by The Pack.

When I have official business to take care of, I like to get it done at the library. That way I'm not distracted by the TV or things to be cleaned or the fashion mags on my couch.

This morning I got to the library right when it opened and got myself 45 minutes on a computer, which also gave me free printing. I was humming along for about half an hour, printing, e-mailing and being as productive as I've ever been, when I got up to get something out of the printer.

When I got back to my desk 5 seconds later, this middle-aged woman was sitting at my computer. Not only was ALL my stuff on the desk: purse, papers, etc. But she had closed me out of my session.

I looked at her in horror, since I just lost everything I was working on. I shouted at her, "What's wring with you? I'm still working! Are you crazy?"

Then the woman actually started to twitch, and I realized my choice of words may have been a poor one, given that Bellevue is five blocks away and patients are known to hang out in the library on 23rd Street.

I got on another machine and finished out my session. Still, you really have to be a few pickles short of a barrell to sit down at a computer where someone has piled up their bag and papers.

Moral of the story: I really need to move out of Gramercy. Are people more sane in Nolita? I mean, the people who actually live there, not the Bridge and Tunnel weekend crew

There Was a Moth. In My Ear.

Moth In Spider's Web
Originally uploaded by Nathan Moody.

Last night I was sitting in an internet cafe on Second Avenue and Seventh Street. I was about to leave when a moth started buzzing around me. I shooshed it away a few times, which seemed to make it very angry. The next thing I knew it zoomed right into my ear.

I've been around for almost 29 years now and I've never heard of this happening. But when a moth flies into your head, not only do you hear it buzzing around in there, but you feel its wings fluttering in your ear canal. It's absolutely freakish. I started twitching and freaking out, so much so that the guy at the computer next to me got up and left.

I walked home thinking that if I hopped in the shower I could drown the thing out with water. After ten minutes of constant water in my ear, the moth was still in there. I had no choice but to go to the emergency room.

It wasn't very busy at Beth Israel, so I was taken rght away. I was assigned to a doc who I'll call Dr. David who couldn't have been much older than me. He poured some chemical in my ear that would kill the moth and then he planned to flush it out with water. Let me tell you: There is nothing more uncomfortable than feeling a moth die in your ear. If I was freaking out, I can't imagine how that moth felt.

Dr. David came back into the room and flushed the bugger out. I was expecting some huge, Silence of the Lambs creature, but it was tiny! Like, pinky finger nail tiny. Dr. David also told me that he's taken cockroaches out of people's ear before. So maybe my moth wasn't so bad.

Here's the rub: Dr. David told me that if I hadn't come in to have the moth removed, it would likely have died in my ear and maybe gotten infected. Crazy.

Thanks, Dr. David! And everyone at Beth Israel for taking that moth out of my head.

New York Warms Up

Una lunga pausa
Originally uploaded by *Ivan*.

The rain finally stopped around here, which is great. I was finally able to go for a run, which is likely the first of many this summer, given all the free time I have.

I am currently in the process of making my apartment more allergy-friendly. This means literally cleaning every flat surface, including the counter, floors, bookshelves, etc. It sounds really OCD, but my sinuses are much happier.

Required reading:
Please get the new issue of Elle magazine. In addition to a great piece about Stephanie Klein (whose blog I've really gotten into) there's also a great piece about John Mayer. Le sigh....

Also, this week's New York Times magazine has a number of great pieces about debt. One can never know too much about such things.

By the way, remember that contact lens that mysterious disappeared from my eye last Thursday? Even after going to the eye doc and being examined by her, she couldn't find it and deduced it just popped out.

Imagine my surprise, then, when I was roused from sleep at 4:00 AM on Saturday with a weird sensation in my left eye, as if something was stuck in the left corner. I looked in the bathroom mirror and sure enough, that lens was jammed in the corner. I pulled it out in utter disgust and went back to bed. It seems it literally rolled behind my eyeball and sat there for two days.

Mystery solved. Move over, Encyclopedia Brown.

The Monkeyshine 9 Plays in the East Village

The crew headed down to the East Village last night to check out the bluegrass stylings of The Monkeyshine 9.

My brother Rob.


His Friend, V. (No, he doesn't have a first name. Just a letter.)


