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April 29, 2007
Sunday Morning
I can't recall the last time I voluntarily got up before 9am on a Sunday. The world is my oyster! Though I do enjoy catching up on my sleep and waking up in the afternoon on the weekends, it can be rather depressing to only have a few hours of daylight. Now I have the whole day ahead of me. Ahhhh...
Friday night met up with an old friend I hadn't seen in nearly a decade. Tommy from Texas. Tommy and I met in a summer film program for promising (uh) high schoolers at Northwestern. Tommy was more or less the same as I remembered him, except he had acquired a dozen tattoos and a career as a drummer in a punk band. His band the Krum Bums are in the midst of a world tour right now and they were making a one-night stop in New York, at this funky Polish nightclub in Greenpoint. I don't really listen to that flavor of punk music anymore but I got to say they put on one hell of a show. The members of the band are mostly Mexican and at one point the lead singer did a shout out to the crowd, "Any dirty Mexicans in the house?" which was met with dead silence. Pretty funny. It was also an all-ages show and Rafe and I were probably the oldest people in the crowd. When I went to the bathroom, the stalls were packed with girls sneaking smokes and gossiping and redoing their eyeliner. Outside there was moshing. Real live moshing. The last time I moshed myself was probably twelve years ago. I lost a shoe and got a black eye. I was lucky I didn't get seriously injured. It's dangerous! It's surprising to me that there's still a punk scene like that, the same kind that's been around for decades. The show was a blast though and the music was so loud and base-heavy I felt as though I was about to go into cardiac arrest.
Later we met up in the East Village with Tommy and had shots of Jameson and many rounds of beer and talked about Texas. Just a fun night. I woke up Saturday thinking I had something important to do but I couldn't remember what. I couldn't even think straight. All I had were visions of mohawks dancing in my head. What was it I was I supposed to do?
Fuck. Taxes! I nearly forgot I had a appointment with Mr. Lupo. I rushed down to Court Street- his office is right next to Raccuglia's Funeral Home. Old school. He was waiting for me out front, arms crossed across his belly. "You Goldberg?" "Yes," I huffed, out of breath, apologizing for being late. "Step inside my office," he grumbled. Inside his office he had, I kid you not, a framed poster of THE GODFATHER. He was quick and surprisingly friendly and the whole process was relatively painless. Sure I was a bit overdue thanks to the assholes at H&R Block (never go there!) but it's ok, I'm all good now. Lupo did me right.
With that weight lifted off my shoulders, and it being Spring and all, I strolled around the hood, got an iced coffee down at D'Amicos, and gawked at the increasing number of fancy new boutiques and young-looking couples with strollers and dogs. We've reached maximum capacity here. The neighborhood doesn't need any more of anything (including babies and pugs). Let's just chill out for a bit. Later I met up with Rafe and we walked down to the oddly desolate Macy's in downtown Brooklyn. That place is only good for a pants crisis, as in "I have no pants to wear! I need pants!" Usually I'm the one with the crisis but this time it was Rafe. He had literally bore holes into the seats of all his work pants (don't ask me how). I kind of like Macy's though, there's something reassuring about it. Growing up my dad used to love taking us to there. He still does. "They have such good sales!" I don't think he's realized that they're always having a sale. I haven't ever gone home to visit without at least one pilgrimage to the store [cue Tradition song from Fiddler on the Roof]
Later, saddled with shopping bags full of new pants, we went out for an early dinner at Hibino, this new Japanese restaurant on a quiet stretch of Henry Street. I'd been dying to go there since it first opened, but everytime we tried to go before it had always been too full. Even when we got there yesterday at opening time, 5:30, there was a crowd of people drooling like zombies waiting to be let in. But it was worth the wait. Their specialty is Kyoto-style home cooking and Obanzai (Japanese tapas) and man do I love me some tapas. But that wasn't the only thing- we sampled an array of tasty morsels. Mmmelt in your mouth sushi. The freshest creamiest homemade tofu (and normally I don't even like tofu). Braised short rib so tender like the best Jewish brisket. One of the best restaurants I've been to in a long while. Clean thoughtful design, attentive smiley service, artful presentation, totally unpretentious and really reasonable prices.
Go. Go now. Best bet is to go at 5:30 right when they open. Bring your own sake.
After, we came home and, drugged by the deliciousness of the evening, promptly fell asleep. Just a little catnappppp.....
I woke up at 11:30 disoriented and crabby and went right back to bed. But now I'm up! Up and awake but still kind of crabby.
Posted by debbie at 9:41 AM | Comments (0)
April 23, 2007
Just Call Me Savvy. Tech Savvy.
I'm a dedicated Hotmail user. I've been using my Hotmail account since I was a virgin. A long time. But lately I've been using Gmail so Rafe and I can chat online while he's away in Memphis for the 22nd Annual Tennessee Ribs Eating Contest. I mean...while he's away on "business." Anyhow, I forgot that I had signed up for multiple accounts back when Gmail was new. Remember how you had to be "invited"? I must have thought all the good handles would be taken if I didn't act fast so I signed up for as many handles as I could. Just in case. For the future.
