Blogorrhea Junior

Live Fast . . .

Yeah, that's me, living that fast life. I had company two weekends in a row! Whoa! Doesn't take much to make me crispy 'round the edges anymore, sadly.

My buddy Livy was in from Seattle this last weekend, having missed the housewarming. Just as well, since Jen and Rich were staying here then and I didn't have room for anybody else. It's the first I've seen Livy in—wow, must be almost ten years? The last time, she came out with her oldest son Jason, who was too tall to sleep in my little teeny office, poor kid. Since then, she's lost weight and let her hair grow into dreads, which makes her look like Toni Morrison, who is NOT her favorite writer.

She came in Thursday morning, met me at work, hung out for a bit while I was in the longest meeting of my life, then I took off work early and we schlepped back to the Bronx and ran some errands and talked and talked and talked and talked, which is what Livy and I have always done. It was good to know we could pick up that conversation right where we'd left off: New books, new music (that was mostly her contribution since I've been out of the music loop), new movies, science fiction, astronomy, physics, science in general, theology, history, politics, moms, family weirdness, etc. Yak yak yak. It was great.

Friday we ran around downtown, looking for souvenirs for her to take back to Seattle. We got off at Chinatown, walked around there and parts of Soho and Noho and the west village, had Malaysian food (more peanut pancakes! Though not as good as Penang's), stopped at O'Nieal's to look at the ceiling and say hello to my favorite bartender, Stewart, who's a doll, took pictures, bought stuff, including a piece of street art from a guy I've seen before. The first time we walked by, his stuff was just sitting there without him but he says he's never had anybody steal it. I bought a piece called "Witness in the Dark" which seems way too, uh, portentous? Oracular? Coincidental? I dunno. And he took our picture: There we are on Spring Street. That's a better picture than I took of Livy all weekend.

After the Malaysian food, we wandered up to Cornelia Street Cafe and heard the Asymmetry Quartet (Lucian Ban, piano; Jorge Sylvester, alto saxophone; Brad Jones, bass; Derrek Phillips, drums). I don't think Livy was digging it, since she doesn't much like improv, but I had a good time. By the time we got home and got to bed, it was about 2:30—a respectable hour for a couple of nightowls.

Saturday we walked across Central Park from Lexington Ave. to the American Museum of Natural History and tooled around the exhibits at the Rose Center for Earth and Space, which were groovy. By then, we were both pooped. We came home and I made soup, we yakked some more and Sunday, I sent Livy off to the Folk Museum by herself while I crashed and burned. She left town on a 6AM flight, which meant she had to slip out the back, Jack, at 3AM. Needless to say, we said our goodbyes before going to bed. It was great to see her. Hope she comes around again next year. Since she took an unexpired Metrocard with her, I'm hoping that's a good sign.

The Party's Over . . .

The housewarming, that is. It was really more of an open house, but just enough people showed up and hung out. Unfortunately, I'd been so paranoid about how many people were going to come that I had way more food and beer than necessary and have huge amounts of leftovers now. Better too much than too little, I guess. At least I won't have to cook for a while. If you missed it, here's what you missed. It was a kind of Six Degrees party in some ways.

All the out-of-towners showed up early: Missy and Lou arrived first, before I'd even gotten into my party clothes, Missy bearing baked goods as usual: a fab chocolate bundt cake in one of those cathedral pans from Williams Sonoma; swirled chocolate chip cookies, and brownies. Yum! Missy is a kick-butt baker, better than I'll ever be and about neck and neck with S'Mel, which is saying something. Missy and I discovered a while back that we had been at Chatham College at about the same time; when I was a student, her step-mom was teaching there, and she lived on the little street behind the campus. We undoubtedly ran into each other at some point.

Jen and Rich showed up on the heels of Marcia and Val, then Victoria, whom I hadn't seen in about four years arrived, and Glo and Kath. Roz and Eva somehow missed each other at their rendezvous but finally made it and got to meet Victoria, who's lived on the same street at opposite ends of the same block for probably 20 years, at least. Roz, bless her heart, brought a ton of taramosalata, which we'll have to recycle for the writing group. Jen DeMerrit arrived about eight with Yvonne right behind her, when everyone but Rich and Jen were gone. Yvonne drove in from Brooklyn, flew in, took a look around and flew out, but we had a fun chat with the two Jennifers & Rich. The two Jennifers discovered that we shared time in the trenches at Tori Rowan's TK writing group.

Marcia and Lou immediately launched into cigar and scotch talk, as I suspected they would. There was much gratifying oohing and ahing, which makes all the backaches worth it. The folks who had seen it on moving day, when there was a huge pile of nasty carpet in one corner and nothing but primer on the walls and boxes everywhere, were duly amazed at the transformation. So am I. The only criticism was the fan pull in the kitchen. Lou kept getting smacked in the head by it and and Rich actually backed me into the kitchen underneath it and said, "Oh, I see why you didn't notice." I'm the only one who doesn't have to dodge it. Revenge of the short people.