If Erin Had an Album, This Would be the Cover


My Brother Andrew Makes Funnies


Post-Show We Went to A German Bar on Avenue C, Which Inevitably Led to...Headlocks!


...And Vamping


No Photographs, Please

Weird Allergy Alert?

Am I the only one having this problem?

All this week I've had a ahrd time putting my contacts in. They've made my eyes red and irritated.

Yesterday I could barely put them in. I finally did and went out in the afternoon, only to feel them move around. Last night I went to take them out, and only one was in there, in the right eye.

I figured it had slipped behind my eye and so I went to sleep, assuming it would slide back over the course of the night. This AM, my eye was all red and mucus-y, like when one has pink eye.

I hot-footed over to the eye doc, thinking the contact was still behind my eye. She poked and pordded a bit, pulled out a glob of eye gook, and that was it. No contact lens. Anywhere. Where did it go?

My eyes are still red and irritated and I don't dare put my contacts on. Is the pollen count back up like it was at the end of May?

Any input would be helpful.

BBQ Photos

Doug got a BBQ for his yard and deck, here are the highlights.

Who Needs One of Those Gas-Fueled Numbers When Real Men Can Handle Charcoal?


Doug Discovers Fire


All BBQs Need Beer


Nazdrovia!

A Good, Hard Sleep

After sushi at Lan last night (I thought I was losing my mind when I couldn't find it, and I know Third Avenue like the back of my hand.) I had some coffee and went back to my bunker where I sat down for the writing session I wanted so badly. I wrote a bit but I also looked over some work I did months ago. Normally at these sorts of things I cringe, but I was shocked...I actually thought it was good. Not godo because I did and I wanted to stroke my own ego, but good because it was.

I was pleased. Progress is such a good feeling.

Around 3:00 AM I fell asleep with the lights and didn't get up until 11:00 this morning because the phone would just not stop ringing, as has been the case for the last few days. Everyone wants a piece of La Pauline...

I'm off to the races now.

Is This Thing On?

Blogger has been muy buggy today. I had this brilliant post earlier that got lost in the ether. Oh well...

I've been insanely busy lately, rocking the power suit and being my ever-charming self. Hopefully tonight I can get some serious writing done, as has been my plan since last week. Can't a girl just get a little time alone?

Lesson learned this week: If one uses a cell phone in a library, it is very likely they will get chewed out by a freakishly tall 90-year-old man. Perhaps even swatted with an old newspaper.

I'm just saying.

The Break-Up

the break-up
Originally uploaded by h2okatcher.

I gave in to my inner movie dork (as I often do) and went to see The Break Up yesterday afternoon with Le Doug. It was actually really funny. Vince Vaughn plays a great, lazy 30-something guy and Anniston, well, she was a bit too thin and too tan for someone who was supposed to live in Chicago.

But it's funny. It was also nice to see Joey Lauren Adams play a married mother as opposed to, you know, Alyssa Jones from Chasing Amy.

And that will be the last Kevin Smith reference on this blog for a while.

I'm out in CT, looking for fun and feeling groovy. Back in NYC on Monday, but very busy.

Hello Everyone...

Due to recent circumstances I realize this blog may be of new interest to some of you. But if I know and you would like details, just e-mail me. No lurking, please.

I will likely have more photos up in a few days. I've been strangely busy with errands these past two days.

The Swan Song

No, no nothing like that. Just today's column in The Simon.

Sun + Wine = Good Times

My New Lens
Originally uploaded by konaboy.

The new column for The Simon will be a little delayed this morning because last night Hillary and went out for a dinner down on the LES. We went to Le Pere Pinard which seems to be the latest Yuppie watering hole south of Houston.

It was a forgettable meal. The spicy shrimp salad was too spicy and, I never thought I would ever say this, the Bordeaux was sour. Sour! I never met a Bordeaux I didn't like, but last night I finally did. I scoff at Le Pere Pinard.

Hillary and I boozed a little more, hitting Pianos and Max Fish. All good times. Then I walked home, stopped at the Virgin Mega Store and bought myself a little Mister Softee, even though I am lactose intolerant. Strangely, it didn't make me ill.

By the way, the new Raconteurs album is awesome. Please get it. I also got En Vogue's greatest hits, because 1990 was a great year.

Quelle belle jour, mes amis! I hope you all get out to enjoy the sunshine.