I had already missed the boat on debbiegoldberg@gmail.com (still cursing myself over that one) but I was victorious in claiming icecreamandhotdogs@gmail.com. Why? I do not know the answer. I also got japaneseconversations@gmail.com. That I remember. Vince and I had hatched together a plan when we were both woefully unemployed. We were going to set up a little business tutoring newly arrived Japanese kids who were moving to the East Village and transforming it into a Little Hipster Tokyo. We would work with them on their English (whatever that meant, we had no ESL training), take them around New York to museums, out shopping, barhopping, whatever they wanted to do. It was to be a cultural escort service. Yeah, whatever, so the idea never really got off the ground. But look where I am now? With the Japanese. It was meant to be.
Also, how could I forget? I finally, praise the lord, got a NEW computer at work. This, after two years using the original Macintosh. I've moved on up.
My new computer is a fresh-from-the-factory Mac. It purrs and glows in all the right ways. It knows me. It can predict what I want before even I know what I want. And today I discovered PhotoBooth, the little widget that uses the computer's built-in camera. See how savvy I am? I know all the lingo. Widget. Actually, I could be wrong. Is it a widget or an application? Both? I have no idea. Wasn't Widget a pansy cartoon character from the early 90s?
According to Wikipedia, yes it/he was. Widget "was a 4ft tall, purple alien from the Horsehead Nebula named Widget who could shape shift." Hmmm...
But the PhotoBooth widget is completely different. Here's my first PhotoBooth self-portrait. Exciting!
But wait. Then I discovered the very special special effects:
Hello from the future.
Sorry. I will try and capture other things in the office besides my face, such as New Girl. I'm not sure what she does exactly. Hell I don't even know her name.* What I do know is that she's a very close talker and that she's taken a real liking, if you know what I'm sayin, to those giant ergonomic/exercise balls that everyone else has long abandoned.
After Kiko slipped off one and injured her tailbone a few months ago, the boss figured the spinal health of his employees wasn't worth the inevitable lawsuit- so the next day we came into the office and saw that the balls were all gone. Gone! During the night he had rolled all the balls into the conference room and brought back the real chairs. The ones with legs. I was disappointed. I was half-hoping to have a little slipping "accident" of my own and get a fat workers comp check. So much for that dream.
Anyhow, New Girl discovered the stash of balls, inflated one with her own breath (just kidding, she used a pump) and now she's bouncing away on it all day long like she's in a never-ending aerobics class. And when she wants to talk to me, she stands up, takes the ball with her, moves it right next to my chair, sits on the ball, proceeds to bounce up and down, and then talk at the same time, with absolutely no self-awareness. She might as well be hopping on a pogo stick. OR A BIG BOUNCING BALL.
Here I am, busting my nuts producing serious journalistic reportage and New Girl is pretending to be the star of her very own fitness video. How the hell am I supposed to prep my interview questions for Buddy** when my co-workers are being so damn unprofessional?
*An explanation: I know, I'm socially inept and lazy but no one has told me and it's been a week and now I feel stupid asking- a reasonable excuse, no? Also, when someone is talking to me and referencing someone else, they don't refer to the person by name, only "him over there" or "her"+ pointing gesture. When they talk to each other they use their last names with "san" at the end (like Goldberg-san, for example) but since I'm not expected to use "san" with everyone, it gets confusing. I don't think anyone here knows everyone's first names anyway. I'm not the only one! There, I feel better.
**Yes, Buddy is the donkey. But as I said, we take what we do very seriously here- we aim to get all sides of a story.
Posted by debbie at 11:44 AM | Comments (2)
The Big To-Do
Hey there. So it's been a while. I haven't been a good sharer lately, I know. I have all these old entries I haven't even had time to post. But as I go through my to-do list and cross off various items, I realize how much free time I have! I only have seven things left on my list:
-Contemplate/worry about the previous 63 items on this list
-Plant an herb garden
-Find out where that peculiar dead mouse smell is coming from
-Train for/compete in a half-marathon
-Learn how to make a perfect mole (sauce)
-Start a dream journal
-Decide where to live next year
Well we have until May 1st for that last item, a whole 8 days away, so what's there to fret about?
In the meantime, Sludgie, the baby whale (yes, whale) that somehow found its way into the Gowanus (and into my heart), has died. I'm not one for emoticons (even that word makes me slightly uncomfortable to be honest), but if ever there was an appropriate time for it, here it is:
:(
Oh Sludgie.
In other Brooklyn-related news, taco season is nearly here! And the sun is out today! I haven't seen the sun since 2006. I naively assumed Texas would be one big sunshiney affair- and instead it was hailing and gusty the whole time. But tacos will make everything right again.
Posted by debbie at 11:25 AM | Comments (2)