Peri called to cancel because Adam had 102 degree fever. Eva and Peri know each other independently of me because they went to cabaret camp together and were planning a show at one point. Laurie was stuck at school dealing with a flood at the building (the joys of being second in command). I wonder if she'd remember Missy and her step-mother, since we went to school together but Laurie was a year behind me? Val and Missy bonded over childhoods in Pennsylvania. Dr. Em apparently became "embroiled" in something or other, she said, and missed the chance to discover who she might have known in a previous life. At some point in the evening, about when I was cleaning up with Rich and Jen's help, Highfield called from somewhere in the boonies of Wisconsin, probably, because his cell was so garbled the only way I knew it was him was the caller ID. My cousin DeeDee also called in the middle of it everything.

And I got beautiful and yummy prezzies! Victoria brought me a beautiful glass mosaic votive holder in blue. Val bought me two beautiful rocks glasses. Marcia bought me a bottle of the amazing tequila she found in Santa Fe. And Roz brought a great bottle of Kentucky Bourbon (which I suspect I'll feed to Eva). Someone, I suspect it was Yvonne, left me a bottle of overproof Jamaican rum. Hmm, what was my first clue it was Yvonne? That she's Jamaican, or that the card on it said "Jude" (her boyfriend's name)? Not that I mind recycled gifts.

And, wow, do I need a bigger fridge, or what? It's all of 4'9" high, shorter than I am. If it weren't for a deep sink and a giant red washtub and six bags of ice, I'd have been serving warm beer and room-temp soda. That pink sign on the freezer door says:

A fun time was had by all, I think. I'm looking forward to much smaller dinner parties and cocktail hours though.  Hopefully, there will be less prep and hangover involved, in case you wondered what the pulsing red rays on my icon meant.

Speak Up!

In a dispatch from the Grey Lady, Maureen Dowd, lone woman columnist for the NYTimes Op-Ed Department, has loosed a salvo for women's voices. It's about time somebody aired this particular piece of dirty laundry. Aside from Molly Ivins, I can't think of another woman columnist I read regularly, let alone pay much attention to (which totally disqualifies Ann Coulter). So I wrote her a note of encouragement:

Go, Maureen!

Thanks for giving voice to a frustration I've had with the Times, especially, but other news media as well, for quite some time. The lack of women's voices as either reviewers or subjects is one of the reasons I stopped reading the Book Review years ago, and it's an even more frustrating lack in the Op-Ed department. You're absolutely right that women are still seen as the castrating bitch when we dare to criticize male power, whether at home or in the public sphere. And while there's something to the idea that women want to be liked more than men do, this need probably springs out of the way our opinions are reacted to, i.e., we're labeled harpies, as you point out. If men were castigated in the same way for being shrill and nasty (traits all humans share--just look at Rush Limbaugh), they might be a little more careful about expressing their opinions too. Women are punished disproportionately for something that's applauded in men. It's a nasty feedback loop.

The trouble is also that women are castigated for just having an opinion and daring to express it if it's contradictory. As a result, we're also taken less seriously, and this is a big factor in the silencing of women. One gets tired of speaking into a vacuum, being told we're just PMSing or just being a bitch, or literally or metaphorically being patted on the head for attempting to "run with the big dogs." Unfortunately, it seems the only way to be taken seriously is to hold your head up while you're wearing them down. After all, as Eleanor Roosevelt said, "No one can make you feel inferior without your consent."

So I applaud you for speaking out and encouraging other opinionated women to do so as well. And while I'm neither a pundit nor a journalist, I am a woman blogger. The Perfidy Report is where I write about the current regime's shenanigans, but this link to an entry in my other blog might interest you, too.

Let 'em have it, girlfriend.

On my way up to a seminar at the Roosevelt Hotel, I ran into this  little art drama on the sidewalk. It's not as much fun as sitting in a restaurant and watching a giant lounging woman drive by on the back of a flatbed, with two construction workers in hardhats sitting on her, but it's pretty good. It hove into view one claw at a time as I was heading toward Grand Central. I think the sculptor was discussing with the movers how to brace it or get it off the truck or something along those lines. And I have no idea what the sculpture's all about. It's two too many horses to be Saint George or Lord of the Rings or The Hobbit, so who knows? More pics of this and Grand Central Terminal at Flee's New York.

You Don't See This Every Day

On my way up to a seminar at the Roosevelt Hotel, I ran into this  little art drama on the sidewalk. It's not as much fun as sitting in a restaurant and watching a giant lounging woman drive by on the back of a flatbed, with two construction workers in hardhats sitting on her, but it's pretty good. It hove into view one claw at a time as I was heading toward Grand Central. I think the sculptor was discussing with the movers how to brace it or get it off the truck or something along those lines. And I have no idea what the sculpture's all about. It's two too many horses to be Saint George or Lord of the Rings or The Hobbit, so who knows? More pics of this and Grand Central Terminal at Flee's New York.